Vincenzo Averello

Today it was announced that Mobile Suit Gundam: the Origin is going to be adapted into anime. This is an unexpected move to say the least. Gundam: the Origin serialized in Gundam Ace magazine in Japan starting in 2002. There was a failed attempt to release the manga in the United States that maintained the magazine size page but only gave 4 or 5 chapters to a book (more similar to an Image Comics trade paperback). Sadly, this method made little sense since the Japanese collections had about 8 to 10 chapters and made clearly delineated stories (two volumes to a story). Suffice it to say I still await the release of the rest of it here.

So what makes Gundam: The Origin so special. Well, for one its popular here among Gundam fans. Also, it adapts the original Mobile Suit Gundam series into a manga series (there are other manga series that do this). That also makes this strange that it creates a circle of production going from the 1979 anime to the 2002 manga to a 2011 or 2012 anime. It might make more sense if things were changed but (from what I read, only 6 of the 22 volumes of manga) not much was changed, just expanded. The character designs and mech designs were more or less faithful so it has the recognizable look for all the characters. Amuro looks like Amuro, Char is Char, and a Gouf is no Zaku, boy. Sure the artist put his own spin on it but still a Gundam fan needs no introduction to the characters.

The announcement says nothing about this series other than its happening. I hope that this finally gives us the 52 episodes that Gundam was supposed to get all those years ago. This would be tragic if it was only a 13 episode thing that only tried to condense the story too much. I will keep an eye on this story to bring up developments. But we should have another Gundam story on Saturday when Bandai announces more stuff.

Source: http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2011-06-22/gundam-the-origin-manga-to-launch-anime-project