S6E14 - TOMINO-THON Returns! Revisiting Mobile Suit ZETA GUNDAM Part 1 (Episodes 1-23)

Well, one thing I wanna just, uh, shout out quickly is I pulled these notes, I- I did a lot of research in a lot of different places.

A couple of English language sources I wanna shout out, because I did pull translations from here, uh, and so I wanna make sure we cite those, is, uh, one of the biggest is that Mark Simmons at gundamunofficial.com has extensive pages on a bunch of Gundam series production history that have a lot of good quotes from various guidebooks and laser disc releases and Blu-ray releases and all that stuff.

And so I would highly recommend if you're interested in any of this stuff, go look.

He also has a ton of, like, production art and stuff like that that obviously we cannot show in podcast form, so I would go look at a lot of that stuff and highly recommend that source.

And then Zeonic Scanlations, which I think are best known in the fan community for their s- uh, translations of some of the Gundam mangas and the Gundam novels, uh, also have some good pages on various planning memos from Tomino for some of these shows.

Uh, and so these are sources that I will be referencing today and in some of the episodes to come, so I just wanted to shout those out.

But a little bit of context as we enter this next phase of the Tomino-thon is just about Tomino's return to Gundam I wanted to put in context here, 'cause it is kind of crazy when you look at it, because Tomino-thon Part A, Sean, was not a very Gundam-heavy season.

We had the one Gundam show, and then Tomino did a bunch of other stuff before and after.

But now Tomino-thon Part B is where his career comes to be dominated by Gundam.

This is the point where, like, you would say this is the thing he becomes most associated with, [swallows] because while Gundam had lain dormant for a few years there, this next phase of the series, and in particular Tomino's involvement in it, is pretty, like, meteoric in the expansion of the franchise.

When you look at how Tomino threw himself into Zeta Gundam, and in particular how much Gundam he personally worked on between it and then when he eventually stepped away from the series after Victory, it seems that once he came back to Gundam, he had an awful lot to say with it before he left.

Between 1985 and 1994, nine-year period, he would produce Zeta Gundam, 50 episodes; the Zeta Gundam novels Five volumes.

Gundam Double Zeta, 46 episodes.

The Char's Counterattack movie.

The Gundam High Streamer Char's Counterattack novels, that's three novels.

The Gundam Char's Counterattack Beltorchika's Children novel, one volume.

We'll talk, that's, that's the Char's Counterattack episode has a lot of, uh, us breaking down what is in those fucking novels.

Uh, you've got the Gaia Gear novels, which are five volumes.

You've got the Gundam Hathaway's Flash novels.

There's three of those.

There's the Gundam F91 movie.

There's the Gundam F191 novelization.

There's two of those.

There's Victory Gundam at 51 episodes, and the Victory Gundam novels at five volumes.

For those keeping track, that is 147 episodes, two theatrical feature films, and 24 novels in a nine-year period, all about Gundam.

Well, one thing I wanna just, uh, shout out quickly is I pulled these notes, I- I did a lot of research in a lot of different places.

A couple of English language sources I wanna shout out, because I did pull translations from here, uh, and so I wanna make sure we cite those, is, uh, one of the biggest is that Mark Simmons at gundamunofficial.com has extensive pages on a bunch of Gundam series production history that have a lot of good quotes from various guidebooks and laser disc releases and Blu-ray releases and all that stuff.

And so I would highly recommend if you're interested in any of this stuff, go look.

He also has a ton of, like, production art and stuff like that that obviously we cannot show in podcast form, so I would go look at a lot of that stuff and highly recommend that source.

And then Zeonic Scanlations, which I think are best known in the fan community for their s- uh, translations of some of the Gundam mangas and the Gundam novels, uh, also have some good pages on various planning memos from Tomino for some of these shows.

Uh, and so these are sources that I will be referencing today and in some of the episodes to come, so I just wanted to shout those out.

But a little bit of context as we enter this next phase of the Tomino-thon is just about Tomino's return to Gundam I wanted to put in context here, 'cause it is kind of crazy when you look at it, because Tomino-thon Part A, Sean, was not a very Gundam-heavy season.

We had the one Gundam show, and then Tomino did a bunch of other stuff before and after.

But now Tomino-thon Part B is where his career comes to be dominated by Gundam.

This is the point where, like, you would say this is the thing he becomes most associated with, [swallows] because while Gundam had lain dormant for a few years there, this next phase of the series, and in particular Tomino's involvement in it, is pretty, like, meteoric in the expansion of the franchise.

When you look at how Tomino threw himself into Zeta Gundam, and in particular how much Gundam he personally worked on between it and then when he eventually stepped away from the series after Victory, it seems that once he came back to Gundam, he had an awful lot to say with it before he left.

Between 1985 and 1994, nine-year period, he would produce Zeta Gundam, 50 episodes; the Zeta Gundam novels Five volumes.

Gundam Double Zeta, 46 episodes.

The Char's Counterattack movie.

The Gundam High Streamer Char's Counterattack novels, that's three novels.

The Gundam Char's Counterattack Beltorchika's Children novel, one volume.

We'll talk, that's, that's the Char's Counterattack episode has a lot of, uh, us breaking down what is in those fucking novels.

Uh, you've got the Gaia Gear novels, which are five volumes.

You've got the Gundam Hathaway's Flash novels.

There's three of those.

There's the Gundam F91 movie.

There's the Gundam F191 novelization.

There's two of those.

There's Victory Gundam at 51 episodes, and the Victory Gundam novels at five volumes.

For those keeping track, that is 147 episodes, two theatrical feature films, and 24 novels in a nine-year period, all about Gundam.