Could a live action GUNDAM movie be next?

[miraclefan]

I have been a fan of the GUNDAM franchise & it's various Alternate Universes since 1999. And have often thought if done right a trilogy of movies on the one year war would be amazing. Especialy with TREK 09 being as big a hit as it is I would think it only a matter of time before some BIG movie company looked at this series. And After seeing THESE pics http://mdn.mainichi.jp/photospecials/graph/gundam/index.html I really do think a live action gundam movie would work! My question however is, if they did make a gundam movie, would you see it? and would it be any good? or would it turn out to be another Dragon Ball?

 

[Leroy]

Bandai has tried this before with G-Saviour it was awful. I doubt any major studio would bother making a movie out of an obscure anime like Gundam.

 

[Dream]

Haven't all the Gundam shows that have aired recently on Cartoon Network failed?

 

[miraclefan]

Haven't all the Gundam shows that have aired recently on Cartoon Network failed?

Pretty Much. The only REAL success was Wing.

 

[Leroy]

Dream Wrote:
Haven't all the Gundam shows that have aired recently on Cartoon Network failed?

It depends on what you consider a failure, the only one canceled and never finished its run was 0079, but 08th MS Team, 0080, 0083, and G all aired multiple times. SEED which was the last Gundam to air on CN in 2004 was put in the 5am deathslot halfway through its run. I have no idea how 00 did on SyFy but it must have done well enough to greenlight airing of the second season in late June.

 

[C.E. Evans]

IIRC, G Gundam and SD Gundam also did pretty good on CN but overall the franchise performed too unevenly for the network's liking (I think there were plans to air a second season of SD Gundam but behind-the-scenes issues may have derailed that). Gundam Seed was the apparently the final straw.

I think a CN exec was even on record as saying the network wouldn't touch Gundam again with a ten foot beam saber...

...but then we are talking about Cartoon Network though.

 

[Pilot Ace]

I doubt any major studio would bother making a movie out of an obscure anime like Gundam.

Wait. What?

Gundam is the furthest from obscure you can get, it's probably among the most beloved anime franchises in history.

Maybe it's obscure from the viewpoint of someone who is clueless about anime in general, but I think that could be said for anyone not familiar with an entire medium of entertainment--they wouldn't necessarily know anything about even the most heralded titles.

Is Akira obscure? Of course not. Do people who know nothing about anime know about Akira? Probably not. Yet there is serious talk about making two films for it.

 

[Leroy]

Pilot Ace wrote:
Wait. What?

Gundam is the furthest from obscure you can get, it's probably among the most beloved anime franchises in history.

In Japan it definitely is but in America nobody has heard of Gundam outside of anime circles and that's what you'd need in order for these Hollywood types to even think about making a live action film.

 

[miraclefan]

Pilot Ace wrote:
Wait. What?

Gundam is the furthest from obscure you can get, it's probably among the most beloved anime franchises in history.

In Japan it definitely is but in America nobody has heard of Gundam outside of anime circles and that's what you'd need in order for these Hollywood types to even think about making a live action film.

If I recall nobody knew what STAR WARS was either, and we all know how that turned out.

 

[JoeD80]

an obscure anime like Gundam.

Gundam is obscure like Star Trek is obscure.

but in America nobody has heard of Gundam outside of anime circles

Gundam Wing had plenty of mainstream success in the US, with selling of model kits, video games, DVDs, etc etc. I think the others could catch on here if the right network stuck to it. Sci-Fi seems to be doing OK with 00.

 

[blockaderunner]

After the abortions that were Dragonball and "Street Fighter": The Legend Of Chun Li, I'm not keen on some of my favorite anime brought to life (Much as I'd love to see a live action Naruto).

 

[Falconfire]

Dream Wrote:
Haven't all the Gundam shows that have aired recently on Cartoon Network failed?

It depends on what you consider a failure, the only one canceled and never finished its run was 0079, but 08th MS Team, 0080, 0083, and G all aired multiple times. SEED which was the last Gundam to air on CN in 2004 was put in the 5am deathslot halfway through its run. I have no idea how 00 did on SyFy but it must have done well enough to greenlight airing of the second season in late June.

Mobile Suit Gundam was only canceled thanks to 9/11. Rather than pick it up again at a later date or move it to Adult Swim they just canned it though they did use it as Adult Swim filler inbetween series.

that being said, Cartoon Network has MTVitis these days and is basically completely dumping cartoons for live action because its cheaper, so any new series would have to be shown on SyFy.

As for a movie, one has been in pre-planning stages for years now. I remember even as far back as 2000, that talks had been going on for a true live action Hollywood Gundam movie. I have a feeling though that a lot of the sucess of a Gundam movie will rely on how sucessful the Voltron movie ends up being once they start shooting that.


I still maintain though that the original is probabaly the ONLY series that would greatly benefit from a re-envisioned anime holding closer to the movies. The show had a exellent storyline that was overshadowed by constant studio interfeirence to sell it to the kids.

A re-envisioning closer to the novels in tone (although obviously not in plotline due to particular events at the end of the novels) would be a great series to follow up Gundam Unicorn, since we are going back to the UC this winter.

 

[clint g]

If given a decent enough budget and properly americanized it could probably make for a decent summer blockbuster. Just look at transformers for example?

 

[Dinosauricon]

It'll need a more mature approach, though. Although the franchise, like Transformers, is mostly about selling toys and kits, there's a good deal of depth in it, especially in the Tomino stories.

 

[clint g]

It'll need a more mature approach, though. Although the franchise, like Transformers, is mostly about selling toys and kits, there's a good deal of depth in it, especially in the Tomino stories.

As a fan, I would love for it to take a more approach. From a business perspective though, I don't think that would happen.

 

[Dinosauricon]

Yeah, especially if Bandai has a lot of control. Gundam Seed/Seed Destiny, for instance, had a ton of Gundams (Although not as many as G) which were marketable.


Plus I'm not sure how if they'd be able to use the traditional Gundam color scheme. Even G-saviour got rid of that. The color scheme was pretty much a compromise I think between Tomino and the merchandisers, but it kind of ended up becoming a tradition.


Gundam's kind of like Doctor Who in America-it's HUGE overseas, but has struggled to find an American audience outside the cult fanbase. The fact that a lot of the Gundam games that get released here are absolutely terrible doesn't help matters (Why can't we get some of the good ones?)


Plus anime adaptations have pretty much all flopped-Speed Racer, Dragonball, Blood were all failures. I don't think the CG Gatchamen or Astro Boy will change that either.

 

[Mr. Sin]

You know, watching the early episodes of Mobile Suit Gundam, I can't help but see some similarities with Trek '09. Mainly, the command crews of both White Base and Enterprise are wiped out/injured etc and replaced with relatively inexperienced civilians/trainees.

Funny thing is there's also the alternate reality thing going on with Gundam too, but without the Time travel 'origin' story.

 

[Meredith]

Haven't all the Gundam shows that have aired recently on Cartoon Network failed?

Pretty Much. The only REAL success was Wing.

They promoted the CRAP out of WING and played it in a good timeslot for teens and adults alike. Plus the Promos were freeking awesome!

[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIa7bQfxiMQ[/yt]

 

[Mr. Sin]

^Done by Peter Cullen, no less. I think the design of Optimus Prime was somewhat inspired by the RX-78-2, myself.