I got into Gundam franchise recently. To be more specific I am watching Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam. I got surprised how good it is. I think I expected it to be more cartoonish maybe, but its actually a serious work about horrors of war. I like how they portray people on both sides of the conflict. Even though you have designated villains so to speak, seeing them die, or loose friends or lovers really made me symphatize with them.
Zeta Gundam is 2nd in the franchise and its a continuation of previous series so im missing some context sadly, but I manage. It's currently free to watch on official gundam youtube channel. Unfortunately the 1st original series is not there.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2IuIvOdOrWM&list=PLJV1h9xQ7Hx8BmOF6F1QBoQ--CVxo4WGF

I also watched The 08th MS team. It's much shorter series and is more like a standalone story, although placed in the context of the original series. It's good, but not as good as Zeta tbh. Has a very cool fight near the end of the series (not the final battle though).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISsWc5nVUDo&list=PLJV1h9xQ7Hx_NWf-b29CR8o3HpUN_zKOx

There are more series uploaded on that channel but idk which are good or not. From what I heard they get rotated after some time so if someone is interested then better to start now rather than later.