At this point you all know my feelings on Gundam Wing by now. Its a series that thinks its a serious war drama when its actually a ridiculous campy convoluted mess that tries way too hard to be the epic of the year at the expense of more important things like coherent storytelling and character development gleefully pulling stuff out of its ass just to be bigger and more bombastic than it really has any right to be. And yet even with all of these huge problems it still did pretty good in Japan and was the series that put Gundam on the map in North America being a mainstay on the Toonami block for quite a while. So in light of its popularity Sunrise decided to make a 3episode OVA called Mobile Suit Gundam Wing: Endless Waltz in 1997 which would then be recut into a theatrical movie with a new TwoMix song and some new footage slotted in a year later. Fitting how I wrote this review not only on GWs 30th anniversary but right as Endless Waltz is being screened in US theaters for the very first time as part of this celebration. Now that Ive seen it Ive gotta say...seriously why couldnt the series have been more like this? Endless Waltz actually goes out of its way to address a lot of my issues with the show even if it winds up having its own problems A year after the events of the TV series it seems like all is going well. The Eve Wars have ended and both Treize Khushrenada and OZ have passed from existence. The Earth Sphere Unified Nation ESUN and a special peacekeeping police force known as the Preventers rose from the ashes of OZ. Since they figure they will no longer have a role in the postwar era four of the five Gundam pilots put their Gundams on a giant disposal satellite headed for the sun with Wufei being the lone holdout. Peace reigns supreme on Earth and in space...for about a year: on the anniversary of the Eve Wars end a rebellion occurs on newlycompleted colony L3 X18999. The rebellion led by seven or eightyearold Mariemaia Khushrenada who reveals herself to be Treizes daughter kidnaps Relena Darlian now the Vice Foreign Minister of the ESUN during a diplomatic visit to the colony. As the Gundam pilots investigate further they discover that Mariemaias grandfatherDekim Bartonreally controls the rebellion. Dekim plans to use X18999 to go through with the original Operation Meteor crashing the colony into Earth and letting the Gundam pilots take control in the chaosif the ESUN doesnt comply with his demands. The Gundam pilots must prevent Dekim from seizing power over the ESUN but two things complicate matters: most of the pilots dont have their Gundams and the only one that doesWufeihas defected to Dekims side. I know a lot of people both Wing fans and nonfans alike have their opinions on Endless Waltz. Some say its a great conclusion to the TV series others say its a hot mess thats worse than the series and so on. Im of the opinion that while it does still have its own set of issues I actually think Endless Waltz makes an effort to improve upon the TV series and remedy a lot of its issues. It may not have succeeded a lot of the time but it tried. For one the movie actually bothers to explore the backgrounds of the Gundam pilots and actually flesh them out for once Sure its not to the level of Episode Zero but its a lot more than the TV series bothered to do We actually get to see and learn about the events that made Heero into a suicidal nihilist the reason Trowa got roped into piloting Heavyarms and even how he got his name and most of all it actually bothers to give Wufei something resembling a character arc Is it weird that I feel him having an antagonistic role wound up actually helping him in terms of rounding out his character? For one his motivations for being an antagonist here actually make sense and are coherent this time around compared to his wishywashy allovertheplace characterization in the TV series though a more concrete explanation for why he does what he does here is still relegated to another side story manga called Battlefield of Pacifists. Seriously what is it with Wing and delegating all its most important stuff to side stories that arent in the TV series or movie? The biggest improvement from the TV series to the movie is obviously the animation. Sunrise really stepped up their game here. Wings animation in the TV series was serviceable but there were times when the characters would be really off model and often times the colors would be flat. None of that is present here. The designs on both the characters and mechs are more detailed and sleek gone are the wonky facial expressions and flat colors and the action sequences are a feast for the eyes. Seriously the way explosions and missile barrages are animated here knowing that theyre all lovingly hand painted just amazes me and well never get to see anything like that again. Though even Endless Waltz had to have some sequences using very wonky CGI but its only used for showing asteroids. Not that that makes it any less jarring. The soundtrack also continues to be an absolute banger TwoMixs two new songs included. Though I kind of wish they could have found a way to integrate White Reflection into the movie rather than relegating it to just the OVA considered the inferior version of Endless Waltz. Maybe they could have used White Reflection as an insert song and had Last Impression just be the ending theme. Them giving the song the shaft like that is doing it a massive disservice since its still a pretty damn good song on its own One of my biggest issues with Gundam Wing in general was how convoluted it got a lot of the time. In an attempt to be this big sprawling epic war drama it had way too many things happening all at once with characters constantly changing sides and going places on a dime often for little to no reason and it became far too complex for its own good sometimes even leaving things completely unresolved and with no real payoff whatsoever. It could have benefited from limiting itself and cutting out a lot of unnecessary fat and Im guessing a lot of production issues behind the scenes resulted in how it came out. I know that was the reason episodes intended to explore the pilots backstories got cut in favor of recap episodes and relegated to the Episode Zero manga. Endless Waltz being a movie cuts away all of the fat and focuses on one particular plotline thats guaranteed to have the biggest payoff and is all the better for it. This also allows for all the relevant characters to have a role to play in the movie no matter how small their actions being the culmination of all of what little development they got in the TV series even if the plot itself is still your standard cliche Villain is gonna destroy the Earth because hes evil and he must be stopped plot. That said Endless Waltz does have some pretty serious flaws that prevent it from achieving true greatness with two of them being especially egregious. For one thing all the Gundams got complete redesigns. This in itself isnt a bad thing though considering how the series ended theyd have to fish for some sort of explanation for why theyd redesign the Gundams and then have them be sent into the sun to be destroyed. Instead of doing that Sunrise decided itd be a great idea to just act like these redesigns have always been around both in the opening sequence and in flashbacks that take place before the TV series starts Like...what? I know Gundam is primarily made to sell merchandise and Gunpla kits and all and if you wanna market new toys fine but dont do it in a way that completely ignores and disregards continuity Seriously I know for a fact that no kid who watched the TV series would be stupid enough to not notice that the very bright red Heavyarms is suddenly navy blue and not be baffled by the movie treating it like it was never bright red I think part of this is due to the fact that Endless Waltz was made with different staff than that of the TV series similar to how that Digimon Adventure 02 movie Hurricane Touchdown was also made by different staff than the TV series and had its share of continuity issues as a result of the staff not doing their research. Speaking of flagrantly ignoring continuity this is gonna go into spoilers here but I cant possibly tiptoe around this so Im just gonna go all in: You cant just show a guy somehow surviving something like that with no explanation for how he did it and why Though considering Wing as a whole loves pulling random Deus Ex Machinas out of its ass and handwaving any possible explanation in order to do just about anything this isnt really out of the norm but its still aggravating as all hell Also apparently Treizes age is said to be 24 years old but Mariemaia who is apparently between 78 years old is somehow his daughter assuming she isnt some kid that Dekim plucked off the street for his own machinations like the movie seems to subtly imply. If you do the math wouldnt that have made Treize 16 years old when he impregnated Mariemaias mother whoever she is? If thats true then...ew. Hey Wing MTV called they want their Teen Dad pitch pilot back. Also due to Endless Waltzs nature as a sequel to the TV series theres no way youre gonna be able to watch this and understand whats going on if you havent watched the series beforehand. I forced myself to watch all 49 episodes of that offtherails convoluted mess because Im a masochist apparently but for anyone who cant afford to do that there is now this cute little recap video of the TV series narrated by Duos seiyuuhttps://www..com/watch?v=ZA3NXIyl6st=736s you can watch. Hey Im always down for more of Duo being a sassy little bitch even when hes explaining the plot of Gundam Wing to you like youre a toddler. So yeah Endless Waltz isnt a perfect movie and its in no way a standalone movie but its attempts to at least address some of the TV series flaws and be actually comprehensible makes it a valiant effort all around. The fact that it was also made to celebrate the Gundam series 20th anniversary also shouldnt be ignored considering its influence on later Gundam series down the line and its impact overseas. Now Im curious as to Yoshiyuki Tominos thoughts on Wing as a whole. But yeah Endless Waltz might appeal to you more if youre already a dyedinthewool Gundam Wing fan and its an interesting little novelty that I might come back to every once in a while.