Producer Ken Iyadomi & Animation Producer & Sound Director Hiroaki Yura (SAFEHOUSE)

How the Gundam Aiming for a “Global” Audience Was Conceived

Mobile Suit Gundam: Requiem for Vengeance isn’t just distinctive for its realistic 3DCG mechanical visuals. By bringing in a foreign director and scriptwriter, not to mention releasing it exclusively on Netflix, the entire production approach has been unconventional compared to past Gundam series. How did the concept emerge, and how did they bring it all to life? We spoke with two key figures to find out.

EVERYTHING FELL INTO PLACE AFTER CHOOSING UNREAL ENGINE

――I understand this project began with a conversation initiated by Netflix. How did the initial planning take shape?

Iyadomi: Previously, we arranged for Mobile Suit Gundam Hathaway to stream exclusively outside Japan on Netflix. Around that time, Taiki Sakurai, then at Netflix and now an executive producer for this project, floated the idea: “How about creating a One Year War Gundam story using Unreal Engine?” Our company was eager to try something new, and producing for Netflix offered the chance to create something aimed at a global audience from day one. After internal discussions, that concept won approval, and the project took off.

――If I’m not mistaken, it’s the first Gundam series produced outside a Sunrise-affiliated studio. How did the team come together?

Iyadomi: There were indeed mixed feelings about it, but once the project was greenlit, we felt we could push forward. Gundam is already well-known throughout Asia, but we wanted to test new approaches to penetrate regions where it’s less recognized, especially in the West. That set our production crew into motion. We reached out to SAFEHOUSE, Yura’s studio, because Sakurai had said, “If we’re going to do this in Unreal Engine, how about this director?” That director was Erasmus Brosdau, who happened to be with Yura’s studio.

Yura: I’ve known Iyadomi for about a decade—back during the promotion of The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya. As for Sakurai and I, we connected on Altered Carbon: Resleeved, a Netflix anime where my team handled background concepts. When I mentioned Brosdau to them, they jumped right on board. We had received various offers to adapt other famous IPs before, but none ever progressed. Then, finally, this Gundam proposal came in. My initial reaction was, “No way this is going to happen,” yet it got approved. I was genuinely surprised.

TARGETING THE WORLD BY REVISITING THE ONE YEAR WAR

――Aiming at a global market makes it logical to set the stage during the One Year War’s European front and staff it with an international team. How were these elements decided?

Iyadomi: The One Year War idea came up in discussions with Sakurai. Internally, we had many Gundam projects in motion. Still, we chose the One Year War as our subject because even those unfamiliar with it could follow the story, while long-time fans would also be satisfied. As simple as that might sound, it was extraordinarily challenging. Until it premiered, I worried we’d be mercilessly criticized.

Yura: My interpretation slightly differs. Iyadomi and producer Naohiro Ogata gave us a thematic image: “Think of a Gundam that feels like films such as Saving Private Ryan or Fury.” Using that as a base, we understood the request as, “There are alternative Gundam series that open it up to a broader anime crowd, and then there are Universal Century stories that cater to existing fans. We want to expand those older, more serious stories internationally.” I grew up overseas—Sydney, Australia, infamous in Gundam lore for the colony drop (laughs). So I know that while times are changing, anime can still be seen as not entirely adult content in some places. In the U.S., for instance, you might know people personally involved in real military conflicts, and they’ll say, “That’s not what war is really like.” I’m a military enthusiast myself, and that’s why I believe the One Year War is an ideal subject. We approached it with careful historical consideration out of respect.

――While modern Japanese anime, even Gundam, often tries to avoid depicting death, setting aside whether showing death is good or bad, war inevitably involves death. There’s something universal about not artificially avoiding this reality and finding drama within it.

WAS THE ZAKU THEIR T-34 BEING CHASED BY A TIGER TANK?

――The production team looks incredibly international. How did you assemble such a global roster?

Yura: Primarily, I handled recruiting and obtained approvals. However, we didn’t select the scriptwriter. Gavin, our writer, was introduced to us by Sakurai and Iyadomi. They said, “There’s a guy writing for the Netflix anime Tekken: Bloodline who’s a Gundam fan. Maybe you should talk to him?” That led to Gavin coming aboard as screenwriter. We began development, brought in SAFEHOUSE, refined the script, and moved into pre-production. Around the same time, we invited mechanical designer Kimitoshi Yamane to join.

――You mentioned Saving Private Ryan and Fury. Were there other source inspirations for the screenplay?

Iyadomi: Saving Private Ryan, Fury, Duel (the Spielberg film), and a Russian film called White Tiger influenced us. We established the time and place, just before the Odessa offensive, so the story would start prior to the battle and end with a retreat. The European setting and the concept of a looming, elusive enemy owe a lot to that White Tiger reference. The Odessa campaign is the One Year War’s final major battle on Earth, which naturally made sense contextually.

DIFFERENT NATIONALITIES, DIFFERENT PREFERENCES, DIFFERENT APPROACHES: THAT’S THE TEAM

――It seems like you’re making a war film out of Gundam, which, while it’s had war-like ambiance in various works before, has never quite been done this rigorously. How did Director Brosdau and writer Gavin view Gundam, and what kind of directions did you give them?

Yura: I mainly worked with the director, while Iyadomi communicated more with Gavin.

Iyadomi: Gavin is a big fan of The 08th MS Team. We didn’t impose heavy restrictions, but during script meetings, I would give him notes like, “I’d like this part adjusted.” He was receptive, revising the script numerous times as requested. We did have to correct historical consistency a lot, but he listened well. I consulted with the director, too. During script readings, he contributed ideas.

Yura: This all took place around the start of the pandemic, so everything was on web calls.

――What language did you use to communicate?

Yura: We spoke in English.

――Not everyone might be a native English speaker, and nuances can get lost. Was it challenging?

Iyadomi: Definitely. Gavin is American, Brosdau is German, Yura is Australian. It was a pretty international mix.

――The 08th MS Team director Takeyuki Kanda famously took cues from the old American drama Combat! Just like 08th MS Team, your project seems to derive from Western cinema, with underlying Japanese elements rising to the surface. Perhaps that makes it accessible to English-speaking audiences?

Yura: Gavin’s writing style is inherently Western, and it settled into a nice rhythm, I believe.

Iyadomi: That’s why we were more nervous about the Japanese reception. Having an American screenwriter for this global project highlighted the significant differences between Japanese and American scriptwriting. Getting the right balance was challenging, especially with exposition. In Japan, audiences are expected to interpret visual cues, while Western scripts tend to explain everything through dialogue. The linguistic difference matters. Japanese relies more on unspoken understanding, while English requires explicit yes or no answers.

Yura: Another factor is that Gavin previously wrote for projects targeting younger audiences, where clarity is paramount. Brosdau, on the other hand, loves Mobile Suit Gundam 0080: War in the Pocket, admires Japanese directors, and has enormous respect for Japan’s art. He’s a big fan of Mamoru Oshii and wants to express much through imagery rather than words. When these two perspectives collided, sometimes we could sense Gavin’s frustration. Still, we needed to highlight Gavin’s strengths. Coordinating among four parties was tough. Take the ending: From a Japanese perspective, it’s clear that Solari stays on Earth, continuing what she can because she can’t return to her child. But in the U.S., where family is everything, they asked, “Why not return home?” Even when we said, “All the HLVs were shot down!” (laughs) they’d respond, “She’d still try, wouldn’t she? Why fight on?” In the final episode, Solari stops being just a soldier and becomes a mother again, so her voice acting, direction, and music shift accordingly. In retrospect, maybe we should have made her motivations clearer.

――It’s fascinating to see different nationalities, each with their own vision of Gundam, debate until this final form emerged. The fact that hardcore Japanese fans found it intriguing makes a lot of sense now.

Iyadomi: We hid Easter eggs for the more serious fans. A prime example is Yuri Kellerne. Even if you don’t know him, he works as an officer dispatched to solve problems, which is straightforward. But if you’re a Gundam aficionado, his presence adds another layer. Same with details like Tigerbaum’s background in the dialogue.

JUST HOW REALISTIC SHOULD THE CHARACTERS LOOK IN CG?

Yura: Our character designer was Manuel (Augusto Dischinger Moura), a professional from Blizzard Entertainment, who joined us just for this project. Our staff member, Takuya Suzuki, had experience at Blizzard, working on Overwatch. We needed people who could blend Gavin’s writing sensibilities with designs appealing to both Western and Japanese audiences, while still being identifiably Gundam. Finding that sweet spot took time. We brought on designer Gou Takahashi as assistant director. He spent years in New York before returning to Japan to work in the gaming industry. He’s from the Gundam generation, understands what Gundam means, and joined our small team of three or four people who hashed out a balanced visual style.

――Specifically, what aspects were difficult?

Iyadomi: It took a long time to decide the CG look. With Unreal Engine, we could go full photorealistic, but then it’d look too live-action. We kept wrestling with it and ultimately ended up where we are now.

Yura: Stylizing CG is challenging. Avatar is photorealistic; Toy Story is highly stylized. But finding a stylization that appeals to both foreign and Japanese viewers is extremely tough. For Japanese audiences, something like Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children is acceptable. But for Americans, that might be too beautiful and lacking in natural blemishes, “Give them freckles, wrinkles,” they’d say. Striking that balance was hard, and we can still improve.

THE ARTISANSHIP OF PERFECTLY TRANSLATING YAMANE’S DESIGNS INTO 3D

―― The One Year War itself draws from various conflicts beyond World War II, making it challenging to satisfy all viewers. The final result feels both somewhat contemporary and comfortingly classic.

Yura: One of our keywords was “anachronism.” For reference, we studied Gundam Hathaway, which feels entirely modern or near-future. But for this project, we had to anchor it around the Cold War era to maintain historical distinction. We were careful about that.

――Yamane mentioned that just one initial illustration locked in the mechanical designs. What was your approach to modeling from there?

Yura: Suzuki at our company oversaw the CG work, checking with Yamane as we progressed. Suzuki is a top-tier hard-surface and environment modeler. Yamane, with his long experience, guided us, and together they formed an indispensable team. Without Yamane’s artistic vision, Suzuki couldn’t have brought it into 3D, and vice versa. What sets Suzuki apart is his ability to expand 2D into 3D. For example, he once recreated an entire city in 3D from 2D game references without any orthographic views. Similarly, here he extended Yamane’s single image into a fully formed 3D concept. That’s our specialty. Still, even Suzuki can’t do everything alone. Determining joint positions and movement requires an animator’s knowledge of anatomy. For instance, our Zaku’s torso can flex at three points now. In traditional animation, you can cheat or “fudge” movements, but CG demands consistency. We carefully rigged the models to avoid unnatural bending, considered how far to detail the panels, and so forth.

――In CG anime, you can sometimes cheat by letting parts clip through. Is that harder in Unreal Engine?

Yura: You can still cheat, but we assume these models will appear in other media—games, kits—so we must build them cleanly for others to use later. Being able to do it right, we choose to do so. Through this project, I truly realized that mobile suits are characters. Their expressions and their presence matter. Yamane’s passion made it clear we needed to faithfully convey that in CG.

THE UNUSUAL GUNDAM HEROINE: IRIA SOLARI

Iria Solari: A captain in the Zeon mobile suit unit Red Wolf. Once a violinist, she lived with her husband and child. The One Year War claimed her husband, and she entrusted her child to her parents so she could fight on Earth alone.

Solari’s character design came from producer Ogata’s directive to create a protagonist unlike any we’d seen before. She’s a violinist. In fact, Yura is a violinist, which played a part in her concept. (Iyadomi)

I actually got involved starting with the soundtrack. The scene where Solari plays the violin? That’s me playing. No fee needed! (laughs) Having a child, being a violinist, these elements served as narrative anchors. They show that she left behind a previous life. (Yura)

CONVEYING THE GUNDAM PILOT CONTEXT WORLDWIDE

Gundam EX Pilot: The pilot of the Federation’s cutting-edge Gundam EX. Though unnamed on-screen, his fierce battlefield prowess is that of a White Devil. He seems to possess Newtype-like abilities.

The decision to make the Gundam pilot a child came from both Gavin and Sunrise. Our creative input was having Yusuke Kozaki, a Japanese designer, handle only this character’s design. We chose him because he understands Japanese anime context and could capture the essence of a Gundam pilot (Yura).

BILINGUAL VIEWING, DOUBLE THE FUN?

Major Rolph Ronet: Once a capable commander, his prolonged Earthside posting has worn him down. He now manages a rear-area recycling center and is too drained to care much about fighting the Gundam or aiding Solari’s battered team.

Major Ronet, the head of the Recycling Center, ended up as a delightfully disappointing officer. (laughs) The English voice actor, Chris Parham, was superb. He’s British, and we wondered if we should direct him differently. But his British sarcasm fit Major Ronet perfectly, so we just let him run with it. For the Japanese dub, we cast Hochu Otsuka. We let him hear the English recording without giving much direction, and he perfectly captured that dry, ironic British feel in Japanese. A true pro. (Yura)

THE “INEPT FEDERATION BRASS” TROPE IS A HARD SELL ABROAD?

The first episode’s column march was deliberately done to convey the general’s incompetence. We got tons of comments like, “How stupid is that?” (laughs) (Iyadomi)

In a real battalion, you’d send out scouts, of course, but the point is he’s too inept to do so. It’s a hallmark of Gundam’s narrative style. This “Gundam logic” can be hard for outsiders to grasp. In the Universal Century, you even have standard-bearers in battle—something the director really wanted to show. (Yura)