English Dub Series Review: Mobile Suit Gundam the Origin: Advent of the Red Comet

In the 1990s Robert Altman made a movie called Short Cuts. The damn thing was over three hours long, it centered around crop dusting, and followed the lives of more than a dozen primary characters. Mobile Suit Gundam the Origin was a lot like Short Cuts—or Singles, Love Actually, Traffic, Go!, Magnolia, or Valentine’s Day, if you prefer.

The only difference between the above movies and MSGtO: AotRC (as the kids are calling it), is that this prequel series had thirteen, twenty-two-minute episodes to tell everybody’s story. That’s ninety-eight more minutes than Altman had, and he was a genius. This series did okay introducing all the characters, but the task was a bit too daunting. I would’ve loved to see more from some characters without having to watch the entire—extremely long—flagship series that came out in 1979—fourteen years before Short Cuts.

The first focus of the series—after Zeon who died within the first ten minutes—was Artesia Deikun. For much of the series’ middle, we lost track of Artesia. This was after she went into hiding and took the name, Sayla Mass. I expected her to be the heart and soul of the series but we missed so much of her life as she grew from a small frightened girl who lost everything into a strong woman with nothing to lose. Her scenes were powerful and offered hope for her fractured universe, but also uncertainty.

Char Aznable died in a fiery spaceship explosion, as did his parents and all evidence of his true identity. Casval Deikun, the man who stole his identity in order to cause chaos, was once the heir apparent to Zeon and older brother to Artesia. He is the titular Red Comet and the closest thing the series had to a true protagonist. However, the moment we find out he is actually a villain—that was around the time he tricked the real Char Aznable into getting blown up—he became a much more interesting character. His motivations were equal parts intriguing and mysterious.

Ramba Ral and Crowley Hamon worked primarily behind the scenes. At first, they served the Deikun family, but once they saw the writing on the wall, they begrudgingly switched their allegiance to Zabi family—the presumed winners. The two of them were obviously in love even though they always tried to hide it in front of the soldiers—especially little Lt. Tachi who had a crush on Hamon, himself. Hamon also provided the most entertaining scene of the entire series when she poorly dubbed a sensual song on the piano.

Degwin Zabi became the despotic leader after he allegedly murdered his predecessor and friend, Zeon Deikun. Degwin is ruthless, but he’s also somewhat wise and calculating. His children, on the other hand, have the ruthlessness about them but aren’t as even-tempered. The eldest, Gihren, is a warmonger through and through, while Kycilia has never seen an angle she can’t use to her advantage.

While Degwin and Gihren were both a little one-dimensional in this series, Kycilia was fascinating to watch from the very first episode. The woman pretended to go along with the family line, again and again, only to bust her ass in the underground in order to forward her own agenda. And she did this all dressed as Cobra Commander from the old G. I. Joe cartoons.

On the other hand, Dozle Zabi was an open book. We got to see him building massive robots in public, not behind a giant wall of secrecy like the mega-super Gundam in Side 7. On top of that, we witnessed him inappropriately proposing to and marrying one of his students from the military academy. They had a child together—Minerva—who Dozle immediately became super protective of. We’re talking, Franken-father levels. Although, ever since the explosion that killed his brother Sasro, the big man strongly resembles Frankenstein, anyway.

Garma Zabi, while the youngest, is the most interesting of them all. He’s a brat and was obviously spoiled by everybody except Kycilia since he was a day old. His father, Degwin, has an uncomfortably close relationship with the boy, and his brothers know not to mess with him if they want to stay in favor with the Zeon party. Garma, despite his flaws, is a hard worker and precocious little rascal. He becomes friends with Char Aznable—the fake, violent one—because alphas can sense alphas and because he’ll do anything to advance his position in the military. And it works; the kid winds up in Hollywood with thousands of acolytes basking in his glory.

Amuro Ray, the protagonist of the flagship series, makes a handful of appearances in this series alongside his band of irregulars, like Fraw Bow, that is destined to grow up to become war heroes. Just like Luke Skywalker before him, Amuro starts his adventure as a whiny little nothing accompanied by one of the most annoying droids in the entire made-up universe. However, Amuro sucks so bad for a reason. He must fulfill his hero’s journey and go on to greatness.

Those are all the individual short cuts I can muster at this time. I hope you enjoyed this complex show.