Mobile Suit Gundam Thunderbolt vol. 15

If vol. 14 was the end of “Act II” of this series, then this is the intermission between acts.  Thanks to Darryl Lorenz and the Psycho Zaku, the Nanyang Alliance was not only able to escape the Taal Volcano base, but hand the Federation forces a crushing defeat as well.  The first half of this volume shows us what the various Nanyang factions are up as they collect the spacebound Psycho Zakus, secure a legendary mobile suit for their plans, and leader Sojo Levan Fu explains himself and his reasons for wanting to destroy Anaheim Electronics to Prof. Karla Mitchum.  Meanwhile, the Federation is licking its wounds as they plan to pursue the Nanyang into space, take them out, and maybe even seize their fancy tech for themselves.  There may be some lingering bitterness about how badly things went at Taal, but the surviving crew of the Spartan is still ready to go and get some payback.  Everyone except Io, that is.

Io is stuck in a comatose state, described as akin to PTSD by Bianca, and it’s not hard to understand why he’s like this after what he did in the previous volume.  The problem is that this is a very plot-convenient case of the disorder that exists to put him in a particular situation by a specific member of the cast.  Then, when the situation reaches peak drama, he’s able to snap out of it.  This is mainly due to the Newtype abilities of Yith, which turn out to be an even bigger can of plot contrivance.  I’ve never seen Newtype abilities work the way hers have here, and neither has Director Humphrey.  In fact, I’m still unclear as to exactly what she did, which isn’t good when you’re adding to the rules of what your space psychics can do.  I realize that mangaka Yasuo Ohtagaki had to find a way to get Io back in action while not undercutting the weight of the grief he was under, but he does it in the most ham-fisted way possible here.

Which is too bad because this volume is all about moving the pieces around on the chessboard.  Forward movement of the plot isn’t the point here, it’s all about getting everyone into place for “Act III.”  Excluding the bits mentioned above, Ohtagaki does a pretty decent job of that, while throwing in a surprise or two along the way.  He even handles the emotions of the supporting cast well, which is why it’s so disappointing to see him drop the ball on the big stuff relating to Io.  It’s not the first time the mangaka has done this, I just thought those days were behind us.  It’ll take more than this to get me to give up on the series after fourteen volumes; thought, vol. 15 leaves me feeling less excited about the next act than I thought I would be.