Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn (eps 1-3) | The Gundam Retrospective 

Purely from a naming convention I'm glad I watched most of the franchise dubbed "FULL FRONTAL!!!" "QUATTRO VAGEEN!!!" "PLE TWELVE!!!"

The single best sound ever made for Gundam is the sound of the Beam Magnum. Also I think Unicorn wasn't to attract new people to Gundam, Unicorn was a love letter for old fans, Unicorn was "Hey thanks guys, here's to 30yrs of Gundam, lets do 30 more years".

Fun fact: There is I believe a kit text for the Jegan that implies the Jegan that did the best against the Kshatrya was involved in the Axis Shock incident 3 years prior and was probably one of the people involved in pushing the colony.

Assault on Torrington is one of the coolest things ever.

I'll answer your question: I never watched a UC gundam series before. I just decided to pick one and watch it on a whim, and unicorn has great animation and looked pretty cool. I was blown away. I fell in love with it immediately. I loved it so much that I overcame my fear of watching the original '78 anime because i wanted to know everyone's back story. Unicorn absolutely stands on its own. And it's so fascinating it will make you want to watch all of the UC.

Unicorn was my entry into UC timeline, then went back to watch all the original stuff before then watched it again and it hit me like a truck. My favourite Gundam series.

Yay! I love Daguza. The staff literally thought: "Lets make a menacing, capable special forces soldier with the most 'im a villain!' Anime character design points possible. Then make him the most understanding, open minded and compassionate...in a realistic way...person possible." Knowing a few elite soldiers and marines myself...it was a nice thing to see. Daguza is real...not a contradiction.

1. Rhidde's 2nd mobile suit isn't the rebuilt Hyakku Shiki. It's the Delta Plus. It's an amalgamation of the Hyakku Shiki & Zeta Gundam. The Delta Plus has the Zeta's waverider mode w/ most of the Hyakku Shiki's general mobile suit appearance 2. Marida Cruz, is in my top 3, of most well written Gundam characters. She's been through so much (backstory) & still has more character development (in series). 3. I made it to the end of your video!🎉

Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn was, hands down, the franchise's tough act to follow. The OVA that took all the best parts of the UC shows before them, amplified them, added in some new dynamics, and resulted in one of the best pieces of anime I've ever seen. These first three episodes did a perfect job of setting up the plot, characters, and stakes, ending by beginning Banagher's character growth of trying to reach out and not kill. It's genuinely good stuff, and the series only gets better from here, particularly in episode 5.

30:16 the reason he does this is so he can hit the head so the Unicorn can strike down the Sinanju easily, but the Sinanju has a second eye sensor (reveling that it actually a Gundam type)

I also love the fact that the ntd was originally built as the newtype detect system, and then repurosed when the federation joind into the uc project and repurposed the entire tbing to hunt down newtypes, adding the destroy system onto the detector.

Not gonna lie, Unicorn was what convinced me to finally give Gundam a fair shake and was the first series I stuck with till the end when it was still on Netflix. Until I saw 00, Unicorn was my #1 Gundam series. Though what probably did help was watching Des Shinta's Super Robot Wars V reviews that helped to fill in a fair chunk of the backstory of the Universal Century that lead into Unicorn. And yeah seeing Unicorn before 0079 really changed how the One Year War came across knowing that the Earth Federation are the actual fascist villains of the Universal Century and that was before they created the Titans and the event they engineered to create them in the first place. Now I never read the original Unicorn novels so knowing that Banagher was originally a Cyber Newtype does kind explain the flashbacks, though speaking of the novel and anime differences we'll get to two major changes next time, both of which were caused by the interference of Yoshiyuki Tomino. One is annoying, the other is just reinforcing his misogyny. Speaking of said change, we'll get into Riddhe and what a raving nut job he is.

As a ZZ fan who´s first gundam series was unicorn, i can say it deffinetly say it´s a cool experience to watch it completely blind, but it´s nicer to know everything beforehand.

Ironically, Unicorn is the first Gundam series I watched about a year ago, and it’s still one of my favorites to this day! I had no idea wtf was happening half the time, but it was still a great intro to the franchise and the expansive lore to the UC. Been a fan ever since.

The part of Unicorn I liked the most was its clarifying and recontextualizing the Universal Century into a more comprehensive and heavily political overarching narrative. It takes a very different dynamic from other Gundam, in Unicorn Banagher is a sort of scale on which the opposing sides weigh themselves upon and confess their sins to. From Banagher's perspective we see the shape of the era and gain more insight into why it became the way it did. Which had certainly been touched upon in other Gundam series and novels, but never quite crystalized into a narrative like this. When I first watched Unicorn I was going through University and really getting into history and political theories for the first time, it was something of a treat to have that feet under me going into it as the story went places. I really should read the light novels, some of the differences between the text and the anime seem pretty fascinating.

This was my first gundam series I ever watched in my first year of university. I dropped it and came back to it a few months later after a co-worker nudged me to try it again. Sure enough even tho it was my first gundam series I fell in love with Gundam and it made me wanna know all the lore and stuff they mentioned in the background and 4 years later I've seen all of gundam and built 4 gunpla. This for me is peak gundam

Gundam Unicorn was, I think, the first Gundam show I actually watched, rather than just generally knowing about. I basically had no idea what the hell anyone was talking about. Still, I can put up with a lot of confusion if there's sweet giant robot space battles.

The music from unicorn is amazing The frontal assault that plays when msn-06s sinanju attack the ship Just get the heart going

Easily my favourite Gundam series, largely due to the pacing. Zeta Gundam and ZZ have so many episodes with generic fights, random dialogue and 2 minutes of actual narrative. Operation Maelstrom should have been highly detailed and several episodes long. If Zeta and ZZ had a dozen hour long episodes instead of 40+ 20 minute episodes, the shows would have been way better.

I remember I mentioned what a strong ending Unicorn has in the 08th MS Team video. That was 10 months ago. What a wonderful wait this was.

The Unicorn is still one of my favorite mobile suits. I literally have 3 different versions of the PG (Final Battle, Phenex, Perfectibility) overlooking my desk at all times.

I started the first Mobile Suit Gundam around the time Unicorn was new. I had this crazy feeling that I somehow needed to watch all of the preceding entries before going there. Also the original Unicorn Theme was one of the first pieces of orchestral music I ever transcribed.

The series that got me into UC. I had only seen Wing, 00 and IBO before this one and wasn't aware of the UC timeline. After seeing this one, it inspire me to check the rest of UC and man, what an incredible experience it was

Watched Gundam Unicorn twice prior to watching other series. It took a lot of research to gather context. Watching after experiencing the rest of the UC is definitely rewarding.

I love Unicorn for 2 reasons: 1, it is genuinely good and I love the art style. 2. It was my introduction to musical god and lord on high: Sawano-san. God damn him.

I just watched episodes 1-3 earlier, and I really agree with the part that Unicorn is too dense with the amount of new things it introduced and and old things that it referenced it's almost overwhelming. But for someone who's consumed a ton of Gundam media since the second half of last year, this OVA felt like eating a very delicious cake. I love it for what it is, and kinda dislike for what it is, but I still love it. A guilty pleasure indeed.

As someone who didn't know anything about uc before this show, wow cool robot

Unicorn is by far my favorite gundam series, the DELTA PLUS is my favorite mobile suit, and Riddhe is my favorite gundam character

This was one of the first Gundam’s I ever watch and I am so happy I did. The animation and story were amazing and I like how the kept it short and sweet and didn’t drag it out

Thank you for another great episode of this Gundam retrospective series!

Brilliant video. This is truly the show that brought Gundam back for me.

Love ya channel bro, thanks for all the hard work also, love the AC2 music

I been being watching your videos as I get into Gundam. Sometimes I'll just replay the video. I'm so hype for this journey

I loved Unicorn. Great content as always my guy, keep it up.

been wainting for a new gundam video, lets go!

Despite protest from my friend, who had gotten me into gundam from 40k T'au lore to watching the entirety of IBO, I decided to give Unicorn a go despite having seen no other gundam series. I loved it. The mech designs and allusions to history made the show feel like it was set in a real world, a bit like Tolkien or in other stories with well fleshed out worlds. I went on to watch all of 00 to really see if this gundam thing was for me, loved it, then watched all of UC in chronological order. The 79 movies made the original series easier to binge, Zeta was incredible, ZZ was difficult at first, and 8th MS Team and Thunderbolt were stellar side stories. Getting back around to unicorn gave me a whole new look on the show, but I wanted to be clear that as a fan of "gundam" but with no experience of the UC, Unicorn is absolutely watchable. Origin is next, just need to find a free place to see it in HD with my UK IP address haha

Ayo youre looking pretty good in this episode. BTW I have been loving this series. Its definitely a reason im super into Gundam

Great review. You just gained a follower with a bunch of likes !

I really liked this part of Unicorn. I'm a new Gundam fan but I just watched Unicorn, doing a mostly chronological viewing of the UC (I did watch MSG 79 before Origin though). I did love how this part seemed to build up on everything we had before and I was actually surprised to see Mineva again after her last appearance in Zeta or ZZ. It makes sense this period serves as the end of the major Zeon faction storyline though.

Great breakdown. I recently bought the blu ray for this series. It’s one of my favorites in the franchise.

I don't know how you got thru those names without quitting in hysterical laughter but you've got more patience than me. Love these reviews, I've just recently gotten back into anime and these are a huge help. keep em coming

Love Unicorn tons! The mech designs and the weight of each is so cool! It would have been fantastic to have a 2 vid from ya, but that is quite a bit and big ask to have people stick around for the whole thing.

Its great to watch this while building the PG Unicorn. Found it unbuilt at a flee market for 150$!

The biggest slap in the face for us gundam fans when it comes to fan service is the "KIA" on a legendary character they show in this series.

I'm just saying you should totally do a review of Big-O. Really cool noir style mecha anime

Finally catching up on this vid for my favorite Gundam anime of all time.

Was holding my breathe until a new release thank god hahaha thanks for this

I have an interesting history with unicorn i watched this and found out that it was from the original UC timeline which led me to research it and found out that Gundam spanded from 1979 and shocked me the franchise was that old and them some time latter an official anime channel on RU-vid(i cant remember the name) had the original series on there and decided to watch it and absolutely loved it and made me a fall for the franchise so i thank unicorn for introducing me to UC which led to the events that made me an offcial gundam fan.

This is my favorite gundam/gundam show can’t wait for him to do it justice

I’ve been waiting for this to drop 😢

You hit the nail on the head my friend went from IBO to unicorn and was confused half the time I told him watching gundam 0079 zeta and double zeta would help he said no so I sent him here to watch your retrospectives

First 30 seconds of the video. Me to a tee. The end of the first movie with the transformation had me absolutely floored and ready for the next movies to follow.

Hey Retcon_404 that's why in 2016 a television rebroadcast as Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn RE:0096. This version break down these hour long episodes into 22 and had new reanimated scenes.

Unicorn is the ultimate slice of fanservice in the Gundam UC timeline which is why you shouldn't watch this series until you watch 0079,Zeta,ZZ(seriously don't sleep on this series),CCA plus Marida and Kshatriya is the best

This was my first UC show and I loved it! I have since watched 0079, Zeta, CCA, and am now watching ZZ to fill in the backstory. It is by far my favorite Gundam show, I think the focus on the deeper themes drew me in even though I didn’t understand the references.

Love your videos!

I saw it when it first came out. I really felt like the series hit the ground running; I wasn't fatigued by the dialogue. For some reason I stopped at epi 4 and never got back into it, I think it's high time I complete this series! Hearing your points justifies why I felt so highly about this series back then too.

I didn't know anything about Unicorn until after it was over and done with. My friend Joaquin told me about Gundam Unicorn and I dug into it and I think it was already finished so it took me awhile to watch this. And yeah I have to agree with you; this is one emotionally draining Gundam show. Oh there is so much information and some much drama that I was about ready to go to bed because I watched these episodes on Friday nights

Gundam unicorn was technically the first gundam show i watched even though i did play some gundam video games before like sd gundam battle alliance. But after i watched gundam unicorn i was left spellbound to the gundam ip as a whole.

Love the videos

Love the use of Xenosaga battle music in the beginning of the vid

Weather wise, I can understand. I'm expreiencing the 1st heat wave of the summer season. (UGH!!) Can't wait for Gundam UC Part 2.

I wholeheartedly agree. Watching Unicorn in its entirety was mentally exhausting at times. The slightest thing that takes your attention away & you'll miss hella key details. The animation & fights still hold up to this day.

I started watching Gundam at the start of 2022, and watched the entire UC Timeline in chronological order, front to end. Including all the side OVAs. I'm so glad I took my time, because with all that buildup, Unicorn was in my opinion - Perfect.

I haven’t seen this show in a while and I have only seen it once. I remember like it but I found the story at time confusing but over all was pretty Good and the Gundam Unicorn suit kick ass and the music kick ass.

Re: 0096 (the tv rebroadcast) really fixed the pacing of the OVA and is alot easier to watch, same with Gundam the Origin tv rebroadcast

As a Die hard fan of the “Ghost in the shell” francise (have my own fan film in production), I actually watched my first complete GUNDAM series in 2007 ,the non-universal timeline series GUNDAM 00and the Trail Blazer series wrap up film. I have acquired/watched several movies from the Universal timeline Mobile suit Gundam Narrative Mobile suit Gundam Thunder bolt Bandit flower Mobile suit Gundam Hathaway Mobile suit Gundam origin VI rise of the red comet. So glad to have found Retcon’s channel to fill in the missing gaps in the history of the universal timeline without me having to hunt down all of those old episodes Myself!! 👍👍👍😁😁

Ill never forget trying to watch the Japanese in full and using my xbox live to rent a episode every few months/years when they released an episode. Can't wait for your thoughts on this interesting series.

Im going to just say, Gundam unicorn was the first universal century Gundam I watched. I had literally only seen ibo before it. And I LOVED unicorn. It's still one of my favorites to this day, and has only increased in rewatch value to me since I've seen all the other uc shows

I liked this series. Saw it after ibo and didn't really care much for it as i was still new to Gundam. Took my time. Saw other series then came back to it. Actually enjoyed it that time. Probably 3-5 favorite series behind 00 ibo and origins. Near to seed and the builder series

I'm glad you got this up, even deep-fried! Now PLEASE! Patreon! I want to give you money!

LETS GO NEW VID:D

I first watched Unicorn in 2014 and have absolutely no idea of what is even going on. Rewatching it now, i realised i really didn't remember or understand the story at all but all the action scenes remains intact in my head and now i really appreciate the show for more than just flashy stuff going on scene. It's probably my favourite out of all the show.

Man, I really gotta go watch more Gundam.

Unicorn was the first Gundam show I watched from the UC timeline. I'm glad it's the first one I watched from that timeline.

I see those gunpla boxes... one of us, one of us... lol. So, I have some issues with the whole underlying idea of Laplace's Box and I do think Unicorn is up its own butt quite a bit. Maybe I'm just an extreme cynic but the idea of a "concept" changing interplanetary politics that much on its own seems so groanworthy considering how vulnerable to propaganda the human race generally is. Like, I can't even imagine or suspend my disbelief that anything could come out in the actual, real world that would make everyone go "oh, wow, so that's the actual truth huh? wow we were wrong. how could we be so stupid." Someone in power would have already thought to spin it and/or people would just ignore it. I do get that it's kind of an interesting idea and that people have fought and died for ideals before but ideals and philosophies can just be invented whole-cloth and don't even have to have any bearing on anything as long as someone with power or influence can make people passionate for their cause. Also I don't really love Newtype stuff. It's fine but the Unicorn as a mech and its time travel shenanigans are very overrated imo. But then again, I tend to unconsciously dislike popular stuff, which I think is kinda just being a knee-jerk hipster, but at least I'm aware of it. *goes back to building old model kits of suits no one cared about*

This series is how I jumped into UC and it remains my favorite. My reintroduction to Gundam was IBO which got me to bit the UC bullet. Before that I saw G Gundam on Toonami as it was airing but then SEED scared me away from Gundam for years with some of the heavy stuff in the later episodes. But back to Unicorn. The music is awsome, the mobie suit designs are some of my favorite and I love them more with every rewatch with the Unicorn itself in Unicorn mode being my all time favorite mech ever. Katoki is the man. I love Banager as a protag and Marida especialy after going back to watch ZZ. I loved Mineva as a total badass i her own right without ever having to be an action hero at all. Frontal is cool as hell and what I really appreciate about him is that he does a great job at presenting himself as this more pragmatic revolutionary than his more obviously insane predecessors while in reality being just as broken and spiteful and his plan in actuality is Zabi tier evil when you get down to it.

I was watching Gundam and thinking when would we see a new video from Retcon. Fun timing. I have Unicorn, but not gotten around to it yet, I’m still at Zeta which has taken me a good few months to get through

Its true that having knowledge of the UC till this point enhances the enjoyment of the show. But its absolutely unecessary

THIS IS MY FAVORIT GUNDAM

This show turns Mineva Sabi into a fantastic character, and easily one of my favourites.

I went into unicorn having only seen maybe 10 eps of the original gundam as far as uc content... But I had like... Religiously read the wiki... I didn't catch or understand EVERYTHING but I got the gist of most of it... And adored every second of it...

I like this video. Make more please

I actually did enjoy binge watching Unicorn (OVA) last year, but also I watched the dub so long dialogue stretches were probably less draining to keep up with.

I started UC with Unicorn and If I enjoyed it alot. its one of my favorite entires in the franchise and its got one of my favorite mobile suits the delta plus

Regarding Audrey falling in the colony; freefall and floating in space should feel similar/identical, so given that she grew up in space, it probably isn't that jarring for her. Not sure if her relative nonchalance is intentionally due to that fact.

Considering how Anaheim has always sold to the highest bidder, regardless of faction, morality or ethics, ironically enough, they might well be the most unbiased history teachers in the UC, since they have no personal stake in making any of the warring factions look particularly good or bad.

I would normally save this for a walk, I am not taking the chance of missing this.

I know the story can work no matter what kind of Newtype Banager is, but I personally like him being a cyber Newtype, if only for the fact it means we get a Cyber Newtype who gets a happy ending

The delta plus isn’t a rebuilt Shiki. Basically before Zeta Gundam the federation was still toying with transformable Gundam and they developed the Delta Gundam, but though simulations it was deemed unstable, the idea was reworked into the Hyaku Shiki. only until they captured a Gundam MK II and reversed engineered its Movable frame did they figure out how to make a stable transformable Gundam, then they went back to the original Delta Gundam plans and made the Zeta Gundam. Some time after Zeta Gundam they went back to the Delta Gundam plans again and make the Delta plus

did you get a haircut man or did you just have it under the hat? Nice video man! i myself am not the biggest unicorn fan but its been awile so a rewacth is in order

I was just thinking of this series. Witch from Mercury just wrapped and had a rushed ending that relied on hand wave magic (is the main criticism going around). A lot of folks pointed to Unicorn as their first go around with this sort of ending and I've never seen it.

How well does that crapifying static snow effect work to please the copyright minders? I've seen very few people do it. It seems like a pretty smart way to go about using clips, but I wonder how well it works

It's Banana! His name is Banana! Also, they're the Sleeves because they are the fringe remnants of Zeon. Just like on a shirt where sleeves are the smallest, furthest portion of cloth from the main part of the clothing, the Sleeves are the tiniest portion of Zeon Remnants. I guess it's also because most zeon remnants are part of Mars Zeon, Oldsmobile or not.

Jokes on you I 100% would of sat here watching a 2 hour long video on gundam unicorn

Hey, Ridde's Mobile Suit isn't the Hyakku Shiki. It's a development of the Original plan for it (the Delta Gundam) called the Zeta Plus

Sometimes, I think about the fact that there's an IRL Anaheim Electronics.

The first UC series i watched and the one that made me deep dive into it Still unable to watch ZZ and earlier gundam though. It looks so rough

Another quick correction: the Zeta Gundam has the BIOSENSOR. The Biocomputer is in the Gundam F-91 and works almost like the complete opposite of the Biosensor. Where as the Biosensor is essentially like the Psycommu taking the pilot input to assist with the Gundam's controls, the Biocomputer works sort of like the ZERO System where it takes the information from its surroundings and directly feeds the information into the pilot's mind.

I know I've commented on this before, but the utter butchery of Gundam names is part of the charm of the Gundam Retrospective series. And it works, really, because Gundam names are some of the wackiest shit out there. Seriously. Ramba Ral? Bright Noa? Kamille Bidan? Kakricon Cacooler? Quattro Bajeena? Quatre Raberba Winner? Rau La Cruset? Bring Stabbity? What do you have to seed a name generator with to get this stuff?