Welcome to The 08th
MS Team rewatch! It must not have been hot enough in the jungle because the
08th MS Team moves to the desert in this episode. It’s still hot but at least
it’s not muggy. That’s a good thing, right? Things still get a little mushy though
as emotions rise high and the characters face the Apsalus once more.
Summary: Episode 06 “Battle Line in the Burning Sand”:
Original Airdate: December 18, 1996
English Airdate: July 30, 2001
The 08th Team is on a new mission. They’re trying to find
a Zeon testing ground for their new weapons in the hopes of finding the Apsalus
and terminating it. Thanks to Kiki’s connection with the locals, they get a tip
off as to the location of the testing ground. They find it in the desert.
Michel is operating the hover truck alone since Eledore is still as the medical
base. Michel is reading a letter from B. B. the mysterious women he’s been corresponding
with since the first episode. The letter must have had distressing news since
Michel is lost in thought and acts as if he’s distracted. He helps Shiro repair
his mobile suit which is malfunctioning and in doing so he nearly injures Shiro
because of his inattentiveness to the task at hand.
Karen and Sanders investigate a huge gash in the side of
a canyon. At the center of the gash there is a segment of melted glass that
follows along the length of a gash. It’s a sign of a large beam weapon which
literally melted the cliff side. They inform Shiro of their discovery and he
immediately suspects the Apsalus. They setup an ambush and test it out with a
remote control plane. The entire team keeps asking Michel to do things and he
gets irritated because he feels like he’s being treated like a child. They’re
not asking him to do things because they specifically want him to do them.
They’re simply asking Michel because he’s the one who’s operating the hover
truck. He’s easily irritated though and it’s starting to rub off on the rest of
the team.
They take a break and Michel begins to tell Karen about
what’s bothering him but then he changes his mind. They spend the night waiting
for the Apsalus and the next day, Kiki is in the hover truck with Michel when
she finds the latest letter from B. B. She starts to make fun of him but soon
stops because the letter gets serious. B. B. admits that she’s worried that
Michel will get injured or killed and she will stop receiving letters from him.
She can’t endure the uncertainty so she lets him know that it might be best for
them to stop corresponding.
With all this pent up emotion, Michel eventually lets it
out. Shiro learns that he’s been acting strangely because of a letter and he
scolds him for being so childish. A fight breaks out between then and Kiki
chimes in. They argue, quite literally, about love and war and it only ends
when Sanders steps in to put a stop to it. He tells Michel that he’ll be
piloting the hover truck from now on because it plays a crucial part in the
ambush and he can’t trust Michel right now.
Later they all think about what they said and some of
them question what they’re really doing in the war and about the people they
love. A song plays on the radio. It’s Eledore’s song and the whole teams relax
to its soothing melody. Michel apologizes to Shiro for his action and they make
peace. Michel has decided to keep trying to broadcast his feelings to B. B. and
to work hard with his team and not let anyone down.
The next day marks the appearance of the Apsalus. The
team jumps to action and they execute their plan to trap the Zeon weapon in the
canyon and blast it out of the air. Michel comes face to face with it and he
freezes. Shiro saves him but only serves to turn the attention on himself.
Unable to shake him off of the machine, Aina yells at Shiro through the radio.
He recognizes her voice and, caught off guard, Aina escapes in the Apsalus with
Shiro’s mobile suit still hanging on.
Commentary:
After two really good episodes this one might seem like a
bit of a letdown but it’s still pretty clearly a good episode. Like most good
episodes of any given Gundam series,
it’s equal parts character development and action piece. Part of the character
development and intrigue of the plot finds is rooted in events of previous
episodes. It works well that the characters takes previous events and reflect
on them. It’s interesting to see that they’re affected by what happens to them
because it contributes to the feeling of realism that’s a key element of what
make this a standout Gundam series.
Part of that realism was also evident in Shiro’s mobile
suit malfunctions. The left leg of his Gundam wasn’t working and he didn’t know
why but he took the time to stop and look at it with Michel. It ws just a
filter that got clogged up with sand but it made the leg stiff and difficult to
move. It was also nice to see that behind all the armoured platting there is an
actual machine. We don’t get many chances to look at the inner workings of a
Gundam and this just helps to remind the view that they’re man made creations
with multiple complex parts. I also enjoyed that Michel drove the hover truck
around the desert sand to erase the tracks made by the mobile suits.
Another way this episode adds to some of the realism is
the colouring. The colours looks faded and washed out as if everything’s been
sitting in the sun too long. It works well considering they’re in the desert.
The animators also produced and interesting thing with how everything looks as
though there is too much light bearing down. It contrasts quite a bit with the
jungle setting of other episodes but it works well.
Not everything works though. The fact that Michel is
still communicating with B. B. via actual letters is ridiculous. The events of
this story take place during the 79th year of the Universal Century which began
at the end of or slightly after the 21st century. There is no way that snail
mail has survived. It might seem silly to discuss realism in a Gundam TV series but there are so many
things we take for granted or that are quickly and easily explained, it’s nice
to see that someone has taken the time to add some depth to the world by having
the characters face such problems as clogged filters. When done well, it’s as
interesting to see those kinds of moments as it is to see beam rifles tearing
advanced machinery apart.
I couldn’t help but be curious is the mission to find the
Apsalus is an official mission. It likely is because the 08th Team likely
didn’t have difficulty proving that they’ve encountered the new Zeon weapon
before. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that everything that appears on the
pilot’s screens is recorded. If that’s the case, the Feds would have audio
visual proof of the Apsalus’s existence. It’s no difficult to believe that
their base commander would approve a mission to find and destroy the new
weapon. I think it also makes sense that the 08th Team is alone and doesn’t
have the support of another mobile suit team for a few reasons. The first is
that the Federation likely doesn’t have the resources to let more than one team
take on the missing. It’s not just a matter of equipment but also of time.
Shiro’s estimate for the duration of the mission was three days but it took
them a whole five days to find and engage the Apsalus in combat. It’s a much
easier to let one mobile suit team go on a longer mission than two or three
entire teams.
Another important part of this episode is that Shiro
discovers that Aina pilots the Apsalus. We do not get to see what the fallout
of that but that’s ok because it’s the focus of the next episode and I’ll be
talking about it tomorrow. Sadly, it’s not all that good.
Do you know the name of Eledore's song? I need to know desperately.
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