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Bandai Snags Some Big Ones
- By Phyl Good
- Published 04/18/2008
- Anime and Manga
- Unrated
Phyl Good
View all articles by Phyl Good
Aaaaaand, Bandai Entertainment does it again. On April 18, 2008, at New York Comic Con, the company announced two new acquisitions, one of them continuing a longstanding Bandai tradition, and the other scooping up the license for a title that was originally granted to a competitor.
Fans will be pleased, but probably not entirely surprised, to learn that Bandai has acquired the licensing rights to the Mobil Suit Gundam 00 series, whose first season just finished its run in Japan in March. Bandai has had a very long history of promoting both the many different incarnations of the mecha anime series, and also of Gundam products, games, and websites. So this acquisition is almost organic, a natural continuation of the tradition.
This series establishes a couple of "firsts" for the Gundam franchise. It's the first of all the series to be produced in high definition, and is also the first to be set in "real world time," that is, in 2307-2312 AD (or CE). Previous Gundam series have been set in fictional time periods with such designations as "Universal Century" or "After Colony," or most recently for the two Gundam SEED series, "Cosmic Era." In this "real time" series, the characters deal with a post-fossil-fuel era, and the political machinations involving an array of solar power generators that orbit the earth.
A second season of Gundam 00 is set to begin in Japan in October of this year, though no mention has yet been made of whether Bandai Entertainment's license extends through those episodes. However, given their involvement with the Gundam world till now, one would expect it's pretty much a sure thing.
The second acquisition announced at New York Comic Con involves the license for Gainax's Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann series. The North American licensing of this show has had a strange history over the past year.
ADV Films had originally announced, back in July of 2007 at Anime Expo, that it had acquired the license for the series. But in January of 2008, ADV removed many titles - and all reference to them - from its website and online store, one of those titles being Gurren Lagann. ADV made cryptic statements about "short-term challenges," but many of the reasons for the suspension of titles remain unpublicized. ADV has, since then, gradually worked to restore license to several of the removed titles, but now we know that Gurren Lagann is not one of them.
Instead, Bandai Entertainment has acquired the license, and the series will become available in North America in July of 2008.
Gurren Lagann portrays life in the future when people are forced to live in isolated underground villages. Yet when a boy discovers a large robot, he and a friend use it to break through to the surface and destroy other robots being used to terrorize surface dwellers. The energizing force that allows humans and other beings to become strong is "Spiral Energy," the power of evolution. Other beings, fearing that limitless evolution could lead to destruction, repress themselves and other civilizations and are known as "Anti-Spirals." The entire series revolves around the struggle of these two forces.
An, Bandai and those robots. There are few things you can count on in life, but Bandai, Gundam, and robots are a combination that never fails.
Fans will be pleased, but probably not entirely surprised, to learn that Bandai has acquired the licensing rights to the Mobil Suit Gundam 00 series, whose first season just finished its run in Japan in March. Bandai has had a very long history of promoting both the many different incarnations of the mecha anime series, and also of Gundam products, games, and websites. So this acquisition is almost organic, a natural continuation of the tradition.
This series establishes a couple of "firsts" for the Gundam franchise. It's the first of all the series to be produced in high definition, and is also the first to be set in "real world time," that is, in 2307-2312 AD (or CE). Previous Gundam series have been set in fictional time periods with such designations as "Universal Century" or "After Colony," or most recently for the two Gundam SEED series, "Cosmic Era." In this "real time" series, the characters deal with a post-fossil-fuel era, and the political machinations involving an array of solar power generators that orbit the earth.
A second season of Gundam 00 is set to begin in Japan in October of this year, though no mention has yet been made of whether Bandai Entertainment's license extends through those episodes. However, given their involvement with the Gundam world till now, one would expect it's pretty much a sure thing.
The second acquisition announced at New York Comic Con involves the license for Gainax's Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann series. The North American licensing of this show has had a strange history over the past year.
ADV Films had originally announced, back in July of 2007 at Anime Expo, that it had acquired the license for the series. But in January of 2008, ADV removed many titles - and all reference to them - from its website and online store, one of those titles being Gurren Lagann. ADV made cryptic statements about "short-term challenges," but many of the reasons for the suspension of titles remain unpublicized. ADV has, since then, gradually worked to restore license to several of the removed titles, but now we know that Gurren Lagann is not one of them.
Instead, Bandai Entertainment has acquired the license, and the series will become available in North America in July of 2008.
Gurren Lagann portrays life in the future when people are forced to live in isolated underground villages. Yet when a boy discovers a large robot, he and a friend use it to break through to the surface and destroy other robots being used to terrorize surface dwellers. The energizing force that allows humans and other beings to become strong is "Spiral Energy," the power of evolution. Other beings, fearing that limitless evolution could lead to destruction, repress themselves and other civilizations and are known as "Anti-Spirals." The entire series revolves around the struggle of these two forces.
An, Bandai and those robots. There are few things you can count on in life, but Bandai, Gundam, and robots are a combination that never fails.