Mobile Suit Gundam SEED: Freedom

 Finally I could watch the newest Gundam movie that came out end of january, and went to break some anime related box office records in Japan.

So time to sit back and enjoy more Kira, Athrun, the Freedom gundam and of course, LUNAMARIA HAWKE.

Taking place a few years after the events of SEED Destiny, Lacus has founded COMPASS, an organisation tasked with opposing independant resistance groups, Blue Cosmos, and other threats.  Kira and his friends intervene on their behalf as the armed force of the organisation, with updated Gundams and mobile suits at their disposal.  

And it immediatly begins with an intervention against Blue Cosmos, showing that Shinn and Kira now work together.  And Shinn now pilots the Justice of Athrun btw.  Now, while they try desperatly to stop all fighting, a new faction Foundation, is coming to the fore.  Originally followers of the Destiny plan, they want to open to the world but secretly plot to still impose the plan.  Genetically enhanced even beyond Coordinators, they reveal Lacus is actually one of them, and set a plan in motion to frame Kira for starting a war.  

 

COMPASS is soundly beaten, losing the Archangel and their mobile suits in the process, only to be saved at the last minute by Athrun and Orb.  They start forming a plan to stop Foundation, whom use Requiem, a giant orbital cannon, to annihilate Moscow, capital of Eurasia as a so called revenge for the faked nuclear attack they orchestrated to start the war.  Kira and his friends receive a gift from Orb, new and updated versions of the Strike Freedom, Destiny and Impulse for him, Shinn and LunaMaria.  They head into space aboard the Millenium, as their former friends and allies start to gather and the plan to liberate the world is set in motion.

 

In a gigantic (and awesome!!!) space battle, the heroes manage to break through the lines and Shinn destroys the Requiem array moments before it can fire on Orb, as Kira and Lacus confront the enemy and overcome them thanks to the newly formed Mighty Strike Freedom, an evolution of the Strike Freedom and a utility pack piloted by Lacus herself.

 

The movie is a great continuation of the Seed Destiny series, tying up a lot of loose ends while setting the stage for the next instalment (SEED Destiny Freedom).  It pays both hommage to the series with a lot of returning characters and mobile suits (even the Buster woohoo) while moving the story along with new equipment like the Millenium, whom replaces the destroyed Archangel as the main vessel they operate from.

 

I really enjoyed the whole film from the first to the final second, and considering it runs for 2 hours, that's a very, very good thing, even though I might have a bit of a personal bias as for me Seed has always been my favorite entry in the franchise...