The newly released Mobile Suit Gundam Seed Freedom is the king of the latest Japanese weekend box office (January 26 to 28) ranking. The sequel to Mobile Suit Gundam Seed and Mobile Suit Gundam Seed Destiny alighted in first place with 634 thousand moviegoers and a gross of 1.06 billion yen (~US$7.2 million).
The movie’s website says that this is the Gundam franchise’s best opening gross.
Mobile Suit Gundam Seed Freedom takes place in Cosmic Era (C.E.) 75, five years after the start of Mobile Suit Gundam Seed. Lead protagonist Kira Yamato and many of the series’ main characters are now part of a peacekeeping outfit called C.O.M.P.S. In this period of the Cosmic Era timeline, an anti-Coordinator faction called Blue Cosmos is carrying out attacks, while the Kingdom of Foundation seeks independence from the Eurasian Federation.
In the real world, the gap between the new movie and the original series spans over two decades — Seed premiered in 2002, while Seed Destiny started airing in 2004. The announcement of a sequel movie was first made in 2006. In 2016, Seed and Seed Destiny‘s series composer, Chiaki Morosawa, who is credited as one of Seed Freedom‘s scriptwriters, passed away from aortic dissection. In 2021, it was revealed that the movie was in production.
Gundam.info describes Seed as:
In Cosmic Era (C.E.) 70…
“The tensions mounted between the Earth Alliance and the ZAFT Forces caused by the ‘Bloody Valentine’ tragedy have erupted into an all-out war.” The Earth Alliance’s mobile armor forces and tanks launch…mobile suits are destroyed one after another…
“It seemed a foregone conclusion that the Earth Alliance, with its superior numbers, would be victorious. But this initial assessment proved to be false. Almost 11 months have passed since the conflict began, with no end in sight…”
Staff
• Director: Mitsuo Fukuda (returning)
• Scriptwriter: the late Chiaki Morosawa
• Scriptwriter: Ryuu Gotou (Seed Destiny novelization author)
• Scriptwriter: Mitsuo Fukuda
• Character designer: Hisashi Hirai (returning)
• Mechanical animation director: Satoshi Shigeta (credited as chief mechanical animation director for the series)
• Art director: Shigemi Ikeda (returning)
• Art director: Yukiko Maruyama (art board artist on the series)
• Compositing director: Takeshi Katsurayama (returning)
• Mechanical designer: Kunio Ookawara (returning)
• Mechanical designer: Kimitoshi Yamane (returning)
• Mechanical designer: Kazutaka Miyatake (design assistance on the series)
• Mechanical designer: Junichi Akutsu (design assistance on Seed)
• Mechanical designer: Hiroyuki Taiga (design assistance on Seed)
• Mechanical designer: Manabu Shintani (Mashin Eiyuuden Wataru: Shichi Kon no Ryuujinmaru)
• Mechanical designer: Zenseava
• Mechanical designer: Takuya Io
• Color designer: Akemi Nagao (Hinomaru-Zumou)
• Music composer: Toshihiko Sahashi (returning)
• CG director: Shigenori Toyooka (Ayaka)
• CG director: Matsuhiro Satou
• CG director: Kensuke Kushida
• CG director: Tomohiro Fujie (Mobile Suit Gundam Hathaway co-CG director)
• Animation production: Bandai Namco Filmworks
Cast
• Souichirou Hoshi as Kira Yamato
• Rie Tanaka as Lacus Clyne
• Akira Ishida as Athrun Zala
• Kenichi Suzumura as Shin Asuka
• Maaya Sakamoto as Lunamaria Hawke
• Nanako Mori as Cagalli Yula Athha
• Yukari Tamura as Aura Maha Khyber
• Hiro Shimono as Orphee Lam Tao
• Yuuichi Nakamura as Shura Serpentine
• Sumire Uesaka as Ingrid Tradoll
• Misato Fukuen as Redelard Tradoll
• Yoshitsugu Matsuoka as Daniel Harper
• Kentarou Tone as Liu Shenqiang
Source: Kogyo Tsushin
