Characters / Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron Blooded Orphans – Gjallarhorn

Index | Tekkadan (Mikazuki Augus) | Gjallarhorn (McGillis Fareed) | Civilians and Other Organizations

Due to the massive list of characters and factions in Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans, the characters page has now been split from the original page. Return to the main page here.

WARNING! In here are plot- and death-related spoilers!

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Gjallarhorn

A military group organized by Earth's power blocs. 300 years ago, Gjallarhorn was founded by Agnika Kaieru and ancestors of the Seven Stars. They put an end to the Calamity War, but long since the passing of the organization’s founding generation, have become corrupt and self-serving. Possessing a monopoly on Ahab Reactor technology, their Mobile Suit strength is unmatched.

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Gjallarhorn as a whole

• Appeal to Force: Gjallarhorn has remained a major force in politics throughout the solar system for centuries by having the biggest army and maintaining a monopoly on Ahab reactors, so no one else can make a bigger one.
• Aristocrats Are Evil: Their glitzy, knightly aesthetic, aristocratic power structure, and harsh, old-fashioned (and frequently self-serving) code of honor emphasize their physical and emotional disconnect from the downtrodden masses they oppress.
• Armies Are Evil: Gjallarhorn are the only eminent military force in Earth's solar system in Season 1, and are shown to be very corrupt and tyrannical.
• Artifact Title: The Seven Stars of Gjallarhorn continue to be called the "Seven Stars", even after they lose one of their families.
• Asskicking Leads to Leadership: The hierarchy among the Seven Stars was determined by how many mobile armors each Seven Stars founder destroyed during the Calamity War. The founder of the Issue family destroyed the most mobile armors, so the Issue family is the highest-ranking member of the Seven Stars.
• Blue Blood: Gjallarhorn was founded by seven noble families to put an end to the Calamity War. These families are known as the "Seven Stars", and members of those families have an outsized influence on Gjallarhorn even 300 years later.
• The Caligula: It's ruled by corrupt aristocrats who will eliminate anything in their path, no matter how insignificant. Corruption is rampant to the point that having anyone with a modicum of decency and morality is a rarity, and they even fully condone lesser rights for Martians and colonists so that they're easier to oppress. They even murder Tekkadan kids with glee in their attempts to kill one publicly-known young woman advocating for Martian rights. It gets worse to the point that season 2's Big Bad had to reform and restructure Gjallarhorn for sheer efficiency's sake due to the ruthless chaos and suppression just making everything worse.
• Color-Coded Armies: Each faction maintains a general color-coding based on where they're assigned to.
  • Outer Earth Orbit Regulatory Joint Fleet: Turquoise under Carta, blue under McGillis
  • Arianrhod Fleet: Deep blue-green.
  • Mars Branch: Dark blue in space, green on the ground.
  • Pacific Branch: Blue-grey.
  • Edmonton Branch: Red.
• Crazy-Prepared: The Gjallarhorn is well prepared to deal with people who oppose them, as demonstrated in how they halt the protests in Dort colonies.
• Elites Are More Glamorous: Members of the Seven Star families generally have access to better mobile suits than the common soldiers of Gjallarhorn, such as the Schwalbe Grazes Gaelio and McGillis pilot or Iok's Reginlaze.
• The Empire: They're the only military superpower in the solar system and they're bent on ensuring it stays that way.
• Enemy Civil War: In Season 2, McGillis's attempts to consolidate his power within Gjallarhorn lead his Outer Earth Joint Regulatory Fleet into conflict with Rustal's Arianrhod Fleet. McGillis requests Tekkadan's help to end the conflict. This cold war finally goes hot in Episode 42, when McGillis publically declares a revolution against Rustal and Iok.
• Expy:
  • To the Romefeller Foundation of Mobile Suit Gundam Wing, both being Terran-based, corrupt, aristocratic organizations responsible for the world's largest militaries.
  • To the Capital Army of Reconguista in G, both being Earth-based militaries that possess a cultural taboo on old technology that they have deemed dangerous to humanity's existence, but will hypocritically violate their own taboo if it means gaining an edge over their enemies.
  • To the VERS Empire of Aldnoah.Zero, especially with regards to the similarities in their uniform designs, being aristocrats having a technological advantage over their opponents, Fantastic Racism against their enemies, and having officers who are very capable frontline fighters. But while VERS is based on Mars, Gjallarhorn as a whole are based on Earth.
• Fallen Hero: By all indications, Gjallarhorn was originally the good guys, using the Gundams to end the Calamity War and prevent humanity from destroying itself. That was three hundred years ago, however, and in the present, they're little more than power-grubbing warlords similar to the Titans and A-Laws. By the end of Season One, all of the economic blocks of Earth have abandoned Gjallarhorn as a means of protection in favor of forming their own armies for the first time in 300 years.
• Fascist, but Inefficient: In season 1, Gjallarhorn is controlled by aristocratic families more interested in increasing their power instead of keeping the organization running; to the point, even the most sympathetic characters fail to make a difference in the system. By season 2, they are at open war with each other. It's only when Gjallarhorn is reformed into a democracy that it regains some semblance of order and stability.
• Hufflepuff House: Only four of the Seven Stars of Gjallarhorn get any real focus, with the remaining three not having their roles fleshed out beyond acting as Satellite Characters in the council scenes.
• Hypocrite:
  • Despite their propaganda against cybernetic modifications they still created the Graze Ein, something that makes standard Alaya-Vijnana implants look tame. McGillis claims that this is because Gjallarhorn never really believed its own rhetoric and simply wanted to keep others from using the power of the Alaya-Vijnana against them. While Graze Ein was part of McGillis own plan, Yamazin gladly uses Ein's brain a weapon for the Arianrhod Fleet.
  • Gjallarhorn's are supposedly neutral in upholding the peace, but constantly interfere for their own benefit or to help whoever's better connected. They try to assassinate Kudelia throughout the series and go through extensive efforts to block Makanai's bid to become Prime Minister again.
  • Gjallarhorn outlawed the Dainsleif, railguns similar to what the Gundam Flauros uses, as they are the only long-range weapons that can pierce nanolaminate armor. As both Rustal and Iok demonstrate, Gjallarhorn is all too willing to plant Dainsleifs on their enemies in order to give them grounds to field their own en masse.
• Hypocrite Has a Point: Once McGillis manages to pilot Bael, Gjallarhorn's rules explicitly state he is their rightful leader. While this makes their harping on about Gjallarhorn's traditions ring hollow, you can understand why the overwhelmingly majority completely ignore it.
• Light Is Not Good: Gjallarhorn uniforms tend to have a lot of white, which should act as a warning.
• Mythical Motifs: Each Seven Stars family has a figure from Norse mythology gracing their sigil.
• N.G.O. Superpower: They are technically a private army shared between humanity's governments, but possess much greater military power than anyone else in the solar system and have an active hand in influencing the politics of the Earth Sphere as well.
• Not-So-Omniscient Council of Bickering: Multiple members of the Seven Stars are gunning to bolster their power and shape Gjallarhorn to be more in their image, something which results in a lot of clashes between different sub-factions.
• Propaganda Machine: They practiced this for a long time in order to look good such as declaring that cybernetic modifications are inhuman. They also use this against their enemies such as detonating explosives during the Dort demonstrations and blaming the protesters for terrorism. Even Tekkadan is not spared by this when Rustal had the media vilified them as criminals.
• Screw the Rules, I Make Them!: Any Gjallarhorn member that doesn't believe in fighting honorably will invariably break their own rules if it means victory.
• Seven Deadly Sins: The heads of each of the Seven Stars seem to embody one particular sin.
  • Gaelio Bauduin: Envy. Despite being good friends with McGillis, Gaelio admits to feeling Always Second Best to him and develops a much more intense desire to overcome him after McGillis stabs him in the back.
  • McGillis Fareed: It's not obvious at first but Wrath. McGillis' driving motive for betraying his friends and trying to take over Gjallarhorn is anger at its corrupt system.
  • Carta Issue: Lust. Carta has an obsessive crush on McGillis, something which allows McGillis to manipulate her and lead her to her doom.
  • Rustal Elion: Greed. Rustal's goal is to hold onto Gjallarhorn's power by whatever means necessary, no matter who he has to sacrifice or how many people he has to kill to set an example.
  • Iok Kujan: Pride. Iok is a Glory Hound taken to the extreme, and his behavior is what ultimately leads to his demise.
  • Elek Falk and Nemo Baklazan don't have any obvious sins, but given how the former is portly and the latter is an withering old man they may represent Gluttony and Sloth.
• Sheltered Aristocrat: The members of the Seven Stars such as Carta, Gaelio, and Iok have a very close-minded perspective of the world they live in due to being members of the upper class and had a very naive view that they live in an aristocratic society where honor and chivalry ruled. They thought that there's nothing wrong in the system and unable to see the problems outside their circle. Though Gaelio admitted that there are problems in the organization and planned to reform it, it's just that he hasn't made any action yet. It's only when Kudelia and Tekkadan entered the picture which shook the status quo, making those traditionalists fighting against any kind of change.
• Single Line of Descent: By the end of the series, three of the Seven Star bloodlines are extinct. Considering these bloodlines are 300 years old, it is rather unlikely that there are no other heirs.
• Soldier vs. Warrior: The Warrior to Tekkadan's Soldier. They are known to use traditional battle formations, announce their presence, and flaunt their combat capabilities. This bites Carta and her unit hard when they face Tekkadan, twice.
• Talking Is a Free Action: Due to being used to fighting against hopelessly outclassed opponents, many members of Gjallarhorn have developed the unfortunate habit of pausing in the middle of a battle to make dramatic speeches to kill time. This comes back to bite them numerous times when they have to go up against Tekkadan and other genuine threats who are having none of their bullshit.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: Several Gjallarhorn members believed in honor when their opponents would prefer to be pragmatic and fight to win. They also are unaware of the deep seated corruption in their organization, and that they have committed enough heinous acts that they are no longer the heroes they used to be in the past.
• Zerg Rush: Gjallarhorn's single greatest advantage is that they can mass-produce technology that no other faction has access to, letting them steamroll their enemies with overwhelming numbers equipped with overwhelming firepower. Their flagship mobile suit the Graze is not all that impressive as they're built with suppression in mind more than combat against other MS like the Rodi frames (let alone monsters like the Gundams and Valkyries) and semi-modern designs like Teiwaz's Hyakuren and Shiden are, and most of their pilots are less than ideal, but it's the only fully mass-producible suit in the solar system meaning Gjallarhorn can field dozens of them where their enemies have only a handful at most.

Inspectors

McGillis Fareed / Montag

Voiced by: Takahiro Sakurai (Japanese, adult), Natsumi Fujiwara (Japanese, young), Steve Staley (English, adult), Dorothy Elias-Fahn (English, young)

^{Click here to see him as "Montag"}

Main mecha: EB-05s Schwalbe Graze (blue), VO8-1228 Grimgerde, EB-06rs Graze Ritter Commander Type (Blue), ASW-G-01 Gundam Bael

A young Gjallarhorn officer from Earth, visiting Mars on an inspection tour. He is the illegitimate son of Iznario Fareed, the leader of Gjallarhorn's Fareed Family. He later adopts the masked persona "Montag" to advance a secret agenda. After the death of Carta Issue, McGillis becomes the commander of Outer Earth Orbit Joint Regulatory Fleet and is trying to resolve the distrusts towards Gjallarhorn. His influence increases gradually by participating in the Seven Stars senate as the representative of House Fareed.

See his page here.

Gaelio Bauduin

Voiced by: Masaya Matsukaze (Japanese, adult), Megumi Han (Japanese, young), Robbie Daymond (English, adult), Cristina Vee (English, young)

Main mecha: EB-05s Schwalbe Graze (purple), ASW-G-66 Gundam Kimaris, ASW-G-66 Gundam Kimaris Trooper

A Gjallarhorn officer, and McGillis's closest Childhood Friend. Also the heir apparent to the Bauduin Family, one of Gjallarhorn's "Seven Stars".

For Season 2 spoilers, see Vidar's character entry.

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• Ace Custom: Like McGillis, he initially pilots a Schwalbe Graze, with a lance attached.
• Affably Evil: He may work for a corrupt military organization, but Gaelio is a perfectly friendly guy and openly loathes Gjallarhorn's more corrupt actions.
• Ancestral Weapon: The Gundam Kimaris was first piloted during the Calamity War by Gaelio's ancestor.
• Alas, Poor Villain: He ends up dying (kinda) with the knowledge that the best friend he grew up with had been plotting against him this entire time and that same man is going to go on and marry his innocent and naive sister... being completely powerless to stop him from doing so.
• Anti-Villain: Gaelio never does anything truly villainous, and in fact is one of the most consistently morally-upright characters in the entire show.
• Avenging the Villain: He attempts to prevent Tekkadan from entering Edmonton, an action that blatantly exceeds Gjallarhorn's authority, so he can kill Mikazuki to avenge Carta's death.
• Benevolent Boss: After taking Ein under his wing, Gaelio treats him with respect and often commends him for his loyalty and honor.
• Berserker Tears: In his battle with McGillis he is bawling his eyes out, bordering on Inelegant Blubbering, all while trying to kill McGillis when he realizes his best "friend" had played everyone like a fiddle and leading several close ones to their deaths.
• Big Brother Instinct: His conversations with his younger sister seem to comprise mostly of him good-naturedly (and sometimes tactlessly) teasing her, but he does genuinely care for her. See his battle with McGills in the season one finale. He says that he trusted McGillis enough to entrust (note the word choice) Almiria to him, and when McGillis seemingly mockingly reassures him that he'll make the girl happy, Gaelio absolutely loses it.
• Big Damn Heroes: In Episode 23, he shows up out of the blue in his newly upgraded Kimaris Trooper to get Carta to safety before Mikazuki can finish her off. Or, at least, he's assured her a safe and proper burial, as she dies from her wounds minutes later.
• Bigger Stick: Gaelio is only ever a fairly decent pilot, but his family's connections let him at least try to keep up with the solar system's best through raw power. In the first season, he's Gjallarhorn's only Gundam pilot, and his Kimaris is considerably better-preserved than the Barbatos. In the second season, he is, again, the Arianrhod Fleet's only Gundam pilot, wears a high-tech fully-armoured pilot suit (more useful than it sounds), and has a special prototype Alaya-Vijnana system that lets him achieve perfect synchronisation with zero drawbacks. Oh, and the Kimaris Vidar, his Gundam's final form, is absolutely loaded with brutally powerful weaponry.
• Blue Blood: The Bauduin family is one of Gjallarhorn's Seven Stars, so Gaelio is accorded with a lot of respect for his heritage.
• Break Out the Museum Piece: Recognizes that the Barbatos is too strong to be handled by contemporary machines, and brings out his family heirloom, the Gundam Kimaris.
• Composite Character: Has many similarities to Garma Zabi, though his fighting style is more reminiscent of M'Quve, his Kimaris being a Gundamized version of the YMS-15 Gyan. And he also becomes a Char archetype later on.
  • This also extended to the upgraded version of his Gundam, the Kimaris Trooper, which, while retaining many similarities to the Gyan is also a Hover Mecha in the style of the MS-09 Dom. Fittingly, according to sourcebooks, both Mobile Suits were made by the same defense contractor and originally designed to be used in tandem with each other.
• Crippling Overspecialisation: As Mikazuki soon realizes, Gaelio and the Kimaris don't have many tactics other than 'smash into the enemy really fast with my lance', and he's in serious trouble if you somehow immobilize him or get inside the Gungnir's reach. The folding knife and shoulder-mounted shuriken launchers help, but not enough, and once Tekkadan has its number, the Kimaris becomes significantly less of a threat than its specs would indicate. The Trooper fixes this a little - the Kimaris's weapons remain broadly the same, but the extra sub-arms allow much more versatility in how Gaelio uses them.
• Due to the Dead: As Vidar, he made the Alaya-Vijnana Type-E System out of his friend Ein's corpse so that he could get posthumous revenge for McGillis turning him into an insane monster. Interestingly, Gaelio himself seems more interested in trying to understand why McGillis turned on him, and tends to frame his revenge as his duty to Ein and Carta rather than something he seeks for himself despite his treacherous friend crippling him.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: After losing several comrades in the heat of battle, failing to change Gjallarhorn for the better, being betrayed by his so-called best friend and left for dead, killing said friend in a misguided quest of vengeance; Gaelio ends the series getting the chance for a normal life with Julieta at his side, as well as having his original goal of Gjallarhorn reformed for him by Rustal.
• Embarrassing Nickname: Mikazuki calls him "Gali-Gali," either because he misheard Gaelio's name when it was introduced, or because Mika's intentionally screwing with him. Either way, Gaelio's not pleased with the nickname at all.
• Emergency Weapon: Thanks to its and it's pilot's single-minded focus on impaling enemies with the Gungnir in hit-and-run attacks, any of the Kimaris's secondary weapons could technically count as this, but the shuriken launchers hidden in its shoulders are the best example. They're not accurate enough for anti-infantry work, and not powerful enough to kill a nanolaminate-armored foe outright, but they're very good for knocking an enemy suit off-balance for a second or two while you try to come up with a Plan B.
• Et Tu, Brute?: His reaction upon finding out that McGillis is his opponent in Episode 25.
• Expy:
  • Of Garma Zabi, as a purple-haired aristocrat who's genuinely nice despite serving an evil faction, a friend of the Char archetype and someone who inevitably gets screwed over by him.
  • Outside of Gundam, he seems to take inspiration from Dan Cain. Both are idealistic, kind men who are partnered with a cynical extremist and lose loved ones in their chaos, causing them to be cynical themselves and snap by going against them.
• Faking the Dead: Fakes his death and takes on the identity of Vidar for most of Season 2. And then he reveals in front of McGillis that he's very much alive...
• Fantastic Racism: Gaelio doesn't consider people who have had the Ālaya-Vijñāna implanted to be human; this is later revealed to be a universally-held belief among the people of Earth, driven primarily by Gjallarhorn's propaganda. On the other side of the coin, he doesn't look on down on Ein for being half-Martian (unlike most other Gjallarhorn soldiers). This quickly earns him Ein's loyalty.
  • In Season 2, he later apologizes to Mikazuki for considering those who had the AV system to be less than human. More so considering he's using Ein's brain to use one without harming himself.
• Glory Hound: In a downplayed (and surprisingly justified) case: after being assigned to Dort 3 while a union strike is going on, he tried going out with his own Gundam to intimidate them and stop the strike right then and there—until he was stopped by his commanding officer. When it turned out this was because Gjallarhorn planned to massacre the strikers to Make an Example of Them, he's positively disgusted.
• Handicapped Badass: He was crippled following his first battle with McGillis. A component of the Alaya Vijnana Type-E implanted in his body allowed him to walk as Vidar. At the end of the series, he becomes wheelchair-bound after removing the implant, resolving to never pilot a mobile suit again.
• The Heavy: For the first Season, he heads the main force pursuing Tekkadan.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: His Kimaris Trooper (with him still inside it) gets finished off by McGillis with his Grimgerde's sword.
• Internal Reformist: He realizes that Gjallarhorn is corrupt and wants to reform the organization from within.
• It's Personal: Not at first, but his conflict with Tekkadan gradually evolves into this after he's repeatedly and humiliatingly defeated, and his friends and allies are killed and wounded at Tekkadan's hands.
• Jousting Lance: As an heir of the Seven Stars, the ruling families of the solar system, his signature mobile suit weapon is an appropriately aristocratic gun-lance. His Schwalbe Graze's version is simple (basically a stripped-down, short-barrelled version of the standard 120mm Graze rifle with a gigantic lance-shaped bayonet), while the Kimaris, naturally, has a fancier design - the Gungnir, a proper jousting lance with two 120mm guns built into the handguard. The Kimaris Trooper's aptly-named Destroyer Lance takes things to the next level - it's a blunt-headed monster with 140mm guns that's so big it needs one of the Gundam's skirt-mounted sub-arms to steady it.
• Last of His Kind: He is the last living Gundam pilot at the end of the series.
• Leitmotif: "Different Definitions", "Out of Control".
• Lightning Bruiser: The Kimaris plays up the 'lightning' part of the Gundam Frames' fearsome reputation. It's a great big mass of thrusters designed to deliver its huge lance into the enemy's vulnerable as fast as possible, and Gaelio's idea of an upgrade is sticking on even more thrusters. This quickly falls into Glass Cannon territory once his style is compared to the Grimgerde. Though his armor is stronger, his style of leaping into the enemy essentially means that it cannot quickly reform its defenses and is frequently the victim of a counterattack. This made the battle with McGillis especially one-sided. Though he could break the suit in one hit, his combat style even with the trooper equipment left him vulnerable to McGillis' superior mobility.
• Maybe Ever After: The last episode hinted that he'll eventually get with Julieta.
• Multi-Armed and Dangerous: The Trooper, the Kimaris's upgrade for ground-based combat, borrows a trick from the Barbatos by fitting two small sub-arms on its skirt armor, which can be used to steady heavy weapons, carry unused equipment, and otherwise make the pilot's life easier.
• My God, What Have I Done?: He agreed to have Ein Dalton put back together, but it's not until he sees the blueprints of the Graze Ein's cockpit with his friend's limbless torso wired into it that the true horror of what he's done hits home.
• Nice Guy: Aside from being a part of a corrupt group, he's a genuinely kind man.
• Not Quite Dead: He turns out to be alive, albeit heavily scarred, in Episode 43, when it's revealed that he's Vidar in front of McGillis.
• Protectorate: Gaelio is McGillis's escort; protecting him is his job. When they talk with McGillis' father, however, Gaelio admits McGillis is the one who has been protecting him the whole time.
• Punch-Clock Villain: Works for Gjallarhorn, but is a perfectly friendly guy barring some impulsive tendencies of his and takes his role dutifully. Even his job isn't an inherently evil one, he's an inspector and is shown to be committed to rooting out corruption in the organization.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: Prideful Gaelio is more prone to holding a grudge and acting on impulse than McGillis.
• Sole Survivor: By the time of the finale, Gaelio Bauduin is the only main character that piloted a Gundam Frame in the series who is still alive.
• Spanner in the Works: McGillis's coup in Season 2 and scheme to take over Gjallarhorn actually would have likely succeeded if not for Gaelio's survival at the end of the first season. McGillis's gambit with the Bael completely hinged on his ability to weaken the Seven Stars and have Gjallarhorn rally behind him as their new leader. Gaelio exposing his crimes from the first season threw a massive wrench into the plan and ultimately caused it to fail.
• Strong, but Unskilled: He gets his own Gundam midway through, but while it lets him hit harder, he still lacks the combat experience possessed by other pilots like Mikazuki and has a very repetitive combat strategy, which is what lets his opponents gain the advantage over him.
• Sympathetic P.O.V.: Has mostly taken this role for Gjallarhorn. He will oppose Tekkadan with everything he has but will do so because it's his duty and in a manner becoming a man of his stature (which he seems to take seriously, to some extent). He is noticeably angry with Gjallarhorn's handling of both the Martian and Colony protests. He also has a lot of legitimate issue with Tekkadan, having been inadvertently Forced to Watch as they kill and maim his friends and subordinates on the battlefield.
• Took a Level in Badass: He becomes a significantly better pilot over the course of the first season, especially after he switches to the Kimaris's Trooper loadout. As Vidar, he completely eclipses his old self, although how much is due to his natural skills and how much is due to the Bigger Stick that is the Alaya-Vijnana Type-E is an open question.
• This Is Unforgivable!: His response upon knowing McGillis used Ein's pride to ensnare Gjallarhorn.
  "How could you? You may be a friend, but I will not forgive such villainy!"
• Transforming Mecha: The original Kimaris has a very small touch of this, with its oversized calves that can open up into thruster packs for lance charges, but the Trooper takes it all the way. By raising its rear skirt armor and splitting its legs in two it can become a blindingly fast centaur-like Hover Tank, allowing Gaelio to use his signature "charge, smash the enemy with huge lance, retreat, repeat" tactic even under gravity.
• Unskilled, but Strong: While he does improve as a pilot over the course of the series, he's usually more of a threat due to the powerful, advanced machines he uses than due to his personal combat skills. In the second season, he even manages to find a way to technologically augment his reflexes to superhuman levels with zero drawbacks, which goes a long way to closing the gap with more naturally talented pilots.
• Villainous Friendship: Close friends with McGillis and later takes Ein under his wing. Although in the former case it turns out to be one-sided.
• Why Can't I Hate You?: Towards McGillis. In Episode 49 after Gaelio finally kills McGillis, he refuses to listen to McGillis admit that he did think of him and Carta as his friends realizing that that would make him forgive McGillis, which would tarnish the revenge for Carta and Ein he fought to gain. In the end, he cries when he sees his former friend die.
• Wingman: He's McGillis's fellow Schwalbe Graze pilot.

Mars Branch

Coral Conrad

Voiced by: Hiroshi Yanaka (Japanese), John DeMita (English, credited as Will Barrett)

Main mecha: EB-06s Graze Commander Type

A corrupt Gjarllarhorn officer who attacks CGS to kill Kudelia.

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• Alliterative Name: Coral Conrad.
• Arc Villain: The main antagonist of the first five episodes, which involve him trying to kill Kudelia.
• Even Evil Has Standards: He finds Kudelia's father disgusting for betraying his own daughter to her death, although it doesn't stop Coral from accepting his help.
• Evil Running Good: Most of his subordinates in the Mars Branch are Punch Clock Villains who aren't aware of their boss's backroom deals with Nobliss Gordon.
• Oh, Crap!: His reaction when he learns that his initial attack on CGS failed, as the attack was unauthorized and his post is about to be inspected by McGillis and Gaelio.
• Rank Scales with Asskicking: He's a Graze pilot, in addition to being the head of the Mars Branch.
• Smug Snake: Coral acts smug when he thinks he's holding all the cards, only to lose it when something doesn't go the way he expected. An example being when McGillis refuses his bribe and threatens to court martial him.
• Starter Villain: He's the antagonist at the start of the series. And he's killed off shortly after Tekkadan leaves Mars.
• Would Hurt a Child: He doesn't care when he's informed that CGS are using child soldiers.

Ein Dalton

Voiced by: Yūma Uchida (Japanese), Max Mittelman (English)

^{Click here} to see the Graze Ein.

Main mecha: EB-06 Graze, EB-05s Schwalbe Graze (purple), EB-AX2 Graze Ein

A rookie Gjallarhorn mobile suit pilot under Coral's command.

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• Ace Custom: He is handed down Gaelio's Schwalbe Graze, equipped with a rifle instead of a lance. Ein himself becomes one after being merged with the Graze Ein and Gundam Vidar.
• Alas, Poor Villain: Ein was genuinely a good person who wanted to do right for the only two superiors who showed him genuine loyalty and respect (Crank and Gaelio) but revenge and pain drove the man into tragic insanity. The fact that he will only be remembered as a screaming crazy abomination, both in-universe and out, drives home the unfairness of his circumstances. Mikazuki doesn't even bother to respond to his heartbreaking cries of anguish, telling him to simply "shut up" as he's killed.
• All the Other Reindeer: He's looked down upon by his peers because his mother is Martian. The first individual who respected him was Crank. When he got to know Gaelio, Ein is willing to sacrifice himself for Gaelio's sake because other than Crank, Gaelio is the only one who even respected him.
• Ax-Crazy: By the end of the series, he's become so focused on Tekkadan that when he finally gains the means to get his revenge, he takes the opportunity with psychotic glee and a reckless disregard for everything else.
• Berserk Button: Disrespecting Lieutenant Crank's memory. Ein was already dangerously obsessed with getting revenge on Tekkadan for what they did to Crank, but seeing one of their pilots launch in Crank's Graze in the battle over Mars drove him into a blind fury. It happened again in the battle at the Dort colonies, when he found out that not only were Tekkadan still using Crank's Graze, but they had modified it beyond recognition (including having painted it bright pink). He only knew it was the same machine because it still has the same reactor signature. At first, he's confused, then he's pissed. Later when Mika wonders aloud who the hell Crank is during their final battle in Episode 25, Ein completely loses his shit.
• Because You Were Nice to Me: This is pretty much the reason why he's staunchly loyal to Crank, because he's the only person that ever treated him with respect. This trope also comes into play with his relationship with Gaelio.
• Body Horror: After being nearly killed, the only way to fix him makes Tekkadan's Ālaya-Vijñāna implants look tame in comparison.
• Boomerang Bigot: Ein looks down at Tekkadan as space-rats, despite being Martian himself.
• Brain in a Jar: After the Battle of Edmonton, Gjallarhorn was able to preserve his brain and install it in a special system in the Gundam Vidar. It's unclear whether Ein could still be considered alive, but this system does allow Gaelio to link with Ein's brain and gain all of Ein's Alaya-Vijnana system enhanced reflexes.
• Cyber Cyclops: He's a Gjallarhorn mobile suit pilot, which naturally means that he exclusively flies variants of the mono-eyed Graze. What makes him special and warrants this entry is that once he's wired into the Graze Ein, he becomes one.
• Cyborg: Graze Ein blurs the line between a proper cyborg and a mobile suit with a biological brain. While he has the looks and firepower of a massive mobile suit, it expresses and moves like a living being similar to a cyborg. Also, his real body is little more than a limp hunk of flesh housing his brain while the mobile suit acts more like his proper body.
• Dark Is Evil: The Graze Ein, which has a dark color scheme and only sees use after Ein's noble goals have been cast aside in favor of simply seeking Revenge.
• Devoted to You: Both a platonic and deconstructed case of this. Because of Ein's status as a half-martian, he was the recipient of a lot of prejudice within Gjallarhorn. Because of this, he found himself dedicating himself to superiors who showed him a modicum of respect, the first being Lt. Crank and later Gaelio. Unfortunately, Ein has a way of taking his devotion to its extreme.
• Disc-One Final Boss: The last major antagonist Mikazuki fights in season 1 as the Graze Ein.
• Emergency Transformation: His transplant into a mobile suit might as well make RoboCop count his blessings.
• Evil Counterpart: Increasingly becoming one to Mikazuki. He's a young combat pilot, born into humble origins on Mars, and possessees a fierce loyalty to his comrades, a Bigger Stick mobile suit, and a triple Ālaya-Vijñāna system that lets him exploit it to the fullest.
• Evil Gloating: He gloats to Mika during the ensuing battle against each other, claiming how he possesses a true Ālaya-Vijñāna System while Mika's one is defective. Not only it doesn't help the situation, but it also pushes Mika to overclock the Barbatos and make an example of a true Ālaya-Vijñāna System with Ein.
• Evil Is Bigger: The Graze Ein may be built around the ubiquitous Graze frame like all of Gjallarhorn's other modern suits, but its extra-long limbs and massive pauldrons turn it into a gaunt, towering monster that looms over everything else on the battlefield.
• Exactly What It Says on the Tin: The Graze Ein is, indeed, Ein's Graze. It's also Ein as a Graze.
• Failure Knight: Watched both of his superior officers, first Crank and later Coral, get killed by Mikazuki. His repeated inactions ends up eating him up.
• Foil: To Mikazuki, as they are both young pilots who are exceptionally skilled, are staunchly loyal to their superiors and comrades to the point of being willing to sacrifice their lives to protect the said comrades and strong motivations of revenge. The only big difference is that Ein slowly loses his sanity to the point of willing to pull Revenge by Proxy, commit atrocities, and ignoring his comrades' wishes and his superiors' orders in his quest for revenge. Mikazuki, by contrast, felt disturbed by his own Blood Knight tendencies and more willing to show his restraint in killing people when putting into consideration what others think of him (such as the Griffon twins begging him not to kill Gaelio) or by Orga's orders.
• Fragile Speedster: Despite its intimidating silhouette, the Graze Ein is still based on the standard Graze — a mass-production unit operating off a single Ahab Reactor, meaning it's physically weak compared to a Gundam. Not only that, but its weaponry is only middling in size and power by mobile suit standards. What makes it truly dangerous is its terrifying speed, agility, and reflex time, coupled with the way its sheer number of weapons allow it to unleash an unrelenting rapid-fire barrage of attacks on a target.
• From Nobody to Nightmare: From an inexperienced soldier, to a veteran warrior, to effortlessly taking out three Tekkadan mobile suits on his own.
• Frozen Face: During Ein's battle with Mikazuki in Edmonton, we're given a brief view inside the cockpit while Ein is in the middle of his Motive Rant; despite the emotion and manic energy of his words, the expression on Ein's face appears placid and half asleep. This is simultaneously inverted with the Graze Ein itself, however, as the movement and flashing of its multispectral sensor (the big round 'eyeball' inside its helmet) make it quite expressive for a Cyber Cyclops.
• Full-Conversion Cyborg: After sustaining serious injuries, he agrees to have what's left of his body be used to construct the Graze Ein, a mobile suit that his mangled body is completely integrated into.
• The Fundamentalist: His constant swearing that he will exterminate all of Tekkadan in revenge for the death of Crank is phrased like a fire-and-brimstone preacher, as in he's going to "cleanse their souls" by murdering them.
• Hypocrite: In their first battle Ein calls out Mika for using nearly defenseless soldiers as shields while in a Mobile Suit. While he and his superiors were attacking nearly defenseless CHILD soldiers with their mobile suits before Mika showed up. Later it becomes clear that he hates being looked down upon by the rest of Gjallarhorn for not being a pure-blooded earthling (and the reason he looked up to Crank and Gaelio since they didn't), but he very openly looks down on "space rats". And finally as Ein-Graze, he claims Mika must be destroyed because he is no longer human when he himself has become far more integrated into his Graze than a normal Alaya-Vijnana System user.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Mikazuki does this to him with the katana of the Barbatos.
• Leitmotif: "Human or Not", "Defenders of the Wild"
• Killed Mid-Sentence: Mikazuki impales the Graze Ein's cockpit before he can finish ranting on about how he failed in avenging both Gaelio and Crank.
• Man in the Machine: After being fatally wounded by Mikazuki, Gaelio (at McGillis' urging) has him given cybernetics that allow him to be installed into the custom Graze Ein, with the Ālaya-Vijñāna system letting him control it as if it were his body.
• Meaningful Name: Ein means "one" in German, and Dalton means "from the valley town" in Old English. Ein is born half-Martian, he does not have a noble background, and as Graze Ein, he literally has one eye.
• Mid-Season Upgrade: Goes from the standard Graze to the Schwalbe Graze to the Graze Ein.
• Motive Decay: Lt. Crank takes it upon himself to challenge Mikazuki to a Combat by Champion on the basis that should he die, Ein would be spared of any backlash for the mission's failure. Because Ein idolized Crank so much, he didn't understand the meaning of Crank's sacrifice and instead dedicated his life to try to avenge his death, first by jumping at the opportunity to work under Gaelio and later being turned into a murderous cyborg. By the end, even his own self-awareness of his situation got completely warped because when he claims he lost sight of his original mission, he thought that meant he was supposed to murder Kudelia.
• Multi-Armed and Dangerous: Like many of the Gundams it's designed to kill, the Graze Ein has a pair of small folding sub-arms. They're hidden in its pauldrons, and carry small machineguns for mowing down tanks and infantry and intercepting incoming missiles.
• New Meat: As a rookie, Ein is prone to making impulsive mistakes in battle.
• Pile Bunker: The Graze Ein has two of these fitted to its forearms, giving it a particularly nasty Facepalm of Doom. Oddly enough, they are single used, once fired, the pile bunker detaches itself instead of retracting.
• Posthumous Character: In a way. Episode 43 reveals that Gaelio took the remains of his brain and Alaya-Vijnana system as a backup system for Gundam Vidar. Gaelio at least considers that Ein is still alive in a way.
• Power-Upgrading Deformation: The Graze Ein is Ein transformed into a hideous but incredibly powerful mobile suit.
• Punny Name: The EB-AX2 Graze Ein does, indeed, have two axes.
• Red and Black and Evil All Over: His dark-colored Graze Ein with its red glowing mono-eye.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: To emphasize its ominous appearance, the Graze Ein's multispectral sensor is red rather than the usual yellow.
• Revenge: What essentially motivates him after Crank's death.
• Revenge Before Reason: He brings his suit into Edmonton to attack Kudelia, despite everyone else, regardless of faction, abiding by the rules banning Ahab reactors from populated areas because of the problems they cause.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: After spending most of the series an Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain that just couldn't compete with Tekkadan's Gundams and Ace Pilots, Ein finally finds himself with a tech advantage once he's using the Graze Ein. He promptly uses it to go completely ballistic on Tekkadan.
• Sanity Slippage: He was mostly a reasonable soldier who wanted to be respected among his comrades despite his background. However, after the death of Crank, he slowly becomes more and more mentally unstable to the point that he would completely disregard any orders from his superiors just to kill everyone in Tekkadan and anyone associated with them, even going to the extent of trying to kill Kudella despite Crank's original orders to have her captured.
• Shoulders of Doom: As the most powerful of Gjallarhorn's many Graze variants, the Graze Ein naturally has the biggest shoulders as well. The "doom" is literal, too - they're as big as they are so they can store a pair of gun-wielding sub-arms.
• Super Prototype: He manages to get his hands on two of them:
  • The Schwalbe Graze he borrows from Gaelio is, as mentioned in McGillis's entry, a limited-run prototype given to elite pilots who could handle its extra-high performance.
  • The Graze Ein is one of several prototypes of the most powerful entirely modern suit in the setting, a Graze variant loaded with weapons and fitted with the most advanced version of the Alaya-Vijnana System ever created.
• Taking the Bullet: A non-fatal version. In episode 17, he saves Gaelio's life by putting his Schwalbe Graze in the way of an attack that would have destroyed Gaelio's Kimaris. Ein and his Schwalbe survive, although the Schwalbe is severely damaged. Two episodes later, Ein repeats the feat. This time, Ein himself gets impaled. Gaelio manages to recover his escape pod, but Ein is forced to be turned into a cyborg to survive.
• Tragic Monster: The circumstances that led to his transformation were arranged by McGillis.
• This Is a Drill: The feet of the Graze Ein can be used as drill-like weapons, while also emitting electrical blasts.
• Tragic Keepsake: He keeps Crank's medal to remember him by. He also wanted to retrieve Crank's Graze, however, it was taken over by Akihiro and later Shino. In his ensuing encounter against Tekkadan, he disabled the Ryusei-Go by aiming at the head with his Pile Bunker so he wouldn't break the Ahab Reactor.
• Undying Loyalty: To Crank and later Gaelio, mainly because these two are the only characters that ever treated him with respect.
• Unknown Rival: He absolutely despises Mikazuki and the Barbatos for killing most of his comrades during the first Gjarllarhorn battle and especially for executing Lieutenant Crank. When he confronts Mika again when Tekkadan is trying to leave Mars, Mika completely ignores him to face another opponent. Later during the final battle in Episode 25, Mika treats Ein as a loud annoyance and doesn't acknowledge his tragic circumstances or breaking words in any way.
• Unwitting Pawn: To McGillis. He paints him as a villain to the bitter end, using him to expose the corruption in their organization and as a guinea pig for the new Alaya Vijnana system.
• Villainous Valor: He never forgets who respected him and should they be in danger, Ein is willing to put his fights aside to save his friends.
• Walking Armory: Most suits in the show have two or three weapons apiece. His Graze Ein, meanwhile, backs up its twin axes with two forearm-mounted Pile Bunkers, two drop-down guns in its shoulders, and feet that can transform into electrified drills. The incredible precision and reaction time granted by his enhanced Alaya-Vijnana system allow him to wield them all to devastating effect.
• Walking Spoiler: Not him, per se, but his status as a cyborg in the last three episodes, to the point that the model kit of the Graze Ein doesn't even feature his current status by the time he was using said Mobile Suit.
• We Can Rebuild Him: After Ein is critically injured fighting Tekkadan in the re-entry battle, McGillis arranges for Ein to be turned into a cyborg (complete with Ālaya-Vijñāna system) to save his life.
• With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: Once he has a mobile suit strong enough to take on Tekkadan toe-to-toe and win, he goes a little crazy in taking his long-sought revenge. It's unclear how much of this is a result of the fact that he's been installed into the Graze Ein and how much is him simply being consumed by revenge.
• Would Hit a Girl: As long as they are related to the sinful children who killed Crank, he goes after them without questions, an alarming example is when he went after Kudelia, of everyone else, he even attempted to outright kill her.
• Would Hurt a Child: He very quickly rationalizes Tekkadan's ages away when he begins contemplating revenge against them. Normally he wouldn't hurt innocent children, but for the sinful children who killed Crank? Not a problem.

Crank Zent

Voiced by: Yasuhiro Mamiya (Japanese), Michael McConnohie (English)

Main mecha: EB-06 Graze

A veteran Gjarllarhorn mobile suit pilot under Coral's command.

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• Anti-Villain: Crank is a noble warrior, unlike his superior officer Coral and his former student Orlis, both of whom have no hesitation over killing innocents.
• Born in the Wrong Century: An equally tragic take, but less brutal compared to Carta. It's obvious to him and everyone around him that he should have been a knight-pilot during the Calamity War, rather than an enforcer for a corrupt police state three hundred years later, and he ends up paying dearly for it. The only recompense for him is at least Tekkadan honored his Combat by Champion request, compared to what happened to Carta.
• Expy: To Ramba Ral. Both of them are veteran officers in the antagonists' forces; both of them are as noble as an adversary can get; both of them end up making senseless sacrifices.
• A Father to His Men: Crank cared deeply for his subordinates and gave his life so they wouldn't be punished for his failure. He was the first member of Gjallarhorn not to look down on Ein for being half-Martian.
• I Cannot Self-Terminate: After Mikazuki defeats Crank, Crank asks him to kill him, as Crank returning alive after having failed his mission would hurt his troops' reputation. However, since Crank was injured from an attack Mikazuki made on his cockpit, he can't kill himself, so he asks Mika to help him along. Mika, having been ordered by Orga to kill Crank, obliges.
• Killed Mid-Sentence: Killed while in the process of thanking Mika.
• Sacrificial Lamb: An antagonistic example. His screentime is largely spent setting him up as a kind leader, disturbed by the realization he's fought and killed child soldiers, and ultimately he's killed early on, advancing the arc of other characters.
• Senseless Sacrifice: Crank challenges Tekkadan to a Combat by Champion in order to spare his subordinates should he lose. He didn't count on Ein becoming obsessed with revenge.
• Small Role, Big Impact: His death basically starts Ein's quest for Revenge.
• Token Good Teammate: He's practically the only member of Gjallarhorn in the first season who actually has a moral compass.
• Would Not Hurt A Child: Crank is horrified when he realizes that he's fighting child soldiers. When his superior officer, Coral, orders him to continue to try to capture Kudelia despite this, he challenges Mikazuki to a duel over her. Crank's intent is to disable the Barbatos, spare Mika's life, and take Kudelia, allowing him to carry out his orders without killing any more child soldiers. Mika finds this to be ridiculous, especially since Crank unknowingly killed several child soldiers in the previous battle.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: After failing to More-or-Less peacefully settle the conflict with the CGS Child Soldiers, he believed his death on an unauthorized solo-mission would spare his subordinates any blame. Not only was this ultimately futile, but obsession over avenging his death gradually drove Ein over the edge.

Arae Proto

Voiced by: Kouichi Souma (Japanese), Kirk Thornton (English)

A Gjallarhorn Officer placed in temporary command of the Mars Branch after Coral Conrad's death. In season 2 he is promoted to permanent head of the Mars Branch and is an ally to Tekkadan.

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• Cavalry Betrayal: Downplayed. After a disastrous defeat by the Arianrhod Fleet, McGillis and Tekkadan flee to Mars, hoping to supplement their forces with the Mars Branch. However when they arrive Arae's already been contacted by Rustal and McGillis has been stripped of his rank. With the other Seven Stars in support of Rustal and McGillis no longer being in the command structure, Arae denies his request for aid. That said he still allows McGillis and his allies access to Mars as a personal favor and the Mars Branch remain neutral in the conflict rather than antagonistic.
• Redeeming Replacement: Arae is much less corrupt and much more affable than Coral was. With Tekkadan's alliance with McGillis's faction, Arae acts as the go between.

Outer Earth Joint Regulatory Fleet

Carta Issue

Voiced by: Kikuko Inoue (Japanese), Carrie Keranen (English)

Main mecha: EB-06rs Graze Ritter Commander Type

A Gjallarhorn officer in command of the Outer Earth Orbit Joint Regulatory Fleet, and direct heiress apparent to one of the organization's "Seven Stars" - Gjallarhorn's seven founding families. A close acquaintance of McGillis and Gaelio since childhood.

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• Ace Custom: She's in the rare and enviable position of flying an Ace Custom of an Ace Custom. The Graze Ritters^note "knights" in German her personal guard fly are tweaked, up-armored versions of the standard EB-06 with fancy-looking swords rather than the usual axes, and her commander variant has extended shoulder armor and unique red highlights.
• Alas, Poor Villain: The poor girl dies after getting a particularly brutal beatdown from Mikazuki and as a victim of McGillis's schemes for power, blissfully unaware the man she loved was only using her.
• All Love Is Unrequited: Poor Carta is in love with McGillis despite that he's engaged. Except that McGillis used her to send her to her doom and doesn't feel any remorse or grief when she died.
• Animal Motifs: There are three fox-tails in her hair, which combined with her Tsurime eyes reflect her cunning and intelligence (at least in her own mind).
• Anti-Villain: At the end of the day, she's just a young woman trying to impress her crush and her stepfather. She's also one of the few Gjallarhorn officers who aren't corrupt.
• Attack Pattern Alpha: She uses preplanned formations a lot, which look very pretty but aren't actually very effective in battle. In hindsight, these formations are actually useful against sentient Mobile Armors (enemies of Gjallarhorn during the Calamity War) not Mobile Suits. But since the Mobile Armors were destroyed (or are they?) these formations that Carta learned and applied are pointless.
• BFS: Rather than the standard Graze axes, the Ritters that she and her squadron fly are equipped with large, gold-hilted broadswords ^note The Gjallarhorn utilizes two types of swords for ground type Grazes, the Battle Blade is a standard black-hilted, single-edged sword made for mass production, and the Knight Blade, golden-hilted broadswords exclusive to Carta and her own squad. for mobile suit combat. It is justified that swords are lighter than the axes, especially for swinging it under gravity. They do not carry guns as well.
• Big Bad Wannabe: If you listen to her, the Outer Earth Orbit Regulatory Joint Fleet is the mightiest weapon in Gjallarhorn's arsenal. It's... probably best not to listen to her.
• Bigger Stick: She may be an absurd, incompetent rookie with no idea how war works, but she's the pilot of an Ace Custom mobile suit, commands a squadron of the same, and is in charge of a large, well-equipped Gjallarhorn fleet with special political privileges, all of which makes her much more dangerous than she might otherwise appear.
• Blue Blood: The Issue family is the most powerful of Gjallarhorn's Seven Stars, which is implied to be how she got command of a fleet despite... everything else about her.
• Born in the Wrong Century: Comes off like this because of her love for grandiose speeches and organized attack formations. It's implied the traits are acquired from a much older brand of warfare (perhaps Pre-Calamity War). Even her command position is seen by most in Gjallarhorn to be something of a relic. All of this proves very unhelpful when she faces a pissed-off band of teenage mercenary fighters that care more about survival and victory than they do about conventions of honor and fairness.
• Childhood Friends: With Gaelio and McGillis (the latter of whom she has feelings for).
• Cruel and Unusual Death: By having her mobile suit dismembered, pounded over and over again and slammed onto the icy ground, she doesn't even die of a clean kill, but rather a slow and a deliberately prolonged bleed out for her role in killing Biscuit.
• Deconstruction: Of what a noblewoman caught up in the factional politics of major families might actually turn out as, if she had no one else to rely on and tries to be a player with limited cunning and skills. Basically, she's Haman Karn without the Newtype skills and Manipulative Bitch credentials.
• Dies Wide Open: After her final defeat, she succumbs to her injuries in her cockpit, her eyes still open.
• Dramatic Irony: Led to her doom as a result of the machinations of the very same man she trusted and was in love with.
• Early-Bird Cameo: She is first seen in 2nd OP before being properly introduced.
• Expy: As a militaristic young lady with a rapid crush on the show's Char archetype, she's basically Haman Karn except much less savvy and competent at her job.
• Fatal Flaw: Carta insists on using traditional battle tactics, right down to announcing her presence and relying on battle formations. This matches up extremely poorly against Tekkadan, who's bread and butter are Guerilla Warfare tactics.
• Has a Type: It's probably not a coincidence that she has a Praetorian Guard of hunky blond men with a suspicious resemblance to McGillis, the boy she fell in Love at First Sight with.
• Honor Before Reason: Yeah, Carta, issuing a challenge to this ragtag army of hot-blooded young men with five mobile suits whose Morality Chain you offed are going to politely accommodate you like gentlemen in a three-on-three honorable duel.
• Improbable Weapon User: Carta earns her Combat Pragmatist chops with the Graze Ritters' unique re-entry tactic - surf through the atmosphere on mecha-sized surfboards, which they kick towards the enemy to start the assault. The Graze Ritters themselves are also made for ceremonial purpose rather than combat, but Carta can still utilize it for combat at ease.
• Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain: She's an insecure woman stuck in a dead-end post who tries to act like the supreme warlord of the solar system. It's hard not to feel a bit sorry for her at times.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: As abrasive as Carta can be, she's one of the few non-corrupt Gjallarhorn officers and she was also one of the few nobles to treat McGillis with respect despite his being an illegitimate child.
• Large Ham: She's a questionably-competent teenager Reassigned to Antarctica to get her out of the way, but if there's a way to make up with that with sheer enthusiastic volume and theatricality, she'll damn well try.
• Laughably Evil: Her incredibly serious Large Ham antics are a prime source of comedy both in-universe and out - even her subordinates, commendably loyal though they may be, can't resist the odd giggle behind her back.
• Leitmotif: "Speculative Methods".
• Let Them Die Happy: After Mikazuki tears Carta's mobile suit apart in revenge for her killing Biscuit, he's prevented from finishing her off when Gaelio swoops in and saves her. However, she's delirious from her injuries and believes that it's actually McGillis who's come to her rescue. Gaelio, visibly holding back tears, plays along rather than telling her the truth.
• Love at First Sight: Her reaction to seeing McGillis for the first time when they were both kids was both instant and lasting - even now, she's got a serious weakness for pretty blond men in uniform.
• Loving a Shadow: She loves McGillis only on a superficial level which also explains her penchant on having blond men as her subordinates. She really doesn't know him very well, let alone not knowing about what his father did to him when he was a kid.
• Miles Gloriosus: Is very prideful of her position as the commander of the Outer Earth Regulatory Joint Fleet, despite the fact that the position is largely ceremonial. In her first true taste of combat, she attempts parade formations, resulting in a subordinate's Graze getting shot in the head.
• A Mother to Her Men: Pompous as she may be, Carta legitimately cares about her men (them all being blonde men who look like McGillis may have something to do with it) and despairs whenever one of them gets killed.
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: Her position may be an artifact, but it still comes with the authority to legally compel the power blocs to turn over enemies of Gjallarhorn. Which causes trouble when the Oceanic Federation attempts to harbor Tekkadan. During the ensuing battle, she figures out which mobile worker Orga is giving his commands from and goes after it. Orga only survives because Biscuit gives his life to save him.
• One Head Taller: Inverts this in her childhood flashback scenes with Gaelio and McGillis where, despite being about the same age and female, she visibly towers over both. This is Truth in Television as girls tend to hit puberty before boys do.
• Perky Female Minion: The closest to one for Gjallarhorn considering its scale, but rapidly deconstructed.
• Pointy-Haired Boss: Carta is ill-suited for her role as commander of a fleet. It's implied part of the reason the Outer Earth Orbit Regulatory Joint Fleet functions as a ceremonial force is because of Carta's mismanagement, as McGillis is able to turn it into an elite military formation by the time Season 2 begins.
• Praetorian Guard: Her elite guard is made up of hand-selected blond men and accompanies her into battle.
• Reassigned to Antarctica: Her position as commander of the Outer Earth Orbit Regulatory Joint Fleet is considered to be something of a relic. According to Gaelio, Carta was given the position to get her out of the way. This happens again after her initial failure to capture Kudelia and Makanai, where she's given the unenviable task of retrying the mission - coincidentally, in some snowy, arctic-looking region in Canada. It doesn't end well.
• Sword Plant: She and her bodyguards do this during her second encounter with Tekkadan, doesn't stop Akihiro from shooting them mid-speech however.
• The Squadette: The sole female Gjallarhorn officer in the Outer Earth Orbit Joint Regulatory Fleet, not to mention its commanding officer.
• Too Dumb to Live: Tekkadan wipes the floor with her team twice, while displaying a complete lack of concern for ideals of chivalry or honor in combat. In her third encounter, she challenges them to a formal, pre-Calamity War-style duel just like Crank did. Unlike as with Crank, Mikazuki proceeds to attack before she's finished issuing her challenge, taking out her two subordinates in short order before taking his time in demolishing her mecha as well.
• Tsundere: To McGillis of course. She has an obsessive crush on him and does a poor job of hiding it.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Her killing Biscuit left Tekkadan without a Voice of Reason who could push back on some of Orga's more questionable decisions, leading them to make riskier and riskier moves that eventually result in Season 2's bleak ending.
• Unwitting Pawn: Gets sent to her demise by McGillis so he can take control of her fleet and her family's resources.
• Villainous Breakdown: She doesn't react well when she or her men are defeated — especially when her subordinates are killed in the process. She starts every battle composed (if hammy) and confident, and ends every battle an incoherent wreck.
• Villainous Valor: She is one of the few non-corrupt Gjallarhorn officers who believes in honor and valor, her decorative mobile suit and ceremonial poses are for mentoring her subordinates to remain pure and honorable, and her method of confronting her enemies is to deliver a fair and square duel as long as a chance is given. This backfires miserably when her opponent is a Combat Pragmatist and is in a Roaring Rampage of Revenge.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: She's childhood friends with both Gaelio and McGillis, even though she acts like she can't stand either of them.
• What the Hell, Hero?: During her Motive Rant, she calls Mika out mid-fight for having no honor, and the latter coldly replies that he doesn't give a damn who his enemies are.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: Behaves more like a Pokémon villain than a military officer, and hasn't gotten the memo that Tekkadan is a group of Combat Pragmatists rather than the honorable warriors she treats them as (and considers herself to be). Even after Tekkadan has demonstrated contempt for such ideals (by shooting at her mid-introductory speech, for example), she repeats this mistake three times without learning the lesson.

Isurugi Camice

Voiced by: Tomoaki Maeno (Japanese), Ben Pronsky (English)

Main mecha: EB-05s Schwalbe Graze (Blue), V08Re-0526 Helmwige Reincar

McGillis's second-in-command in the Outer Earth Joint Regulatory Fleet. Isurugi is a skilled pilot who operates an information network.

• All the Other Reindeer: Isurugi is from the colonies, so he suffered a lot of discrimination in Gjallarhorn before he met McGillis.
• Badass Normal: Being a Gjallarhorn pilot, he doesn't have any biological modification received, yet he can fight against Gaelio, who had a pseudo-Alaya-Vijnana system installed that significantly enhances his Kimaris, to a draw. Even more impressive when you realize that he managed to do it in an incredibly bulky and heavily armored Mighty Glacier vs. a heavily upgraded Gundam Frame, all without taking a single hit.
• BFS: The Helmwige Reincar trades the Grimgerde's dual swords for one really massive one. In fact, the Valkyrja Buster Sword is so massive that the Reincar needs extra support from the machines front skirt in order to properly handle it as well as pads on its feet to help spread its massive weight.
• The Confidant: The only member of Gjallarhorn who McGillis shares with his actual ambitions and behind the door dealings with.
• Heroic Sacrifice: Throws his life away to stop Gaelio from impaling, and later going after McGillis.
• Mid-Season Upgrade: About halfway through season 2, Isurugi upgrades to the Helmwige Reincar, an upgraded Grimgerde, since McGillis needs the extra firepower but can't pilot the Reincar himself without risking exposing himself as Montag.
• Mighty Glacier: The Helmwige Reincar. It's an upgraded Grimgerde disguised as one of its sister units with its output now focused on bearing the load of its heavy armor and weaponry. In both, it's sorties against Hashmal and Kimaris Vidar, it takes absolutely no damage despite being hit in the former and facing a Gundam in the latter.
• Not So Stoic: He loses it when he sees firsthand the fight between the Barbatos and the Hashmal, especially when the former takes the Helmwige Reincar's BFS, which needs special attachments just to use it, and subsequently uses it to land the death blow on the latter - with ONE ARM.
• Number Two: Assistant to McGillis and second-in-command of his forces.
• The Quiet One: Outright described being "shy" in his profile.
• Raven Hair, Ivory Skin: Black haired and has pale white skin.
• Satellite Character: For the most part, we know nothing about him and he only serves as an extension of McGillis' power in season 2. It's only during his death scene that we learn a bit about his background.
• Secret-Keeper: Isurugi is the only other member of Gjallarhorn who is aware that McGillis is Montag.
• The Stoic: He shares McGillis's tendency not to display his emotions.
• Super Prototype: He pilots McGillis's old Schwalbe Graze, which is a prototype Graze that is superior to the mass-produced version but is more difficult to control.
• Taking the Bullet: He dies taking an attack from Gaelio that would have killed McGillis.
• Undying Loyalty: Is wholly loyal to McGillis despite being aware that they only sees him as a pawn and what became of his previous allies. Episode 45 reveals that while he doesn't really care for McGillis as a person, the reason why he's so loyal is that he wants to see the world that McGillis will create. Regardless, he is the confidant McGillis trusts more than anyone else, and Isurugi follows his orders without question.

Liza Enza

Voiced by: Kengo Takanashi (Japanese), Joe Zieja (English)

A young and idealistic officer in Gjallarhorn who serves as the main public representative of McGillis's Revolutionary Fleet.

• Early-Bird Cameo: He makes his first appearance in an easy-to-miss scene in episode 41, right before becoming a fairly important character an episode later.
• Hero-Worshipper: Respects Tekkadan and admits to being partially inspired by them when he meets them face to face.
• Mauve Shirt: Appears in a few episodes, enough to establish that he's idealistic to a fault and wholly devoted to McGillis's cause, but dies in battle with the Arianrhod Fleet.
• Nice Guy: Treats Tekkadan with respect despite their lowly origins, stating that he's honored to meet them and that their acts at Edmonton inspired him and the other members of the revolutionary fleet to rise up.
• "Not So Different" Remark: Admits to Tekkadan he and the other young officers in Gjallarhorn were inspired to rise up by them, and even calls them his "comrades", something which Eugene finds disconcerting.
• Rousing Speech: When McGillis finally puts in motion his plan to wrest full control of Gjallarhorn, it's Liza who gives a televised speech exposing all of Rustal and Iok's crimes and rallying the other soldiers to rise up against them.
• The Captain: He's seen in charge of one of the Revolutionary Fleet's battleships during their outer space battle against the Arianrhod Fleet.
• The Face: Rather charismatic, and prone to speeches about Gjallarhorn's honor and justice. This makes him the perfect poster boy for the revolution.
• Wide-Eyed Idealist: He believes whole-heartedly in McGillis's revolution and the authority of Bael. This, unsurprisingly gets him killed when the rest of Gjallarhorn refuse to play along with the revolution's fairy tale narrative.

Arianrhod Fleet

Rustal Elion

Voiced by: Tōru Ōkawa (Japanese), Ray Chase (English)

Lord of the Seven Stars' Elion family and commander of the Arianrhod fleet. Rustal is a charismatic leader who has the complete trust of his subordinates. He (openly) opposes reforming Gjallarhorn, which brings him into conflict with McGillis.

• Affably Evil: Rustal is a pleasant man who treats his subordinates well. Unfortunately, he's also ruthlessly dedicated to keeping the corrupt Gjallarhorn in power.
  • The affable part is emphasized in the ending, where he actually reforms Gjallarhorn himself and even strike a deal with Kudelia to pass a law making Human Debris illegal.
• A Lighter Shade of Black: Compared to the other corrupt Gjallarhorn members he treats his subordinates genuinely well, is honest and self aware in his dirty dealings, isn't driven by personal prejudice, and even at his worst he's pragmatic enough to abandon his intent to wipe out the heroes and even assist them once it becomes the most expedient means to his goals.
• At Least I Admit It: He's completely honest with his underlings. He makes it clear to Iok and Julieta that he is no saint and that he uses dirty and unsavory tactics to get things done.
• Awakening the Sleeping Giant: Tekkadan was making real progress until they decided to pick a fight with this guy.
• Badass Bureaucrat: Given that Iron-Blooded Orphans is a mecha series, it says a lot that the most dangerous man in the entire cast is a bureaucrat, politician, and strategist who never personally engages in physical violence. Rustal's weapon is the wealth, influence, and might of Gjallarhorn itself, which he wields with unparalleled skill and brutality.
• Bad Boss: Played With. Rustal treats his underlings with professional courtesy and steers away from unnecessary risks that might endanger them; because of this, he's got a number of deeply loyal followers. However, when he deems it a necessary risk, things can get ugly. The battle with the Revolutionary Fleet is a prime example of the fanaticism of his followers and Rustal's cold calculation. He has one of his men pose as a soldier in the Revolutionary Fleet and fire a Dainsleif at Rustal's own fleet, killing a number of his men. The nameless soldier then commits suicide so Rustal won't be implicated and Rustal uses the death of his own men (that he orchestrated) to give his Dainsleif squadron the go-ahead.
• The Bad Guy Wins: He ends Tekkadan as an organization, wipes out McGillis' Revolutionary Fleet, and succeeds in reforming Gjallarhorn into a more democratic system with himself at the top, all of which furthers his personal reputation.
• Beard of Evil: Sports a beard, and ruthlessly supports a corrupt system.
• Big Bad: He is the primary antagonist of the second season. He's the main person in the Seven Stars holding back any kinds of reforms to Gjallarhorn and is responsible for green-lighting or allowing most of their crimes.
• Bigger Stick: One of his greatest advantages is that he can and will leverage the entire industrial might of the most powerful organization in the solar system to crush his enemies. The Dainsleif squadrons are perhaps the ultimate example. A Dainsleif launcher uses one of the rarest and most expensive devices in the solar system, an Ahab reactor, to repeatedly launch giant spears made of one of the rarest and most expensive materials in the solar system, mobile suit frame alloy, at the enemy. They're also so clumsy, slow-firing, and difficult to aim that they're only really effective when used en masse. Rustal spends ludicrous amounts of money and resources to mass-produce them and becomes functionally invincible in fleet combat as a result.
• Broken Pedestal: Downplayed. Julieta loses her respect for him (slightly) once she realizes he's not the man she thought he was. Though she still entrusts herself to him as the man who raised her.
• The Chessmaster: Skilled at long-term and multi-faceted plans. It comes with being a master strategist. In episode 45, he has one of his supporters act as one of the revolutionaries and fire a Dainsleif railgun thus giving him the moral high ground to use them against McGillis.
• Coat Cape: Most of the time, he's seen wearing his dark green overcoat on his shoulders, including the image of him shown above. It makes for an interesting parallel with Orga.
• Corrupt Politician: He elevates this trope to a lethal and highly purposeful art form. The best way to put it is probably that he has an intimate understanding of the rules and mechanisms which Post Disaster politics actually run according to, as opposed to the ones they pretend to operate by, and will make the fullest possible use of them to advance and protect the power and influence of Gjallarhorn (and himself). Bribery, blackmail, influence-brokering, and even the occasional False Flag Operation are all on the table if he thinks the benefits will outweigh the costs.
• Cult of Personality: He's enough of a force of personality that all of his subordinates are completely loyal to him. Even Iok and Julieta follow him in spite of him being open about the dirty dealings he does with them.
• Death Glare: He delivers a piercing cold glare to Iok when he calls on the alliance between their families.
• Despotism Justifies the Means: It's never outright stated, but all of Rustal's gambits seem to suspiciously align with getting himself more power and bumping off anyone who gets in his way.
• Diabolical Mastermind: One of the Gjallarhorn Seven Stars, who in addition to serving as commander of the Arianrhod Fleet controls a shadowy network of spies and mercenaries through which he's able to do things like engineer proxy wars to destabilize his political rivals or make deals with Corrupt Corporate Executives and mob bosses.
• Early-Bird Cameo: Not Rustal himself, but his fleet first gets a mention in Season 1 when they're called in to suppress the workers' protests in Dort.
• Enemy Mine: In the epilogue he cosigns the anti-Human Debris treaty with Kudelia, even though she has close ties with Tekkadan and he's clearly aware she's harboring some of their members.
• Even Evil Has Standards: It's implied he really did not care for Iok's stunt in framing and slaughtering the Turbines in misplaced retribution against Tekkadan, at least as far as the negative publicity it brings onto Gjallarhorn. He stops Iok from completing the deal, apologizes to McMurdo and agrees to call it even with him and is quite pissed at Iok for a while afterwards, having him under house arrest.
• Evil Gloating: When Orga contacts him through Barristan that he would surrender himself, Rustal refuses to accept it and gloats that he will kill everyone in Tekkadan just to make an example for underestimating Gjallarhorn.
• Evil Parents Want Good Kids: Implied. He gives his adoptive daughter Julietta plenty of lessons in realpolitik, but seems extremely comfortable with the fact that she's developing a stronger moral code than him. In accordance with his philosophy of incremental change and evolution, it likely helped convince him to set her up as his heir in the ending.
• Expy: Like Gihren Zabi (Gundam's original Diabolical Mastermind) he is a nobleman who engages in Fantastic Racism, is a Non-Action Big Bad and a Manipulative Bastard who inspires loyalty in those around him. The big difference is that Rustal is pragmatic, realistic and most of all, sane. He even manages to do some good in the end.
• False Flag Operation: A staple of his. He often sets things up so that he'll have justification for doing what he pleases during warfare.
• Fantastic Racism: Like most of Gjallarhorn, Rustal looks down on Tekkadan for being "space rats".
• A Father to His Men: Rustal makes the effort to look after his subordinates and they practically worship him in return. That being said, he is willing to send them on suicide missions and target them in False Flag Operations.
• Foil: Ends up becoming this to McGillis through the second season. Both are Chessmasters, looking to restore Gjallarhorn's reputation to the public. Rustal is driven by his desire to maintain order while McGillis wants radical reformation. Interestingly, Rustal is A Father to His Men who recognizes the value in keeping allies while McGillis is more than willing to discard those he finds standing in his way of achieving his ambition. This ultimately comes into play in the finale where during McGillis' coup, he find himself undermanned compared to Rustal, who has larger support because he always made an effort to maintain good relations. Rustal ends up having a decisive victory because of this.
  • He is also one to Orga, down to wearing a Coat Cape. Both are leaders of their respective organizations and chess masters, but whereas Orga is likely to make decisions based on emotions and is willing to risk his life plenty of times, Elion is a hardcore pragmatist and won't put himself in the line of fire. Orga is also young and often unaware of the politics revolving around their conflict, whereas Elion is acutely aware.
• Four-Star Badass: Rustal may not be a combatant himself, but that doesn't stop him from being a ruthlessly effective strategist and a diabolically successful player of politics. The Ace Pilots in his fleet all owe their victories in battle to being backed up by Rustal's tactics and how he makes use of his fleet's resources.
• The Gloves Come Off: Rustal's handling of Tekkaden's final fight can be seen as him not leaving anything to chance. Despite Tekkadan losing all but two of their remaining mobile suits, Rustal doesn't even give Minazuki a chance to fight at full strength. Knowing that he's facing an ace who is renowned for his piloting skills and willingness to fight dirty, Rustal instead treats him like a real threat and throws absolutely every thing at him. After using a kinetic orbital strike to severely damage Barbatos he sends his ace pilot Julietta in a highly advanced mobile suit to finish him off.
• Hypocrite: One of his most defining traits is that hypocrisy is something he simply does not care about. Rustal will do what he believes is good for him, he will do what he believes is good for the solar system, and, preferably, he will do both at the same time. Moral consistency is simply not a concern. He'll bring down the aristocracy while creating his own dynasty. He'll whip up classism while grooming his own lowborn surrogate daughter for high command. He'll use his criminal connections to expunge dangerous criminality. It's what makes him such an incredible menace - he can comfortably live inside the crooked, self-contradictory, and immensely powerful mess that is Gjallarhorn and uses it to maximum advantage while everyone else trips over their principles.
• Internal Reformist: Despite supporting the corrupt system of Gjallarhorn for most of the series, it's he who reforms Gjallarhorn completely following McGillis' exposing of the crimes of the Seven Stars. This is heavily implied to be to earn himself good favor and provide an excuse to take full control of Gjallarhorn.
• Invincible Villain: It's an unwritten rule in the Post Disaster setting that you don't mess with the Arianrhod Fleet. Half of it is because they're the largest and most heavily-armed formation in the largest and most heavily-armed military force in the solar system. The other half is because they're led by this guy. Rustal is the sort of person whose existence explains why Gjallarhorn has maintained its rule for three centuries despite its corruption and decay - he's got the political nous, the strategic genius, and the utter ruthlessness necessary to eliminate any serious threat to their authority. The story of Season 2 is the story of Orga and McGillis picking a fight with him out of blind hubris and gradually realising why that was a terrible, terrible idea.
• Karma Houdini: He reforms Gjallarhorn completely and is seen as a "hero" for putting down McGillis and Tekkadan and helping Kudelia abolish the Human Debris system. His atrocities are never exposed and he never receives any comeuppance, in fact he winds up with more power than he had before.
• Kick the Dog: When Orga calls after the outcome of the conflict becomes clear and offers his own life for the safety of the members of Tekkadan, Rustal rejects Orga's pleas to allow him to surrender and instead coldly stating how he intends to completely destroy all of Tekkadan as an example of Gjallarhorn's power. Ultimately subverted, as while the battle costs the lives of many members of Tekkadan, once the fighting is over he lets the rest go free.
• Knight Templar: Rustal's firmly determined to do whatever underhanded methods it takes to ensure Gjallarhorn remains in power, no matter the fallout or casualties they bring, because he believes Gjallarhorn is necessary as a peacekeeping force.
• Lack of Empathy: Rustal's ruthlessness and desire to see Gjallarhorn stay in power comes with a lack of any sort of care for who he has to trample on to do so, whether they be the citizens of Earth's power blocs or victimized Child Soldiers.
• Large and in Charge: The Gjallarhorn aristocracy tend to be on the tall side (Gaelio, for instance, is over two metres tall), but Rustal is absolutely huge. It makes him look appropriately imposing as the solar system's apex predator, and serves as another parallel with Douglas MacArthur, who was north of six feet tall and towered over most of the Japanese officials he worked with after the Second World War.
• The Man Behind the Man: He makes use of his mercenary contact, Galan Mossa, to trigger the Arbrau-SAU war, in order to keep his hands clean and prevent anything from being traced back to him.
• Nebulous Criminal Conspiracy: He's implied to have some sort of deal worked out with both Nobliss and McMurdo. He's able to call upon the former to use his media connections to paint him in a favorable light and smear Tekkadan, and he saw it as necessary enough to stay on good terms with the latter that he was willing to punish Iok for the stunt he pulled regarding the Turbines and make a personal apology.
• Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: Rustal's refusal to let Tekkadan surrender led to their last stand which took the life of Iok, killing enough of Gjallarhorn's leadership Rustal is forced to overhaul the corrupt system and ceed the power over Mars he fought so hard to maintain.
• Non-Action Big Bad: He's never seen piloting a Mobile Suit himself, and instead has Vidar, Iok, and Julieta do the fighting for him. Doesn't make him any less dangerous though, since he's a master strategist.
• No Historical Figures Were Harmed: He takes a great deal of inspiration from General Douglas MacArthur - he's a towering, charismatic military commander who's extremely ambitious, has significant underworld connections, and is ruthless in battle but surprisingly magnanimous in victory. His handshake with Kudelia at the end of the show is a direct reference to the famous photos of MacArthur and Hirohito.
• No-Nonsense Nemesis: Rustal does not hold back and is perfectly willing to make full use of his fleet's power to crush his enemies into oblivion. Perfect example is the series' Final Battle. Tekkadan expected a brutal Last Stand, but Barbatos' power alone would have made it incredibly expensive for the enemy. So he annihilates them with an orbital strike. Mikazuki and Akihiro still take a few with them (like Iok), but from a strictly comparative view it was a pretty Undignified Death for the pilot of a titular Gundam.
• Nothing Personal: At the end of Season 2, Rustal is steadfast in making an example out of Tekkadan. While he doesn't personally begrudge any particular member, from his perspective, Tekkadan has caused too much dissension amongst society and that there is no way Gjallarhorn can regain their reputation or order while Tekkadan remains.
• Oh, Crap!: Rustal has one when he see Gundam Flauros with a railgun aimed straight at him.
• Parental Substitute: Essentially serves as one to Julieta, right down to setting her up as his unofficial heir in the ending. He takes a typically pragmatic approach to it - he'll treat her with respect and give her good, useful life advice, and he will try to ensure she isn't exposed to unnecessary danger, but if he needs to send her out on a mission that will almost certainly kill her, then he will do it (and then give her top-tier medical treatment if she makes it back alive).
• Pet the Dog: One potential interpretation. Despite his threats to Orga to kill all of Tekkadan, he actually stops his pursuit after Mikazuki falls in battle. The ending implies that he is very much aware that the surviving members now work under Kudelia, but he looks the other way.
• Pragmatic Villainy: Rustal is ruthless but not unreasonable. He is perfectly willing to take extreme measures to realize his goals, but he is also heavily pragmatic and takes no pleasure in excessive violence.
  • He personally apologizes to McMurdo for Iok's unwarranted assault on the Turbines and breaks up Iok's alliance with Jasley, salvaging their relations with Teiwaz and preventing Iok from bringing any further bad publicity onto Gjallarhorn.
  • In episode 45 he attacks only the Revolutionaries, Tekkadan and McGillis as he knows that Outer Earth Joint Regulatory Fleet is only following McGillis out of duty and with him dead, they will give up quickly.
  • With Iok, Carta, and McGillis dead, numerous crimes committed by the Seven Stars including McGillis own crimes exposed, Rustal has the Seven Stars system disbanded after the war and replaces it with actual democracy. Rustal's methods of maintaining peace also ironically ends up aligning with everything McGillis promised. Disposing of the rest of the Seven Stars also means he won't have to share power with anyone, and as the great reformer who kicked out the sneering aristocrats that the common people had long since grown to despise he probably won't have to worry about being voted out any time soon.
  • His supposed Pet the Dog situation is also a case: He is heavily implied to be aware of Tekkadan's survival but looks the other way around since they're officially dead on paper and Tekkadan's military prowess was void with the loss of their remaining Gundams, with Akihiro and Mikazuki along with them. Furthermore, by having positions under Kudelia where they could live and work peacefully just as they wanted anyway, there was no longer any need to pursue them and see them as threats. And for him, that's good enough.
  • In the end, he signs legislation finally banning the use of Child Soldiers, which were a threat that damaged and nearly toppled the old regime.
• President Evil: The epilogue has him presides over a Gjallarhorn that's more democratic thanks to some reforms he's implemented, he's still actively responsible for many of the atrocities their old regime committed and shows no remorse for his corrupt behaviors.
• Realpolitik: Rustal is perfectly willing to play dirty and cut deals with other unsavory figures in the Earth Sphere if it means advancing his agenda, which involves Gjallarhorn remaining a dominant force in the solar system.
• The Rival: In Season 2, McGillis is competing for influence with him. Rustal welcomes the challenge.
• Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!: Rustal proclaims his move against McGillis, who had just acquired Gundam Bael and by Gjallarhorn's tenets should be their leader, to be this in order to justify committing what is technically treason.
• Smug Smiler: He's constantly smirking around whenever something good happens to him.
• The Sociopath: A high-functioning and highly pragmatic example. He's polite and charismatic, able to condition people to be completely loyal to him, but while he does consider some people friends he also thinks little of sacrificing them if it benefits his own motives. He dislikes unnecessary bloodshed for pragmatic, but is also perfectly willing to orchestrate conflicts in which hundreds of people die just to advance his own goals.
• The Stoic: Rustal never flinches once throughout the series, the closest being when he visibly sweats as Shino is aiming his railgun at him.
• The Unfettered: Rustal does not care about consistent moral principles, and takes a very big-picture view of costs and benefits. He'll do what he thinks helps him, he'll do what he thinks helps the solar system, and he'll preferably do both at once. If that means committing war crimes, sacrificing his own loyal subordinates, and/or spending silly amounts of money, then he'll do it, even if he regrets it.
• Villain Has a Point: While he leads the rebellion against McGillis and his claim that he wants to reform Gjallarhorn and do away with its outdated ways, he notes straightforwardly that, in using Bael to become the new leader of Gjallarhorn, McGillis is relying on the very same rules and standards of the past that he claims to want to get rid of. He further elaborates that its founder's legacy has very little to do with Gjallarhorn's history following the Calamity War and that if he truly wanted to fix Gjallarhorn then he should be rejecting Agnika Kaieru as a relic of the past.
• Villainous Friendship: He held the "Bearded Man" in high regard, noting how he'd sacrificed everything from his family to his own name for the sake of Rustal's ambitions. At the same time, he's not terribly torn up when Galan is killed and outright scolds Julieta for weeping over his death, only being concerned with how Galan's actions furthered his own political ambitions.
• Villain with Good Publicity: The public considers Rustal to be a hero. However, Rustal is completely ruthless and has absolutely no qualms about killing innocents to accomplish his goals. After the final battle, Rustal reforms Gjallarhorn and his popularity hit an all-time high. Tekkadan and McGillis, whose war against Gjallarhorn necessitated the reforms, are forgotten by most.
• Would Hurt a Child: When Orga calls Rustal to negotiate terms of surrender, Rustal reveals that he plans on killing every last member of Tekkadan, almost all of whom are children, because just killing McGillis would make Gjallarhorn look weak. Ultimately subverted - after destroying Tekkadan's name, base, and Gundams, he's content to let the survivors live out their lives in peace, implied to be because they no longer pose a threat to his authority.
• Written by the Winners: Because Rustal wins the decisive battle at the end of the series, with a little help from Nobliss Gordon and his media connections, Rustal is able to cast himself as the hero fighting to defend Gjallarhorn, McGillis as a treacherous usurper and would-be tyrant, and Tekkadan as amoral mercenaries helping him.

Iok Kujan

Voiced by: Nobunaga Shimazaki (Japanese), Grant George (English)

Main mecha: EB-08 Reginlaze (Iok Custom), EB-06s Graze Commander Type (Iok Custom), EB-06 Graze

Lord of the Seven Stars' Kujan family. He is loyal to Rustal. Unfortunately, he seems to have gotten to his position primarily through inheritances and nepotism, which he mistakes for his own competence.

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• Blue Blood: The head of Gjallarhorn's Kujan Family.
• Born Lucky: Iok has a tendency to miraculously survive certain death. It doesn't save him from Akihiro's revenge.
• Break the Haughty: The Hashmal arc is this for Iok in a nutshell. Iok goes to Mars, thinking that he'll destroy the inert Hashmal with ease and earn his family an Order of the Seven Stars. Instead, he accidentally awakens Hashmal and only survives because his bodyguards sacrifice themselves and Julieta rescues him. After Julieta gives Iok a dressing down, she has Vidar babysit him for the rest of the battle. Afterwards, McGillis ends up embarrassing him in front of the rest of Gjallahorn's top brass during the debriefing. Rustal then tells Iok that he will end his alliance with the Kujan family unless Iok can prove that he is capable of restraint. Iok doesn't take that well.
• The Brute: He's this for the Arianrhod Fleet. While he is one of the Seven Stars, due to his incompetence as a strategist, the only thing he contributes to Rustal's forces besides the men he commands as head of House Kujan is his own skills as a mobile suit pilot. Even when he's commanding an operation, his main tactic is just to have his forces hammer away at the enemy with massive firepower.
• The Caligula: Iok's utter incompetence and impulsiveness make him ill-suited to be his family's head, much less the commander of a military force. As a result, he's only really good at getting his own men killed in battle and endangering civilians with his reckless strategies.
• The Charmer: Why Rustal was so interested in him in the first place. Iok is so honest and passionate, he can easily command people's loyalty due to his personality even to the point of death.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: Akihiro crushes him to death with Gusion's scissors at his cockpit. Brutal, but hardly undeserved.
• Detrimental Determination: His sheer tenacity puts himself in needless danger, leads to many of his allies dying or forced to make concessions to fix his mistakes, and erode his power as his superiors put him on a tighter leash. But all those setbacks lead him to continue in desperation to make things right only making things worse. This leads to his death that could have been avoided if he followed everyone telling him to hand back, ending his family line forcing the dissolution of the system he sought to protect.
• Dramatically Missing the Point: One of his main flaws is that he wants to be like Rustal without understanding why Rustal's leadership works. He sees Rustal being efficient, sees him being ruthless, and comes to the conclusion that being ruthless is being efficient, never realizing Rustal's worst actions always have a point to them and he isn't cruel for the sake of being cruel. This leads to him committing pointless acts of cruelty that bring no benefit to his side under the belief that he will become respected for them, and is actually shocked when the opposite happens.
• Dumbass Has a Point: Despite his military incompetence, Iok does realize Dainsleif are so powerful they're worth using despite being illegal. Even Rustal implicitly agrees, as he keeps them around after demoting Iok and a major part of his strategy is contriving a justification to use them against Tekkadan.
• Even Evil Has Standards: In episode 48 he participates in Rustal's plan to further defame Tekkadan. The plan involves them not making the first move and allowing Bael to strike them first to show they're not the aggressors. Having to order his men to stand still and be attacked is something Iok can't stand and he willingly throws himself unarmed at Bael as the bait instead.
• Expy:
  • Similar to how Rustal takes cues from Gihren Zabi, Iok takes more than a few from Garma. He is young, vain, fancies himself a noble warrior and is fueled by insecurity. It is precisely these flaws that led to Garma's death and the same hold true for Iok.
  • In other ways, Iok also takes numerous cues from Don Quixote: a delusional Glory Hound that believes himself to be a noble and chivalrous individual that all should aspire to become, when in reality; he is an absolute lunatic that causes more harm than good wherever he goes.
• Fatal Flaw:
  • Iok is a Glory Seeker to an absolute fault. He frequently rushes into battle without much of a plan outside of seeking personal glory. The only reason he doesn't die is through a combination of his men always saving him or through sheer luck. He tests his luck one too many times come the final episode, where even his men couldn't protect him from the wrath of an enraged Akihiro.
  • His inability to heed the words of his mentor and his men, who try to give him helpful advice about listening to those around him. In the final battle, one of his men even asks him to not rush off to fight. He does exactly that and dies as a result.
• A Father to His Men: Deconstructed. His devotion to his men lead him to take increasingly incompetent, short-sighted, and immoral actions for their sake that waste their sacrifices for his sake. It also blinds his men to how unfit he is for leading them.
• Foil:
  • In many ways, Iok is the opposite of Ein. Ein had to work hard to become even acknowledged and ranked in the hierarchy of the Gjallarhorn military while Iok was born into it. Ein is more capable than most but still gets no respect, while Iok is, at least, treated with courtesy. But, while Ein is highly regarded by his superiors, Iok is seen as a liability by the higher-ups in Gjallarhorn.
  • He also plays as one to Carta. Whereas Carta was motivated at proving herself worthy of her position in Gjallarhorn, Iok tended to only seek to prove his worth after doing something incompetent. They are both obsessed with honor, but while Carta heeds the rules by the letter and never does anything dishonorable till the very end, Iok tends to break them to commit atrocities while still considering himself as reclaiming his honor. Finally the actions up to their deaths is based around Iok refusing to heed the advice of his men and dying as a result, Carta heeded the advice of McGillis who gave it to her so she would die fighting Mikazuki.
  • To Julieta. Iok is primarily a sniper, while Julieta prefers melee combat. Iok was born into authority, while Julieta had to work hard to become an Arianrhod pilot due to her status as a commoner. Iok is incompetent and doesn't realize it, while Julieta is skilled but realizes that she has room for improvement. Naturally, the two of them can't stand one another.
  • To Gaelio as well. Both with born into comfy lives within Gjallarhorn, but while Gaelio has principles and legitimately believes in honor, Iok has a hypocritical sense of honor that he routinely bends to self-aggrandize himself and justify committing atrocities.
• Friendly Sniper: Cheerful and supposedly deadly with his Reginlaze's massive gun.
• Frontline General: He wants to be one and insists on leading his men into battle, even though he's a subpar combatant at best and an utterly terrible military leader.
• General Failure: The only reason Iok wins any of the battles he's in is due to strength of the forces he commands and his Plot Armor. In battle, he's a terrible leader whose recklessness and single-minded determination to earn Rustal's respect leads him to cause blunders that result in the deaths of his men and lots of unnecessary casualties.
• General Ripper: Iok takes his family's creed to justify using excessive force against whatever enemy he's fighting, even if they're women and children.
• Glory Hound: A lot of his stupidity and recklessness stems from his constant desire to prove himself to others and to gain recognition.
• Hate Sink: As a Lethally Stupid, self-righteous General Failure whose blunders cause loads of unnecessary deaths on both his own side and to civilians, there's not a whole lot to like about Iok. Tellingly, he's the only one of Rustal's three subordinates to die, and in a manner which is equal parts incredibly brutal and darkly appropriate, which also forces the abolishment the corrupt system directly leading to nearly all the good to come from the bittersweet ending.
• Hot-Blooded: Just a little too eager to serve Gjallarhorn and prove his worth to his family, which unfortunately causes him to make some serious mistakes in the battle against Hashmal.
• Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy: Despite the fact that Iok's top-of-the-line Reginlaze is built from the ground up for sniping, his ability to hit targets varies wildly from scene to scene. In his first battle, he successfully snipes the weapons out of an enemy's hands, then anticipates every single one of Mikazuki's potential dodges in advance - and ends up missing anyway, as Mikazuki figures this out at the same time, and just maintains a completely straight course while Iok is left furiously firing at the places he should be. His next battle has him congratulating enemy Gildas on their superior dodging ability - the problem is, neither mecha was moving at all while he was shooting at them. This paints a general picture of a man with a great deal of technical competence, but far too little battlefield experience to express it fluently or consistently.
• Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain: Deconstructed. In a more light-hearted series, watching this pompous braggart constantly falling flat on his face (sometimes literally) would be nothing but good, clean fun. In a realistic setting, though? Not so much. Iok's incompetence leads to his own men dying pointless deaths left and right, even when his plans fail they leave lots more good people dead and his selfish, short-sighted narcissism leads him to keep coming back over and over again to spread more violence and death.
• Insane Admiral: "Stupid Evil Admiral" might be a better descriptor, but Iok has a habit of employing needlessly destructive tactics in battle in the name of his twisted idea of glory. A good example being when he deliberately ignores a surrender signal from the Turbines and has his men fire superweapons at escape pods carrying their women and children.
• Irony: Throughout the series, he was constantly attempting to either keep or win back Rustal's favor, in order to keep his family's position in the Seven Stars. His death is ultimately what leads Rustal to scrap the Seven Stars.
• It's All About Me: In episode 40, Iok breaks the codes of combat and insists on shooting down the Turbine's Hammerhead, despite Naze's attempts to surrender, to put himself in better standing with Rustal.
• It's All My Fault: After his soldiers all sacrifice themselves to make sure he escapes Hashmal's rampage, Iok is consumed by grief and makes another attempt to stop Hashmal, risking his life once again to do so. He even begs his men to forgive him in what appears to be his final moments. Subverted later when, after the incident is resolved, he refuses to accept any blame and attempts to blame McGillis instead.
• Karma Houdini Warranty: Iok survives as long as he does in Season 2 because his men look out for him and through sheer utter luck. His luck finally runs out in the finale when he rushes ahead to try and kill Akihiro.
• Karmic Death: After an entire season of barely surviving, he's finally crushed to death by Akihiro with the Gusion's shield-scissors. Being killed by Akihiro also counts as Iok, through directly causing Naze and Amida's deaths, is indirectly the cause of Lafter's murder. Akihiro even goes into full Unstoppable Rage upon hearing Iok's name.
• Kick the Dog: He outright ignores the Turbines' signals for a peaceful surrender and instead has his forces fire on the pods carrying civilians away from the battle, all just to prove his ruthlessness to Rustal.
• Know-Nothing Know-It-All: It's become increasingly apparent as Season 2 goes along that Iok got to his high ranking position through his family name, not through any actual deeds. Even Julieta takes him to task on his lack of knowledge about the Calamity War and the Mobile Armors.
• Leeroy Jenkins: He has a really bad habit of taking action without taking the slightest effort to consider the consequences.
• Lethally Stupid: Iok's defining traits are his complete incompetence and his utter obliviousness to that fact. He starts out merely handicapping his own side, but his idiocy starts getting innocent people killed and derailing plans in a big way when he wakes up a long-dormant Mobile Armor Hashmal.
  • Nearly happened again in episode 40 when he didn't have his ship enter battle mode as a way to gloat. This nearly got him and his crew killed. One of the ships in his fleet does, however, end up paying the price.
• Long-Range Fighter: Iok wants to lead from the front, and his family would prefer that he stay back where it's safe. Tailoring his suit for long-ranged combat is his way of resolving the argument, although the folks back home are still pretty unhappy about it.
• Meaningful Name: His surname sounds similar to "kujaku", Japanese for peacock, an animal which is also known for being showy and useless. Similarly, fitting is that the peacock is occasionally associated with the sin of Pride, which Iok embodies.
• Mid-Season Upgrade: Inverted as Iok's incompetence and frequent defeats cause him to actually get downgraded as the season goes on. His custom Reginlaze is what he starts out with but it gets wrecked during the Hashmal incident. After that he's instead given a commander unit Graze as Reginlazes are limited production so he can't easily replace it. He customizes it with his favored black and yellow paintjob and adds the surviving sword from his first mobile suit, but this custom Graze is ALSO destroyed in a reckless charge. After that, the only thing Rustal is willing to trust him with is a generic colored and equipped regular Graze. To the surprise of no one he gets defeated AGAIN as challenging Gundam's in an underpowered grunt goes about as well as you expect and this time Iok gets killed.
• More Despicable Minion: While Rustal is pretty evil on his own, he is also a highly pragmatic man who avoids doing evil if he feels it is not necessary, and is willing to do good when what is good for others is also good for him. He is also fully aware that he is a terrible person and makes no effort to hide it from his underlings. Meanwhile, Iok is a Glory Hound and Stupid Evil person who commits horrible war crimes purely because he mistakenly believes he will become more liked for it. He also has a serious problem with self-reflecting and admitting he is not the great leader he wants to be.
• Never My Fault: After the Hashmal arc incident, Iok takes to blaming McGillis and Tekkadan for his disgrace and losing his men. This leads him to frame the Turbines for transporting illegal weapons after Jasley convinces him that the Turbines are responsible for Tekkadan's rise to power. Of course, all of this conveniently ignores the fact that Iok was the one who accidentally reactivated the Mobile Armor, leading to all the nasty chain of events on Mars.
• Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: He might have killed Akihiro if he hadn't dropped his own name in his boasting. The opportunity to avenge the Turbines gives Akihiro the willpower to go on just long enough to get some gruesome revenge.
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: Iok finally shows competence in Episode 39, when he frames the Turbines for smuggling an illegal railgun, forcing Naze and his crew to go on a suicide mission to save their reputation. Iok kills Naze and Amida in the ensuing battle while demonstrating that he has no qualms against committing war crimes if it furthers his goals.
• Number Two for Brains: He's second to Rustal Elion in the hierarchy of the Arianrhod Fleet, but unlike Rustal - who is a master strategist and experienced political player - Iok is a Stupid Evil General Failure.
• Pet the Dog: He and Julieta hate each other and he's endangered her life more than once, but when her suit ends up mangled against the Barbatos, Iok is shocked and expresses hope that she's ok.
• Pre-Final Boss: Of a sort. He's killed by Akihiro right before Mikazuki's duel with Julieta, which is the final fight of the series.
• Rank Scales with Asskicking: Subverted. Iok is one of the leaders of Gjallarhorn and a commander in the Arianrhod fleet, but he has also taken up being a pilot and has a tendency to fight on the front lines, however, he's a mediocre pilot and his bodyguards live in constant fear of his incompetence getting him killed.
• Sink The Life Boats: In Episode 40, Iok attacks the Hammerhead's defenseless escape shuttles to prove his ruthlessness to Rustal.
• Sketchy Successor: According to Rustal, the previous Lord Kujan was a charismatic and skilled commander. Iok inherited his father's charisma but is far less competent.
• Spanner in the Works: He ruined Tekkadan's plan to ambush the mobile armor several times which resulted to Mikazuki, going on an all-out attack on Hashmal and getting paralyzed on the right side afterwards.
• Stupid Evil: In battle he frequently goes far beyond what he needs to do to win and employs tactics which do nothing but cause needless destruction and casualties, as well as making his own side look bad. He's so stupid he manages to be one of most despicable war criminals in the show by complete accident.
• There Is No Kill Like Overkill: Uses his Dainsleif squadron to destroy Amida's Mobile Unit, almost getting Julieta caught in the crossfire as well.
• This Cannot Be!: Spends his final moments unable to accept his coming Karmic Death.
  Iok: I can't die in a place like this! It's impossible!
• Too Dumb to Live: Several times throughout the show he does things that normally would have gotten him killed, if not for his sheer luck and the sacrifices of his men. His luck finally runs out, and he receives a much deserved Karmic Death when he announces his name as he attempts to finish off a severely weakened Akihiro. Unfortunately for Iok, upon hearing that name, Akihiro realizes he was the man responsible for the death of Naze and Amida, and indirectly responsible for Lafter's death through his association with Jasley. He manages a brief Heroic Second Wind, and survives just long enough to crush Iok to death with his weapon before being killed by other Gjallahorn troops.
• Underestimating Badassery: In the final episode, Iok attacked the heavily damaged Gusion, believing Akihiro to be nearly dead. This ended up being the last mistake that Iok would ever make.
• Undying Loyalty:
  • Like the rest of the Arianrhod Fleet, Iok practically worships Rustal.
  • He has a tendency to inspire this. His men have actually died for him out of loyalty and he shows he cares for them too.
• Unwitting Pawn:
  • Iok contacts Jasley to try to get him to take out Tekkadan for him. Instead, Jasley manipulates Iok into taking out the Turbines himself. Although Iok succeeds in killing Naze and Amida and dismantling the Turbines, this only serves to give Tekkadan a reason to kill him and Rustal remains displeased with Iok. In the end, attacking the Turbines helped Jasley and did nothing but cause trouble for Iok.
  • Iok's alliance with Jasley is ultimately what gives McGillis enough evidence to kickstart his revolution against the Seven Stars. All of Iok's war crimes get revealed to the public and used as proof of Gjallahorn's corruption.
• Villain Team-Up: After Tekkadan and McGillis humiliate him during the "Hashmal" incident, Iok makes a deal with Jasley Donomikols in an attempt to get back at them.
• Villainous Breakdown:
  • After Rustal threatens to end his alliance with the Kujan family over Iok's recklessness, Iok snaps and enters a hasty alliance with Teiwaz's Jasley in a desperate attempt to redeem himself in Rustal's eyes.
  • He flips out again just before he's crushed to death by Akihiro, spending his final moments pathetically refusing to accept his fate.
• Villainous Valor: Iok charges McGillis unarmed to provoke McGillis into giving Arianrhod justification to wipe out Tekkadan. Since McGillis's goal was to create a distraction, he plays along and wipes the floor with Iok, who only survives because McGillis's sword missed him by a few inches.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: His hammy, passionate and reckless aspiration that his subordinates look up to would be admirable in a different mecha genre. Their failure to realize this is far from that genre costs them.

Julieta Juris

Voiced by: M·A·O (Japanese), Abby Trott (English)

Main mecha: EB-08 Reginlaze (Julieta Custom), EB-08jjc Reginlaze Julia

A skilled pilot in the Arianrhod Fleet. She is fanatically loyal to Rustal because he took her in despite her being a commoner.

• Absurdly Sharp Blade: The Reginlaze Julia's Whip Swords are tipped with golden frame-alloy, just like the Bael's arming swords and the Hashmal's tail. It lets them achieve much more cutting power than such lightweight weapons should be able to.
• Added Alliterative Appeal: Julieta Juris pilots the Reginlaze Julia, which is armed with two Julian Swords.
• Always a Bigger Fish: Julieta is a skilled pilot in her own right, but unfortunately for her whenever she gets sent out she usually finds herself going up against someone who's way more experienced and tougher than her. In her sortie against the Turbines, Amida was able to hold her own against Julieta's Reginlaze and even came close to winning. Later on, Julieta finds herself going up against Mikazuki and gets an absolutely brutal thrashing from him that leaves her hospitalized.
• Anti-Villain: Julieta is an honorable soldier who disapproves of war crimes. Unfortunately, she's fanatically loyal to a man who is more than willing to commit war crimes to carry out his agenda.
• Armed Legs: The Reginlaze Julia had bladed skirts that fold over the legs to become oversized bladed legs, intended for zero-G combat instead of walking.
• Badass Normal: Being a Gjallarhorn pilot, she doesn't have any biological modification received, yet she can fight against Mikazuki at ease, who has a triple Alaya-Vijnana system implanted.
• Be Yourself: The head mechanic for her new suit nudges her towards getting AV enhancements after her loss against Amida, and while she decides she's going to go through with it after learning the truth behind Vidar having adopted that same system, Gaelio himself tells her flat out that she's fine just the way she is, and doesn't need to change herself physically to become a better pilot.
• Black-and-White Insanity: Downplayed, but Julieta initially saw Rustal as a noble paragon of justice and Tekkadan as irredeemable evildoers, and most of her Character Development is understanding the shades of grey beneath the war. By the epilogue, she has already understood Tekkadan isn't as evil as she thought and her side wasn't as good.
• Boyish Short Hair: Wears her hair short, and is a capable mobile suit pilot.
• Break the Haughty: While not particularly arrogant, Julieta's pride still get taken down a peg when she loses to Amida in a one-on-one duel despite piloting a superior Mobile Unit. It actually takes Iok having his mobile suits fire railguns at Amida to take her down. Julieta later admits that she was ashamed that her first immediate feeling was feeling relieved—a serious blow to her pride as a no-nonsense pilot.
• Broken Pedestal: Ultimately a Downplayed Trope, in the final arc Julieta starts to experience this towards Rustal as she starts to actually grow sympathetic towards Tekkadan. She still carries out her orders, right down to "killing" the already dying Mikazuki. While she accepts that her mentor is not quite the noble visionary that she built him up to be, she still accepts the role of the Fake Ultimate Hero in order to maintain the peace, aspiring to build a better future so kids won't have to suffer the same fate Tekkadan did.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Julieta has no problem with speaking her mind and blatantly insulting her superior officer Iok, which are generally not qualities one seeks from a soldier, and she's introduced sitting on a high ledge, leaping down from it and eating a passing butterfly to see what it tastes like and gagging as a result. However, she's a skilled enough pilot that she can get away with her behaviour.
• Bigger Is Better: The Reginlaze Julia is absolutely enormous, clocking it at five meters taller than the Graze Ein. Unlike most examples of this trope, it doesn't convey strength, but speed and durability - most of that bulk is from extra armour and thrusters, and it's a regular old Reginlaze underneath it all.
• Can't Catch Up: Throughout Season 2, this has been a part of her character. Even in a brand-new mobile suit, she couldn't beat Amida and would have died in a lesser suit. When she has to distract Mikazuki with an entire squad, she's barely able to keep herself alive while the rest of the squad has largely been wiped out.
• Characterization Marches On: Not even a minute into her first appearance after doing a flip off a floor above, when a passing butterfly lands on one of her fingers, she spontaneously eats it to see how it tastes. She doesn't react positively. However, in the very next episode and the rest of the series, Julieta has a serious and no-nonsense attitude, most especially when it comes to Iok.
• Co-Dragons: Along with Vidar, she is one of Rustal's two strongest pilots. Of the two, Vidar has the stronger mobile suit, but Julieta is more dedicated to Rustal's cause.
• Close-Range Combatant: In stark contrast to Iok, Julieta prefers aggressive close-quarter combats.
• Daddy's Little Villain: Has a father daughter-esque relationship with Rustal and serves as one of his top lieutenants. The epilogue also shows Rustal is grooming her to one day succeed him as leader of Gjallarhorn.
• Dark Action Girl: Julieta is a very skilled pilot who is able to fight evenly with Mikazuki. She's also on the side of season 2's Big Bad.
• Dual Wielding: Her Reginlaze has a pair of large Pile Bunker stilettos for melee combat, providing a considerable upgrade in power, speed, and versatility from the Graze's single ax. The Julia has two Whip Swords.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: For a given value of evil, Julieta was horrified when she learned of Galen Mossa's death because he was her mentor and recommended her to serve under Rustal.
• Even Evil Has Standards: She's visibly disgusted when Iok refuses to accept Naze Turbine's surrender and has to remind herself that she only came along because she needs to field test the Julia.
• Evil Counterpart: Anti-Villanous Counterpart To Mikazuki: they both are strange but skilled mobile suit pilots from humble origins. They both prefer melee combat and they are both fanatically loyal to their superiors. However, while Mika's boss is an Anti-Hero mercenary, Julieta's superior officer is a Knight Templar for a corrupt military police force. Fittingly, she's Mikazuki's final opponent.
• Expository Hairstyle Change: She's shown to have grown her hair out in the epilogue, where she now serves as Rustal's aide and anointed successor.
• Fake Ultimate Hero: Julieta becomes revered as the woman who killed the Devil. While Julieta is a very skilled pilot, the ONLY reason that Barbatos went down was that Rustal ordered an orbital Dansleif barrage on it and Gusion earlier, dealing both suits and their pilot's heavy damage. Even then, Mikazuki was killed by the backlash from releasing Barbatos's limiter.
• Fantastic Racism: Like most of Gjallarhorn, she believes that cybernetics make one less human. She realizes that she was wrong in the epilogue.
• Fatal Flaw: Her absolute devotion to Rustal causes her to overlook his morally dubious actions. And her desire to get stronger to serve him causes her to overlook her existing worth in spite of Rustal and others insisting she's fine as is and considering the price of greater power objectionable. She gets better about this.
• Final Boss: She is Mikazuki's last opponent in the series.
• Foil: To Iok. Julieta prefers melee combat, while Iok is primarily a sniper. Julieta had to work to become an Arianrhod pilot due to her status as a commoner, while Iok was born into authority. Julieta is skilled but realizes that she has room for improvement, while Iok is incompetent and doesn't realize it. Naturally, the two of them can't stand one another.
• Heel Realization: By the final arc, Julieta starts to undergo this, accepting the fact that the only real difference between her and Tekkadan was that she was lucky enough to grow up from a privileged position.
• Hollywood Healing: Four episodes after she's put in a Healing Vat by Mika, she's able to stand.
• In-Series Nickname: Iok calls her "monkey", either out of annoyance or because she likes climbing.
• Karma Houdini: She avoids any consequences for what she does under Rustal save her own conflictedness. In the finale, she's likely to become Gjallarhorn's next leader.
• Lightning Bruiser: The Reginlaze Julia is incredibly fast and is strong enough to survive at least five attacks from Amida that would have destroyed a lesser mobile suit. Its offensive output is less impressive, but its swords can cut through nanolaminate-coated armour pretty well by the standards of a single-reactor suit thanks to being tipped with golden frame-alloy.
• Maybe Ever After: The last episode has hinted that she'll eventually get with Gaelio
• Meta Mecha: The Reginlaze Julia is partway there - it's basically just a Reginlaze with lots of extra bits stuck on it, including a set of huge, removable armoured 'trousers' that add weapons and thrusters for use in zero gravity.
• Mid-Season Upgrade: About halfway through season 2, Julieta convinces Rustal to let her test pilot the Reginlaze Julia.
• Morality Pet: It's implied she is one for Rustal, given that he encourages her to keep an impartial opinion of him. By the epilogue, it's implied he is grooming her to be his successor.
• Negated Moment of Awesome: Episode 15 sees the debut of her new suit, the Reginlaze Julia after she was handpicked by Rustal to be its test pilot. Unfortunately, Amida beats her with almost no trouble. She only survives because her suit is more advanced and Iok ordered a huge concentrated strike on Naze and Amida.
• Noble Demon: Between the cast members surrounding Rustal, she comes off more as this compared to the Tragic Villain Vidar and the blatantly Stupid Evil Iok. She's willing to participate in war crimes if they further Rustal's agenda, but she's not particularly malicious off the battlefield.
• Parental Abandonment: Urdr Hunt reveals that her parents abandoned her and she was raised by Gjallarhorn.
• Perky Female Minion: Fills this role for Gjallarhorn in season 2. Her perkiness gradually fades and she becomes more serious and focused in order to keep Iok reigned in.
• Propaganda Hero: In the epilogue, Julieta is revered as the heroine that killed the Devil of Tekkadan. She has to go along with this in order to preserve the peace between Gjallarhorn and Mars.
• Sanity Ball: She's shown early on to be a Perky Female Minion, but because she's often paired with Iok she often finds herself having to play the sane one to him.
• Spanner in the Works: She derails Tekkadan's plan to take down Rustal by striking Shino at just the right moment to throw off his shot, getting him killed.
• Ship Tease: With Vidar. She seems to be drawn to him for reasons unexplained, she's one of the few people he's willing to open up to, she calls his fighting style beautiful, and when she finally sees his true face, she calls him handsome. Their final scenes has him asking her out to dinner.
• Statuesque Stunner: The epilogue shows she's now nearly as tall as Rustal.
• Stone Wall: Her job isn't to defeat enemy Ace Pilots (although if she can, that's a nice bonus), but to distract and delay them so the Arianrhod Fleet can bring its phenomenal might to bear without interruption. As such, her Ace Custom unit, the Reginlaze Julia, is mainly designed for survivability. It's only a single-reactor suit, unlike the Gundams it regularly faces off against, and its weaponry is fairly lightweight, but it's highly agile, heavily armoured (particularly around the cockpit), and has weapons chiefly designed to keep the enemy at a safe, manageable distance. There's a reason that Julieta is the only person ever to survive a patented Mikazuki No-Holds-Barred Beatdown.
• Super Prototype: Her suit is a specially-customized early model of the Graze's successor unit, the Reginlaze, and is superior in every regard to its parent - it's faster, tougher, more agile, and better-armed.
• Sympathy for the Hero: In episode 49, she expresses admiration that Tekkadan still fights for its ideals even when everyone has turned their backs on them. Come episode 50, even though she has to take the credit for taking down Mika and Barbatos, she takes no pleasure in said duty, and doesn't even want to fight him, only barely fighting back against the partially destroyed Barbatos and asking why he's still fighting as if begging him to stop.
• Token Good Teammate: None of her teammates are really evil, but Julieta is the only one who maintains her sense of perspective and avoids crossing the line, even when most of her allies fail at that.
• Tsundere: When Gaelio asks her out in the finale, she yells at him for being so frivolous, before agreeing to have dinner with him. She even starts rolling his wheelchair at high speeds in embarrassment and irritation at Gaelio's flirting.
• Tyke-Bomb: Urdr Hunt reveals that she was raised from early childhood to be a Gjallarhorn soldier after her parents abandoned her.
• Undying Loyalty: She is completely loyal to Rustal because he took her in when she had nowhere else to go. After Mikazuki nearly kills her, she realizes that this trope is a rather self-destructive attitude to have and that Rustal isn't the hero she thought he was. She continues working for Rustal but is now openly critical of him. Rustal doesn't seem to mind though, and in fact, seems to encourage it.
• Vague Age: Appears to be either a teenager or a young adult in Season 2. By the epilogue she seems to have fully matured and grown taller.
• Villainous Friendship: Julieta looks up to and is on good terms with her superior Rustal, and bonds with Vidar after he joins the Arianrhod Fleet's roster.
• Villainous Valor: She continues to fight against Mikazuki after the Julia loses an arm despite the clear skill and power difference between them. When Mikazuki impales her cockpit, severely injuring her, she tries to grab his leg to prevent him from retreating. She only survives because Mikazuki didn't have time to finish her off.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: She might get annoyed at Iok's impulsiveness and loud attitude but she still goes out of her way to make sure he's safe after his suicidal run against Hashmal.
• Whip Sword: The Reginlaze Julia's Julian Swords can transform into bladed whips.
• Worthy Opponent: Attacked Amida because she considered her this in a glance during their battle in Season 2. Then Amida started walking all over her, despite being in an outdated suit.

Vidar

^{Spoilers!Click here to see his true face}

Voiced by: Masaya Matsukaze (Japanese) Robbie Daymond (English)

Main mecha: ASW-G-XX Gundam Vidar, ASW-G-66 Gundam Kimaris Vidar

A mysterious masked man working with the Arianrhod Fleet. Vidar has a grudge against McGillis and has been providing Rustal with information on him. It is heavily implied that his true identity is Gaelio, having survived the events of the first season.

---

• Always Second Best: Admits to having felt this way towards McGillis. Even after getting the Alaya Vijnana Type-E installed in him, Gaelio still never quite reaches McGillis's level. Of the two battles he fights with McGillis in Season 2, in the first one he's only able to turn the tables thanks to a hand injury McGillis suffered before the battle began, and in the second one they fight Rustal has to throw waves of mobile suits at McGillis first to wear him down before Gaelio fights him, and even then McGillis is still able to stay even with Gaelio and end the fight in a draw.
• Anti-Villain: He's more misguided than evil. Gaelio is letting his hatred of McGillis for betraying him trick him into overlooking Rustal's crimes for the sake of stopping McGillis.
• Armed Legs:
  • His Gundam has two folding blades on each foot - one on the toe, one on the heel - to give it a vicious kick.
  • The Kimaris Vidar has drill knees. While they might seem like secondary weapons, Episode 45 demonstrates their potential when Vidar uses them to saw an enemy Graze clean in half.
• Be Yourself: Surprisingly, he does this for Julieta, as while she toys with the idea of getting AV enhancements, after seeing Vidar's in action and being egged on earlier by the head mechanic, he tells her flat out that she's fine just the way she is, and doesn't need to change herself physically to become a better pilot.
• Brought Down to Normal: After the death of McGillis and the fall of Tekkadan, Gaelio has his pseudo-AV implants removed, returning him back to being a regular human being but also taking away his ability to walk, forcing him to use a wheelchair.
• Came Back Strong: Applies to both Gaelio and the Kimaris. While Gaelio wasn't a pushover in Season 1, by Season 2 he's one of the few people to actually get the upper hand in a fight with Mikazuki, and this time around, he manages to incapacitate McGillis in the Gundam Bael, unlike the one-sided battle in the first season's climax. The Kimaris, meanwhile, gets a massive power boost thanks to the Alaya-Vijnana Type-E.
• Co-Dragons: Along with Julieta, he is one of Rustal's strongest pilots. Of the two, Julieta is more dedicated to Rustal's cause, but Vidar has the stronger mobile suit and is more integral to Rustal's plans.
• Cool Helmet: His pilot suit has an intimidating, high-tech full-face helmet. It's also thickly-armoured enough to let him take a pistol shot to the face without significant injury, which proves very useful in his final encounter with McGillis.
• Cynicism Catalyst: McGillis betraying and defeating him in the Season 1 finale changed him completely and made him into a revenge-driven man. He sides with Rustal who wants to keep the status quo in place partly because he sees McGillis ideals as hollow.
• Deal with the Devil: Besides his motive of revenge against McGillis, it's implied that Vidar owes some sort of debt to Rustal. Having been saved by Rustal after being defeated by McGillis at the end of season 1, and surgically enhanced with Alaya-Vijnana so that he could continue to fight, he is only able to seek his revenge thanks to Rustal.
• Detachable Blades: Gundam Vidar's Burst Saber can disconnect from its hilt and serve as an explosive should it get stuck onto an enemy. The Vidar carries 6 spare blades in total and its pilot utilizes it in its full potential with his agile combat style.
• Dragon with an Agenda: His main reason for working under Rustal is just for a chance to get retribution against McGillis.
• Dramatic Unmask: He finally unmasks himself in episode 43 when he confronts McGillis, though given his voice actor and dialogue leading up to this point, it's hardly a surprise.
• Enigmatic Minion: His head is fully concealed behind a mask and he's with the Arianrhod Fleet to get back at McGillis for mysterious reasons. Although if you've been paying attention it shouldn't be too hard to figure out who he really is before the reveal even happens.
• Expository Hairstyle Change: After taking off his mask, Vidar/Gaelio's is revealed to be quite shaggier and unkempt, compared to his well-groomed style in Season 1.
• Fantastic Racism: Averted, he has no problem with the Alaya-Vijnana system after having it installed into himself. He even apologizes to Mika for his past behavior in episode 43.
• Fighting Fingerprint
  • In its first combat outing, the Gundam Vidar charges its targets at high speed, impaling them with its saber, much like the Kimaris would with its lance. It soon deviates and incorporates kicks and pistol shots into its repertoire though.
  • When Mikazuki fights Vidar in Bael's hangar, the first attack it performs after activating Alaya-Vijnana Type E immediately clues in Mikazuki as to who he's fighting, as he recognizes Ein's fighting style from when they fought in Edmonton in season 1.
• Fragile Speedster: The Vidar is the first Gundam to ever qualify as one of these rather than as some variety of Lightning Bruiser. It doesn't use its massive reactor output to carry thick armor or oversized weaponry (in fact, its armor is skimpy and its weapons positively delicate), but to grant it speed and agility unmatched by any other suit - which also helps with its offensive output, thanks to the enormous velocity behind its strikes.
• Guns Akimbo: The Vidar has two small, rapid-firing pistols for engaging lightly-armored targets and knocking heavily-armored enemies off-balance.
• Hypocrite: Accused of being this by McGillis during their fight in Episodes 45 and 46. Him being Gaelio, who had frowned upon the Alaya-Vijnana system in the first season, but is now using it in order to fight him to a draw, this makes sense.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Much like its previous iterations, the Kimaris Vidar is capable of dealing this to enemies via its Drill Lance, the Dainsleif launchers on the side of said lance, and a couple of knee-mounted drills, as a random Graze and Isurugi's Helmwige Reincar found out the hard way.
• I Need You Stronger: He unmasks McGillis's plot to seize Bael and take control of Gjallarhorn, and interrupts him right before he manages to do so. However, instead of crushing him right then and there, he lets McGillis do it, because he wants to deny McGillis and his ideals in their entirety. While this prolongs the Gjallarhorn civil war, he emerges victorious in the end, being the one to personally kill McGillis after disabling Bael in a brutal duel.
• Knight Templar: Vidar considers any defiance of Gjallarhorn's order to be punishable by death.
• Leitmotif: "Defenders of the Wild". It being shared with Ein is no coincidence.
• Lightning Bruiser: In comparison to the original Kimaris, and the Fragile Speedster Vidar, Kimaris Vidar is this, being a heavily armored unit capable of both beating down a squadron of Graze and keeping up with Bael. Interestingly, this is due to Alaya-Vijnana Type-E allowing the unit to achieve its full potential, as the base form was often very straightforward and limited in what it was capable of, as well as limited in its attack strategies.
• Masking the Deformity: In Season 2, it's revealed that, in addition to wearing the mask to hide his true identity, he had sustained facial scars from his fight with McGillis in the finale of Season 1, which his faceplate mask helps to hide. After revealing himself, however, this becomes a Subverted Trope, as he no longer needs to hide his true identity anymore.
• Meaningful Name: Vidar and his Gundam are both named after the Norse God of Vengeance. Vidar seeks to take revenge against McGillis and Tekkadan. Not only that, Vidar is one of the only Norse gods to have survived Ragnarok, implying that this person has survived a pretty catastrophic event. Considering he's Gaelio, who survived the attack by McGillis, the symbolism was intentional. Expanded further in the Finale when Gaelio becomes the only Mobile Suit Pilot in the series that flew a Gundam-Frame left alive.
• My God, What Have I Done?: He's horrified when he kills McGillis only to realize that McGillis really did view Gaelio as a friend, but lacked the ability to realize that he could trust Gaelio.
• Noble Top Enforcer: Rustal's top mobile suit pilot, but isn't actually evil and has incredibly sympathetic motives for working for him.
• Odd Name Out: Gundam Vidar is the first Gundam frame from the Post Disaster setting that isn't named after a demon from the Ars Goetia. Instead, it takes its name from Norse mythology, which is a common theme for Gjallarhorn. This is to disguise that Gundam Vidar is a heavily redesigned Gundam Kimaris.
• One Hero, Hold the Weaksauce: 'Hero' is a loaded term in a setting and story as murky as this one, but the thing that makes Vidar most dangerous is that thanks to his unique cockpit setup, he can use the Alaya-Vijnana System to boost his reflexes to their maximum, superhuman levels without frying his brain. It's because the data-flow goes through another, long-dead brain before it gets to his - Ein's.
• The Power of Friendship: McGillis gloats during their last battle that no matter who wins, it'll be a testament to his philosophy of the power of the individual. Vidar is quick to shoot back that his newfound strength isn't anything like the kind McGillis lionizes since he's technically working together with Ein to defeat him.
• Punch-Clock Villain: On the surface his goals aren't evil at all. He's just trying to stop the man who got two of his friends killed, betrayed him and tried to murder him. He'd almost seem like a hero, if not for the fact that he's thrown his lot in with Rustal Elion, who is much worse than the man he's trying to get revenge against.
• Rule of Symbolism: In Norse myth, Vidar slew the wolf Fenrir as revenge for killing his father Odin. Fenrir also happens to be the Fareed family's sigil.
• Ship Tease: With Julieta. She seems to be drawn to him for reasons unexplained, she's one of the few people he's willing to open up to, she calls his fighting style beautiful, and when she finally sees his true face, she calls him handsome. She may or may not be going on a dinner date with him after their final scene.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!: Episode 49 is him saying this to McGillis. Repeatedly and painfully.
• Significant Double Casting: He shares a voice actor with Gaelio, a victim of McGillis's schemes. Then he turns out to be Gaelio himself.
• Something Only They Would Say: If it wasn't already obvious who this guy is, then this line to McGillis seals it.
  Vidar: I don't understand. Piloting the same model in which Carta Issue died crying out for your love. How can you do that?
• The Stoic: Besides keeping to himself much of the time, Vidar is quite guarded in his conversations with Julieta. Having to hide his identity notwithstanding, this is contrasted to how affable Gaelio was prior to his "death," illustrating just how much he's changed in his quest for revenge against McGillis. At the end of the series after achieving his revenge, he returns to being his usual friendly self, even asking Julieta out for dinner.
• Super Mode: He's had a pseudo-Alaya-Vijnana system installed that allows him to let Ein's brain (which is preserved within the Gundam Vidar) take over his body in combat, allowing Gaelio to use the full power of the Alaya-Vijnana system without the horrific side effects.
• Token Good Teammate: He's only with the Arianrhod Fleet to get back at someone he has legitimate reasons to hold a grudge against. Other than that he isn't evil at all.
• The Quiet One: He doesn't talk much, and the few times he does he speaks in a very low volume. Once he reveals himself as Gaelio, however, he becomes a lot more chatty. Julieta even lampshades the change in the epilogue when he starts flirting with her.
• Revenge: Vidar tells Julieta that he's fighting for revenge, although it becomes apparent later on that it's not necessarily his revenge he's fighting for - he's more bewildered by than angry at McGillis, and sees it more as a duty to Ein and Carta than something he wants to do for himself.
• Royal Rapier: To fit the Vidar's Fragile Speedster fighting style, it wields a delicate but wickedly sharp fencing epee with a replaceable blade. The original Kimaris's main weapon was a colossal Jousting Lance that was devastating but cumbersome.
• Scars Are Forever: He has a very large scar on his face. The result of his loss to McGillis last season.
• Shed Armor, Gain Speed: The original Kimaris was extremely fast, but its bulk made it easy prey to more agile foes. In addition to lightening its weapons, Vidar massively stripped down its armor in order to give it greater freedom of movement and a better power-to-weight ratio, leaving several key components exposed (including the lower parts of the Ahab reactors) and cutting out slots in the remaining plates to further reduce their weight. All of this means that the Vidar is the most fragile Gundam ever built, but is so obscenely fast that actually landing a hit is nearly impossible.
• That Man Is Dead: Julieta suspects that Vidar renamed himself after his Gundam to erase the life he had before the mask. However, after McGillis begins his coup, Vidar unmasks and embraces his old identity as Gaelio Bauduin.
• This Is a Drill: The Gundam Kimaris Vidar arms itself with both a gigantic Drill Lance, as well as mecha-sized drill bits in its knees. The results of being impaled on them are not pretty, to say the least.
• Unkempt Beauty: Even though his face is scarred and he's a lot less groomed than he was as Gaelio, Julieta remarks he's still quite handsome.
• Vengeance Feels Empty: Upon finally succeeding in killing McGillis in Episode 49, he quietly realizes that taking revenge on his former friend ultimately amounted to nothing but regret and sadness. As McGillis lays dying, Gaelio outright begs him not to explain his reasons, as that would mean he would be forced to forgive him and his revenge would be meaningless. When he finally dies, Gaelio can only bid farewell.
• Walking Spoiler: The true nature of Vidar's identity is a massive spoiler for events that occurred late in Season 1. He's confirmed to be Gaelio in episode 18 of season 2.
• We Used to Be Friends: Subverted towards McGillis. Gaelio states that while he thought they were friends, he realized that he never truly understood McGillis despite trying to.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: Vidar genuinely believes that McGillis is a tyrant using propaganda about reforming Gjallarhorn to seize power and so he's dedicated his life to stopping McGillis by any means necessary, even allying with the ruthless Rustal Elion.
• You're Insane!: McGillis accuses him of having gone mad during their fight. Ultimately he's wrong as Gaelio is actually the more stable of the two.

Yamazin Toka

Voiced by: Hitomi Nabatame (Japanese), Karen Strassman (English)

The Arianrhod Fleet's chief engineer.

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• Evil Genius: Anti-Villainous example. Yamazin is in charge of maintaining the Arianrhod Fleet's equipment in working order. She also knows about the truth about Alaya-Vijnana Type-E system and might have even helped develop it. In the epilogue, she might have helped restore the Bael and return it to its resting chamber.
• Ms. Exposition: She's there mainly to explain technical details related to Mobile Suits.
• Punch-Clock Villain: She is just doing her job.
• Punny Name: The resident Ms. Exposition of the Arianrhod Fleet is called Talker.
• Slasher Smile: It's made clear that something isn't quite right in her head when she is talking with Julieta about the difference between a monster and a man, where she flashes one wicked grin.
• Stealth Mentor: Much like Vidar, she encourages Julieta to find her own identity instead of validating herself through the opinions of others. Unlike Vidar, she is much subtler about it.
• Wrench Wench: The Arianrhod Fleet's chief engineer and a very attractive woman.

Seven Stars

Iznario Fareed

Voiced by: Show Hayami (Japanese), Marc Diraison (English)

McGillis' father and Carta's legal guardian. Descended from one of the Seven Stars of Gjallarhorn, Lord Iznario currently acts as the head of the organization.

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• Abusive Parents: Bruises seen on McGillis's neck as a child suggest that Iznario abused him. Episode 43 reveals this included sexual abuse as well.
• Big Bad Ensemble: He's the closest Season 1 has to one along with Nobliss Gordon. He's the backer of most of Gjallarhorn's activities and much of the plot revolves around his scheme to acquire more power for himself by having his candidate become Prime Minister of Arbrau.
• The Chessmaster: Iznario's goal seems to be to control Earth from the shadows. To this end, he's arranged for his son McGillis to marry into the Bauduin family, made himself Carta Issue's legal guardian, and is attempting to get Henri Fleurs elected as prime minister of Arbrau. If all his schemes succeed, he'll have considerable influence over three of the Seven Stars as well as Arbrau.
• Diabolical Mastermind: Plots to use his authority within Gjallarhorn and political connections outside of it to make himself the most powerful man in the Earth Sphere. One step of this plan involves installing his chosen candidate as Prime Minister of Arbrau.
• Et Tu, Brute?: Rebukes McGillis for manipulating him and leaving him to take the fall for the Graze Ein incident, as the thanks he gets for having raised him. It definitely loses its sting when it is revealed that his actual relationship with his adoptive son is less "adoptive father" and more "pedophile retainer".
• The Exile: He's forced into exile at the end of Season 1 after his corruption is exposed.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: He's been in the OP from the beginning, as a reflection in McGillis' fancy knife.
• Foil: To Gallus Bauduin, the only other known Gjallarhorn member who's a parent. Both are products of their society, embodying Gjallarhorn's old fashioned code of honor in different ways. However, Gallus is heavily implied to genuinely care for his children, while there is very little love lost between Iznario and McGillis, despite what first appearances may indicate. Season 2 explores the latter relationship in disturbing detail.
• Has a Type: Episode 43 reveals it to be blond boys.
• Hate Sink: The reveal in episode 43 makes him this as he not only adopted McGillis to regularly have sex with him, but he was either too rough to him in bed or just abusive or both.
• How the Mighty Have Fallen: One of the most powerful men in the solar system. The election of Henri was to secure him even more power. By the end of Season 1, he is disgraced and forced into exile.
• Karma Houdini: Played with. Though he was disgraced and forced into exile at the end of the first season, by the end of the series as a whole he still lives, while McGillis, his victim, dies.
• Laser-Guided Karma: The blond boy who he adopted and molested is now one of the most powerful leaders of Gjallarhorn who sent him into exile.
• Minor Major Character: He's one of the top leaders in Gjallarhorn, his machinations drive a great deal of the plot and he played a critical role in shaping the worldview of one of the main characters, but he only appears for a minute amount of scenes in Season 1, and barely appears at all in Season 2 apart from one flashback sequence.
• Oh, Crap!: In Episode 25, he panics when he realizes that his own son Out-Gambitted him.
• Out-Gambitted: McGillis turns Iznario into a scapegoat for the Graze Ein fiasco. As a result, Iznario is forced into exile and McGillis reaps the rewards of Iznario's schemes to take over the Issue and Bauduin families.
• Pædo Hunt: Episode 43 reveals that Iznario is a pederast who adopted McGillis to make him a Sex Slave.
• Parents as People: Despite giving the vibe of the head of a military organization employing Clasp Your Hands If You Deceive and Orcus on His Throne most of the time, Iznario is surprisingly someone who tries to be less formal with his son—with little success. Subverted by the second season, when we discover the true extent of his relationship with McGillis.

Gallus Bauduin

Voiced by: Mitsuaki Hoshino (Japanese), Keith Silverstein (English)

The head of the Bauduin Family and father to Gaelio and Almiria.

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• Ambiguously Evil: He's one of the heads of a corrupt military organization, but is never shown engaging in any corrupt or malicious behavior himself and from what we see of him, he seems to be a friendly and caring father.
• Good Parents: Cares for both his son and daughter, as well as his son-in-law McGillis.
• Hufflepuff House: It's never really elaborated on what role House Bauduin plays in Gjallarhorn or what forces are under their control.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: We don't see what happened to him after Rustal "reformed" Gjallarhorn and made himself its sole leader in the epilogue.

Nemo Baklazan and Elek Falk

Voiced by: Kenta Sasa and Ryunosuke Watanuki (Japanese), Unknown (English)

The other two members of the Seven Stars, heads of the Baklazan Family and Falk Family respectively.

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• Affably Evil: They're heads of a corrupt military organization, but both act perfectly cordial during the meetings of the Seven Stars, giving genuine praise to McGillis for his work in restructuring and improving the Outer Earth Orbit Fleet.
• Evil Old Folks: Lord Baklazan is an elderly man and visibly the oldest of the council.
• Fat Bastard: Lord Falk is quite the portly fellow.
• Satellite Character: Their main roles are mostly to fill space during the council scenes.
• Team Switzerland: Play this role during McGillis's Civil War with Rustal over control of Gjallarhorn. While they cannot fight against McGillis, as that would mean opposing Gundam Bael, they refuse to back McGillis either given the deceptive means he used to acquire Bael and work his way into power.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: Disappear by the epilogue, and it isn't shown what happened to them after Rustal enacted his "reforms" to make Gjallarhorn more democratic.

Lord Issue

Father to Carta and head of both the Issue Family and the Seven Stars.

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• The Ghost: We wouldn't know he even exists if not for him being mentioned once or twice.
• Posthumous Character: He's on his deathbed when he's first mentioned in a flashback, and dies offscreen at some point during the series.
• Strong Empire, Shriveled Emperor: While Gjallarhorn is at the height of its power when the series first begins, Lord Issue is too sickly to make any appearances.

Others

Agnika Kaieru

Main mecha: ASW-G-01 Gundam Bael

The founder of Gjallarhorn who created the organization alongside the ancestors of the Seven Stars and fought against the Mobile Armors during the Calamity War, saving humanity from extinction.

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• Ace Pilot: His skills were apparently so great that the Bael's twin swords were the only armaments he ever needed against the Mobile Armors.
• Dual Wielding: Bael's model kit guide reveals that, much like McGillis, Agnika favored the use of twin special-alloy swords. This being McGillis, this is probably not a coincidence.
• Expy: The various pieces of backstory we get in supplementary materials paint him as one of Domon Kasshu. A Hot-Blooded Close-Range Combatant with a twin sword fighting style who piloted a winged Gundam against an evil AI created by his father, both of which were named for Judeo-Christian supernatural entities.
• Founder of the Kingdom: More like Army, but he still gets the revered treatment that the position comes with.
• The Ghost: Founded Gjallarhorn and is possibly the most influential figure in the history of the Post Disaster timeline, but we never get to see what he looks like at all.
• Hot-Blooded: Gunpla events for Iron-Blooded Orphans revealed he was like this when he was alive.
• Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: Because he died as the Bael went to sleep following the Calamity War, Gjallarhorn began to deify the Gundam and believe that Agnika’s soul rests within it. Whether there is truth to this legend is not explained, and the Bael itself never displays any special properties when piloted by McGillis, aside from being a powerful mobile suit as all Gundam Frames are.
  • It is however mentioned that many other wannabe heroes have attempted to reactivate Bael in the past and it stubbornly refused to turn on until McGillis did so, suggesting that the legend of it only accepting Agnika's "heir" is something that had some basis in reality.
• Posthumous Character: Dead long before the start of the story, but survives in legends and a particular biography which greatly influenced a young McGillis.