The original gundam movies

[Green]

I was thinking about buying the box, anyone here ever see the movies? The only other Gundam I've seen is Wing (all of it). I've heard that Char's Counterattack (which will be released this year) is a great movie, so I was wanting to see the original saga before I get any other Gundam. Opinions?

[Station]

Its a good set to get cause it begins the entire series. If you want to see all the other Gundam series, this is where to start.

[JennRose]

The Gundam Movie box set is well worth having if you want a firm grounding in original Gundam lore, provided you don't mind a set of sub only discs. (Though I prefer hybrids, it's mainly because I do put movies on for the noise value while I work about the house or on the comp) If you must have dubs you'll have to shell out for the 10 discs that make you the TV series Mobile Suit Gundam.(did CN ever finish airing "Original Gundam" as they called it?)There are pluses and minuses on both sides.

Although the Series obviously expands the story out and gives a bit more time for character development, much of the series is spent on earth in largely pointless battles (it has since become something of a cliche in the Gundam universe that no Gundam series starts really rocking 'till everyone returns to space from whatever they had to do on Earth), the better to introduce more variants of the mechs and thus have a wider selection of toys for Bandai to sell. Given that Gundam's more plot and character driven story was something of a novelty at the time, surprisingly little of either is lost in compressing the 43 episode (approx 21.5 hours)series to 3 movies (approx 441 mins or 7.5 hours).

And yes, I'm aware that the TV series as released here has only 42 episodes but at the director's specific request, one episode was dropped entirely because he simply didn't like it. What'cha gonna do? *shrug*

It should also be noted that although the picture has been cleaned up for DVD, the TV series animation is very clearly of its time (late 70's) and since it was considered something of an experiment, there are places in the series where attention to detail in the animation is somewhat lacking even for the standards of the day. Also, where the Movies are in a sub only release, the TV show is English dub only - At the specific request of Bandai/Sunrise's home office in japan. (Presumably an attempt to keep japanese fans from importing for some reason?)

The movie's storyline scrambles some of the events from the series (though none of the major events are lost). Because of this, and the aformentioned poor quality of some of the original TV animation, various scenes were re-shot entirely or added to the three movies, making for a better total viewing experience.

As a final note, The TV series did not fair that well when originally broadcast in japan. It was in condensing and re-releasing the series as three movies that kicked off real interest in Gundam and its future incarnations.

Hope this helps.
Shade & Sweetwater,
Jennifer ^_^

[Green]

Thanks Jenn, I didn't know about the reshot stuff or that the movies were what became popular.