The next chunk of Destiny episodes sees everything on something of a holding pattern for a bit before getting to the next major battle. That being said it does set up a few things for later and develops Shinn a bit more, again sadly for no reason as it later turns out, but hey-ho. Let’s take a look!
The first few episodes see the Minerva crew tasked with a few missions really just exist to give Athrun and Shinn a chance to interact. The first one they find an Earth Alliance base where the soldiers are randomly killing the local civilian population and having flashbacks to his own trauma Shinn goes and rescues them in the middle of battle, something he believes was the right thing to do but Athrun gives him a good old Bright Noa-style slap across the chops for not following orders. This was soon followed up a rather non-sensical mission where the Minerva and other ZAFT forces had to take out a large “Lohengrin” canon emplacement and Athrun picks Shinn to pilot through a narrow cave network and take out the canon from behind enemy lines, showing faith in his skills even if he doesn’t get on with him (something Shinn dislikes him for, even though the key role is what he’s always after). Shinn of course manages it and Athrun praises him for it, the two… sort of bond for a bit. By the way, I said “non-sensical” because it wasn’t explained why none of the flying ships and mobile suits didn’t just, well, fly over the defences and destroy the canon, the idea they had to be in a narrow canyon in front of the canon and had to wait while Shinn did some risky cave manoeuvres made for a good episode but made NO sense when you stopped and thought about it…
Athrun says all he needs to say about dealing with Shinn with just one look.
We then slow down for a bit as Athrun, Shinn, Ray and Lunamaria (the latter two are still around but still aren’t doing anything yet!) are introduced to new ZAFT ace pilot and winner for worse name in a Gundam show Heine Westenfluss, who take them to Chairman Durandal who reveals the whole Logos organisation pulling the strings of Earth during a nice chat. Athrun actually has a gall to talk about “a friend” who told him the futility of war as you kill one and it creates an enemy who wants to kill you etc like it’s a lesson he learned despite the fact that’s what he’s doing again right now! Episode 20 is a recap episode sadly, then we get more Kamile/Four replaying as Shinn meets Stella and saves her from drowning and the two bond over their drying clothes in the cave (something very similar to Athrun and Cagalli in SEED as well…) Stella still has the mind-of-a-child thing going on and it’s all building up to some good old fashioned Mobile Armour drama (hey that rhymes!) later in the show.
Shinn and Stella do battle before either meet each other and bond, as pilots on the opposite side of a conflict tend to do in Gundam shows!
That leads to the big battle which I’ll get to in the spoiler section. Very Minerva heavy as at this point the series is still focusing on Shinn like he’s the protagonist, though we do get some throwbacks to Kira and his makeshift crew, plus fake Lacus Meer does a concert to the troops at one point and we get more Meer-Athrun awkwardness. We also see Cagalli’s old forced-fiancé Yuna Roma Seiran has not only agreed to an alliance with the Earth, um, Alliance but is now ordering the Orb Fleet around, much to the many experienced commanders’ distain…
Overall Thoughts:
“This is Heine’s Gouf Ignited suit, you’ll be seeing it many times over in the coming battles, so look forward to it!”
Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny continues to put focus on young Shinn and his short temper alongside the rest of the Minerva but it’s safe to call a lot of these episodes pretty bog-standard, or one episode’s case: a full-on recap episode. The final two are at least entertaining, but overall I think this is a weaker part of the show, nearly all set up without the pay-off, but that’s the nature of reviewing chunks of episodes rather than whole seasons!
The last two episodes of this batch has the Minerva assaulted by a combined Earth Alliance and Orb fleet and our quartet of Athrun, Shinn, Rey and Lunamaria is out-matched due to numbers and the Phantom Pain Extended soldiers being there with their stolen Gundams. It’s at this point where the Archangel appears and Kira one-shots loads of troops all at once, as he tends to do, while Cagalli appears in a suit and tries to tell Orb to stop and head back home. This doesn’t work and the battle rages on.
Kira and his Freedom gives Stella a damn good kicking. Screw all the guns and laser swords!
Athrun is annoyed at Kira for bringing Cagalli into the war, Shinn is angry at Kira for disabling suits on all sides but gets taken down for it (without hurting him, naturally!) and then both Stella and Mr. Westenfluss try and attack Kira and Heine is killed by Stella accidentally, so… that was a short run! Would you believe they actually tried to have people like Athrun react sadly like he was an old war buddy despite the fact they only met two or three episodes ago. What a pointless character that was! Still, his Gouf Ignited was a fun play on an original MSG suit, so… there’s that. The Archangel retreats alongside both armies as they all go to lick their wounds.
Hogan Reviews 
Destiny is one of those things where even if you dislike it you can at least see what they were TRYING to do.
1.) Shinn: Basically a deconstruction of Kamille. The reason Kamille gets better is because he has a support group who take the time to mentor him and call him out on it. They also have the time to do so; SHINN doesn’t have that; he’s traumatized by the death of his family, and the only people in a position to help either a.) have their own shit to deal with (Athrun, Talia, Arthur etc) or b.) WANT him to fail (Gilbert and Rey.) Shinn ultimately going bad actually made sense from a story standpoint, and I do think part of the hostility was that people were expecting a Kamille story where he gets better and were salty they didn’t get what they wanted.
2.) Cagalli: She’s a teenager thrust into leadership and cracks under the pressure. That’s not a bad idea but again execution is lacking.
3.) Athrun: The reason he left ZAFT last time was because his father was fucking nuts. Gilbert at least SEEMS reasonable at this point, and the EAF hit a trauma button for him by trying to use nukes again (his mother was killed in the nuke attack that launched the first war). Another person argued that while Athrun isn’t bad he is unwittingly rather controlling, and part of his arc is growing out of it.
4.) Djibril: He’s the OBVIOUS villain who masks the REAL antagonist of everything (Gilbert). A lot of people kinda bought into Gilbert’s facade though and missed he was kinda NEVER the hero to begin with. And yes there are people who really are THAT childish and sociopathic. Most villains aren’t cunning masterminds, and most sociopaths are short sighted impulsive man children. Djibril’s basically a short sighted man child…..but because he has money and influence he’s scary rather than just pathetic.
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Oh yeah, there are good points, I think that’s what makes the finale so frustrating (not to get too far ahead, but…). Like I’ve said I enjoy Shinn as a character in these early moments and see clearly the path he could’ve gone down had he stayed the protagonist, but while you may say his staying with the villains made sense, and it does in-universe, it doesn’t make sense in a satisfying story way. Shinn as the protagonist should’ve realised on his own that he was being manipulated and triumphantly done something about it but instead he continued being so until he was told he was an idiot in the finale and literally left crying while Kira and Athrun tied up all his plot threads. It’s those kind of things that make the series as a whole unsatisfying, even if it does have good bits…
But enough about the reviews to come! I will agree that Durandal is a good villain, though if anyone actually fell for his “noble leader” role with that look and voice (both sub and dub) then I don’t know what to say!
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That was more back in the early mid 2000s. The “Evil Lacus” meme became popular around this time.
I don’t mind the idea of Shinn falling from grace, though I think he and Kira should have had the final fight for symbolism (Kira defeating Shinn is a reference to Kira accidentally making Shinn)
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