The pacing with the old Universal Century shows has to do with Yoshiyuki Tomino. I would say the mtoarijy of mecha fans know that anime directed by Tomino (even the modern anime, like King Gainer) tends to be characterized by rather strange pacing (e.g. episodes of nothing happening, and then suddenly an important event happens off screen and we're only made aware of such events through voice over narration), erratic character development (too many examples to describe), and general kitsch and silliness (ZZ in general, but other Gundams apply). LOLTomino is the way most people tend to describe his direction.That said, I would say the mtoarijy of Gundam anime that are NOT directed by Tomino tend to have normal pacing. Not to say the other Gundam shows had perfect pacing (actually I would say 0083 suffers a bit because of the change in directors halfway through the show), but they're definitely not LOLTomino.