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So I finally had some time and watched a bunch of MSG: Iron Blooded Orphans. I have not finished the show yet, so these are my impressions of the show up to episode 16.
For me, the show is like a 6.5 or 7/10. Watchable, but definitely not something I'd put in my favorites.
The good: The mecha fights and overall animation quality is actually superb, and the main story is pretty engaging. I think that most of the characters (with some notable exceptions; I'll explain) are interesting and feel more naturally fleshed out than most anime. The show does a good job delving into some more "mature" themes, i.e war, slavery, child soldiers, poverty, politics, corruption, colonialism, etc. and I love that.
The bad: A few of the side stories and characters are cringey at best, and actively off-putting at worst, especially the events surrounding the show's female characters. As an example, there are two female characters that are romantically interested in the protagonist (who is a young teenager). One of them is similar in age/maturity to the protagonist, and one of them is a much younger child. This in and of itself isn't necessarily a problem, if it were handled in a mature way but personally I don't feel like they do that. They seem to focus a lot on the fact that the young one is jealous of the other girl (and other older female characters) because she doesn't have a "womanly" body yet, giving them an excuse to use the older girl characters as fanservice/eye-candy. But, its not just limited to that. For example, one of the "groups" in the show is one guy as captain of a ship harem of multiple wives as the crew. Just like the child thing, a harem or other poly relationship wouldn't necessarily be a problem, if it were handled in a mature way. But instead, they decide to have use it as an excuse to show a bunch of scantily clad women who are incredibly obedient to one dude, which personally I don't think is a healthy depiction of that sort of thing. There are a couple women in that group that get a bit of character development outside of that, but I don't feel like it really makes up for it. Plus, they use the harem thing to plant the idea in the little girl's mind that she and the older girl can both be the protagonists wives, which IMO is a very... strange narrative choice, to say the least. There are other problems I have with the show, but they're along along similar lines and I dont feel like writing out every single thing.
I don't know if I'll finish the show. We'll see. But, as far as Gundam series go, I'm a little disappointed with this one. As it stands right now, I liked Unicorn better. Maybe I'll watch 00 or Seed next.
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