Gundam The Origin

As an advocate of Prequels in general, I wanted to try watching a Prequel to something I don't know the original story for.  I heard of this recently and that it was pretty good.  As you may know the only Gundam series I was previously familiar with is Gundam 00 which is not part of the Universal Century continuity.

Four Episodes are available, only the third has an after credits scene.  All four are Dubbed already, which is good, in Japan some characters are still voiced by the same actors who voiced them 40 years ago even though they are younger here.  I don't want to deal with that.

After watching them I learned that this isn't really a Prequel to the existing continuity but more of a Reboot that starts at an earlier point.  Still a similar concept.

Overall I like it, the first episode is difficult to get into at first.  What it needed was some narration set up at the beginning, like the 2nd, 3rd and 4th episodes had.

From the vague knowledge I had of Gundam going in I was easily able to guess who was supposed to be Char.  Gundam gets called the Star Wars of Japan, and Char the Darth Vader of Japan.  In some ways I think how this handles Char is how many Prequel haterss would have wanted Anakin to be written, someone introverted who doesn't much express his emotional angst.  But Lucas had a specific point to make about Anakin not being cut out for the Stoic nature of what the Jedi Order had become.  And in the OT Darth Vader was not exactly someone who restrained himself.

I think this could be a good introduction to the franchise for new fans.  I don't think I could ever watch the original Gundam, I simply don't like how most 70s Anime looked.  Here, it is hilarious how some characters look obviously like their original character designs were made in the 70s, but others not so much.