‘Mobile Suit Gundam Hathaway’ Review- Ghosts Still Haunt The UC

 Taken place in the Universal Century timeline, ‘Mobile Suit Gundam Hathaway‘ is an anime film directed by Shuko Murase. It was produced by Sunrise and released in the United States through Netflix. It is the start of a new Gundam trilogy.

In the year UC 105, twelve years after Neo Zeon War, the Earth is plagued by attacks from Mafty, a terrorist group trying to force humans from evacuating the Earth. A passenger vessel is hijacked from Mafty insurgents, but they are stopped by celebrated pilot Hathaway Noa (Caleb Yen) and Earth Federation military Captain Kenneth Sleg (Aaron Philips). They both pique the interest of a young woman on the trip Gigi Andalucia (Megan Shipman). She deduces that Noa is, in fact, the Mafty leader, which is why he stopped the hostage situation, they were not Mafty, but a splinter group. Though he denies this, he secretly meets with Mafty agents to escape the city, sending him and his Xi Gundam on a collision course with Penelope Gundam and its pilot Lane Aim (Kieran Walton).

First off, the movie has a ton of fan service. They consistently mention the actions of Char and the early days of the First Gundam. They even manage to get in a few references to Gundam Z into the dialogue. They were well-placed and made to give context to the era that the film takes place in and I thought it came off well.

The animation is also excellent. I will admit, I thought the Penelope and the Xi looked a little too round, but that is my own nitpicking ways, I suppose. Outside of that, I thought the illustrations and character designs were very cool, plus the climatic battle reminds us why we like Gundam films.

As for the plot, I thought it was interesting and very good. They weave in those classic themes of war, innocence, love, hatred, and how lives are impacted by violence. I also found the characters very interesting and that the dynamic of Hathaway and Captain Sleg to be a nice developing rivalry. I hope Sleg gets his own Gundam unit to battle each other as I did not think Lane was an adequate rivalry or at least give him more development outside of being a punk.

Bottom line, Mobile Suit Gundam Hathaway is a fine continuation of the Universal Century saga and I cannot wait for its sequels to bring the trilogy to fruition.