SEED seems to be one of the more divisive non-UC series in terms of opinion. I really personally really liked SEED, its characters (although they all kinda have the same face, which apparently tends to be a thing with the character designer Hisashi Hirai who also did Fafner) and themes. It kind of has the same story beats as 0079 (and was written that way) but it’s also its own thing (it feels the most Macross-y out of all the Gundams IMHO with idols and messy love polygons). The sequel series SEED Destiny is less favorably received than SEED due to the drop in writing quality (it also tends to overuse the same musical cues) but I found it alright, definitely not as good as SEED but still watchable.