Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny - Reception

Reception

The series has been highly popular in Japan, having won the Animage Anime Grand Prix awards for best anime in the 2004 and 2005 polls. In both of these polls, Athrun Zala, Kira Yamato and Lacus Clyne have also topped the most popular characters categories, with the last episode and the OVA also occupying their own category. DVD sales have been good, with various of them appearing in official Japanese rankings. In November 2005, Bandai Visual announced that Gundam SEED Destiny had sold over one million DVD volumes in Japan. Soundtracks have also been popular with both themes from T.M. Revolution and Nami Tamaki topping Oricon charts during their release. In the Recording Industry Association of Japan's awards, Gundam SEED Destiny was the winner in the category of animation album. In the Anime Nation's top selling DVDs, the twelveth Gundam SEED Destiny volume ranked ninth.

Critical reception for Gundam SEED Destiny has been positive but it was often compared with Gundam SEED. Gundam SEED's backstory was noted to be essential for the plot of Gundam SEED Destiny to the point that Maria Lin considered that it was required to watch the former to fully understand the series. The new cast of characters was well-received with the relationship between Rey Za Burrel and Neo Larronoke bringing speculations regarding their identites due to how it mirrored one from Gundam SEED. However, initial reaction to lead character Shinn Asuka has been mixed due to his antagonistic personality and how some of the new and returning characters overshadowed his role in the series. While at some points Shinn's role and relationships were found entertaining, UK Anime's Ross Liversidge liked how returning character Kira Yamato took bigger role in the series. However, Chris Guanche, Editor-in-Chief of Mecha Anime HQ, wrote early on his reviews of the series that he would have preferred to see some kind of balance between the old and new characters and hoped that Fukuda would not end up "sidelining" the new ones. Guanche was more critical to the series considering the way the ending was exceuted.

Still, the themes from the series have also been praised for being entertaining and debatable despite also sharing it with other Gundam series. Chris Beveridge from Mania Entertainment further commented on this, stating that while it brings parallels other series, Gundam SEED Destiny's themes are "also done well enough that it stands firmly on its own." The last episodes were criticized for bringing situations similar to the ones from the ending of Gundam SEED. In contrast, the fight scenes occurrying in these episodes were praised alongside the emotional impact brought by some scenes. The OVA repraising the events from the series' last episode was praised for explaining events from Gundam SEED Destiny such as Gilbert Durandal's discussions with Rau Le Creuset. It was also noted make a more satisfying ending, allowing to develop more of their characters with the emotional focus being more explored than in the television series' finale. Guanche agreed that it was a better ending than the last episode but said it was still weak.

The series' animation was highly praised for the coloring and character designs. The mobile suits' designs have been well-received despite the fact they transformed, something considered cheesy by Anime News Network's Paul Fargo. The fight scenes were also noted to be the main focus from the televisions series' last episodes, as they brought entertaining action scenes with the new mechas introduced. However, the OVA was noted to downplay these scenes, with some of them being hard to fully understand. Soundtracks also had praise for bringing enjoyable themes and the return from Nami Tamaki. Fargo stated that composer Toshihiko Sahashi notably improved his scores from Gundam SEED, with artists' opening and ending themes also being entertaining. The Japanese voice was noted to bring popular idols such as Maaya Sakamoto, resulting in an enjoyable one. On the other hand, response to the English casting was mixed with some actors making appealing portrayals while in other cases poor ones. Nevertheless, Don Houston from DVD Talk advised viewers to listen to the English dub rather than the original Japanese version, having noticed that some sound effects were remixed and thus improved the audio.