Mobile Suit Gundam GQuuuuuuX -Beginning- is a compilation film containing the first four episodes of the upcoming TV anime, Mobile Suit Gundam GQuuuuuuX. The trailers made it look to be something similar to G-Gundam (much like how Gundam 00 shares many elements with Gundam Wing). However, that is far from what we get in this film.

In general, there have been two types of Gundam anime: those taking place in the original UC timeline and those taking place in various alternate realities—realities that share little in common beyond a few key concepts like war between Earth and space, mobile suits, Newtypes, and, of course, Gundams. Gundam GQuuuuuuX is a new breed of alternate universe Gundam—one that takes place in the UC timeline but a different version of it than the one we've come to know over the past 40 years. Basically, this anime is built around the question of, "What if Char found the original Gundam and both stole it and became its pilot?"

The first half of the film is solely concerned with this thought experiment. It takes us through the events of the One-Year War as Char forms his own Newtype unit, upgrades the original Gundam with funnels and the Psycommu system. He eventually ends up changing the outcome of the war--only to disappear in a flash of light during the final battle.

To fans of the original Gundam, this part of the movie is pure fanservice—and the more knowledgeable you are, the more fun it is. We see important interactions altered—a massively different way things could have gone. This is something commonly seen in fan fiction but not something we've gotten before in official Gundam anime. It's a blast on its own, but it serves as more than a simple dalliance into the realm of “what if.” The whole second half of the film (not to mention the rest of the upcoming series) is an original story built upon this base—and one intricately connected with it.

Like with Gundam NT, the inciting event for the back half of the movie is the reappearance of a mobile suit thought lost years before. Taking place in UC 0085, the story is centered around the reappearance of Char's RX-78-2 Gundam and the Zeon team tasked with recovering it.

Yet, in the middle of this is Machu, a teenage colony-born girl, awakening to her Newtype powers. Machu is largely an enigma in this film. She is brave and impulsive, but still more intelligent than others give her credit for. She is driven by something—a feeling she doesn't understand, a longing to be free from the metal tube floating in space she was born upon.

Her surreal, psychedelic first contact with the Psycommu system inside Gundam GQuuuuuuX gives focus to that drive. She is suddenly chasing a high that can only be experienced in the heat of battle even as her Newtype powers give her glimpses of the future both inside and outside of the cockpit. And on top of that, she has to deal with the sudden emotional connections she has to the other Newtypes she encounters.

The rest of the main characters are likewise captivating. From Nyaan, the young female smuggler, to Shuji, a graffiti artist who serves as Machu's partner in underground mobile suit battles, each comes with their own personal mysteries and motivations. I look forward to spending more time with them in the upcoming TV anime—along with the myriad of colorful side characters that populate the story.

On the presentation side of things, this film looks amazing—and not just in the ways you can see in the first trailer. Though the mecha have been updated, the UC 0079 portion of the film keeps the 80s animation style of the original Gundam. This is propped up by the use of the original Gundam soundtrack as well. To put it another way, it looks and sounds like a cleaned up version of the original anime. It's only after the timeskip that we get the new art style (though the characters that appear in both halves of the film keep obvious remnants of the old one). And to go with the flashier, hip-hop designs, we get the kind of music to match it. While you'd think that the two halves of the film would feel at odds with each other, they don't. It simply feels like shifting naturally from one generation to the next. It's a truly impressive feat.

All in all, this film (and the series to follow) look like a perfect fit for both hardcore Gundam fans and total newcomers alike. For the OG fans, we get mysteries like: “What happened to Char,” “why wasn't Amuro around to get in the cockpit,” and “what is the world like after Zeon's victory?” For newbies, we have the coming-of-age story of a captivating girl dealing with superpowers and giant robots. Taken all together, it's a ton of fun.