What I Want From the Next 'Gundam'
The next Mobile Suit Gundam series is going to be announced at SDCC—and that says a lot about the direction the legendary mecha franchise is heading in.
In just a few short weeks, Bandai and Sunrise will announce the future of Mobile Suit Gundam (different from the previous times they've announced the future of Mobile Suit Gundam this year, but we'll get into that). In a surprise move, it's doing so not through a dedicated event in the mecha franchise's home turf, but at a panel at San Diego Comic-Con.
This is, of course, a Big Deal. Not just because it's a new Gundam—and despite that becoming more and more common lately, it's still an event. But by announcing the next mainline entry in the series in an arena that is pretty much explicitly for a non-Japanese audience, Bandai is indicating something that it has been wanting to do for a very long time: Gundam is now ready to take on the world.
Of course, Gundam's actually already done this plenty. The Wing explosion of the '90s put the franchise on the map in the West in the first place. Witch From Mercury propelled the series to a new level of success and international recognition through the power of a clean slate and lesbianism. GQuuuuuuX—which was a huge success in Japan, and received a more mixed tone elsewhere—was marked by Char Aznable showing up in Times Square and streamed on Amazon's Prime Video (although you'd be hard pressed to find Amazon dot com making any kind of fuss about that). They've been threatening that live-action movie for years, and now it's actually filming.
Hell, SDCC itself is no stranger to Gundam news aimed at the franchise's Western audience: last year, to celebrate Wing's 30th anniversary, the convention debuted a brand new animated short that seemingly teased a Frozen Teardrop adaptation at some point (it might honestly happen now that Bandai has teased a new Wing project as part of the franchise's broader 50th anniversary celebrations).
But there's still something markedly different about announcing whatever this new show is—the show that is likely going to be the main face of Gundam and push it to a global audience, perhaps harder than they've tried even recently. It's a huge opportunity for the franchise to show what it's capable of, and why it's been so enduring for almost half a century.
So as someone who already understands all that, here's what I want to see.