What, did you think it was a kind of cheesecake or something?
It kind of depresses me to think that, even 300 years from now, the Middle East is still going to be a huge hotbed for ethnic hatred and sectarian conflicts. Or, at least, that’s what Gundam 00 tells me. The episode prologue and the Amuro Ray-narrated chunk of exposition at the beginning of the episode were incredibly fascinating to me, from a projected-history standpoint. The whole episode being about Azadistan and the coup d’etat there just shows Mizushima Seiji at his best–i.e., pointing out that, yes, the MIddle East is a huge problem that is not going to go away without any effort. I don’t know if Mizushima plans to actually get all political and start taking snipes at current events, but the future world of 00 is, unfortunately, a fairly accurate representation of what the world might become. Of course, in ten years or so, all this may look as silly and outdated as Soviets in Gunbuster.
There was not as much Setsuna F. Seiei development as I would have liked, or hoped, but it looks like he’s getting his multi-episode arc to explain his past like Allelujah Haptism just had, so I’m assuming everyone moaning about Setsuna being an underdeveloped tool (he’s a guy, okay, he can’t grow breasts) will be shown exactly why Setsuna F. Seiei is an underdeveloped tool. In place of Setsuna development, however, was some nice scenes of Marina. I can’t help but feel sorry for the poor girl, she’s acting exactly like I would if I were head of state. If you ever needed a clear and concise reason as to why I shouldn’t be head of state, well, just look at her. She’s learning just how hard it is to juggle factions and still come out on top. The hard way. Still, she’s the most moe head of state since Sabe–err, I mean, Yulia Tymoshenko of the Ukraine left office. The woman has computer wallpaper of herself, that’s how moe she is.
00 has made it through half of its run, give or take half an episode. I only foresee good things for the future. Keep up the good work, Sunrise–and try not to have too bad a cliffhanger, okay?
Anime wa Bakuhatsu da! 
