Gargantia
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You are currently reading a thread in /m/ - Mecha
You are currently reading a thread in /m/ - Mecha
So who else watched this? I'd like to hear from people that actually liked it, cause for the life of me I couldn't enjoy this show.
I respect it for all the shit it tried to pull off, like effectively making it a real and super robot series, and setting up the main character's conflict well. However, it all felt really cheesy and lame to me. It was like watching a slice of life anime with some robot action sprinkled in every couple episodes. Maybe I'm biased towards mecha series that are toy commercials with fights every episode, but dammit I want to see robots fight when I watch a robot anime!
Best character: Chamber
I enjoyed it, but I can certainly understand why people might not like it. I actually wish it was longer so that the world and conflicts could have been fleshed out more.
Also you have to wonder about any anime that can be described as Gunbuster meets Waterworld.
>>14418163
>Gunbuster meets Waterworld
How do you figure?
>>14418117
>It was like watching a slice of life anime with some robot action sprinkled in every couple episodes
Well that's pretty much what it was for most of the series. I see it as mostly about Leto coming to terms with the fact that he didn't have to spend his entire life waging war and whatnot and if that's not your cup of tea then that's fine.
>Best character: Chamber
No contest.
/m/ is probably gonna roast me about this again, but I love Gargantia too much to make my glowing admiration for it go unsaid.
I love Gargantia. Like, a lot. To me, it's an excellent modern adaptation of the dystopian/utopian genre of fiction that so many popular franchises just get wrong today.
You've got Ledo, the archetypical protagonist of the genre, who falls out of his society into the utopia that is Gargantia. Through his interactions with this new world, he grows to realize some of the dystopian ways he was brought up in, and ultimately grows as a human being, choosing to live life as his own person instead of being a part in a war machine.
You've got motherfucking Chamber, who is one of if not THE best written AI characters of modern science fiction. He goes through his own character development, but it's subtle, and follows its own rules which are distinctly foreign from a human's development. Chamber develops his own wants and desires, and I could spend far more time than I care to tonight dissecting his actions in the final episode, how he clearly encounters logical blocks in his programming and works out a loophole to arrive at a conclusion that allows him to best help Ledo. And more than that, he's a concept at the end that we really don't see any of in science-fiction: the idea that a malfunctioning AI acting outside the bounds of its programming doesn't need to be an enemy to humanity. He can be a total fucking bro. That's just not something that I've ever seen before. Far too often, fiction depicts malfunctioning AIs as being hostile to humanity, but I personally feel that concept to be tired, and awfully lacking in faith when it comes to our mechanical friends. If we're good to them, and grow alongside them, and regard them as our partners, why wouldn't they do as Chamber did and choose to be good to us in turn?
I could rattle on and on about this but I've done it before, and I'll probably do it again.
>>14418117
It was clever. So many mecha series start out with just some civilian getting caught up in a massive war and sequence of events ever expanding in their gravitas. By the end of the series they're trying to save the whole world or some shit. In this it was just the opposite, with the protagonist starting out a solider in an interstellar war learning to live a simple civilian life and regain his humanity.
Gargantia was great because while many mecha series try to go big, this one went small. In the process it allowed the characters and the world events to become introspective, and contemplative. Because it wasn't a race to bigger and bigger events it was able to take it's time.
On top of that great central idea it had many other clever ones that made the world so engaging and real. The real thing that makes the series stand out is Chamber though. He is probably the best written AI character I have ever seen. Most people picture artificial intelligence to be like ritualized human intelligence, but this show really understood that's not the case at all. It's logic would only be an extension of it's programming, but that doesn't mean it wouldn't have free will to a degree.
So yeah. Great series. Love this show.
It does everything Fafner does worse.
Why would I watch it or recommend anyone watching it?
>>14418366
It doesn't have THE FACE
>>14418459
So? Only babies get upset by Hirai face.
>>14418290
>>14418240
I like how the people who like this show are this stupid.
>>14418492
>>14418487
>>14418366
People can tell the samefagging and falseflagging pretty easily this early into a thread, you know.
>>14418498
Sorry officer, but only two of those post are mine, and one of those is a direct response to my first.
Nice victim complex to assume I think you're stupid because you like this show, not just that I think Gargantia is an inferior product carried by Brand Name Recognition more than it's own content.
I can see where your complaints are coming from. I mean, sure, I did enjoy it and all that but it's not perfect. Still a fun watch.
No contest that Chamber's the fucking best though.
OP here, after some time to think about it, I've figured out what would make this series more enjoyable to me. The biggest turn off was the amount of hokey bullshit they did on the Gargantia floatilla. If they had wasted less time having cookouts and got into the moral implications of fighting the Hideauze earlier it would have been more engaging seeing our mc grapple with that the whole time, and come to see humanity differently in light of that instead of after the fact. Also, as much as I like loli's, with what this show was trying to do it didn't need to weigh itself down with annoying child characters, especially as a primary love interest. If they had even just made Bellows the main chick I think it would have worked better. The themes of the series are just too mature for the characters they use to portray them.
>>14418509
>Brand Name Recognition
Are you referring to Urobuchi?
>>14418117
>It was like watching a slice of life anime with some robot action sprinkled in every couple episodes.
I was personally okay with that, but then again, I was okay with all the slice of life shenanigans they had in Turn A Gundam, so I'm probably the minority when it comes to what people want in mecha anime.
The post-apocalyptic world building was also a personal highlight for me as well.
>Best character: Chamber
No disagreements there.
Overall, I can recognize that there are issues that may prevent people from enjoying the series and frankly, if you find you can't enjoy it, then that's fine. No doubt there are other series out there that would fit your groove better.
>>14418874
Thank you for warning me about Turn A
>>14418904
??? You're welcome? Seems that a show like Getter Robo or Gurren Lagann would fit your bill better if robot action is what you ask from a mecha series.
>>14418914
Those still might not have enough action for him.
A/Z is probably more his style.
I liked it. There are shows built around the robot-fight-per-episode formula that do it well, but it's refreshing to see giant robots as a natural part of a larger sci-fi setting.
It was just the right length, everyone completed their character arcs, and the themes wrapped up coherently. No one is going to call it the greatest anime ever but it was well put together and entirely satisfying to watch.
>>14418621
>The biggest turn off was the amount of hokey bullshit they did on the Gargantia floatilla.
What? No. The man out of place/time in a slice of life situation is a a classic sci-fi trope. Speculative culture clash like that is one of the best things about the genre. If anything it went to shit after the Hideauze reveal cause it just turned into another animu war is bad situation.
>>14419361
>Speculative culture clash
This doesn't work well here because the space nazis basically have no culture and the gargantians are fucking retarded.
I still can't get over how they charge rent to the alien superweapon that can obliterate the entirety of earth humanity. That's some n-dimensional level of retardation.
>>14418240
>who falls out of his society into the utopia that is Gargantia.
u wot m8?
>>14418117
Great setting and characters but the actual story was very underwhelming.
