"Star Wars" versus "Gundam"

Last time I was in Japan, I pondered the incredible success of "Gundam." In a toy store full of plastic models, there were only two that weren't "Gundam." Pretty incredible for a series nearly 30 years old. The success of "Gundam" in many ways parallels the success of "Star Wars", but in many ways diverges from it.

Both were released around the same time; "Star Wars" in 1977 and "Gundam" in 1979. Both are science fiction, but the only thing they have in common is the light sabre weapon wielded by Gundam. Other than that, the stories and story telling is very different. Where as Star Wars is a swash-buckling adventure which doesn't take itself too seriously, Gundam is very serious. This is why it stood out from all the robot animations before it: The kind where the hero's robot gets beaten in the first half of the show, magically transforms and smashes the enemy (who escapes to fight another day). Gundam on the other hand was the first of the "real robot" genre.

In "Gundam" the fighting is brutal; there are a lot of dead soldiers in every episode, and the protagonist Amuro feels a deep guilt for it. The characters are reasonably complicated, and don't play to stereotypes. The supporting cast are each their own. The civilians, instead of being thankful, are often too caught up in their own desires to thank the soldiers that defend them. Interestingly too, there is no clear good or evil; There really *are* heroes and villains on both sides. Hero Amuro and Hero Char fight on opposing sides, but they're both heroes. There's a very well thought out background science to the whole thing which explains how the weapons work and the spacecraft fly: It's actually hard science. This isn't Star Trek Science they make up as they go, but stuff that really does fit together. So far as drama, I actually find "Gundam" pretty hard to watch because it doesn't neatly pigeonwhole itself. It's fairly complicated and you have to think as you watch it. For example, you actually have to pay attention to the supporting cast. In "Gundam 0079" (the original series) there is no politics: This is just about the soldiers.

Compare this with "Star Wars". The fighting is intense, but until the PT the dead soldiers metaphorically disappeared from the battlefield like the PC game. Luke doesn't feel the least bit of remorse at all the people he killed when he blew up the Deathstar. (Neither did Tibbets who dropped the Atomic bomb on Hiroshima, but with 100,000 dead including 40,000 children I doubt Lucas would consider them cut from the same cloth). It's not that Luke ever rationalizes it: It just never comes up. In "Star Wars" the line between good and evil couldn't be more stronger. The supporting cast are cardboard cutouts: Generals who almost change by the shot, and Wedge who, lets face it, we know nothing about. You can ignore the supporting cast: They're just part of the scenery. In "Star Wars" there's absolutely no background science (maybe added to the books I've never read, but certainly never mentioned in the movies) for the hardware. Only the extremely unconvincing Midichlorians retrofitted to explain the force. When you watch "Star Wars", you disengage the brain, sit back and enjoy the ride. As the various ChefElf threads have shown, if you start prying around, it falls apart. OT "Star Wars" was somewhat about politics and PT "Star Wars" was mostly about politics. It would have been a master feat if Lucas had pulled it off, but it was boring as hell.

Both are adventures, but "Gundam" is a drama where as "Star Wars" is much lighter (at least the OT was. Lucas tried to turn the PT into a drama of sorts, only to fall into the chasm between the two genres).

What "Star Wars" and "Gundam" have in common is they've both had incredible influences on popular culture. In the West while we're still rabbiting on about "Star Wars" thirty years after the event, in Japan "Gundam" is still going strong. (BTW "Star Wars" is still very popular in Japan. Not for merchandise perhaps, but book stores still carry a lot of material.)

Both have spawned fan boys, even if "Star Wars" following has fragmented into drooling force.net masturbators and we, the jaded renegades. (It's been noted Aussies are disproportionate on ChefElf and suggested it may be because of the Aussie character to call crap crap loudly. By comparison in Japan if you don't like it you hold your own counsel and go elsewhere.) Amusingly a few months ago when Wikipedia's edits were traced they found six employees at the Japanese Ministry of Agriculture whose sole task seemed to be just editing Wikipedia's Gundam pages. The Japanese Government rebuked them and put out a press release stating "The Ministry of Agriculture is not responsible for Gundam": http://news.bbc.co.u...fic/7029685.stm

Their pop culture appeal both spread to the military: Years ago George Lucas was annoyed when Ronald Reagan's SDI came to be known as "Star Wars". More recently the Japanese Defence Ministry released a paper "Towards the Realization of Gundam (Advanced Personal Equipment System)." http://www.animenews...ealizing-gundam

Both "Star Wars" and "Gundam" haven't been able to say no to the cash cow, and have pumped out tonnes of merchandise. Neither have been able to say no to sequels. "Gundam" has produced an absurd number of spin-off series, but AFAIK the setting is usually different so it doesn't suffer from all the continuity errors that plague Lucas. Another difference is that "Star Wars" is very Lucas' baby. "Gundam" on the other hand belongs to a company called Sunrise. (Sunrise's viral marketing is very clever. Their current hit is "Sergent Frog", about a platoon of incompetent frog aliens that get stranded on Earth and are constantly planning (and botching) an invasion. Sergent Frog himself is constantly distracted by his love of building Gunpla (Gundam Plastic Models) which I suspect has inspired a new generation of consumers. The quality of many of the Gundam toys I've seen is pretty crappy. The "Star Wars" stuff at least seems a little more solid.)

Some of the "Gundam" spin off series have been not very good, but for some reason their fans forgive them. With "Star Wars", well, it's best summed up by the Hot Waffles Song "George Lucas raped our Childhood" (Lyrics: http://www.lyricsand...ong/598371.html ) I cannot forgive the man who blamed his fans for his own cockup instead of saying "Sorry, I hear you and will do better next time".

"Gundam" has spawned many imitators in Japan. These are popular, but IMO many are too imitative without adding their own mark. An exception is the excellent "Neon Genesis Evangelion" http://en.wikipedia....esis_Evangelion which had the deepest ending you will ever see. "Star Wars" kicked off a whole craze on Science fiction which has lasted to this day, but there have been remarkably few direct imitators. "Battlestar Galactica" and the "Buck Rogers" TV Series perhaps, but after that, I can't name one. Or maybe I'm being too kind?

In the end we have a paradox: Two memes, so similar, so different, yet both pervasive. Maybe "Star Wars" is a kids story that's enjoyable to adults, and "Gundam" is an adult's story enjoyed by kids? Either way, when I was in that toy store and saw the shelves stacked with Gunpla I felt like I was in a parallel universe.

For those who are interested in checking out Gundam, there are many, many series. Begin at the beginning with (it has many names): "Mobile Suit Gundam", "First Gundam", "Amuro Gundam" or the easiest name to find "Gundam 0079". You can get it dubbed or subtitled. I recommend the subtitled one. The dubbing is a bit too cheesy. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gundam

Trivia: Gundam creator's Yoshiyuki Tomino original inspiration came from the mobile infantries armour suits in of Robert A. Heinlein's book "Starship Troopers". These were left out of Paul Verhoeven's "Starship Troopers" movie satire due to cost.

This post has been edited by Toru-chan: 13 December 2007 - 08:08 AM

I've only sen Wing, and I have to admit the story telling in GW was a good bit richer than in Star Wars, especially the prequels. Despite being animated I find Gundam Wing to be less cartoonish than the prequels, and certainly on an equal footing with the OT. The comparison between SW and Gundam is definately apt, in my opinion. Especially considering the many sequels -- G Gundam is perhaps as worse than the PT, but in a far more laughable way.

The other thing pointed out was the story telling. I think Gundam has the unfair advantage of having a longer time period to tell its story, but regardless it does do so in a quite interesting manner. I found myself enjoying the people opposing the main characters just as much as any of the main characters in Gundam.

As for transformers, that was a tv series first and foremost about merchandising, and then about the decepticons being cool and robots beating eachother with different objects. That's a winning formula any day. I dont know what the movie was about except lightening fast blurry matrix action ™ As for comparing to star wars or gundam, Transformers was bad ass, but in a completely different way. I think even as a five year old I knew that series was sending subliminal messages to me to buy their toys, but those toys were so bad ass I didnt care. Its a special kind of love that you have for a series when you know its only after your money but you forgive it.