Realizing I can post anything here. Anything at all. I can just post everything I think about every episode of Gundam and shit if I want. This is the kind of freedom opened up by the information superhighway
I love Yoshiyuki Tomino's brand of bullshit so it's too bad I'm starting at the first thing he had nothing to do with but whatever it's still good shit. Plus, if you're going to make a little OVA spinoff something that's just about normies and not Newtypes is a good idea! Everyone is named like a human because cowardly minds wouldn't try to make true Gundam names. I've forgotten all of them already but my brain is very bad, apologies.
First episode does us the favor of starting off with a military engagement where I bunch of people get killed so we can see how nice and rad the animation is and also get a feel for the particular vision of mobile suit combat. On one level they feel more like Just Human Beings in how they move while being shot. Very organic and less like the big machines they are. On the other hand one gets its arm shot mostly off and the gun is dangling off firing all over and it kicks ass.
Of course the actual plot is about some very young kids experiencing kid conflicts and kid angst while living adjacent to the One Year War. I'm not invested enough yet to make sweeping statements but I can enjoy what it's putting out. I don't know the timeline well enough to understand how everyone is talking about the Federation having no mobile suits. They clearly have them. Come on kids pay attention.
Episode ends with the war actually happening locally, as one would expect. The Zeon guys seem like they'll be maybe more like the protagonists this time but I can't actually imagine getting into the politics of the war or Zeon or anything. But this is just a guess.