Written by Edwin Francisco
The director of Kong: Skull Island has landed the Gundam live-action film. Jordan Vogt-Roberts is now the director of the Gundam movie.
Jordan Vogt-Roberts is well known for directing Kong: Skull Island and the Kings of Summer.
He is also currently working on a Metal Gear Solid movie, which is still unknown when and if that is going to push through.
Legendary Entertainment with Sunrise has been planning a Gundam live action movie since 2018. Legendary Pictures has recently partnered with Netflix to make this a reality.
He is joined by Brian K. Vaughan, who will be writing the screenplay.
Vaughan is known for creating Y: The Last Man.
He also worked on The Runaways, Under The Dome, as well as, on comics like Paper Girls and Ex Machina.
Overseeing the project will be Cale Boyter, known for producing Pokémon Detective Pikachu for Legendary Entertainment and Jason Young, director of Original Studio Film for Netflix.
The anime itself has a long history and several timelines.
The timeline that will be used for the movie will be Universal Century (UA).
The UA timeline is the most popular of all and has more stories under it.
Even the most recent Mobile Suit Gundam Hathaway (which is scheduled to be released in May 2021) uses the same UA timeline.
Kong: Skull Island Director Lands Gundam Live Action Movie
Image: Nippon Sunrise
This was not the first attempt to make a live-action movie with the Gundam franchise.
There was a live action American movie made by Sunrise with Polestar Entertainment in 1999, which was called G-Saviour.
The movie title without the Gundam name is already doubtful on its quality.
I understand this was made for the Gundam Big Bang Project to celebrate the 20th Anniversary of the Gundam franchise.
I do like Jordan Vogt-Roberts, especially with his passion with Metal Gear.
It proved to me that he is the man for the job.
With Brian K. Vaughan writing, this is again very hopeful since he has a pretty impressive history in comics and television.
But then again, I am worried because Netflix also made Death Note which was promising, but didn’t go too well for the fans.
This does put a lot of pressure for Jordan Vogt-Roberts and Brian K. Vaughan to make this right.
Jordan Vogt-Roberts Will Direct A Live Action Gundam Movie
Image: Legendary Pictures
It’s not impossible to see a good and proper robot movie and Pacific Rim is proof of that, which was also made with Legendary Pictures.
Actually, this was the movie that convinced Sunrise that a Gundam movie was possible which led them to partner up in 2018.
An executive at Sunrise Ken Iyadomi, spoke about the live action plans at Project Anime in 2019.
Legendary will distribute the movie in China while Netflix will release it online through their streaming service.
The original anime Gundam was released in 1979, created by Yoshiyuki Tomino, animated by Nippon Sunrise.
It pioneered the modern anime mecha we see today.
It has been made into manga, movies, games, toys, and more.
It is one of the most popular Japanese brands in the league of Sanrio’s Hello Kitty or Nintendo’s Mario.
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