Convoy to Oblivion is the sixth and final episode of Mobile Suit Gundam: Requiem for Vengeance [1].
Synopsis[]
While Captain Solari struggles with survivor's guilt, the convoy is attacked. She decides to stay behind to secure an escape route to the spaceport [1].
Events[]
Two series of events play out in parallel in the opening of the episode.
Iria withdraws a violin from its case. She carries it, barefooted, in an ankle-length metallic red dress, to a spotlit area of a wooden floor.
Iria washes up on the shore of a river. A light on her wrist flashes. Her soldiers find her.
Iria plays the violin.
Alfee Zydos, in Federation uniform, drives a Russel 1/12 Zebu along a road at night. The truck stops, and he flags down a Zeon convoy headed the opposite direction. They transfer Iria to another truck. Alfee asks Ony Kasuga if Iria will survive. Her eyes are open; she says, "LeSean."
As Iria plays her violin, the orchestra joins in. Her dress lengthens, spreading over her feet and rushing across the floor. Reflected light casts her face in a red glow as she plays. The dress rushes across the floor, pooling, ripples and overcoming itself in small waves, until the entire stage is covered. She completes her play with a flourish, and bows to the theatre. Applause comes from the darkened audience. The audience members stand as the house lights come on, revealing themselves as Zeon soldiers, all grievously wounded. Blood rushes at their feet, swiftly rising past their waists as they clap. The dead members of the Red Wolves — Kale Zavaleta, Reid "Chubs" Ghelfi, Kneeland LeSean — continue applauding as gunfire rings out in the theatre. Iria weeps.
Iria wakes in the back of a Russel. Ony tells her it'll be okay. She sits up, her head bandaged. Alfee offers her a place to lean. She looks around the truck: Major Rolf Rohne sits in the front passenger seat, Hayley Arhun and Anders Heaton are in the back. They're headed to Odessa Spaceport, to extract to space. Their convoy is composed of a PVN.44/1 Weasel, two PVN.3/2 Sauropelta, three Russels, and a Samson carrying Iria's scrapbuilt Zaku. Ahead of them, an HLV lifts off from a port along a river.
As the convoy passes through a town, the Weasel is destroyed by fire from a Federation M61A5 MBT. The convoy is forced to turn, as a second tank appears. The two tanks are quickly disabled by a pair of Magella Attack tanks. Hayley laments that "the Feds are taking the city by storm." Another soldier says, "I heard the main force has been annihilated."
Alfee asks Iria how she feels. She says like she failed them: her dead compatriots. "You didn't fail anyone. LeSean and the others, they were just doing their job. We're soldiers," says Alfee. "It's what we do." She protests: they were her responsibility. Alfee refuses to blame her. "It was that Gundam, and the cold-blooded killer at the controls."
Iria replies: "He's just a kid, Alfee. A scared kid. He just wants to survive this war and go home. Same as us." Alfee says that the Gundam pilot killed her team, and would have killed her, if not for LeSean. "I know what he is. But he's probably not that much older than my own son."
Alfee tells Iria that she's not responsible for the pilot. She has a responsibility to her own son.
The convoy comes under fire from yet another Federation tank. A RGM-79 GM equipped with a YHI FH-X180 180mm Cannon aims at the convoy, but is disarmed and destroyed by a MS-07B-3 Gouf Custom of the Midnighter Squadron. A second Gouf destroys two more Federation M61A5s; its pilot, "Midnight Alpha", requests that the convoy reroute to the HLVs at the port of Odessa. Ronet says that they were assigned to the HLVs at the spaceport; the Midnighters say that the spaceport has been overrun by the EFF. The spaceport's HLVs have all been grounded or destroyed. The convoy heads to the port.
Rohne requests that the Midnighters escort the convoy to the port, but is denied. The Midnight Squadron is needed to hunt Federation tanks, to prevent the tanks from firing on the HLVs. Iria volunteers to join the Midnighters, defending the HLVs. Rohne asks if she's prepared to die there. Alfee reminds her of her son. Iria says it's her duty. Ony objects: Iria has a sprained wrist, a head abrasion, and likely a concussion. Iria thanks him for patching her up, and all of them for saving her life. She hands her watch to Alfee, so that he can give it to her son, and then transfers to the Samson, to board her Zaku.
Six HLVs are located at the port of Odessa, in floating launchpads. A battery of twelve Ground Assault Guntank Type B has come within range, and begins to bombard the launch site. Iria, accompanied by four Midnighters in Goufs and a MS-05B Zaku I, destroys the battery and its accompanying tanks.
The convoy's Zeon soldiers board HLV 8; Ony says his goodbyes. He will remain on Earth, working for the UMRC.
Shortly after HLV-7 makes it to clear airspace, the Gundam appears, killing Anessa of the Midnighters with its beam rifle. Its damaged eye has not been repaired. Another Midnighter, Loft, charges the Gundam, but Iria stops him. He's in no fit condition to fight the Gundam. Iria orders Loft to destroy the remaining Federation tanks, to ensure that the Zeon soldiers can safely go home. She promises to take down the Gundam, and Loft retreats.
As HLV-8 launches, carrying her compatriots, Iria engages the Gundam in melee, beam saber vs heat axe. With her radio, she calls out to the Gundam pilot:
Gundam pilot, can you hear me? This is Iria Solari. We met at the EFF base. You returned my watch. You know who I am. The Earth Federation's won. We're just trying to retreat. Please, let us go.
The Gundam pilot replies:
Just surrender! If we let you terrorists off the planet, you'll just attack us again later.
Iria asks him to help her save lives. He scoffs, and attacks.
Two FF-3F Saberfish approach HLV-8 and HLV-9, firing rockets. HLV-9 explodes; its parts fall on Odessa. Only One HLV is left on the ground.
Iria struggles with the Gundam, at the top of the Potemkin Stairs, saying that she and the Gundam pilot are alike. He rejects this. He slices off the left arm of her Zaku, disarming her of her heat hawk. As the sun sets over the port, HLV-10 launches.
Iria introduces herself to the Gundam pilot: She's a mother who just wants to see her son again. "A mother?" he asks, and shuts off his beam saber. The falling debris of HLV-9 impacts the square at the top of the stairs; the Gundam knocks Iria's Zaku out of the way. Her Zaku is free, and stands. A large piece of debris covers the square, obliterating the Duke de Reichelieu Monument. The Gundam frees itself from under a smaller piece of rubble. "I'm here, Iria. You're right. Maybe we could und—" says the Gundam pilot, as Loft stabs the Gundam's cockpit through with his Gouf's heat sword.
The Gundam falls.
The last HLVs have left, but a Zaku I pilot says that there's a Zanzibar waiting, and the Midnighter and Zaku walk away. Iria stays on the steps, mourning the lost Gundam pilot.
HLV-8 docks with a Musai in Earth orbit. It is one of several HLVs docking in this fleet. The fleet breaks orbit.
Epilogue[]
Iria's closing monologue:
The deployment of EFF mobile suits changed the course of the war. Zeon forces were driven completely out of Europe and Asia. All I wanted was to go home and be with my son. But I have seen firsthand how this war has forced children to become soldiers. How could I leave, knowing that more will suffer this fate? I joined the Zeon remnant in Africa, where the battles against the Federation still raged. What I found there: those with no home to return to. Soldiers consumed by hatred, seeking revenge for the fallen. Those who dreamed of dying with glory on the battlefield. But the desert will not be my grave. For as long as there is a chance to give children a future without war, I will fight.
Stats[]
Release[]
- Netflix: 2024-10-17
Characters[]
Mechanics[]
Technology[]
Locations[]
Factions[]
Conflicts[]
Terminology[]
Items[]
Music[]
Notes & Trivia[]
- The HLV launch procedures are not realistic. Noise levels near the base of large rockets are dangerously loud; findings from various real-life rocket launches have sound levels approaching 200 Decibels near the base of a large rocket at launch, and near 120dB miles away. The show's characters are mere hundreds of feet away from HLV-7 when it launches, and are not wearing ear protection. They are depicted as having conversations seconds after the HLV's departure. In real life, they would probably be deaf and in enormous pain from ruptured eardrums.
- The stairs which Iria and the Gundam fight on are the Potemkin Stairs. This is apparent from the design of the monument at the top of the stairs, the design of the stairs, and the position of the stairs relative to the port of Odessa.
- The sunset in this episode does not match the date or time of day. The Potemkin Stairs lead northeast as they descend to the port. The only time of year that the sun is low on the northeastern horizon is near down, near the summer solstice.[2] This episode occurs after November 6, 0079, and before the end of the One Year War in January 0080. The fight begins during the day, with the sun higher in the sky; the sun is setting by the end of the episode. The sun should be in the southwest, with the stairs in shadow.[3]
References[]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 Netflix (2024-10-17). “Gundam: Requiem for Vengeance”
- ↑ SunCalc: computation of the path of the sun for Prymorski skhody, Prymorskyi bulvar, Prymorskyi, Odesa, Odessa Oblast, Ukraine, at 05:23 UTC+3, 22 June 2025.
- ↑ SunCalc: computation of the path of the sun for Prymorski skhody, Prymorskyi bulvar, Prymorskyi, Odesa, Odessa Oblast, Ukraine, at 16:04 UTC+3, 21 December 2024.