Mobile Suit Gundam: North America Needs Its Own Statue
Mobile Suit: Gundam has become so popular that not only did it receive several cafes in Japan, but it also currently has a handful of life-sized statues that have been erected in Japan. With the Walking Gundam being the first of its kind in a life-sized statue which actually has the ability to take steps under its own power, it's long past time that North America receives a statue of its own, considering how the West has become far more passionate when it comes to anime over recent years.
Honoring fictional characters is nothing new for North America, with there already being statues dedicated to pop culture characters including, but not limited to, Robocop, Superman, The Mothman, James T. Kirk of Star Trek fame, and the Jolly Green Giant to name a few. When it comes to representing anime characters, Japan is leagues ahead of the West, not just with Mobile Suit Gundam, but with franchises such as Attack on Titan, One Piece, Naruto, and the offbeat characters of Studio Ghibli each being represented in the East. While we aren't asking for a life-sized statue to be erected in the middle of downtown New York City, having a Gundam mech somewhere in North America would certainly help in the West catching up with the love of anime that Japan has.
On top of statues, Japan also has art exhibits and live-action stage plays to honor both the anime series themselves as well as the creators that helped bring some of these big stories to life, with even stories such as Beastars and Rurouni Kenshin getting their own live-action adaptations. Recently, Mobile Suit Gundam even had a live-action stage play, covering the story of Gundam 00 by using some hilarious technology to imagine the actors piloting the giant mech suits. We're probably a while before stage plays hit North America regularly which adapt anime stories, so we'll start with a Gundam statue just to be safe.
2022 will see a new Gundam movie arrive that re-creates the lost episode from the original series, as a new series is set to launch later this year in the fall starring the franchise's first female protagonist in Gundam: The Witch From Mercury.
Do you want to see a life-sized Gundam statue erected in the West? Feel free to let us know in the comments or hit me up directly on Twitter @EVComedy to talk all things comics, anime, and the world of Gundam.