Mobile Suit Gundam Sieg-Axe has finally begun (I’ll give my impressions another time).
As a Gundam fan, I’ve been hoping to see the continuation of Unicorn Gundam for a long time (although it seems to have been released as a novel).
Where is the Universal Century headed? Will there be a sequel to the film’s narrative? Will Banagher and Yona join forces? Will Kamille Bidan be resurrected (I’ve been hoping for this for almost 30 years now).
As a fan, my interests and concerns continue on and on.
To be honest, a long time ago I used to write science fiction for young people (not the deep stuff published by Hayakawa Shoten or Sogensha).
I’m sorry it’s so old, but I was once hooked on “Legend of the Galactic Heroes,” then “Prince of Space,” then “Genma Taisen,” then “Guin Saga,” and I began to want to write a novel that could become the basis for an anime when I was still young (a long, long time ago).
However, like historical, suspense, horror, and magical fantasy, the field of science fiction has a strong core fan base, and there are many people who are deeply knowledgeable and have a strong opinion about it, and are truly experts in that field.
Partly because the works I created were poorly made, but no matter how much I wrote, it was not accepted by those people, and I received sharp criticism after sharp criticism, and before I knew it, I was completely broken.
When it comes to serious science fiction, you always have to think about consistency with the laws of science and technology and physics, and how it does not clash with previous works, and while thinking about these things, before I knew it, I fell into a deep self-contradiction that I could not escape, and eventually I was no longer able to write science fiction at all.
The same process happened when I next tried mystery novels, horror, and historical stories, and I was pushed back by the atmosphere of no one-time visitors in each field, and like a job hopper, I kept appearing in various fields and fading out.
In the end, I ended up drifting into the world of children’s literature, a field that doesn’t belong anywhere, or perhaps it fits into all of them.
The meaning changes slightly depending on whether it’s aimed at children or can be read by children, but either way, it’s a world without any strict frameworks or rules, and there’s a lot of freedom.
As long as it makes children happy, it’s fine if crayons suddenly start talking or if bean-jam buns fly in the sky to help people. There’s no need for strict physical laws or science and technology.
At the same time, when I was writing science fiction, I often thought that science fiction or mystery that is too philosophical or too rigidly crafted might not be very suitable for film adaptation.
Even just my favorite science fiction movies, “Solaris” and “Star Trek,” are difficult to understand as film works if you think about it carefully.
That’s one good thing about them, but they also have deep content that probably wouldn’t be popular with the general public, so much so that I’m amazed they became such worldwide hits.
If you actually read movie scripts carefully, the structure of the scenario is often very simple in live-action sci-fi, horror, or thriller movies. Even Star Wars, if you just follow the story, is a simple and clear battle between good and evil, and it just seems grand and profound with the help of music and images (I’m sure I’ll get in trouble for saying this). When adapting a novel that has an original source, I feel it would be a great success if they could incorporate even a third of the content into the film. It can be said that a novel contains a lot of information. That’s why there are often disputes between the original author, the film adaptation side, and the production side when adapting a novel to a film. It’s impossible to get everything in line from the beginning. For example, when you get used to the One Piece movie, where the original manga has so many plot twists and characters, it’s inevitable that even though Oda himself wrote the screenplay for the movie, it feels a bit too simple and unsatisfying. Returning to the point, because novels contain a lot of information, when you read deeply into them, you inevitably find some flaws. And there is no novel without flaws in this world. Strangely enough, a novel with few flaws is not necessarily a masterpiece.
On the other hand, when you read the novelization of a work that has been made into a movie, you are often disappointed. The flaws stand out.
Unfortunately, I feel that this tendency is stronger in Gundam novels (although I think Director Yoshiyuki Tomino is a genius).
This was triggered by a strong feeling I had when I read the novelization of Zeta Gundam a long time ago.
On the other hand, when “Nausicaä” and “Castle in the Sky” are novelized, the excitement I felt from the movies disappears into the distance.
It’s easy to say, but it seems difficult to create a deep story with images.
If the movie itself is too full of details, it becomes like Evangelion, which requires an explanatory book. Of course, it’s not that one is better, the other the other, but I feel like there are very few novels and films that are both outstanding.
Among them, the ones that come to mind that seem to be compatible are the series of Hemingway’s works, such as “The Old Man and the Sea” and “For Whom the Bell Tolls.” More recently, there’s “Drive My Car,” which is a combination of several of Murakami Haruki’s works.
Even the Moomins are completely different in the novel and anime versions.
By the way, when it comes to people who write scenes for novels, there are those who write with specific images in mind, while others, like myself, do the opposite and write just the plot first, and then add in the characters and scene descriptions later.
Probably, I don’t know which is correct. There’s probably no right answer…
The relationship between film and novels is even more difficult than the Universal Century flow.
“Growing up with Gundam for decades”
