Gundamette

So, here I am watching the original Gundam series and I'm at the part where Amuro and his mother have some weird emotional shit going on. Firstly, this series is making me feel too much, and relating to that, I need to call my mom and let her know that I appreciate everything she's done for me. Secondly, it's making me wonder what the role of the feminine is in Gundam. I'm gonna start pointing out bits as they show up, but from what I've seen through sleep clouded eyes, the female characters generally have a more emotional perspective on events.
In episode 13v2 released by Zeonic Corps (Let's just say I saw the episodes at a friend's house, and didn't know they were pirated at the time. Upon hearing that they were pirated, I ripped out my own eyes and wept bloody tears), there is a scene where Amuro Ray shoots a Zeon soldier through his blanket in front of his mother. In the scene, two Zeon soldiers enter a communal dwelling, ordering everyone to freeze. Upon entry, one of the soldiers tries to get information about the Core Fighter sighting from a child, who refuses to give the information and tells them that he'd, "like his mom and dad back". Cue some beeping from Amuro's communicator watch, which attracts the attention of the Zeon soldiers. They approach him, and he shoots the one in front. Now, Amuro's mother's reaction is poor to say the least. She reacts initially in horror, openly questions his actions and laments what he's become. During her reaction, she asks herself "is this because his father raised him?". Looking through the scene step by step, one can notice several things. Firstly, the stage of resistance against Zeon is so obviously important that a child can clearly see the correct course of action, even in the face of chocolate. Secondly, there is a situation that somewhat clearly sets mortality as a highly probable consequence for either side. Thirdly, his mother experiences a major disconnect from her son because of the violence he's done. In the anime, his mother does not point out the possibility that the people hiding Amuro will be put in danger by his violence, but she points out that he has hurt/killed/attempted to kill men with families. In this situation, unless you were to add in the consequences of future retaliatory attacks(still haven't finished the series), violence is necessary for Amuro's survival and is almost forgivable. His mother's reaction might be realistic, but it's an odd inclusion for an action cartoon. It turns something that could classically be portrayed as a John-Wayne-style-good-guy-move(fuck it. hyphens, right? also, fuck it, bad guys aren't people, right?) into something morally questionable. By doing this, it brings his morality into question. Without really developing closure to this event, the episode goes on to end with his mother sobbing as he rejoins the White Base to continue his war against Zeon. His mother represents a much more sympathetic and human view of the world, and fulfills the cliche of women being emotional creatures. I'd be curious to take a second look at the anime with a more critical eye and some feminist glasses. It seems like it could be fun because this is such a classic boy's/shonen(shounen? am i a misspelling-culture-appropriating-shitlord-miso-gynist?(hyphy-vaguely-racist-punnery(hyphy-hyphens(more parentheses than a lisp file)))) anime, and it's so far removed from the feminist critique/academia/circlejerk.
In any case, while I've decided to do slightly(really slightly) less rambling in this post, the formatting is painful. For being an action anime about war, Gundam has a pretty strong anti war message. I'd expect that from the modern Gundam series, since everybody's a peacenik these days. I guess it makes sense though, given the time period that it was released in, and the scars Japan had from WW2. It's a terrific series though so far, and I'm having a blast watching it, even if my life is burning down all around me.