Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam

"Zeta Gundam" redirects here. For the eponymous mobile suit, see Z Gundam.

Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam
機動戦士Ζガンダム (Kidō Senshi Zēta Gandamu)
Genre	Military science fiction, Real Robot, Space Opera
Anime
Directed by	Yoshiyuki Tomino
Studio	Sunrise
Released	March 2, 1985 – February 22, 1986
Manga
Published by	Kodansha
Magazine	Comic Bon Bon
Original run	1994 – present
Volumes	3
Anime
Zeta Gundam A New Translation: Heirs to the Stars
Directed by	Yoshiyuki Tomino
Studio	Sunrise
Released	May 28, 2005
Anime
Zeta Gundam A New Translation II: Lovers
Directed by	Yoshiyuki Tomino
Studio	Sunrise
Released	October 29, 2005
Anime
Zeta Gundam A New Translation III: Love is the Pulse of the Stars
Directed by	Yoshiyuki Tomino
Studio	Sunrise
Released	March 4, 2006

Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam (機動戦士Ζガンダム, Kidō Senshi Zēta Gandamu) (aired 1985–1986) is a television anime, part of the Gundam series and a sequel to the original Mobile Suit Gundam. The show was created and directed by Yoshiyuki Tomino, with character designs by Yoshikazu Yasuhiko, while the series' mechanical designs is split amongst Kunio Okawara, Mamoru Nagano, and Kazumi Fujita. The series was originally aired by Nagoya Broadcasting Network (and its sister ANN stations), rerun on the anime satellite television network, Animax, across Japan and later its respective networks worldwide, including East Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, and other regions.

Between 2005 to 2006, the series was reproduced and compiled into a movie trilogy, Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam: A New Translation. Though still directed by Tomino, it involved many changes in the original storyline.

Plot summary

Main articles: List of Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam characters and List of Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam mobile weapons

U.C. 0087. seven years after the end of the One Year War, the story told in Mobile Suit Gundam, a group called AEUG secretly emerges from the Earth Federation and Zeon remnants including Char Aznable, disguised as Quattro Bajeena, led by the Earth Federation Forces Brigadier General Blex Forer, is determined to fight against the elite taskforce of the Earth Federation, the Titans, which is established to hunt down Zeon remnants but ruthlessly kill anyone demanding equal rights for the space citizens.

The story of Zeta Gundam begins in the view point of the civilian teenager named Kamille Bidan, whose parents are engineers working for the Earth Federation and Titans, traveling to the colony Green Noa to meet his parents and ran into trouble by hitting a Titans officer, Jerid Messa, who said his name Kamille is very feminine. AEUG task force led by Quattro launched an attack on the colony to capture the newly developed Gundam Mk-II testing in Green Noa and Kamille, with his skills and knowledge of the champion Junior Mobile Suit competition took the chance and piloted the Mk-II prepared for Jerid to fight against the attack and followed Quattro back to Argama, the mothership of AEUG. Kamille's parents were later used as hostages by Titans to force the returning of the Gundam Mk-IIs, but Jerid, without knowing the capsules contained hostages, destroyed the capsules, leading Kamille to join the AEUG to fight against Titans.

The plot mainly follows the view point of Kamille in the war, having him meet various people of all sides, including brainwashed artificial Newtypes of Titans and the giant corporation leaders of Anaheim Electronics who is secretly funding AEUG. The plot continues with several battles between AEUG and Titans and the conflict eventually became a civil war after AEUG launched a full out attack on the Earth Federation's assembly at Dakar, and Quattro revealed himself to be Char Aznable and presented evidences of Titans' tyranny including using a nerve gas called G3 on a defenseless colony. Earth Federation court soon ruled Titans to be illegal and backed up AEUG to hunt down Titans leader Jamitov Hymem.

After losing the support from the Earth Federation, Titans turned to its original enemy, the Zeon remnants, Axis Zeon, and wants to form an alliance with Axis to regain control of the Earth sphere. Axis Zeon's leader Haman Kann had a different proposal in mind, and also contacted AEUG, using the civil war of the Earth Federation at hand to politically ask for the control of Side 3, the former Zeon colonies.

Axis involvement and Jamitov's assassination by the Jupiter fleet's leader Paptimus Scirocco soon led to a battle to gain control of the Gryps colony, headquarter of the Titans, modified to be a colony laser, a type of super weapon also seen in Mobile Suit Gundam, where a full sized O'Neil Cylinder is turned into a laser. The war ended as Kamille, piloting the titular mobile suit Z Gundam, killed Paptimus in battle and AEUG's sinking the Jupitris, flagship of Paptimus and most of the Titans fleet. Having also major damage on its forces, the AEUG and Earth Federation will face the full force of Axis Zeon, which is revealed to be hidden in the asteroid Axis, renamed as Neo Zeon in the story of Mobile Suit Gundam ZZ.

Media

Television series

Main article: List of Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam episodes

Compilation movies

In celebration of Gundam's 25th anniversary (and also the 20th anniversary of Zeta Gundam), the 50-episode series was compiled into a movie trilogy called Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam: A New Translation. According to Tomino, the movies were created to fix some of the problems he identified in the television series and to bring it into a 21st century context for a new generation now experiencing the increasingly commercialized series, such as Mobile Suit Gundam SEED. The first movie, Heirs to the Stars, opened on May 28, 2005, followed by Lovers on October 29, 2005, and Love is the Pulse of the Stars on March 6, 2006. The compilations digitally remastered the television series of Zeta Gundam with new footage. Around 33% of "Heir to the Stars" was remastered footage, with 70% for "Lovers" and almost 80% for "Love is the Pulse of the Stars". However, several major plot events from the TV series were either edited or removed to allow the films to flow more smoothly, unlike Tomino's previous Gundam film compilations. Likewise, the fate of some characters in the television version were entirely changed, notably Kamille's — in the original, his final battle renders him into a vegetative state, while he remains physically and mentally fit by the end of movie trilogy. In addition, mobile suits belonging to the Gundam timeline, but designed after the television broadcast of Zeta Gundam, were also placed into the movies.

North American release

In 2004, after almost 2 years of delays and failed television and merchandising deals, Bandai released a limited edition Zeta Gundam boxset with dubbed English and original Japanese audio tracks. The English dub was done by Blue Water Studios based in Calgary.

Due to Bandai not having rights to the theme songs outside of Asia, the opening and closing sequences were altered. The English subtitles were criticized as inaccurate and appear to be based on the script for the English dub, rather than a direct translation of the original Japanese script. Bandai corrected the subtitles to a properly translated version for later DVD releases in 5 cases with 2 discs each. The box-set includes pencil sharpener collectibles and a 48-page booklet and poster. Each DVD in the Bandai Region 2 release contains five episodes.

In 2006, Bandai Entertainment acquired the rights to the US release of the "A New Translation" movie trilogy, currently pending release.

Reception

Critical reception

Since its original run had ended in 1986, Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam has received universal critical acclaim and has had a significant influence on science fiction anime since then, particularly in shaping the Real Robot and Mecha anime genres. Zeta Gundam is today still regarded as one of the best series in the Gundam franchise. The Nihon Review gave Zeta Gundam a score of 9/10, stating that it is, "without a doubt, one of the original’s greatest incarnations as well as the milestone that solidified the franchise for the ages." They concluded that it is "a classic that sparked a phenomenon that is still burning strong" and that "all great stories are timeless and Zeta Gundam is no exception."

The review website Mania.com gave the anime an overall 'B+' rating, regarding it as "one of Yoshiyuki Tomino's greatest works." They stated that the "lack of an A/A+ is that this is recommended for fans who are already familliar with the Universal Century storyline," recommending that audiences view "the original movie trilogy" first before watching Zeta Gundam. The reviewer Chris Beveridge of Mania.com gave certain volumes of the series a full 'A' rating, describing the last ten episodes as being "the huge payoff episodes" where "you can almost feel the characters being rushed around a bit and moved through the paces. But at the same time, it all comes so fast that it's simply enjoyable to watch so much happen and change so quickly."

Popularity

During its original run from 1985 to 1986, Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam had experienced the highest television viewer ratings in the history of the Gundam franchise. According to Japan's Weekly The Television magazine, the viewer ratings of Zeta Gundam averaged 6.6% and peaked at 11.7% during its original run.

See also

• Kidou Senshi Z-Gundam: Hot Scramble, a part-FPS part-platformer Famicom game based on the series was the first console Gundam game.

External links

• Official Websites: Anime, A New Translation I A New Translation II, A New Translation III, GundamOfficial
• Anime Academy Review: Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam
• Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam ({{{type}}}) at Anime News Network's encyclopedia
• Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam at IMDb