For western audiences, Nineties Gundam can largely be outlined by one sequence: Gundam Wing, the sixth main entry within the franchise, and the one that will set the stage for the mecha series’ rise within the west via its landmark broadcast run on Cartoon Community in 2000. However only a yr after Wing aired in Japan, Gundam returned with an entire new sequence—one that usually flies below the radar as one of many sequence’ most intriguing additions.
After Battle Gundam X first broadcast in Japan in 1996, and is now, exterior of Blu-ray releases just a few years in the past, lastly making its worldwide streaming debut for free on Tubi this month. Set in what was on the time Gundam‘s third alternate timeline—i.e, not being a part of the “Common Century” continuity that the primary 4 Gundam sequence have been all a part of—after Wing and its predecessor G Gundam, Gundam X picks up a decade and a half after a lethal interstellar conflict has ravaged the Earth and its house colonies. Following a younger scavenger named Garrod Ran, one among many survivors eking a residing by scavenging and repairing remnant mobile suits from the conflict’s aftermath, Garrod discovers the titular Gundam X and crosses paths with the crew of the battleship Freeden and wrapped up of their goals to safeguard a handful of Newtypes, advanced people who’ve developed enhanced notion from residing in house, from being exploited by varied emergent factions trying to thrust the Earth Sphere into interstellar battle as soon as extra.
Whereas Gundam‘s prior alternate universes in Wing and G Gundam solely carried unfastened parallels to the framework of the worldbuilding of the Common Century—largely within the type of battle between Earth and house colonies, and, after all, large mecha—Gundam X was the primary of the alternate universes to essentially explicitly grapple with one among Gundam‘s most fascinating concepts within the type of Newtypes, each in taking the literal title (different AU Gundam exhibits have explored the idea via completely different lenses and names, after all) for these enhanced people and in addition in inspecting their place on the earth past their exploitation as belongings of conflict. Though on the time Gundam X had combined reception—it ran for simply 39 episodes, truncated from a deliberate 49, and was in the end overshadowed within the west solely by the success of Gundam Wing, by no means receiving an English-language dub—in years because it’s been re-examined and appreciated for its place in the wider oeuvre of Gundam‘s alternate timelines.
Of the trifecta of ’90s Gundam AUs (placing apart X‘s direct successor, 1999’s anniversary sequence Flip A Gundam, a sequence that, whereas in its personal continuity, largely performs with concepts connecting itself to the unique timeline and the broader Gundam franchise), it’s the one which’s arguably essentially the most in dialog with the unique Cell Swimsuit Gundam and its own direct successors in Zeta and Double Zeta. It’s effectively price trying out, particularly as Tubi’s free—and hopefully an indication that, even when lots of Gundam‘s large hitters are all at the moment touchdown on different streaming houses, we might see just a few extra entries from the franchise get a highlight on Tubi too (the aforementioned Flip A, a franchise spotlight, is in determined want of a streaming dwelling!).
You possibly can try After Battle Gundam X on Tubi here.
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