Jun 14, 2021
*THIS IS A SPOILER FREE REVIEW*
As this franchise settled itself, us Gundam fans have had to come to terms with the fact that Universal Century Timeline anime can more often than not be lackluster in audiovisual presentation, which makes them fail to reach their full potential except for a few cases. Hathaway's Flash is one of the blessed children that achieved excellence.
Tomino is a visionary with near unparalelled thematic depth and ambitiously deep concepts, but the actual execution of such ideas properly has often been held back by the plot structure limitations set by Sunrise and Tomino's own flaws, such as his bad storyboarding and
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trademark stilted dialogue. Sometimes we get amazing looking and sounding Gundam UC shows like NT but without Tomino's vision they end up lacking substance and soul sometimes. In contrast, Hathaway's Flash is based on a Tomino novel but it is also adapted by people who are more competent with regards to direction and structure.
All of Tomino's messages and ideas can be evidenced in the bleak and almost dystopian world that Hathaway's Flash confronts us with, but everything is brought to life in such an expressive way that I couldn't believe it. The animation, direction, cinematography, pacing and music were absolutely exceptional. Both Sawano and Murase did a fantastic job, and the attention to detail was so good to see. The dialogue is still very much "tominoesque" at moments but it's definitely not as noticeable and jarring as in other installments.
All in all I just have no significant complaints, and my only frustration is that we have to wait for the next two movies since this one was baiscally all build up. This is certainly not as great as the legends like Zeta or CCA, but it's certainly up there with the greats and gives me hope that this franchise can go in a promising new direction.
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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