Mobile Suit Gundam: Requiem For Vengeance Review

 

Synopsis: 
Set during the latter months of the One Year War, this entirely CGI-animated mini-series tells the story of the renowned Red Wolf Squadron, an elite platoon of Zeon soldiers. Deployed in Eastern Europe and tasked with recapturing a key military base, the Red Wolves encounter the Earth Federation's terrifying secret weapon, the state-of-the-art mobile suit known as the Gundam. The Wolves' seemingly standard operation quickly becomes a prolonged fight for survival against the "White Devil", with Commander Iria Solari struggling to balance her duty, her personal demons, and the lives of her loyal men.

Release Date:
2024

Episodes:
6

Timeline:
UC 0079

My Grade:
C+

After the terrible Mobile Suit Gundam: MS IGLOO released back in the mid-late 2000s, the idea of another CGI-animated Gundam series initially sounded dubious at best. However, with the advancement of computer animation technology in the ensuing 15+ years, the possibility of a quality CGI release seemed at least plausible. Visuals from the trailers for the new Netflix mini-series looked promising and the idea of using Epic Games' Unreal Engine 5 was an interesting concept. So how did Mobile Suit Gundam: Requiem For Vengeance turn out? Ok...I guess?

The premise of the story is simple and straightforward: we see a narrow slice of the One-Year War from the perspective of Zeon soldiers who are vastly outclassed by the new state-of-the-art Gundam. There's not a lot of depth here overall, but the characters feel surprisingly real, especially our heroine Iria Solari, as well as a select few supporting roles. For what it is, I think this is a decent enough narrative revolving around the horrors of war, and in particular, how ordinary people are changed into killers.

That said, the plot does diverge from the core Gundam story we're all familiar with - the mobile suit here is not THE Gundam, but seemingly an alternate retelling of its wartime appearances, which may leave some viewers divided or confused.

Really though, the gimmick here is the CGI animation. Requiem For Vengeance is certainly a massive step forward from what I previously described as the crude, PS2-era cut-scene animation in MS IGLOO. As expected, the effects are particularly well-realized in the mobile suits and other mecha, with a level of detail and weight previously unrealized in traditional animation.

Where the CGI still falls short, however, is in the rendering of anything organic, notably the human characters. There's still an uncanny valley effect here, which is amped up by the exaggerated motion capture work. Moreover, though Requiem For Vengeance was apparently animated first and foremost for the English language version (in this case the Japanese track is the dub), there are many puzzling instances in which the lip flap doesn't match the vocalizations.

Some exceptionally poor, almost cartoonish voiceover performances further mar what could have been a good, if not mind-blowing, mini-series. As they say, the devil's in the details, and the details here are what prevent a solid creative and technological foundation from becoming anything greater. Requiem For Vengeance is certainly worth a watch for Gundam fans, but will likely be forgotten about in the long run.