I just watched the first episode of Turn A Gundam. A mecha podcast I follow, Giant Robot FM, recorded an episode on it. I hadn’t watched the series before I decided to pop in and at least watch the first episode. It was nothing like I was expecting.
I had heard the name before but knew nothing about the show. I’ve seen like tenish episodes of original Gundam, the first few of a couple other series, seen gunpla of a lot of mobile suits, and I’ve been watching the current series, Witch from Mercury. Gundam from what I’ve seen is giant robots fighting in space.
So, I was not prepared for the early 20th century-like setting the main character started wandering around in after landing from space. The flying wing blimp reset my expectations for this series hard. Later, airplanes that seem just past the biplane level of tech are referred to as being the latest models. And the cars are boxy “just this side of Model Ts” vehicles. Where are the lasers and hover bikes and space war? I started questioning if I was watching the right anime. Maybe I was watching an episode of the Little Prince instead. But no, the mid episode eyecatch proudly declared I was watching Gundam.
Toward the end of the episode some allusions are made to what the situation is but there is still a lot that’s unclear. While I am desperate to know what is going on I like that the characters aren’t “as you know”ing at each other. Also no robots, giant or otherwise, show up in this first episode but I’m not disappointed because of how interested I am in learning more about this world.
I original watched this just so I could listen to that one podcast episode but I am compelled by my curiosity to keep watching.