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∀ガンダム
30
5
Finished
Jun 26, 1999 to Mar 26, 2002
6.5/10
Average Review Score
50%
Recommend It
2
Reviews Worldwide
Being an adaptation of the Turn A Gundam anime, this manga follows roughly the same plot. I say “roughly” because it skips a lot of stuff from the original in order to get through to the end in only 5 volumes. I imagine this would make the manga quite confusing to someone who has not seen the anime because it skips over many important events and pieces of dialogue that explain the reasoning behind the things that they did include. This makes it jarring at times and it seems to jump around frequently in terms of character development and setting. The art is definitely this manga’ssaving grace, with its clean linework and detailing that make the mobile suits and other machines pop. It also remains reasonably faithful to the original in its art style for character faces and clothing designs, which is a positive. That being said, I did feel like Loran Cehack and Guin Rhineford could have been drawn with a bit darker skin to be more accurate, but that’s a minor nitpick. The cast of characters is the same, but the characters themselves can feel a bit wishy-washy due to the ultra-fast pacing of the manga. This only adds to the confusion that one who has not seen the original may feel when reading it. This does not mean that the manga is unenjoyable though, and I found it to be entertaining enough. As a result, I do recommend this manga, but as more of a recap rather than a complete retelling.
Several hundred years have passed since the fierce battles using Mobile Suits throughout the universe. After many wars, earthlings forgot how to make developments in their own civilization. Some humans moved to the moon. For a very, very long time, they dreamed about returning to earth. When Planet Earth regained its standard of living to that of the days of the Industrial Revolution, Diana Soler, the Queen of the Moon entered into negotiations with the head of Planet Earth so that the Moon Race could return. She also secretly dispatched a reconnaissance troop to check the environmental and living conditions on Planet Earth. Rolland Seac came to Earth as part of the troop. Almost drowned in a river, he was saved by two beautiful sisters, Kiel and Sosie. After the accident, he started working for a mine, owned by the father of these sisters. He soon gets used to living on Planet Earth. Two years pass and the Moon Race who are becoming impatient with the slow negotiations takes action and forcefully tries to return to Earth. Flames engulf the streets. The "Turned 'A' Gundam" appears from the White Doll Ruins and Rolland finds himself riding it. He becomes the savior of Planet Earth. Rolland's struggle to avoid war between the Moon and Planet Earth begins.
This is doing everything the Anime fails at right! It's taking the basic setting, plot and story elements and fleshing them out, also changing what didn't work in the anime. It fixes the pacing, gets rid of most of the side cast only taking up screentime and which didn't have any meaningful character arcs and even gives some characters like Poe a real motivation and developing a character arc for her. Finally it also recognizes how terrible the villains were written in the Anime and how much pointless bloat with fights the Anime had, which never amounted to anything. It even fixes the ridiculously cheesy childishending by turning it into a bittersweet one. Read this if you think the anime is good, also read this if you think it's bad. And even read this if you just want to read a mecha manga you haven't heard of before. The only case that I think you should not read this (yet) is if it's your first Gundam and or mecha story. Other than that this is highly recommended over the Anime!