Gundam Build Fighters Try

Oh boy…I am not looking forward to this one. Last week I reviewed Gundam Build Fighters, and declared that absolutely loved it as a love letter to the Gundam franchise and every series before it. This time however…well, remember when I mentioned the two things that can happen when a series needs to sell toys? If not, a reiteration:

1: Toss it under the rug and not even try to give a reason for the story or even the series. Just make up shit as you go and sell it off to the kids for an extra 10 bucks.

2: Give a damn about the series and the legacy you’re carrying

Low and behold, as per the standard these days, a sequel series was created that did the opposite of its predecessor and took door number 1: Gundam Build Fighters Try.

This series is one of the worst cases of “Generation Xerox” I have ever seen before in my entire life. At least when Batman and Catwoman have a daughter, there’s at least an attempt to make her look different and not just a clo-

Okay, bad example. Point is: while Try has some potential to be great, it unfortunately could not live up to its previous season and falls flat on its ass.  Well, enough putdowns, let’s take a look into: Gundam Build Fighters Try

Story

Our series takes place 7 years into the future after the events of Build Fighters. At the end of that series, the mysterious source of the Plavsky Particle was exposed and destroyed, making Gunpla Battle impossible. However, Nil “The Early Genius” Yajima used his knowledge to bring Gunpla Battle back better than ever. However, in these past few years, a smaller tournament for <19 fighters began. The tournament required a team of three from different schools and academies across the country.

We follow the struggle of Fumina Hoshino, the president and only member of the Gunpla Battle Club. After all previous members have left or graduated, she struggles to find participants who shared her passion for Gunpla and fight in the team tournament. As luck would have it, her school receives a strange new transfer student: the hot-blooded, idiot hero Sekai Kamiki. After showing Sekai how amazing Gunpla Battle can be, Fumina goes on to recruit her childhood friend Yuuma Kousaka, but to no avail.

When the president of the Plastic Model Club attempts to shut the two down through a Gunpla Battle with Yuuma’s help, Sekai’s chosen Dom is destroyed during the battle. But amidst the flames, stands a new Gunpla; built by Sei Iori himself, Sekai comes out swinging with the Build Burning Gundam! During the battle, Yuuma remembers a promise he made to Fumina about going to the tournament with her. After throwing the match, he joins Sekai and Fumina in their quest to win the tournament. Couched by Mr. Ramba Ral himself, they join the tournament under their new name: Team Try Fighters!

Right off the bat, the story at least tries something different. Nils was established as some kind of genius, and it has been seven years, so I’m willing to let it slide that the Plavsky Particle is back. Hell, at least this time it’s a genuine scientific advancement instead of something magical, so it’s a plus. While I do prefer one-on-one battles, the concept of 3-on-3 adds a new dynamic so the audience from the previous series doesn’t get too bored out of its mind and newcomers can be intrigued on the idea alone.

The biggest part of where this series fails is the story’s core element: pacing. Ignoring the first season’s existence entirely, the pacing is just wretched. While at first, it starts off pretty well. Chracters are introduced, battles are fought and won, hooray. But, where this story fails is that it introduces these characters and then IMMIDIATELY puts them into the battles and throws them away. Hell, most of the characters we see beyond the main 3 are SHOWN, but we learn nothing about them besides just minor hints and glints. And what’s more, it takes the utterly STUPID Bleach approach and while we see these characters do stuff, we don’t learn anything about them until they’re getting their asses kicked.

The pacing of battles are immediately ruined when we have to spend five minutes of filler explaining the character and their motivations. You pace a great battle by either having the character’s motivations spilled out beforehand to hype it up, or do it afterward to feel the impact the fight had on the character. This gets ESPECIALLY worse in the main tournament when we meet some different teams and characters, but only get hearsay about them from other characters and not learn squat until the fight itself. The worst offenders are a team of triplets who’s only development comes from the leader of the team, and his backstory is given RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FIGHT. Even worse, the fight was split into two episodes and resolved before the halfway point. If you’re going to spend time making us feel sorry for these characters, then BUILD THEM UP, not slap it on at the last second.

This is another gigantic issue with this series: the fights themselves. While admittedly, Build Fighters had some super robot moments as per usual for Gundam series, there was at least an attempt to downplay it in favor of the characters and the WEIGHT of the battles themselves. I did think that it got ridiculous that Reiji could win with one super bunch or super laser, but it just gets foolish in Try. EVERYONE has their own little One-Hit-Kill super duper attack they name themselves and trounce any disbelief. Sekai is the worst offender of this, creating new super attacks completely out of nowhere with NO build up beyond his “fighting spirit”. He even creates some stupid shadow clone attack and NEVER uses it again. It’s a practical Chekov’s Gun: it was used, but never used or even MENTIONED again. They even do it again when Sekai learns how to stop his rival Wilfred’s ultimate attack.

Even then, there’s a romance subplot that unlike Build Fighters, doesn’t get resolved and is just played up for laughs. Call me a hopeless romantic, but what’s wrong with tying up the romantic subplots instead of just leaving them up in the air? Its tedious and repetitive.

Summary: the story had potential, but it just got absolutely wasted with horrible pacing and straight ass-pulling that makes me cringe.

Characters

This is where the aforementioned generation Xerox comes into play. Because of the absurd amount of characters because of the new team concept, I’ll only be going over our main ones this time around. Let’s dive right in and get this over with.

Fumina Hoshino: A middle school senior who brought in all the viewers with her casual clothing. She is a Gunpla fan at the bottom of her heart, strong-willed, and very creative in her Gunpla designs. I had thought she was going to be the main character in all of this (yes, it’s a show about “teams” but there has to be some kind of focus). But unfortunately, she was shoved aside for the “hot-blooded fighter” and the “cold and quiet professional”. Around the main tournament arc, her character is just…nowhere really. Her only focus by the end of the series is her rivalry with another female to succeed the famous Lady Kawaguchi, and that’s not even resolved by the end of the series. But, as I stated, her only real purpose was to pull in the fanservive with her casual outfit. Seriously, who would wear this outside of a damn gym?

Sekai Kamiki: Oh boy, this one’s gonna hurt…Sekai is one of my least favorite characters. He is a straight generation Xerox of Reiji; he’s even called “the second coming of Reiji” by Mr. Ral. I do find it somewhat unique that he’s a straight bare-fisted monk archetype fighting in this world of super lasers and all-range attack weapons, but then it just gets ridiculous with the ways he is able to ass pull most of his victories with some new technique of his martial arts school, Jigen Haoh Kenpo. He does serve a much more practical audience surrogate, as it’s established that his master often takes him on training trips around the country and away from society. He can function well, he’s just not overly book dumb about it. What’s more, he carries one of the worst offenses a character can have: everything is handed to him. He doesn’t build his Gunpla, it’s made by Sei and then upgraded by Yuuma. When it gets damaged, it’s repaired by someone else. Hell, he even gets handed THREE females after his dumb ass with no real explanation why they like him. Fumina is at least believable, Gyanko is exaggerated, but can at least be understood, but Shia…I just don’t see why she likes him beyond his Gunpla. That’s it. Even worse, he carries the typical “once I see it once, I can do it” trait. After a great and skilled builder shows him how to repair Gunpla, he instantly becomes an expert at it. The show TRIES to downgrade him a bit by having some stupid idea of “assimilation”; that the damage done to his Gunpla is reflected on to him. At first, it’s actually critical to a fight. When he gets slashed in the spine, he’s made useless. But it serves no other point in battles except when someone exploits it, and that’s just a waste of time. Honestly one of my least favorite anime characters of all time.

Yuuma Kousaka: the weirder caser of the Xerox clause. We met him before in the previous season, but he had brown hair like his sister China. But I guess the creators were so desperate for an Obelisk Blue to complete the color trio, they retconned that shit. Yuuma is played out as the professional of the group, wasting no time in trash talk and just focusing on the fight and his sniping. He is a far better character and more developed than his two cohorts. Outside of battle, he is just as quirky without it getting annoying with his crush on Sekai’s sister Mirai and his straight man routine. I will criticize that we learn that he stopped playing Gunpla Battle because of a humiliating loss to another Battler. When he sees that Battler again and finally gets the chance for payback? Nothing. No resolution whatsoever beyond a damn DRAW.

Mr. Ral: What have they done to you, Ral-san? Sigh, they reduced the best thing of the previous season to a pointless side-character who’s only purpose is to either talk about other fighters, teach the basics of Gundam lore, or make a small reference. The ONLY thing we get of the old Ral is his itching butt…once. At least he gets a badass scarf.

Minato Sakai: A rival builder of Yuuma from Osaka. THIS guy is by far my favorite character. He is pretty much this seasons Meijin Kawaguchi IF Meijin Kawaguchi was not already in it. This guy is just pure passion about Gunpla. Originally just a show builder, he takes it a personal insult when his rival keeps flip-flopping back and forth between building and battling halfheartedly. Hell, even the MEIJIN is scared of this guy when he builds not only a damn Megazord, but even a Gunpla/Doll mix of Fumina. This guy is just over-the-top and a joy to watch through and through.

Wilfred Kijima: Sekai's rival and the leader of Team Celestial Sphere. Not much to him and his team beyond their Gunpla designs. He's pretty much the top dog around the whole tournament and is the opposite to Sekai's "underdog". Then again, "underdog" implies Sekai had a good chance of losing...Wilfred is a bit of a battle nut, seeking someone worthy to be his rival. Nothing else beyond that.


Saga Adou: Yuuma's enemy. A pure blood knight merely looking for a great battle and willing to break his own body in order to do it. He's only fun to watch during fights but he's flat as a damn board.

Shia Kijima: Speaking of flat, its time for our loli bait. Shia is Fumina's rival in love and in battle to become the successor to Lady Kawaguchi, a female Meijin. She is only a decent character for comedy's sake between her, Fumina, and another girl named Gyanko and their struggles for Sekai's attention. Well, the show needed a loli and who else but a third romance option for Sekai? Yippie-skippy....

Production

The animation is a slight upgrade from the previous series. There was even the inclusion of CGI. And for once, NOT horrible CGI!

The Gunpla designs are rather standard and nothing really stands out from the previous season. There is at least the added bonus of NOT re-using any suits from the previous series which gets a cudos from me. However, I think the intent for selling toys got too obvious this time around with the sheer number of characters and customized kits. Hell, our characters each go through TWO mid-season upgrades, giving their kits 3 variations each and more to sell. A personal favorite design of mine this time around is the Denial Gundam purely for its uniqueness and 100% original design. Seriously; you try looking this thing up, there is NOTHING stating what other Gundam it was based on. And no, the Build Burning is not a 100% original design either, halfwit fan-nut-tards; it’s based on the Impulse Gundam, the primary suit of SEED Destiny, fitting in with Sei’s choice of the Strike being his suit so shut up.

My least favorite design has to be the damn Gunpla dragon they made out of SD Gundams. I do admit, I like the inclusion of some SD models into the series instead of just using them for the kawaii factor. However, Fumina’s badass-adorableness with her Star Winning Gundam is ruined when its transformation is lazily named “Real Mode”.

The music is actually pretty dull compared to its predecessor. No track stands out in its uniqueness or sound in anyway. Plus the theme was a bit “by-the-numbers” and standard. I will give this show credit that details were important…when they mattered. Early in the series, there was a character who used “Straight-Builds”; Gunpla built straight out of the box with no real detail added like the cleaning of nub marks or customized paint. When we get a close-up of said model, you can actually SEE the nub marks. Nice little touches like that are something true Gunpla builders can appreciate.

Fanwank

Nothing. Seriously. Beyond a few character and team names, there really is no absurd amount of fanwank this time around. The best we get is a character called Akira Suga; an exact clone of Sleggar Law from 0079. Luckily, the finale helps us out by giving us “finish your drink” variety of cameo in the form of Sekai’s teacher.

Conclusion

Short compared to my previous review, but that’s the problem with sequels. They try so hard to repeat what made they’re predecessor did to succeed that there’s really not much to talk about beyond the small things they improved on. That, or rap on the bad things.

But I don’t hate Try; I’m just disappointed in it. It was a sell-out start to finish, but it’s not a bad anime to throw on the TV when you’re looking for background noise to playing Zeonic Front. Bad is the last word I would use to describe it. If nothing else, it’s just sub-par.

The best way I can summarize this review: it’s like Dragon Ball Z. I mean that, too. Build Fighters is Dragon Ball and Fighters Try is Z; everything is on a grand scale now, the mighty journey from the previous series is now pretty easily accomplished, the battles are more grand scale but are reduced to firing the biggest laser than any actual combat techniques or tactics, pacing is reduced to garbage, and tiny nods are made to the previous show in passing mention but to no real accomplishment.

Overall, Build Fighters Try can be seen more as just filler for the eventual third season coming. Oh trust me; Gundam’s been around for almost 40 years; they’ve got plenty of room to re-release more models with custom parts.

If nothing else, it’s a good anime for newcomers. Old fans will tire of it quickly, as I did.

C+