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Part 3
Time for the third and final episode of Igloo 2 as it’s now November of 0079 as we see Lt. Arleen Nazon being released from prison and then we’re taken to the battlefront of Operation Odessa as we see GM’s and type 61 tanks fighting and pushing forward against the Zeon forces only to be stopped because of the long range bombardment by a Dabude land battleship. Of course, that commander we love to hate Corematta is there and cursing the Dabude and saying the classic “I’ll get you next time” as a group of Guntank’s come in from the horizon.
Turns out these are three prototype Guntank’s that were discontinued because their plans were stolen and given to the Zeon as of course they are piloted by Arleen and two others with her were the team developing and testing them when one of her members, her lover Clyde Bettany, stole them and went to the other side. As soon as they arrive Corematta gives them their basic orders – they will lead the attack to break the deadlock and destroy the Dabude. He also isn’t the nicest of people about the Guntanks and he of course runs them down going so far as to even question if they could be considered “mobile suits”.
Later that night we see Arleen sitting in the cockpit of one of the Guntank’s as she muses over Clyde when suddenly the monitor’s inside light up with the picture of Clyde as our friend the Goddess of death appears and asks why she is burning with such revenge and Arleen in her shocked state says that it’s all she’s got left. The goddess then replies with a cryptic message that she has seen it happen and that in the end Arleen will die, then Arleen wakes up and we discover its morning and that it was all a dream – or was it?
As the battle begins one of Arleen’s men wonders how the Zeon positions were found and other guesses that the Federation must have a spy in the Zeon forces. With Tanks and GM’s leading the charge followed by the Guntanks they rush forward but discover the Zeon were waiting and set a trap for the GM’s and tanks as they fall into a trench and bomb up explosives in said trench destroying the Federation’s forces. The Guntanks then rush forward at high speed and jump the trench taking out the Zaku’s and Zeon tanks with their firepower. It’s at this point that Arleen gives the coordinates of the Zeon gun emplacements at the Federation uses it’s artillery to take it out.
They then spot the Dabude and the Guntanks race into action as we learn that Arleen and her men were given a deal – fight in the war and they’ll be set free from prison after they were charged with treason. Arleen has also become convinced that Clyde is on board the Dabude – despite no proof being given mind you. And I thought Sasuke from Naruto was a nutjob with it came to revenge. Pushing forward, the Guntanks use their rockets to take out the Dabude’s Zaku guards and push forward. As they fight their way through one of the Guntank’s is taken out by a Zaku while the pilot was distracted. The other pilot then takes a hit and decided to perform a kamikaze attack on the Dabude and rushed straight at it causing massive damage. Arleen then takes more fire and suddenly realizes that there is a second Dabude in the area and prepares to attack it but she is given orders by Command to ignore it and continue her assault on the damaged one. She ignores the order and rushes forward, fighting and taking hits from the defense units of the new Dabude as her takes her Guntank closer. As she stops in front of his, disarmed and disabled, she prepares to activate the self destruct protocol as Clyde Bettany was indeed on the second one. While she hears him trying to explain himself the Goddess of Death appears again and asks Arleen if this is what she really wants to do. Not listening to either, since she dismisses Clyde’s pleas and his begging for his life, she activates the protocol and her Guntank explodes destroying the Dabude with it.
We then see Arleen on the battlefield as the Goddess of Death appears before her and asks her if she could hear the voices of the battlefield. It is then that we learn that Clyde was actually a double agent and he was feeding information back to the federation as part of his mission. Arleen breaks down as artillery fine rains down where he is as the Goddess merely muses about how gravity may pull things down but the Gates of hell are open everywhere.
Nimrod’s Thoughts: Well, this is certainly the type of episode I had expected from the start of the entire series. The Most “Gundamy” of the three it was fast past and was done in a blink of an eye. The story wasn’t that special though it was neat to see the mobile suit battle. Again, the Goddess of Death stuff just was weird and served no purpose other than to be the way to tie the episodes of this series together.
The series itself isn’t good but at the same time I’ve seen worse. I think my favorite of the three was the first episode followed by this one but once you see them you can easily forget them. I think part of the issue is there’s no single character the viewer can identify with through the run other than the goddess of death and her role is simply background for the most part. Will we get more episodes? Doubtful but then again we thought the same about Igloo when they announced the three new episodes too.
