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Gundam Build Fighters Try
Episode 8

by Lauren Orsini,

This episode gave us a full house of features—no less than three different Gundam Build Fights, tons of interpersonal drama, and screentime for every character we've met yet. But the undisputed star of Gundam Build Fighters Try episode eight was Gyanko.

Gyanko is bossy, overbearing, and utterly transparent. She goes for what she wants with her whole heart, and even if her methods are questionable, she can't help but be charming for her spirit. Like everyone else in this show, she's a major Gundam nerd. (Here's a bit of trivia: Gyanko's team name, Song Dynasty Vase, is a reference to Mobile Suit Gundam's Zeon general M'Quve, who piloted the first Gyan and collected Chinese pottery.) Gyanko is larger than life, both in her battlefield presence and booming personality, but that strength isn't intimidating now that she's utterly crazy in love with Sekai.

Since only Sekai could fall for Gyanko's unbelievable guile, the pair end up at Many Burger, (slogan: “Such Fries!”), making a vow to defeat one another in the finals. Gyanko and Fumina are rivals for Sekai's love, but our spacey protagonist doesn't seem to have feelings either way. Why are so many girls in love with this short, angry redhead in the first place?

We're finally getting to a place in the plot where Gundam Build Fighters Try has an edge over its predecessor, and the potential to become even more interesting. The key relationships in Gundam Build Fighters were Sei and Reiji's bromance—I've always referred to the show as Gundam Best Friends, personally—and their conveniently available love interests, China and Aila. In Try, the drama is turned up to eleven, and it's hard to tell who is going to end up with who. Yuuma loves Mirai, but she doesn't feel the same way. Fumina and Gyanko love Sekai. Minato loves Fumina. With so many developed and passionate characters, there are lots of shipping possibilities, and as these character's relationships with one another evolve and change in a way that Sei and Reiji's weren't given the chance to do, Try could become an epic character drama.

If you're a diehard Gundam fan, you can't miss this episode's unmistakable fanservice. Minato's dream sequence at the very beginning featured more female Gundam characters than I could count, including Dorothy from Gundam Wing and Laura (actually Loran) from Turn A Gundam. More lasting than these cameos however, was the introduction of Akira Suga, a transfer student who is the spitting image of Mobile Suit Gundam's sideburned ladies' man Sleggar Law. Not only is “Suga” pronounced like Sleggar, but another character actually refers to him as “Sleggar” during the episode.

We can expect Suga to be similar to Ral-san: a reincarnation of a familiar character from the Mobile Suit Gundam universe who shares similar personality traits adapted to Try's modern day setting. Knowledge of Ramba Ral taught us that Ral-san would prefer to pilot a Gouf and that his ideal woman is Hamon, Ramba Ral's love interest. As a result, we can probably predict a few things from Suga based on our knowledge of Sleggar, like the fact that Sleggar piloted a support unit, the G-Fighter, and Suga pilots a similar model.

With so many older characters to choose from, it's great to see that Sunrise hasn't lost its touch and can still come up with personable, interesting characters like Gyanko. The battles took a backseat to Gyanko's one woman show this week, but I wouldn't call that a bad thing. Whether you love her or hate her, this episode makes it easy to sympathize with her plight.

Rating: A

Gundam Build Fighters Try is currently streaming on Gundam.info.

Lauren writes about anime and journalism at Otaku Journalist.


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