# Mobile Suit Gundam: The 08th MS Team (1996)

> A young Federation ensign takes command of a small mecha unit in Southeast Asia and must hold off Zeon forces while hunting a secret new weapon.

Canonical page: https://ember.film/tv/39926

## Facts

- Seasons: 1
- Episodes: 12
- Episode runtime: 25 min
- Status: Ended
- Genres: animation, war, science fiction
- Cast: Nobuyuki Hiyama, Mami Koyama, Osamu Ichikawa, Kikuko Inoue, Keiji Fujiwara, Hiro Yuuki, Tessyo Genda, Show Hayami
- TMDB rating: 7.9/10
- IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0159569/

## Ember's analysis

- Pacing: brisk
- Intensity: strong
- Complexity: accessible
- Violence: brutal
- Tone: grounded, melancholic, tense, bleak, sincere

## Synopsis

Mobile Suit Gundam: The 08th MS Team (1996-1999) is a Japanese animated mecha war drama produced by Sunrise and Bandai Visual, a one-season original video animation run of twelve episodes of roughly twenty-five minutes each. Ensign Shiro Amada, voiced by Nobuyuki Hiyama, is transferred to Southeast Asia to take command of the 08th MS Team, a small unit of mobile suit pilots. The engine of the series is simple and concrete: the squad must distract Zeon forces through jungle sorties while Federation ground troops search for a mysterious new Zeon weapon, and every episode is built from these guerrilla missions, tense skirmishes, and the friction inside a unit under pressure. Karen Joshua, voiced by Mami Koyama, and Norris Packard, voiced by Osamu Ichikawa, anchor the ensemble alongside Aina Sahalin, voiced by Kikuko Inoue. The tone is grounded and melancholic, with a bleak edge to the combat and a wistful sense of young people carrying adult wartime burdens. Set against tropical jungle terrain during the one-year war era of the Gundam universe, it is a compact, self-contained entry for viewers who want the franchise's military realism at a smaller scale. Fans of the original Mobile Suit Gundam, Band of Brothers, and Full Metal Panic! will find resonance in its squad-level focus and mature treatment of war.

## Shows like Mobile Suit Gundam: The 08th MS Team

- [Mobile Fighter G Gundam (1994)](https://ember.film/tv/27748)
- [Macross Zero (2002)](https://ember.film/tv/54156)
- [Mobile Suit Gundam SEED (2002)](https://ember.film/tv/18563)
- [Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam (1985)](https://ember.film/tv/12745)
- [Schwarzes Marken (2016)](https://ember.film/tv/58122)
- [Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans (2015)](https://ember.film/tv/56965)
- [Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn (2010)](https://ember.film/tv/41299)
- [Mobile Suit Gundam ZZ (1986)](https://ember.film/tv/5355)
- [Turn A Gundam (1999)](https://ember.film/tv/34534)
- [Mobile Suit Gundam 0080: War in the Pocket (1989)](https://ember.film/tv/42139)

---

Site overview: https://ember.film/llms.txt