Rolls up after being missing for months. States he’ll take care of everything. Doesn’t elaborate. Leaves.
The sixteenth episode of Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch From Mercury has aired now. In the last episode, Guel continued to suffer before deciding to head back into space because he still has a brother who hasn’t died and is currently going bankrupt. Now we return to check up on the situation with the Earth House kids and Mio to see what they’ve been doing after their peaceful days came to an end. What secrets await us?
Find out in my Recap and Review.
Recap
So we cut back to Belmera asking what happened to Eri and Prospera explaining that she exists within the Gundam. Her biometric code completely matched the Lfrith, but her body couldn’t handle it, so Prospera used the Gundam to keep her alive. She exists as nothing but permet code now and will disintegrate without a body, but with a Permet Score of Eight she can expand the range of the data storm through Quiet Zero. Then Eri can live in freedom using it.
Prospera wants Bel to help her, but the latter refuses because it goes against Vanadis’ principles. However, Prospera points out she made enhanced humans that use the Neural Expansion theory that Dr. Cardo refused to accept. Worse, Bel was the one who invented the theory and thus she’s just as guilty, meaning neither of them has an escape now.
In other parts of space, we see that news of the terrorist attack has spread with Sarius being kidnapped and at least 12 people died while more were injured. Dawn of Fold being responsible for that, on top of Vim being killed and Delling being comatose, has resulted in a whole bunch of riots and protests on Earth. The higher-ups note this is due to someone leaking confidential information, while Shaddiq sits there and claims he doesn’t know anything about his father being missing.
Lauda wonders why Cathedra hasn’t done anything while the four hags note that the Space Assembly League is starting to root around as well, meaning they’ll have to elect a new president. Shaddiq intends to run for the head of the office since Mio can’t manage everything without any of the houses backing her. Speaking of Mio, Lauda tells her GUND-Arm has been cleared of suspicion though and now she won’t have to be used as a trophy for others. She’s got bigger issues to worry about at the moment though.
Back at the school, everyone is under lockdown with some people leaving and others considering the school done. The Earth House has been suspended, their mobile suits confiscated, their home vandalized, and everyone blames them for the deaths during the Rumble Ring and the current atmosphere. One of them draws blood and Chuchu gets ready to put them into the ground, but Mio pops up and tells everyone to cut it out while threatening to blackmail the assailants.
Then we see that Nika is still alive as Sabina is treating her injuries. Sabina asks her to join their group so she can continue her studies and act as a bridge between Space and Earth. Nika refuses since she doesn’t want to use the ends to justify the means while pretending to be a victim, though Sabina notes that she and Shaddiq will do what it takes to bridge that gap themselves.
We also see that Elan 5 gets ordered to steal Aerial since they don’t have time to seduce Su. They also call him out on being lazy during the Rumble Ring, though he claims he was just observing the situation. So he has no choice but to obtain the Aerial if he wants to live.
Back with Shaddiq, it’s explained that his company has split into six factions and he’s in sixth place. But none of that matters because Guel is back! He made it to space without suffering anymore! He goes up to his brother’s office and just casually asks if he’s doing well, and Lauda passes out from happiness. Petra explains the situation and how he didn’t even have time to grieve, so Guel tells her to take care of him. He’ll handle the rest.
Mio, meanwhile, looks into Nika’s disappearance and discovers others disguised as Front Management took her away. She has the woman who helped smuggle her look into it and she agrees in exchange for being given a free pass to investigate the Shin Sei company that Prospera owns. She suspects that something is amiss and needs to act as a mediator to figure it out.
Mio informs the others about Nika, which actually gets Chuchu to thank her since they couldn’t figure out anything on their own. Then they lump onto her all the business they shelved until this point before Suletta asks to look at the Greenhouse with her. She decides to make time for her groom, but then Prospera just shows up out of nowhere to say hello to the other Earth House kids.
We then cut back to Elan 5 trying to steal Aerial, but getting no response when Elan 4 was able to. Then Aerial wakes up and he nearly gets his brain fried as he’s pulled into the data storm and warned to stay away by Eri, who tells him he can’t come there before getting booted out. Belmeria tells him that he can’t handle it and refuses to help while lamenting that she had no choice but to enter Peil’s payroll to survive, hoping that GUND’s ideals would lead to a better future.
Elan 5 isn’t feeling as generous and backhands her. Then he calls her out on wanting to stay alive while bringing up that he was treated as a human experiment and she didn’t care about his future. He then leaves to report her to the higher-ups.
Back with Mio and Su, the two talk about everything that happened. Mio apologizes for calling her a murderer rather than thanking her. But then Su brings up her mother said she’d understand everything and that they did the right thing. Mio asks her how she can still smile after smashing someone into paste because her mother said to, which causes her to question if she would even give up her dreams to do so or kill someone.
Suletta takes a breath and then states that she would since it was because she listened to her mother that all the things she wanted came true. Her mother is always right. That causes Mio to seek out Prospera, demanding to know what she intends to do by using her as a puppet.
Prospera just straight-up tells her that her father is the object of her family’s vengeance. After musing about how Rajan, Delling’s second-in-command, didn’t tell her anything, Prospera explains the Vanadis situation to her and how Delling took everyone from her. Even now the dead are whispering they want revenge for it all. Mio states that if the adults want to kill one another then fine, but leave Su out of it.
Prospera, calling her an admirable bride, then asks for her to cooperate once more. Since if they have a new president their plan will be ruined, she wants her to become the next president. After all, she’s Delling’s bloodstained daughter.
Review
Now that’s a freaking episode! We got Prospera scheming! We got Su and Mio reunited! We got Guel finally getting a win! Not a single mobile was sent out yet I’m hyped up!
So let’s break it all down.
First off, Prospera is the best antagonist in the series by far. She doesn’t need force when she’s weaponized mom-guilt. Not even with just with her own daughter, but even people who are against her.
Based on what she said, I believe using Quiet Zero will expand the data storm into a space that she can control as she did during the duel. If the data storm is expanded and she exists as permet code, then she should be able to move freely within all of it. Or at least that’s the hope that I have, as the alternative would be her being shoved into Suletta’s body like the ED shows, which is both immoral and kind of a downgrade compared to a robotic body depending on if she lacks sensory input.
I also love how Prospera just outright tells Bel and Mio that she wants Quiet Zero to go off without a hitch and wants them to help. And when they refuse, she guilt-trips by bringing up their own sins (Cycle of Sins makes sense now). She does it so masterfully too, leveraging her own past and daughter to do so.
With Mio, it’s clear that she has some issues with her father but she was left ignorant of the Vanadis incident. Now Prospera is basically shifting that guilt onto her shoulders, along with the fact that it was her mother’s project, in order to move her around like a puppet. If she wants to save Su, she’ll have to dance without the ignorance that her daughter has about being on strings and she knows it.
With Belmeria, it was because she came up with the Nerve Expansion theory that resulted in so many enhanced humans being used up. Something she did in order to survive by entering Peil’s payroll. Something that even her former mentor disapproved of enough that it literally causes her to have a breakdown when confronted by both Prospera and later Elan 5.
Speaking of Elan 5, he tried and failed to get into Aerial. And the moment that Belmeria refused to help, he’s willing to throw her under the bus to save his own skin. It’s cold, but it’s effective since it’s clear that she knows more than she’s letting on and it’ll keep him alive. He said it before, he’ll do what it takes to survive.
Not that I don’t understand why he’s mad. Even Elan 4 got pissed when he realized that he shortened his own life for nothing upon getting into the Aerial, who let him ride her but didn’t kick him out. In this case, Elan 5 has no sympathy for the woman who made him like this while playing the victim and selling her out to prolong his own life is completely in character.
In fact, I’m betting Belmeria is going to be taking Prospera’s offer if only to keep living or she’ll get killed to redeem herself. She has enough screen time and has shown enough guilt that she could be Fumitan’d (killed off in order to protect someone she was supposed to let die for her bosses). It’ll make a nice redemption arc and possibly get Elan 5 to either reconsider his words or sink into being a complete villain by dismissing it.
Continuing with Space politics, we all know Shaddiq was the one who leaked confidential information. We’re not blind. He clearly wanted the election to happen, and considering he has shown no scruples, I suspect he intends to kill off the competition to make his dream a reality.
The Space Assembly League, after being teased last season, is also getting some screentime. The woman who offered to smuggle Mio to Earth before and then acted as a pilot for her has some deep connections to be able to piece together Nika’s disappearance. And the fact that she’s looking into Shin Sei means that she probably sees some connection everyone else is blind to, which leaves me to think she’ll be a major player as a mediator. I like her despite her only having a few minutes of screen time in total.
Speaking of Nika, I do like she’s at least sticking to her guns… but I understand where the others are coming from. Sabina, in a few sentences, got more characterization than she’s had in a while from sympathizing with Nika to being an Earthian. Her goals align with Nika’s, but she also notes that ideals alone won’t accomplish anything, which ties what Norea believes as well. She’s more of a middle ground to one who believes in pacifism and the other who wants Spacians dead.
And now the best for last, we have Guel’s glorious return. He pops in out of nowhere, states he’s going to take care of everything, and then leaves. He has clearly grown wise over the last few months he went missing, and now he’s basically going to come in and fix everything… I hope.
Let’s be real here, the writers could always decide to screw him over again. He didn’t tell them that he killed his father, and that’s ripe for the picking for everyone else to exploit. But I want to have hope that he’s done suffering and taking loss after loss.
Let him have this win.
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