Mobile Suit Gundam Narative - News & Speculation

[Kanon]

Originally Posted by Obelisk ze Tormentor

That said, I can't wait for Unicorn 2 just to see what would happen next, but we're gonna have to deal with Hathaway first .

You say that like it's a bad thing. I can't wait for Hathaway's Flash!

Speaking of newtype abilities being used for something other than war, one thing I did like about the movie is that it was showed us there were people interested in newtypes for things like improving their businesses. I can't remember if that's something that's been explored before.

[Obelisk ze Tormentor]

Originally Posted by Kanon

You say that like it's a bad thing.

Oh no, not at all. I can't wait to see that sunovabitch Bright & Mirai in action . And that sweet sweet Xi Gundam & Penelope .

Originally Posted by Kanon

Speaking of newtype abilities being used for something other than war, one thing I did like about the movie is that it was showed us there were people interested in newtypes for things like improving their businesses. I can't remember if that's something that's been explored before.

IIRC the previous owner of Lalah used her skill for some gambling before Char found & rescued her.

[bakato]

I found the idea behind Zoltan sympathetic. He's my favorite type of antagonist. A dark twisted version of the protagonist who took a wrong turn.

Even when they witness a miracle, they don't even try to understand its true essence...Humans like you and me get carved up in the name of a miracle!

Much like his predecessors, he's critical of these fancy fireworks called miracles and its hard to argue when you consider humanity didn't change at all.

[Obelisk ze Tormentor]

There's still definitely something positive to say about Zoltan as a character. I actually quite enjoy his screentime, but I wished they didn't go the psychotic route with him. I wished for a more level-headed villain/antagonist who doesn't murder people for no reason early on when he's battling the Gundam inside the colony.

[Rising Dragon]

I liked Zoltan better when his name was Shagia and Olba Frost. But I did enjoy how he called out Newtype evolution theory for being the crock of shit that it really was.

I personally enjoyed the battles in NT, but overall I wasn't terribly impressed, particularly with how it seemed to take ideas from other shows because UC's effectively run out of its own. The II Neo Zeong is just the Devil Gundam all over again. This time it was defeated by the Gundam AGE-FX--sorry, I mean Phenex. The Phenex was the one to defeat the Xamdrag--no, wait, sorry, the Vagan Gear SID--oops, wait, wrong again! I meant II Neo Zeong.

And overall its talk on Newtypes is still just discussing a question that Gundam X answered a long time ago.

[Obelisk ze Tormentor]

Originally Posted by Rising Dragon

I personally enjoyed the battles in NT, but overall I wasn't terribly impressed, particularly with how it seemed to take ideas from other shows because UC's effectively run out of its own.

Not if you count the side materials. There's a lot of weird shit in UC comics & novels waiting to be adapted into anime (if they so choose).

Originally Posted by Rising Dragon

And overall its talk on Newtypes is still just discussing a question that Gundam X answered a long time ago.

The definition of "Newtype" in UC is still vague even during the Victory era. That kinda gave away the fact that we won't get a definitive answer about it before we go pass Victory. Or they may do it sooner by ignoring the past late-UC installments.

[LoweGear]

This eternal question about Newtypes is precisely why I'm not as particularly fond of "mainline" UC as I used to. It just seems they like to go back to the same questions over and over again, without much in the way of doing anything exciting with it. At least many of the non-UC titles either make it quick, relegate the matter to the side, or just outright never include the aspect in their works.

[bakato]

Originally Posted by Obelisk ze Tormentor

There's still definitely something positive to say about Zoltan as a character. I actually quite enjoy his screentime, but I wished they didn't go the psychotic route with him. I wished for a more level-headed villain/antagonist who doesn't murder people for no reason early on when he's battling the Gundam inside the colony.

Psychosis is being unable to determine what's real and what's not. Zoltan and Batman may both be crazy, but they're living in reality.

[Obelisk ze Tormentor]

Originally Posted by bakato

Psychosis is being unable to determine what's real and what's not. Zoltan and Batman may both be crazy, but they're living in reality.

When I said "psychotic" in my last post, I don't mean it in the strictest technical term. I mean "psychotic" as it being generally synonymous with "crazed, unhinged, unbalanced, mad, loony and distraught" which you can easily google.

[Obelisk ze Tormentor]

For those who don't know yet, here's a translated interview with the people behind NT originally done by Akiba-Souken.

The curious ones should check out the link because it also has insightful photos of the production, but here's half of the interview for convenience:

Spoiler for saving space:

— First off, how did production for Gundam NT get rolling?
Ogata: In 2014 the final Unicorn Gundam OVA release, then in 2016, the TV version Gundam Unicorn RE: 0096 aired, and finally in 2017, the life-sized Unicorn Gundam was erected in Odaiba. The series was such a success that we talked about where we might be able to take it next. A story that takes place around the same timeline as Unicorn seemed to be a given, so we dabbled in the idea of a Gundam Unicorn 2. Continuing an already drawn-out series with even more story would take time, though, so Fukui decided to start with bringing in the Unicorn Gundam 03 Phenex from Phoenix Hunting.

— The movie changes quite a lot from Phoenix Hunting.
Ogata: During our meeting, we agreed on using Phoenix Hunting as a motif, or starting point, but ultimately rewriting to bring in a new main character and what not. We thought about naming it Unicorn 2 or Unicorn 1.5—to connect it to Unicorn—but we went with Gundam NT because it is a new narrative added to the Universal Century timeline.

— This is the series that will start the “UC NexT 0100 Project,” correct?
Ogata: “UC NexT 0100 Project” at its core is a way to fill in the gap between the events following the conclusion of Unicorn and the start of Gundam F91. Only once the production for NT was underway, did we decide to follow up with projects that were attached to games, novels, and manga. If we were delving into further UC territory, why not keep going?

— Gundam NT has the potential to be a very influential film as the starting point of this ambitious project.
Ogata: You’re right, the pieces will overlap at times, but Fukui intends for NTto be the punctuation point between Unicorn and the rest of the UC timeline. Fukui brought together all the Universal Century storylines up until that point and arranged them into Gundam NT.

— Why was it that you chose for Gundam NT to be a theatrical release as opposed to an OVA like Unicorn or Gundam Thunderbolt?
Ogata: By going for the movie format we created yet another way to enjoy UC Gundam. I’m falling back on Unicorn again, but when we first were brainstorming of how to distribute it, we thought of going the traditional OVA route like its UC predecessors 0080 War in the Pocket, 0083 Stardust Memory, and 8th MS Team. However, at the time (late 2000s) OVA culture had collapsed—straight to video series weren’t selling anymore. When we thought of how we could sell it, the idea came to show it in theaters then sell it afterward. We could even have special viewing events where we could sell the discs. Simply put, for NT, we went straight to the movie format instead of showing OVAs as movies.
The movie version of Gundam Thunderbolt has been pretty popular as well as Star Blazers: Space Battleship Yamato 2199 and Star Blazers: Space Battleship Yamato 2202, so we thought it was about time we gave movie version a chance. There were a lot of places we could have easily not put effort into, but seeing how NT was set to be the flagship piece to restart the UC timeline, one thing we wanted was for all 47 prefectures to enjoy it. And while it wouldn’t be released at the same time, we wanted America, China, and other Asian countries to be able to watch it.

— Can you tell us why you decided on Yoshizawa Shunichi to be the director?
Ogawa: Yoshizawa had been working in Studio 1 on series like Gundam Reconguista in G and Thunderbolt, but I think I first asked for his involvement in the project towards the beginning of Thunderbolt.
Yoshizawa: That’s right.
Ogawa: We’re trying to usher in new, young talent, but… well, you’re not that young (laughs).

— If you don’t mind me asking, how old are you?
Yoshizawa: I’m thirty-nine.
Ogawa: We wanted forty and unders working on UC Gundams. It was that way for the TV release of G-Reco and the movie version now. I guess we want them to sort of bathe in Tomino’s light.
There are many stories within the Universal Century. Furuhashi Kazuhiko took a new approach with directing Unicorn, which I think was for the best, but we wanted something a little closer to Tomino’s style this time around, so we asked Yoshizawa.

— What is unique about Yoshizawa’s directing?
Ogawa: I’m not sure about the artistic side of it, but Yoshizawa has a particular tempo or rhythm to his work. He is aware of Tomino’s directing style, and I felt that his tempo was a good match for this project.
Yoshizawa: That’s how our conversation went, but when you first brought up the proposal to me, I turned white. It would be my directorial debut, and a movie at that—I was surprised. I had no reason to turn it down though, so I accepted it.
While working on G-Reco, I had briefly talked to Tomino about how to go about future job proposal discussions. He told me I wasn’t in any position to be picky about my offers, so I went in with an “I’ll take whatever comes at me!” kind of attitude.

— How did Tomino react when you told him you were going to be the director?
Yoshizawa: Ha ha ha ha. Well, he seemed pretty worried when I told him, but he gave me advice here and there—kind of like he was pushing me in the right direction. Even when I drew storyboards or did work for other companies, I asked Tomino for advice. Taking the other company’s work into consideration, he would give me advice on techniques—stuff like moving the camera angle to get more dynamic shots, paying attention to how characters rise and fall during their steps, or just generally how to liven up a scene. It was always very concrete advice so I sent him the storyboard for the opening phase of NT out of curiosity of what he would say.
The next day he didn’t come to the studio. I thought, “Huh, that’s weird,” but then he didn’t come the day after that either. I thought he’d had enough, but when I finally asked him he said he got frustrated after seeing the first couple of pages. Reason being that NT starts with the colony drop scene. “You’re all so young, and yet you’re going to start from the colony drop scene just like all those years ago?” Basically, he was saying it was a pretty big failure (laughs).
Ogawa: It’s fine. Better he said it then (laughs).
Yoshizawa: Tomino felt that we hadn’t taken a single step from his UC stories. This is a story that takes place after Char’s Counterattack, so why were we falling back on the same setup? From there, he had some not-so-nice words towards the scenario writers. I wonder what kind of face I was making during that…
Ogawa: I’m sorry you had to take the brunt of that (bitterly laughs). Did you take anything away from that scolding (laughs)?
Yoshizawa: I’m going off track here a bit, but Tomino always has nothing but positive words for Imagawa Yasuhiro (director of G Gundam). Imagawa made a completely different kind of Gundam, after all. Tomino also saw the first episode of Wing Gundam recently and had nothing but praise for that as well. Seeing the scene where the character just comes out with, “I’ll kill you,” he said that was a fresh spin on drama (laughs).
The Gundam series that he likes to see are ones that are lightyears away from the Gundam he created. Because of how he is, you would think he has this strict image of what Gundam is supposed to be, but in reality, he praises lots of other Gundams with stuff like, “What a fresh take on it,” “This is an interesting angle to attack it from,” or “This is a Gundam I’d never thought of!” I wonder why he doesn’t say it to others when he tells me all the time. Anyway, because of that, I worked up the courage to try and vary myself while still staying within the restrictions.
Ogawa: We had a lot of restrictions on you, what kind of stuff did you end up going with?
Yoshizawa: Well, the colony had to fall, right? Usually, the colony falls, and the whole screen turns white, but this story focuses on the circumstances around adults, and those affected by war, so we drew the fall with that in mind. Before, there was never a camera placed on the ground capturing the hole created by the impact and the countless lives lost. The Musai, the Zakus, the colony falling, we didn’t focus on that at all. I just changed where we placed the camera is all.
I also changed the presentation of the Gundams. In Zeta Gundam, it starts with the Mk. II Gundam, then Zeta Gundam appears. In Victory Gundam, it works its way up to the V2 Assault-Buster Gundam. Everything keeps powering up. In NT, the first time Narrative shows up is when it’s at its flashiest—it only gets simpler after that. The opposite of the norm. Having things opposite of the norm, or just changing how it was present, was how I tackled the challenge. If you watch with that in mind, I think you can spot the slight differences.

— What were you focused on while creating NT?
Yoshizawa: I really think it was the film’s speed and tempo. I tried to go for pacing similar to Char’s Counterattack—the fights and the drama coming at you one after another. Given how long Unicorn was, it was able to take full advantage of that and show off massive mobile suit battles or fluid character animation depending on what was needed and then connect it between the films. NT is, well, the complete opposite on this front. I also like the Gundam films more than the original TV broadcast. This isn’t exactly a point about film, tempo, or characters’ walking animation, I just like a specific pattern of directing and was able to do that. I watched Tomino’s anime since I was a kid, so I think it was a question of how do I incorporate that into my work? It’s something that got drilled into my head while working on G-Reco.

— What were you told while working on it?
Yoshizawa: Oh nothing specific as I had heard it all before. However, I was able to get to the heart of what I’d heard while working on G-Reco. The more you work with it, the more extensive your knowledge of it is.

— Can I ask about the character designs as well? The character designer this time around was Kim Se Jun, director, scriptwriter, character designer, storyboarder, key animator, mechanical designer, and animation director for Gundam Twilight Axis. How did he come on board?
Ogawa: NT was actually approved first. We hadn’t properly moved into production yet though so the release orders were reversed.

— Interesting. Kim has a 90s analog style to his artwork.
Ogawa: He definitely has that 90s Madhouse feel to his art. The reason we brought on Kim was that he could draw old guys. There aren’t a lot of people that can draw old guys well, and they are abundant in UC. The lines are very fine, so it seems like picking up a sense for it is pretty tricky.

— There are a lot of hand-drawn mechs in NT. What would you say is the allure of hand-drawn mechs?
Yoshizawa: Fluctuation. When you draw with 3DCG the lines are perfect every time, but with hand-drawn stuff the form is often broken, the lines don’t match up, and there are smear effects that all add more character to the animation. By using that smear to your advantage, you reveal a charming part to the animation. The opening sequence is out, so if you look at it closely, there are parts of the setting that are completely off. Those are good moments of that fluctuation. That’s what I felt at least.
This is especially true for mecha animation. Komatsu Eiji is an amazing mecha key animator that knows how to use smears and deformation to his advantage. The Anksha transform in a slow and clunky way, but he was able to fantastically draw up a shortened version in the blink of an eye! He fudged his way through transformation mechanics with the smear effects. It’s amusing to see what each animator brings to the table.
That doesn’t mean there’s no merit in 3D. In fact, precision is key. The sheer amount of detail that can be added is fascinating. In the latter half of the movie, there is a scene where they’re flying through an uncountable amount of gas tanks, that would be far too exhausting to draw by hand. The Phenex Destroy Mode transformation gimmick is incredibly detailed and shines because it’s 3DCG. If that’s what you like than CG is what you want—both sides have their appeal, so it’s not crazy to say you like both.

— Can you clue me in on why you want the younger generation, artists like Yoshizawa, Kim, and Komatsu working on Gundam?
Ogata: I mean, everyone else has gotten older, so it’s harder for them to draw fine lines with their worn eyes (laughs). No, I’m only joking. Of course, that’s a concern, but every new generation has different experiences and shows they grew up with. Even if they all like the same series, they could have picked up different things depending on when they watched it. I’m forty-four right now, but if we went with my interest and preferences it would end up being the fifties and up creators with our target audience being the later generations. That’s how series were created, and how they will be created, but with stuff like Unicorn that was intended for the thirty to forties crowd, it gets a TV airing, and suddenly the view age range expands. When you think about what Gundam should be about from here on out, it has to be for that next generation, not use older guys that are going to die in twenty or thirty years. However, if we continue to stick with the same group of people making what we like, then it’ll get stuck on the forty to fifties group. With that in mind, we bring in the younger generation to work on series.
I think by having Tomino team up with these different creators he’s able to rejuvenate himself in a sense—he had his time to preserve his work. Gundam deserves the same treatment by having new entries one after another put out by young creators. By doing that, we’ll get closer to reaching the next generation. Of course, this means going down entirely new avenues like with Iron-Blooded Orphans and Build Divers, but it also means taking a fresh approach to the Universal Century. It’s no fun if the same set of fans get to see the same thing over and over again. Tomino has said this before, but he sees Gundam as a weapon for young creators to make a name for themselves while making what they want.
That’s why, while we had a lot of the staff from Unicorn, the core of the project was comprised of a younger generation. They’re the main while the Unicorn staff is their support. So while NT is a Universal Century Gundam, it will likely be different than what you’re used to. That’s part of the fun.

[Obelisk ze Tormentor]

A pretty decent short look of NT compared to others in YT:

YouTube

https://youtu.be/KmwPi4BVvxg

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[Chosen_Hero]

I accidentally watched this without knowing that I need to watch Unicorn first, was still ablw to follow the story pretty well and I trithfully didn't like the movie, at least story wise. I definitely am not a fan of where the main UC of Gundam has gone so I'll just stick to stories like a IBO, Wing, etc.

[ArmorPilot]

I've pretty much given up hope at this point of any good new Federation grunt GM/Jegan action. Zeon sells more model kits and we can't *gasp* show them lose except to Gundams...

[Psyco Diver]

Looks like Gundam Info (Official Gundam Youtube channel) will be playing NT in English dub and multiple language sub

[Helius]

YouTube

https://youtu.be/cQms8VY4lPU

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YouTube

https://youtu.be/MFRA7X_ozUw

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[GN0010 Nosferatu]

I sometimes can't help but feel Narrative was an excuse to do another Gundam vs Neo Zeong fight.

[Psyco Diver]

I forgot to comment on this

That was interesting, I was ok with the time travel stuff they mentioned because that made sense with new types but ghosts, that’s a bit much for me. The bad guy was meh but had a interesting back story, the rest of characters were similar, bleh but interesting backgrounds. The ending worked for me and explains away why there are no psycho frames in the future timeline of UC

[Obelisk ze Tormentor]

Originally Posted by GN0010 Nosferatu

I sometimes can't help but feel Narrative was an excuse to do another Gundam vs Neo Zeong fight.

Because Full Frontal didn't use Neo Zeong at its full battle potential in Unicorn. Instead, he used it as a time-traveling Disney-ride for Banagher .