Cooling on GQuuuuuuX

I'm finding that after we're two-thirds of the way through GquuuuuuX I'm starting to find myself cooling on the show from an initial feeling of “Hell yeah I love this!”

From the Beginning movie it seemed like the course of the show would be about Clan-Battle and center on Machu, Nyaan, and Shuji. When they first had the character blurbs on the website, one of the things that drew me most was the note that Nyaan was a refugee, having had to flee from her home colony. The idea that we were going to see a new side to the fallout of the One Year War, plus Annqi's bitter remark that Zeon “winning” didn't leave Spacenoids any freer, had me really interested in the show.

By my standards, the episode with the witch was peak. Got to see a new side to the One Year War, with Shiiko being in complete denial of her own Newtype potential because she's rejected the concept completely as Zeon propaganda. Her lingering bitterness that she was never able to avenge her Mav, how she can't help but see her normal life with her kid as giving up on being a pilot.

And, unfortunately it has to be stressed critically, Machu knows all this. Machu got to meet her and knows who this Clan-Battle is against and the fact that Shuji would just kill her without remorse forces Machu to consider what she's doing and how little she actually knows about Shuji.

And then the show brings back the Black Tri-Stars just to have them die in the same way they did in Gundam 0079 and this is the start of the downward slide to me. Cameron showing up is whatever, he's not really important and a minor bureaucrat showing up in roughly the same functionality in both series is fine. It doesn't register to me. Even if I really liked how the battle showcases the difference in Machu in Nyaan and how they react to the kira-kira and the GquuuuuuX moving according to their will, it really leaves me feeling sour how they bring back the Black Tri-Stars just to kill them in the same way as in the original series.

If anything, the climax with the Psycho Gundam is the nadir of the show to me.

In Zeta Gundam, the whole tragedy around the Psycho Gundam is that the protagonist knows who is in it. It's not an abstract attack on Hong Kong from a faceless mook, Kamille knows Four and he's heartbroken that she would so indiscriminately attack the city. And we know why she is forcing herself to do this, without the memories of her past she doesn't feel like she has an identity or a future. Even if we, the audience, can guess that the experiments on her caused her memory loss and that the Murasame Lab will never restore her memories. They didn't even give her a name, she's only Four because she's test subject number four.

Now look at GquuuuuuX.

None of the protagonists know who Deux is.

They're not even a part of stopping the Psycho Gundam! Hell I don't even Machu even saw the damn thing! Our protagonists aren't even a part of the biggest event happening in the episode!

And if they gave the show time to breathe or actually focused on the protagonist trio instead of trying to cram in as many references and proper nouns as possible, it's so easy to see how the story could've gone.

Deux sees Shuji's graffiti around. Maybe she's thrilled that someone else knows about the kira-kira. Maybe she's even more possessive of it and angry that they've been in it. They get to know her and Gates has to make some excuse so that Deux doesn't blab out that they're in whatever this timeline's equivalent to the Titans is.

Shuji just sees an enemy and the Gundam is telling him to fight. Machu can't understand why he'd fight a kid just like them. How could Gates make Deux fight like this. They can hear each other over the radio and know how much the Psycho Gundam is messing with Deux's mind.

Nyaan thinks there's no way they'll be able to beat the Pyscho Gundam and starts to panic. She begs Shuji to flee with her, he won't and is spirited away by the Red Gundam. Machu ACTUALLY SEES HER HOME COLONY BEING BLOWN UP WHICH I HAVE TO STRESS IN THE EPISODE IT LOOKS LIKE SHE NEVER EVEN SAW THE PSYCHO GUNDAM INDISCRIMINATELY SHOOTING INSIDE THE COLONY and meets up with the panicking Nyaan and wants to take the GquuuuuuX to put a stop to this. Nyaan begs Machu to run away with her because all Nyaan knows is being abandoned, things going terribly. Machu never loved this colony but she can't bear to see it destroyed like this. Machu begs Nyaan to fight along side her, but she can't bring herself to trust in Machu and sees it as being abandoned again.

Machu begs Deux to stop this. Deux is deeply broken by the Red Gundam vanishing taking her out of the kira-kira. Challia still ends up shooting down the Psycho Gundam. Maybe because he sees Machu won't pull the trigger and kill. Maybe Machu does get to Deux and make her stop for a moment, and in that opening Challia just kills her to end the threat she poses. And then shoots down Machu as well to take her and the GquuuuuuX again.

Nyaan is still running, trying to reach the colony's dock to find anything she can flee with. Xavier still finds her and still convinces her to come with him.

And none of that is what we get! Nobody knows who Gates was! Nobody knows who Deux was! The redesigned Hambrabi doesn't get to do anything! This season finale scale event doesn't have anything to do with the protagonists! It's such a waste!

Then I am yanked even further out of the experience by them introducing the GfreD and it's the same fucking colors as the EVA-01 YES HIDEKI ANNO I KNOW YOU'RE INVOLVED.

When they announced that GquuuuuuX would be an alternate timeline from the main UC canon, the thing that I dreaded was that the show would be too referential. Too much a parade of proper nouns and people who already had a wiki entry, and not about the characters in this show.

After the episode with the witch, I feel like that dread has been coming to pass. More proper nouns, more old characters showing up, less to do with Machu and Nyaan and Shuji.

We still have more episodes to go and maybe my opinion will change. If anything, my feels right now are less that GquuuuuuX is mediocre to bad, and more that I am now having to wrestle with the show that I wanted vs the show that we're getting. Some of it may be attributable to budget cuts forcing them from two cours down to one, but that still doesn't fly to me. I can admit that the back half of season 2 of The Witch From Mercury was extremely chopped down to fit into their budget, but they still delivered on the deepening of Suletta and Miorine's relationship.

GquuuuuuX feels like it's failing to be about the protagonists in any major way at all and that just makes me sad.