Episode
                  32: The Great Destroyer Meets Zero 
                  Airing Date
                  2000-04-17

            Let me head off the voluminous amounts of email right now -- the 
            title of this episode changes depending on which version you watch. 
            The earlier, family-friendly version (which is the one I review 
            because this is a family-friendly website, after all) is called "The 
            Great Destroyer Meets Zero." The later, midnight run version, which 
            has all kinds of goodies like blood and bad words and heady ideas 
            about God, is titled "The God of Death Meets Zero." Same episode, 
            slightly different title. There's no need to alert me to this fact. 
            Comprende? Bueno. Moving on… 
            My problem with this puppy is the lack of anything outside the 
            simplest of stories. Another writer could have taken this same exact 
            story and made it more exciting but as is, this one felt flat and 
            was strangely devoid of adrenaline. In a nutshell, Lt. Trent of OZ 
            becomes obsessed with figuring out the Zero System on the Wing Zero. 
            He even ignores orders from Colonel Tubarov. 
            Trent realizes he needs to study data from a real battle and then 
            he'll be able to master the thing. Realizing that both Wufei and Duo 
            are still in outer space (as opposed to Trowa, who IS outer space 
            right now), Trent decides to locate one of the Gundam boys and force 
            them to be his lab rat. Duo is the first found and he's given the 
            choice of assisting Trent or watching an entire Space Colony being 
            destroyed. Once behind the wheel, though, Duo realizes the Zero 
            System isn't a good thing -- it's dangerous and hard to control. 
            Trent takes over and, naturally, loses his mind. He even takes on 
            some of his own Mobile Dolls. 
            Duo pops into his nearly refitted Deathscythe and takes Wing Zero 
            on. Trent can't handle himself and winds up in bad shape. Duo's 
            convinced that the Wing Zero has the possibility of dominating the 
            human race but that it's too dangerous to exist. 

                  The ghost of Gundams past. 
            Not bad, huh? So what went wrong? Heck if I know -- I just review 
            these things, I don't fix ‘em. If I had to guess, one of the major 
            problems is that Lt. Trent has a starring role in this episode but 
            he's really a glorified extra. We don't know much about him except 
            that he's an obsessed nut. If one of the other characters had taken 
            this cause up -- someone like Dorothy Twigbrows or Sally Po -- at 
            least we'd be privy to more backstory which would've heightened our 
            involvement in and understanding of the conflict. The way the story 
            plays out, however, leaves little to the mind to take apart -- it's 
            a crazy unknown against one of our heroes. Guess who's gonna win? 
            Duo comes off as well as can be expected. At turns he's cocky, 
            sweet, determined, loyal and happy-go-lucky as ever. Once his 
            brain's being twisted, though, it becomes clear that the Zero System 
            is an acquired taste. So far only Heero and Quatre can handle it. 
            And me, of course, but I'm the secret sixth Gundam. Uh oh. Not so 
            secret anymore. 

            --Ross Brooks is the Gundam called The Great Relaxer.