The Great Gundam Project: Mobile Suit Gundam (Abnormal Mapping)

Welcome to the first episode of our new premium Gundam podcast, The Great Gundam project! This is a weekly exploration of Gundam two (or so) episodes at a time, in release order, until Gundam ends ... or we do!

We start in the modest days of Universal Century 0079, a time when people lived in fear of their own actions, and a boy named Amuro Ray learned that just because you're good at machines doesn't make you good at using them to murder.

We return to our regularly schedule Gundam as the White Base arrives at and leaves Luna II, and Char realizes he's up against a bunch of amateurs.

Gundam is back again! Amuro flails with a hammer. Char hammers with a bazooka. Mirai pilots the ship with a juicebox. Many tools for many purposes.

Hey all, sorry for the lateness of this, I was sick and Jackson was out of town. But we're here now with some new adventures of Amuro and the gang and Char and his war boys. It goes badly for everyone.

Hello friends, welcome to the return of regularly scheduled Gundam. Today? Amuro gets a boner, Bright gets a seat, Char gets a win, and Garma gets fucked.

This week's Gundam is here and Jackson is, somehow, still shocked at the willingness of anime fans to uncritically embrace nazi aesthetics. Bless them, they still had hope.

Two worlds, one where every soldier is bad and one where every soldier wishes they could just go home and be human again. The coin flips. We glimpse both sides. Which world would we rather live in? Which world will Amuro find himself in when all is said and done?

Today we talk about the Mysterious Japan-only Episode 15, and the secrets of Mobile Suit Martial Arts(tm) that are contained within. Amuro shows us why the Guncannon is cool, Sayla shows us that the pilot really makes the mech, and we debate the merits of hamburgers for breakfast.

Amuro is a busy boy, designing fight simulations and falling asleep at computers and leaving the ship to go on harebrained adventures out in the wastes of this battlefield—Earth (not to be confused with Battlefield: Earth). Also we discover a world where anime hasn't figured out how to be horny yet. It's a good time. For us. Not for Amuro.

Amuro is still out in the wastes. Ramba Ral is getting desperate as his supplies dwindle. The desert is hard on all of us. Today? Two decisive battles for the fate of the White Base, and one sad fallen war hero. RIP <redacted>!

We round the halfway point of Gundam today as the White Base takes a beating, Ryu won't stay in bed, Bright won't get out of bed, Amuro needs to think with his head, and we lose a beautiful boy to the horrors of war.

Callooh, callay, tis time for Odessa Day!

'Twas brillig, when Amuro wabe, 

and Matilda mimsied to the grave. 

The Doms galumphed to M'quve's groan,

and the H-bomb tittered the whole way home.

With Odessa behind us the White Base takes some time to rest and repair. But everyone's favorite boy is here and ready to take center stage. That's right: Kai steps up and gets an episode about him! Oh also Char's back, I guess.

After spending approximately three weeks on travelling to the Battle of Odessa in five days time, the White Base now is able to cross the Atlantic in a single episode and we're able to say goodbye to multiple doomed characters in a single 30 minute podcast. The fits and starts of Gundam are the fits and starts of war, and while love might not bloom on a battlefield, it can certainly reap the most bitter of harvests.

Space, the war-torn frontier. These are the voyages of the 13th Autonomous Corps of the Tianem Fleet. It's urgent mission: to provide a decoy against Zeon attack, to seek out Zeon bases and destroy installations, to courageously battle with no hope of winning.

The White Base takes a lickin' and keeps on kickin', Amuro learns that tragedies can take all sorts of forms, and Mirai takes center stage as the Gundam crew arrive at Side 6 for a variety of misadventures. Also, the race is on for which side will figure out the sordid past of the blonde siblings first as both Sayla and Char start dropping one too many hints that more is going on than they've ever let on.

What is a final goodbye if it falls of deaf ears? What is bravery in the face of hard vacuum? What is a single mobile suit piloted by a single boy in the face of galactic war? None of these questions will be answered today, but everyone will suffer under the burden of them. Such is the way of life. Such is the way of Gundam.

Endless twilight had spread this blight
Deep in the heart of texas.
The clouded sky all our crops die
Deep in the heart of texas.
The oncoming doom as the cannons boom
Deep in the heart of texas.
Reminds me of - the one I love
Deep in the heart of texas.
The engine scream and children dream
Deep in the heart of texas.
The bison roam we lose our home
Deep in the heart of texas.
The hard vacuum comes all too soon
Deep in the heart of texas.
The soldiers fight in endless night
Deep in the heart of texas.

Newtype (n(y)o͞o taɪp)

noun 

1. A hypothetical evolutionary subcategory of human brought to light under immense pressures, defined by extra-natural mental or physical performance. 

"We studied the newtypes until our computers could no longer measure their results."

Verb

1. (Slang) When you get a new phone and it doesn't know how to correct your mistakes. 

"Sorry, im newtyping here mi phone broke"

Please click this link for an important video supplement!

What is fate in the great sea of stars? What is destiny when all of humanity shrinks its focus to a single point in time along the great waves of history? As all forces are marshalled for the battle to decide the fate of the whole of us, we look to two children adrift between the moon and the earth, our hope and our fears, our future rushing towards us.

Here, after a whole year of fighting, two men stand facing on the edge of history, so close yet so far in their tragic fight against special boys in special robots becoming the totality of human existence. How little they know there are four decades of this yet to come. But there is yet hope, in the dying of the war, in the flames of battle, there is one yet brave enough to proclaim the truth: the robots don't need legs in space.

Welcome to The Great Gundam Project! This is a podcast where Jackson and Em, hosts of Abnormal Mapping, watch two episodes of Gundam every week, until they catch up. They started this journey in 2017, and are recording this short episode from the future of 2020 to provide a little context to those that might be starting this journey now.

We are releasing the first season - that’s 21 podcasts covering Mobile Suit Gundam (1979) - for free! The podcast itself and the entire 160 episode+ backlog is avaliable at patreon.com/abnormalmapping for only $1 a month (that’s $12 for 50 new episodes!). But if you’re new and perhaps haven’t even watched Gundam yet, you can dip your toe in the water for free! I hope you enjoy the podcast, and I hope you continue with us on this anime journey.