It grabs you by the eight-year-old you used to be and then refuses to be stupid about it. The pitch alone is unhinged in the best way: Journey to the West's Monkey King, the Three Kingdoms' strategist and his sworn brother, all rebuilt as Gundams, so Wukong Impulse Gundam drops out of the sky as a burning meteor with no memory and Zhuge Liang Freedom Gundam reads the coming catastrophe in the stars while Liu Bei Unicorn Gundam just starts walking toward it. Every design is a double joke that lands twice, once for the history buff and once for the person who can name the Freedom's wing shape from across a room. The SD proportions let the animation go full slapstick physics in one cut and full heroic silhouette in the next, and it never apologizes for either. Short episodes, zero fat, chibi mechs taking oaths of brotherhood completely straight. You will start it ironically and finish it caring which Gundam gets home.

A red-hot meteor crashes into Neo World, and at the spot where it lands appears Wukong Impulse Gundam, a youth with no memory of who he is. What follows is chaos that spreads from world to world, threatening the balance that heroes have long kept in place. Reading the stars, Zhuge Liang Freedom Gundam foresees a coming disaster. Together with his sworn friend Liu Bei Unicorn Gundam, he sets out to save the worlds from the crisis, and the two take the amnesiac newcomer along on their journey. Along the way, Wukong meets the heroes of each world, and the question hangs over him whether he will bring peace or ruin. SD Gundam World Heroes is a 24-episode action and mecha ONA from 2021.