Yazuhiko Yoshikazu Interview
Summarized from March 2022 issue of Gundam Ace

As many people know, Yaz drew the covers for Gundam Ace during the serialization of the Origin. There were more than 100 issues with his artwork. He drew then in a single day. He says he can’t do that anymore because he doesn’t have the strength and needs two days to finish it. Laughing, he says it’s more like a week now.

He says that any more time than a day on the artwork would’ve been disastrous since there were other commissioned works to do (posters, etc.). When asked if there were any particularly difficult pieces, he said that naturally there were, but the Black Tri-Stars kinda pissed him off a bit. Plus, having the colors vary to avoid similar shapes was an issue.

Given the fact that his artwork isn’t digital, he says he envies those artists since they can start over. He draws once, and he’s done. He says he didn’t have to redraw anything for the Origin, but there were some other things where he couldn’t cover up some errors.

He gives an example that if the base coat is uneven, the drawing won’t look good, but sometimes he’d get interrupted so the paint would dry in the middle of his work, so it’d be uneven. He said he’d even try to cheat sometimes but wasn’t satisfied when it came out different than what he anticipated. He cites the April 2006 issue of Ace as being a particularly troublesome one (Note: Gihren on the cover giving his speech).

The cover of the Origin’s mechanical works book took him three days to draw. He wasn’t happy with it. The Gundam Ace editorial department wanted Char’s Zaku on either side and the Black Tri-Stars.

Yaz doesn’t use black when it comes to his works. It’s his unique way of coloring backgrounds, so no two blacks are ever the same. The interviewer says Yaz doesn’t own any black paint. Because he doesn’t use it, it takes a while to create a single background. He remembers back to his childhood days watercolor when he was told to get rid of black and white.

While black is convenient, Yaz says that it doesn’t give you that sort of “mysterious black” or the ability to blur things (he cites the August 2011 issue of Ace with Amuro on the cover in space). He took a lot to heart from the principal of his school (plus, he apparently grew up in a poor village).

CHAR & SAYLA’S PAST

Yaz notes that it wasn’t in his original plan for the series, and he felt like he couldn’t move on with things until he depicted their background. So he approached Sunrise, and they gave him some ideas, and he also asked them for feedback. He goes on to point out that he wants people to know that Origin wasn’t a work that he started because he wanted to draw it. Sunrise asked him to, so it started as their project. He did a lot of “prescreening” and never made decisions on his own.

CUCURUZ DOAN’S ISLAND

Yaz wasn’t involved in the episode that aired at the time. He says that some of the episodes were outsourced, including animation direction, but the only one he really remembers is episode fifteen. It seems the entire episode (scenario included) was outsourced.

It wasn’t included in the Origin manga because the goal was to make the story as slim as possible, so everything that was extraneous was removed. Still, Yaz didn’t think it was a lousy story and felt the setting was quite fascinating. He says it reminds him of Coppola’s Apocalypse Now. While the scale of the story is different, they’re structurally similar.

FIRST GUNDAM’S EPISODES ARE 22 MINUTES. TO MAKE A MOVIE, A LOT WOULD HAVE TO CHANGE?

Joking aside, Yaz says there is so much information in the episode itself that it could easily surpass a two-hour movie. After seeing the first draft of the scenario, he says that he wondered how he’d compress it all together.

MECHANICAL DESIGNS

Katoki proposed a variation of the Zaku that Doan uses, and Yaz says it’s very good. He says he can’t go into details just yet, but it’s quite unique. He says that he hears there are a lot of fans of Doan’s Zaku. Laughing, he says that the animation director told him that he has to have it throw rocks. He says that there is such an abundance of love from the fans they had to get creative with the action.

CASTING

“It will also be interesting to see how the cast fills out for Doan, as this information has yet to be announced.”

That announcement is probably still a little ways off. In terms of the cast, while the White Base crew will be featured, everyone was revamped for The Origin except for Amuro and Kai. This was done in anticipation of the main story of the One Year War arc, but that adaptation is no longer happening. For this reason, there were hardly any lines, despite this bold decision that was made. I always regretted this, but I’m glad that Doan came about, so it didn’t end up going to waste. I think there is a refreshing mix of the new and the old, with Furuya playing the leading role.

EARLY SUMMER RELEASE

Yaz is hoping to have it out before summer vacations start.