GUNDAM SEED DESTINY

GUNDAM SEED DESTINY

The Followup to the Gundam SEED series, Destiny follows the story of a young ZAFT pilot called Shinn Asuka, and is set 2 years after SEED. 

OVERVIEW - Basically the same sort of set up as SEED, a "real robot" giant mecha anime set in a world divided by the divisions between natural born and the genetically enhanced co-ordinators. Taking place two years after the previous series, it follows a ZAFT crew onboard a new ship, the Minerva, who's path starts out very similiarly to the Archangel's in the previous series. we're given introductions to the new leaders of this world, the rookie pilots of the Minerva and a glimpse at what the heroes of the last series are now up to. 

REVIEW - Again, a large cast, complex inter-relations between them and a long story.. trying to review SEED was very hard to do as it was hard to keep information regarding the plot together while talking about characters, animation and so on.. as such this time i'll be breaking it up into parts, starting with the character reveiews.

Kira Yamato

Kira, and his partner Lacus, spends the start of the series in the orphanage in Orb where the two have been since the end of the last war. The pair of them appear to be constantly stoned while in each other's presence, even more so at the start. After the Junius 7 issue, and the destruction of the wooden shack they were living in with the orphans, they move into what appears to be a massive mansion.. why they were livng in a wooden shack before I have NO idea.. eventually Lacus comes under attack, revealing the mansion to have a massive underground military complex built into the hill behind it, in which the restored Freedom mobile suit has been sitting. The scene in which the keys to this area are coaxed from Lacus seem more like trying to get someone to allow an addict to indulge in their habit again more than anything else, but Kira eventually launches (by blowing up part of the hill above the mansion being attacked by 5-6 mobile suits) and flitting about randomly before disabling all the attackers, who promptly commit mass suicide. 

In the aftermath of this, it is revealed that Cagalli will be marrying someone she was in an arrangement with because she's been pressured by that guy and his father into it, along with becoming allies with the Atlantic Alliance who've started a new war against the PLANTs, because of this the Archangel is launched, from a secret underground dock of course, and Kira kidnaps Cagalli right from the wedding, conveniently being had outside, before vanishing. The story moves on for a bit with no mention of Kira, before they suddenly hear that Orb forces are being forced to attack the Minerva. Kira then shows up in the Freedom and causes chaos, damaging the Minerva and causing "sacrificial character introduced the previous episode only" Heine Westenfluss to be killed, provoking a serious over-reaction by Athrun. Athrun takes temporary leave from the Minerva to find and speak to Kira and Cagalli, where Kira spouts some semi-philosophical crap at him, something of a trait he and Lacus share for most of the series, before Athrun leaves again. Kira again intervenes in the battle between Orb forces (held almost at gunpoint by the Atlantic Alliance) and the Minerva, disabling Athrun's mecha completely and damaging the Impulse, causing a hissy-fit in Shinn. 

Kira again fades from the story at this point, with nothing major happening outside of Lacus going to space till the DESTROY appears, a giant, giant mecha that wipes out three cities in quick order, Kira battles the DESTROY unit, till the Minvera and Shinn appear, Shinn having another hissy fit till he realises Stella is the pilot of the DESTROY. Kira saves Shinn's life by stopping the DESTROY which also causes the pilot to die from internal explosions, prompting Shinn to have a hissy fit. Shortly after the Minerva is sent to battle the Archangel, which ZAFT have declared an enemy ship, and Shinn takes advantage of the fact that Kira will not intentionally kill another pilot to destroy the Freedom, prompting hysterical laughter from Shinn. 

Kira is revealed to be alive, on board the seemingly destroyed Archangel and the ship returns to Orb. He returns to space when Lacus is in danger on board Cagalli's mech (with insanely over-sized boosters attached), and is given the Strike Freedom (still refered to as just the Freedom afterwards...) which is basically an upgraded Freedom with all the new toys and gadgets the newer mecha have in the series. Kira shows his skills by disabling 25 enemy units in less than 2 minutes with this new unit, before returning to the Eternal and Lacus, cue stoned behaviour and semi-philosophical talking. 

From this point on, Kira basically dominates any battlefield he joins, the combination of his incredible skills and the immensly powerful Strike Freedom proves too much for any other pilot to deal with, with only Shinn and Rey coming close to slowing him down. Outside of battle his behaviour could be called almost Messianic, always calm, always having a deep philosphical view. In many ways his character can be considered to have gone full circle by this point, returning to being someone who is happy and content with his life and his place in the world, just not the world at that point. 

While Destiny is meant to be the Minerva and Shinn, the growth of the characters from SEED is pretty massive and i personally wish they'd told the story from their point of view again, with Shinn as an aside to that. 

Athrun Zala

Athrun appears at the start as Alex Dino, the poorly disguised bodyguard of Cagalli, now the head of the Orb nation, both of whom are present at the theft of the new suits right at the start. Due to the chaos this causes, and the launch of the Minerva that they went to for medical treatment, both Cagalli and Athrun are present when the orbit of Junius 7 is found to have been changed, Athrun goes out in a stock mobile suit to help break up the 8km object before it can impact the Earth and becomes involved in the battle against terrorists dropping the former colony in Athrun's dead zealot father's name. When the Minerva decides to try and blow the thing up while entering the atmosphere, both Shinn and Athrun's suits also begin burning up from atmospheric friction, Shinn's more advanced suit faring better than the stock suit Athrun is in, and both are recovered by the Minerva, who then docks at Orb for repairs. 

Athrun's distaste for the social situation he finds himself in is clearly shown at this point. While being "in love" with Cagalli, and she with him, the political union of what appears to be the two strongest families in Orb via the "arranged as children" marriage of Cagalli to the Seiran family Heir, Yuna Roma Seiran clearly takes priority, as shown by Yuna's dismissive attitude towards Athrun and his overly theatric response to Cagalli's safety. Feeling useless and probably pissed at Yuna's behaviour Athrun decides to go speak with the chairman of the PLANTs, effectively proposing to Cagalli just before he does. As such Athrun is in the PLANTs when the war breaks out and is smooth-talked into re-inlisting in the ZAFT military by the chairman and the fake-lacus, Meer. He then is sent to Earth to join the crew of the Minerva. 

Both Athrun and the captain of the Minerva are made members of something called FAITH, while never really explained, FAITH appears to be higher ranking inside the ZAFT military, basically allowing them to act as they please in how they follow orders. As such he is given field command of the mobile suit pilots while they are in combat, which causes Shinn to have a hissy fit, and another pilot on the team, Lunamaria, to flirt with him endlessly (even though she is well aware of his relationship with Cagalli). Athrun follows his orders like a good soldierduring this time, tries to help Shinn stop being such a dick to everyone and fends off affectionate advances from both Luna and fake-lacus. On a few occasions he speaks directly with the chairman, who spends the early part of the series waxing poetical about the pain of war, its causes and its effects and how he wishes it'd all just end, sucking Athrun in somewhat. After the first intervention of the Archangel in a battle between Orb forces and the Minerva, Athrun heads out alone to find them and speak to them. Arranging a meeting via an old crewmember he "somehow" runs into (little deus ex machina-ish for my taste) he speaks with Cagalli and Kira, basically telling them to grow up, behave and leave the fighting to him. He defends the PLANTs when Kira speculates that the chairman may be behind the assination attempt on Lacus, and dodges the question about who the fake-lacus is. Unknown to any of them, Lunamaria is pulling a stalker on him and is recording their coversation and taking pics. 

He continues to clash with Shinn over Shinn's awful attitude to everything, gets pissed when Heine gets killed for trying to attack Kira and after being beaten by Kira, spends a great deal of time moping about getting into rows with Shinn. He complains aggresively when the Archangel is declared an enemy, and when Shinn returns all giddy with joy at having defeated the Freedom and presumably killed Kira, Athrun proceeds to do what I'd been wishing someone would do the entire series and clock's Shinn one.. sadly it just makes Shinn more arrogant and pissy. During the Minerva's time in dock, as the chairman arrives with two new units meant for Athrun and Shinn, fake-lacus overhears Rey and the chairman discussing Athrun, while looking at the stalker-pics Luna took. The chairman then basically suggests its time to get rid of Athrun as he's not falling in line, prompting fake-lacus to warn Athrun. Athrun proceeds to try and escape, first trying to convince fake-lacus to leave too, but when she has a phsycological break in front of him, declaring herself the real lacus, he leaves her. Eventually he is aided by the CIC officer from the Minerva, Meyrin, who happens to be Luna's little sister and also has a crush on Athrun and the two escape on board a stock mecha. Athrun is then chased down by Shinn and Rey in the new units, where Rey mind-fucks Shinn into attacking and seemingly killing Athrun and Meyrin. 

Recovered but severly injured, Athrun wakes up on the Archangel, finding out Kira is alive and the ship is intact. He spends the next several episodes having a crisis of personality and weepy moments with Cagalli before realising the chairman was a douche all along and joining back up with the Archangel crew. His appearance in the new Infinate Justice (refered to again as just the Justice afterwards) during the invasion of Orb by ZAFT causes Shinn to have a confused hissy fit. In the end it is Athrun who slaps Shinn down for good and sinks the Minerva, and while Cagalli has taken off his engagment ring, he doesnt mind because he feels they're on the same path and it'll happen for real in time. 

Lacus Clyne

Lacus is less pivotal in this series herself, but her personna is widely used, mostly by the fake-lacus and the chairman. She starts off being love-stoned with Kira in orb, targetted for assination by the PLANTs and eventually one-up's the fake-lacus by pretending to be her, stealing a shuttle and returning to space and the Eternal. Like Kira she seems to spend most of her screen time spouting semi-philosophical ponderings on what is going on behind the scenes, and her team are the ones who really crack what the chairman is ultimately aiming for. 

Seemingly unmoved by the existance of fake-lacus, one of the better moments of the series comes towards the end where fake-lacus interupted a broadcast by Cagalli to spout propaganda about how awesome the chairman is, which is then interupted by Lacus herself, causing fake-lacus to panic and fluster in front of the cameras. Lacus is, once again, the almost-mystical source of revelation for most of the original series characters with her sometimes bizarre conversations about "who you really are" and "choices" and so on. 

Thankfully Lacus herself does NOT sing once in this series, and the random spoutings from her single Haro are also less common. 

Cagalli Yula Athha

Cagalli has a lot more screentime in Destiny, but sadly it does little to expand on her "Tsundere" character. Torn between her want to be with Athrun and her political commitments to her contry and some jackass she is brow-beaten into being a "good little girl" by Yuna, signing Orb over to the Atlantic Alliance and almost getting married to Yuna. she spends her next few appearances crying a lot over Orb's military being used to attack the Minerva and being called "a fake" when she tried to stop them on the battle field by talking to them. 

When the Orb flagship is sunk and part of its crew defect to the Archangel, she gets it together little more, but still pines over Athrun as he's not there and is in fact with ZAFT. (endless shots of the engagement ring at this point...) it also turns out she was the one to rescue Kira from the damaged cockpit of the Freedom when Shinn defeated him. As the story carries on, she grows up some, decides to battle her political opponants and take back control of her country then ZAFT invades Orb. She is given a new mobile suit, which is refered to as "her father's will" and has been supposedly locked away for 2 years. This suit however uses the latest technology seen only in the brand-new mecha's in the series, is as poweful as any of them and is completely gold-coloured, something to do with being able to reflect beam-weapons. Quite how this suit with brand-new, cutting edge technology was built 2 years ago is beyond me and one of the worst over-sights in the entire show.. 

She takes command of the Orb forces, having Yuna recognise her as "the real one" before instantly having him arrested for treason, resulting in another of the series more satisfying moments as Yuna gets decked and the shit kicked out of him by the frustrated Orb officers. Orb, with the help of the newly arrived Kira, Freedom and Justice suits and the Archangel holds off the invasion and Cagalli regains control of her nation. She stays on the planet when everyone else goes up into space for the final part of the series, her political strength renewed and in firm control of her nation, being one of the only nations to reject the "Destiny plan" put forward by the chairman. 

Shinn Asuka

Shinn is, to put it simply, a dick. Arrogant, argumentative, disrespectful, ignorant, self-absorbed, moody to begin with, he picks fights with everyone but Rey, Lunamaria and the chairman at almost any chance he gets. Tends to dress like a girl when in civilian clothes. His story begins during the invasion of Orb in the first series when his parents and little sister are killed in an explosion during the battle. Shinn was spared as he ran down a slope after his little sister's mobile phone, something seen a lot through out the series (no, its not creepy to keep your dead sister's phone charged for 2 years, listening to her voicemail message whenever you can.. not at all...). Blaming the leading family of Orb instead of the invading forces for their deaths (because thats normal right..) he left Earth to go to the PLANTs and joined their military (because your family being killed in a war is a great motivational factor for military enlistment....). Shinn is in command of the Impulse mobile suit, the most ridiculously overly pointless mobile suit i've ever seen in any mecha series, being more like something from the power rangers. The Impulse launches as "core splendor", a little fighter jet, "chest flyer", the chest, arms and head of the mecha, "leg flyer", the legs of the mecha and the "silhouette Glider" packs that alter the equipment load of the mecha. In an even tackier twist, the different packs also change the colour sheme of the chest module, with the guns making it turn green, the swords making it turn red and the "force silhouette", basically a pack for atmospheric flight, turning it blue/red like the signature gundams of most series. Huge amounts of time in the early episodes are wasted with every launch of this suit, taking on average three to four minutes to show its launch and almost instant combination. 

Shinn instantly picks a fight with Cagalli and Athrun when the board the Minerva during the theft of ZAFT's new suits, and continues to bitch and whine at Cagalli because she's the daughter of the man Shinn blames for loosing his family. No-one ever bothers to explain to Shinn that Cagalli lost her own father and a lot of friends in that same war, though Athrun does mention it to Luna. Shinn shows a begrudging respect to Athrun for his "legendary ace" status to begin with, but as Shinn's own achievements in battle increase, this goes. Shinn is the only new character shown to have the SEED factor, but unlike Kira and Athrun he doesnt have the ability to conciously "activate" it. Also unlike the other characters, Shinn's SEED factor only seems to kick in when he's having a childish hissy fit. It first appears when the Minerva is ambushed by an Earth Alliance fleet as they leave Orb. As Orb are in the process of becoming allied to the Earth Alliance at this point, they dispatch their military to prevent the Minerva from returning, which makes Shinn have a hissy fit, activates his SEED factor and sink a load of ships, causing untold amounts of death that dont seem to bother him in the slightest when he returns to the Minerva, in fact he seems quite happy with it. 

Shinn continues to mope, bitch and pick fights with his superior officers as the series goes on, at one point claiming he could defeat an entrenched enemy who wiped out a whole detachment singlehandedly, then backing off and claiming he was being given an "impossible mission" because "Athrun doesnt want to do it" within a few minutes. He even picks a fight with a local resistance fighter who appears to be about 12 at the same time. Athrun continues to try and get Shinn to stop being such an ass and for a while you think it might actually work. Shinn also sucks up all the shit the chairman says like its gold-dust, because he thinks it'll end war. During shore leave Shinn rescues a girl from drowning, acting like a dick to her till she has a freak-out. they eventually start to get along and Shinn promises to "protect" her. Unknown to him, but known to the audience, this girl is Stella, one of the Earth Alliances "Extended" pilots, human children trained almost since birth and manipulated with drugs, surgery and mind-control, and she is the pilot of the stolen unit known as the Gaia, one of three units that Shinn and the Minerva have been attacked by several times after their theft at the start of the series. 

When Shinn and Rey discover a facility used in the creation of these Extended's and the news gets back to the commander of the unit Stella is part of, one of them has a freak-out caused by a "blockword", a mental failsafe to stop the Extended's in their tracks (Stella's blockword is "die" or "death" which is what Shinn had unknowingly said to her to cause her freakout), during that Extended's freakout he begins talking about "mother" (his blockword, as in he did that to himself) and how she's at the lab and she's going to die, causing Stella to freak out. Stella takes the Gaia and goes to the lab, where she gets into a fight with Shinn in the Impulse. Shinn's all happy about being able to show off and trying to kill her till he damages the cockpit and sees Stella inside. Shinn then breaks regulations and brings her onboard, shoving people about and demanding she be treated even though the doctor is trying to follow procedure which prevents him from treating enemy solider without the captain's say so. Shinn gets a rap on the knuckles for this, the first of many lenient treatments he recieves because "he's a super-ace now" and probably is a large part of his arrogance. 

As the story goes on, and Athrun is defeated by Kira, Shinn's arrogance grows, claming Athrun isnt that special and why should he be in FAITH and so on, Stella, being held captive in the sickbay, grows weaker because her entire body chemistry is screwed up and the ZAFT doctor cant work out how to treat her. Shinn eavesdrops on a conversation regarding Stella's eventual fate and the fact that she'll likely die soon and then beats up a nurse, takes Stella and returns her to the commander of the Extended unit. He demands that Stella be taken to a "warm happy world far away from wars and mobile suits" and the commander promises this. While the Captain locks him up for this, and hopes he doesnt get the death penalty (while i'm sitting there praying the little gobshite does) when they return to base, he's let go with no penalty.

By this point it becomes obvious that Rey is working with the chairman in something, and both of them are manipulating Shinn into doing what they want. Not that Shinn seems to notice, or mind, as it appears he's become happy with indiscriminate killing and being congratulated for it. He shows no remorse or mercy during battle and when things dont go his way, like when facing Kira, his reaction is more like a kids tantrum than anything else. When the DESTROY unit is activated, and the Extended commander's lie to Shinn is revealed to the audience, The Minerva is sent to stop it. Shinn gets pissed at the Freedom and the Archangel for being there first and attacks the Freedom and the DESTROY until the cockpit is again damaged and he gets a message from the Extended commander that Stella is inside. He tries to talk the mind-wiped, scared-shitless Stella down but it fails and Kira is forced to destroy the unit in order to save Shinn's life and the lives of countless civilians. Shinn of course blames Kira for Stella's death (not the people who lied to him and put her back into war) and swears vengance, working with Rey in analysing how the Freedom fights and noticing that it never takes a killshot. 

Once the Minerva is assigned to destroying the Archangel Shinn heads out to fight, his being the only working mobile suit onboard at the time, and still cant beat Kira, causing him to throw a tantrum and activating his SEED factor, its while this is happening and the Archangel is almost destroyed that Kira gets distracted and Shinn goes in for the kill. After the massive explosion from the Freedom's Nuclear powerplant, Shinn is seen laughing hysterically in his cockpit. Upon his return to the Minerva he runs up to Athrun and boasts "I got my revenge, yours too", prompint Athrun to smack him in the face (yay!) However Rey comes to Shinn's defense, vocally, saying there's nothing wrong with defeating your enemy, adding justification to Shinn's arrogance and murderous intentions. 

Rey continues to work on Shinn's mind, playing his fear of war, the loss of family and friends and the rewards for being a good boy in so much as a world free of fighting, and when Athrun tries to escape in a mobile suit, Shinn give chase in his new suit, the Destiny. While Athrun takes the last chance to try and get Shinn to realise the chairman isnt such a good guy, Rey pushes Shinn's buttons with reminders that Athrun is now a "traitor" and is working against their plans for peace, causing Shinn to throw his toys out of the pram again and attack, and seemingly kill Athrun and Luna's little sister. 

As the dust over this incident settles, involving the fabrication, missinformation and covering up of the facts to make it look like Athrun and Meyrin were defecting with top secret info, all Shinn can actually manage to say to the sister of the girl he presumably killed is "sorry" as he's walking past her. For some screwed up reason, this actually marks the start of a relationship between Lunamaria and Shinn... dont ask me, i have NO idea why. Eventually a massive fleet sets out heading for a base meant to contain the bosses of an organisation called LOGOS whom the chairman has publicly named as manufacturing wars in order to make money off of them. During the battle Shinn gleefully kills hundreds, and is actually awarded with a medal and membership of FAITH along with Rey. 

Its revealed that the top dog in LOGOS has been seen in Orb, prompting an invasion of that country by the ZAFT forces, with Shinn himself volunteering to "destroy" them. It looks like they may manage it when Kira arrives from space with the new Freedom and Justice, and proceeds to kick everyone's ass. Eventually ZAFT retreat and in the aftermath as Cagalli broadcasts her response to the invasion she is interupted by fake-lacus, who is in turn interupted by the real Lacus. This confuses a lot of people, especially poor simple-mided Shinn who turns to his friend Rey to ask whats going on. Rey simply backs the chairman, as he always does. Shortly after this the LOGOS boss fires a super-weapon at the PLANTS, destroying several of them. This causes a scramble of forces on the ground to get into space to stop it, including both the Minerva and the Archangel. 

Once the weapon is put out of commission, and the LOGOS boss killed the chairman introduces his "Destiny plan", based on the concept that war is also caused by fear and uncertainty which leads to anger, suspiscion and jealousy, the destiny plan will assign all people their roles in life based on their genetic profiles, meaning everyone will be doing what they're happiest doing and no more wars. The Archangel crew had already worked out that the chairman has been manipulating things behind the scenes to create the latest war, feed the flames, manuvour himself into a favourable position with all people so they'd accept this plan and they decide to stop him. Orb almost instantly comes out with condemnation of the plan, as Cagalli was part of the Archangel crew, but Shinn is confused, and goes to speak with Rey again. At this point the truth behind several little flashbacks seen through out the series is revealed and Rey tells Shinn that he is a clone (like Rau Le Creuset from SEED) and implores Shinn to follow the chairman's plan. 

When the chairman fires the same weapon used to destroy the PLANTs at an Alliance base on the moon housing their president who was about to reject the destiny plan, it becomes clear that the chairman will destroy anyone who doesnt fall in line, causing the Archangel, Eternal and a fleet of ships from Orb to move against them. Once again the Minerva is ordered into battle agains the Archangel and Shinn and Rey are dispatched to destroy the opposition. Kira ends up facing off against Lunamaria, in the Impulse, which he disables, and then Rey, where he has flashbacks of fighting against Rau Le Creuset and its finally revealed that Rey is a younger version of Rau Le Creuset, a clone of the same man basically. Kira manages to distract Rey with semi-philosophical talk and disables his unit. As this is happening Shinn fights Athrun, screaming and bitching about traitors and shit, eventually Luna moves her heavily damaged unit into the fight and tries to stop them but Shinn is basically too far into his hissy fit to care and Athrun ends up smashing his unit up, sending it slamming into the moons surface. Luna chases after Shinn while Athrun and another go and destroy the weapon before it can fire at Orb. 

As Kira destroys the flying astroid fortess of the chairman and goes in to have his final confrontation with him, Luna is seen craddling Shinn who's having a hallucination of Stella, telling him to meet her "tomorrow". As the weapon explodes, followed shortly by the fortress, Shinn is seen crying with Luna. 

In reflection, I assume Shinn is meant to come across as an "angry kid" who's good intentions are used and twisted because of his skills and his ability to use the SEED factor, but in general, he's the most dislikable "lead" I've seen.

Overall review

Overall, Destiny feels rushed, I dont think there was originally plans to have a second series set in the same universe and following on. There's huge plot holes, unclear or illogical motives such as Shinn's hate for a country who tried to protect and defend him over the aggressors who attacked them. then there's the whole "Mu La Flaga/Neo Roanoke" thing for which they had to retcon the ending of SEED for as it shows Mu's shattered helmet floating in space in the original versions, yet he's somehow alive and brainwashed with a new personality? (is Mu batman and can breathe in space?) then there's how it all goes down in a similar fashion to the original series but with the Minerva not the Archangel.. it could be suggested that the chairman leaked the info on the new suits to set the whole thing up, given his comment of "I hold great expectations for that ship, in that it could fill the same role as the Archangel did in the last conflict" and how savvy he is at the manipulation of people, coupled with his cryptic comment about the LOGOS boss in the last few episodes.. but its never explained. Also with "The Terminal", from whom the Archangel crew get information from, they're never explained, comments like "they even have that? how big is this organisation" when a Gaia model launches during the Eternal's escape from a hidden factory.. A quick wiki search shows a glut of spin-offs, side-story's set at the same time featuring other characters that seem to provide this information but its frustrating to watch just the anime and have all these seemingly deus ex machina-type events and organisations creating pivotal points with little or no explination. 

Destiny also re-uses massive amounts of clips and sections from SEED, some presented as Flashbacks, others just re-worked a little to show updated models. while the drawing is more consistant with the characters and the mecha drawing remains top form it constantly re-uses sections, like the 3-4 minute Impulse launch/combination almost every single episode, it also suffers from the curse of the infinate recap, whereby up to the first 5 minutes of EVERY episode is recap, followed by 90 seconds of into, cutting down on the actual time spent telling the story. I realise a lot of this is budgetary, cutting costs and so on, but a lot of it is also due to padding, dragging the storyline out across more episodes so it'll meet the expected amount, and in a anime-original series like this, they cant even claim they're catching up with the manga like some do. 

That said, the story pace is better, it feels less like parts are being over-done or skipped over, Kira's rescue is shown, Athrun's is hinted at even before he leaves the port in the mecha and the few parts where something does show up out of the blue, its an understandable reason why, like the introduction of the new Freedom, in all honesty they'd have had to be working on that since almost the start of the story but its a "shock reveal" moment, a common story telling practise.

SUMMARY - 

Story -   Destiny runs at a better pace than SEED did, events tick along nicely and there's solid development of plot, events and character interaction. That said.. Character growth happens in spurts, its like one moment of shock = re-evaluation of personal viewpoint, which is a little odd, there's also some strange relationships, like the archangel captain and the desert tiger, whom at the start seem almost a married couple, yet he goes into space and we barely see him again, and she ends up back with her thought-to-be-dead-but-actually-brainwashed fella from SEED, Why Lunamaria chases Athrun even though she's aware of Cagalli and why she never brings up Cagalli around fake-lacus, and even gets jealous over fake-lacus.. it feels like large parts of the picture are missing, and i suspect they're tucked away in side-stories released as manga as a cash in (sadly) and there's also the motivaton, it makes sense when LOGOS are the bad-guys, we are all aware of how corrupt the industrio-military complex can be i assume? but then what is the chairman's goals, his reasons for wanting to create this destiny plan of his? never made clear in the anime and again, i fear hidden away in cash-in products outside of the anime. 

There's also the point about Shinn, he'd be better off as an anti-hero, starting as an antagonist instead of the lead character. I find it hard to have any empathy for him, as he's such a total dick you feel he brings most of his troubles on himself. The series also takes heavily from other areas, the fake idol idea is a very old one, the "bad guy is the brainwashed boyfriend of one of the good guys" idea was kicking about in sailor moon and the scene where Shinn lays Stella to rest in a lake couldnt get more FFVII without Shinn sporting a buster sword.. there's also a glut of characters who recieve little to no growth at all, even with large roles, like the Extended pilots, Stella has a little exposition but only to serve as a love-interest/tragic romance aspect for Shinn, fake-lacus has her entire character growth shown in one episode in the form of a diary, Roanoke gets nothing till he's found to be Mu and Meyrin's only personality appears to be that she's Luna's sister, feels she's podgy and has a crush on Athrun.. all of which hurts the show overall. 5/10

Production -  Production values are much better in Destiny than in SEED, and I would say that Destiny is possibly one the earliest anime's i've seen that starts to measure up to more modern values in this area. There's little loss of continuity in character drawings, they retain their dimensions regardless, arms dont suddenly become longer/thinner and there's less fish-eye appearances during close ups too (i mean, they're all a little fish-eyed, but its consitantly fish-eyed). the CGI is less intrusive, if still obvious and it shows the difference a year of development of techniques can make in the animation field. 7/10

Music - The music of Destiny is bland, none of it really jumps out at you at any point really. the awful songs of Lacus make a re-appearance, but only to show the motivational tour of fake-lacus, and they've been sped up a fair bit too, making them more like early 2000's chart crap. While it seems like the dynamic of uptempo-start/emotional slower outro was attempted to be kept, the outro's are also bland, not nearly as emotional as some of the ones from SEED. The series occasionally will play a refrain from previous themes, especially during its many flashback moments, which does bring in a reasonable feeling of continuity between the two series, but still not evoking much more than an overall "meh" from me. 4/10

Accessability -  sadly, this score is lower for Destiny, as they fell into two "obvious-anime-cliché-is-obvious" moments.. the first being the Idol concerts with the "oh!" chants from the crowd at the end of every line.. its not something you really hear at western shows, and from my understanding is a very japanese-only cultural thing. The second one being the artificial hot-spring on the Archangel, shown once. first off, who puts an hot-spring on a warship? secondly the ship is being kept in the fictional nation of Orb, based around the real-life Marshall Islands, yet the entire design of the hot spring is so very very traditional japanese.. which doesnt match with the more European feel of the rest of the settings in Orb. I read that it was likely put in as "fan service" but for a casual western viewer it'll make little to no sense. Other than that, its fairly accessable for the majority of us "Gaijin" 8/10

  

Overall Impression - The SEED line of the Gundam Franchise is very popular, spawning net animations, manga, novels, games.. but Destiny is a weaker show as a stand-alone to SEED, it relies heavily on people having seen SEED, and having access to the side-stories and materials to make sense of some of the plot points. The lead character has little redeaming features, something they tried to address with the release of a re-worked ending OVA (orginal video animation for those who dont know) that was longer than 30 minutes and addressed a lot of the issues, including Shinn meeting up with Kira in Orb after the conflict where Shinn actually almost shows some remorse for his sensless acts and even signs of possibly moving on emotionally. While featuring a large cast, there's a lot of focus on already developed characters or those that just dont develop at all and the sudden switch of the Minerva from the "good guys" to "pawns of the big bad" in the last few episodes is a little confusing. 

A reasonable sequal, but bad on its own due to a lack of context. 7/10

FINAL SCORE - 31/50