We’re now finally in the new stretch of content for Gundam GQuuuuuuX, and it’s a mixed bag.
Following the initial clan battle, Machu and Shuji are doing very well for the Pomeranians, with multiple victories under their collective belts.
Even Challia Bull is impressed with their output and doesn’t seem at all concerned that having two psycommu mobile suits in close proximity could cause a Zek Nova.
One neat detail is that the room where Challia watches the clan battles is actually a reused asset from the Rebuild of Evangelion movies (see below).
This is in no way a criticism and is actually a smart and sensible approach to anime production.
We are also introduced to a new Federation pilot called Shiiko Sugai. Known as the Witch during the war, due to her high kill count, we also get hit with a new term, “unicum”, which is this in-universe’s name for an ace pilot. Why they just didn’t call her an ace, I don’t know.
In any case, she wants to fight the Red Gundam, as Char killed her MAV during the war.
Sugai is an interesting character because, on first appearance, she’s a very sweet and polite mother with a mushroom bob haircut. I like the fact that her demeanor and appearance subvert what we expect an ace pilot to be like in Gundam.
In amongst this, Shuji says that the Red Gundam wants to go to Earth, and the constant dialogue he has with the mobile suit makes me think that something of Char Aznable was left behind after the original Zek Nova. Machu also enthusiastically agrees to go to with him.
The resultant clan battle then reveals some bizarre mobile suits which are called Gelgoogs but are in fact GMs.
Let me explain, in the original Mobile Suit Gundam, the initial objective was to get the Gundam back to the Federation so they could mass produce it. As they were on the clock, the Federation made a simpler version called the GM. The name is sometimes thought to be “Gundam type Mass-production model”, but that hasn’t always been consistent.
Now, in this weird new timeline, Char told the Zeon higher-ups to stop production of the Zeon Gelgoog and instead mass-produce the Gundam, which in turn creates a mobile suit that looks like a GM, but because this is Zeon, it is now called a Gelgoog.
It does make sense, but all of this is beginning to feel like bad fan fiction again, and it’s also just confusing to newcomers, which this series is seemingly aimed at.
One interesting feature is that the head design for this “Gelgoog” does really remind me of the Daughtress from Gundam X, and I suppose that’s no bad thing, especially as Gundam X deserves more love as it is.
Anyway, the fight between Sugai and the Gundams goes as you’d expect. Sugai uses hooks and wires to move around her target in a difficult-to-predict manner, but is eventually undone by Shuji, who literally zips behind her in “nothing personal, kid” meme fashion and shivs her mobile suit in the back.
To be honest, this felt massively unnecessary. Yes, Sugai was determined to get vengeance on the Red Gundam, but Shuji could have easily immobilised her mobile suit rather than kill her. After all the prior clan battles weren’t to the death.
Like with most of GQuuuuuuX, it’s not really coming together as it should and feels oddly amateurish at times. The designs are still bugging me, but I think that now we are in new narrative territory, the story will hopefully pick up.
However, this latest episode didn’t really do it for me and just felt overly convoluted to get to a death that was wholly unnecessary. Here’s hoping the following episodes get better from here on out.
Gundam GQuuuuuuX is now streaming worldwide via Amazon Prime Video.
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