02-07-2025
‘Gundam Hathaway' Gets A 90s Anime Makeover In Fan Animation
The Xi Gundam looks more like its Kazumi Fujita counterpart in this fan animation.
Back when the Hathaway's Flash novels were written, no one thought we'd ever see an anime. So this new fan animation pays tribute to that in a very 90s way.
Done by Space Boy, it approaches the story from the perspective of the original novels. That means character designs by Haruhiko Mikimoto and modified designs by Kazumi Fujita, based on Moriki Yasuhiro's original illustrations.
It also means that we have four tone shading, which holds up with the rest of 90s mecha anime, which would have been how these books had been adapted, if Sunrise had decided to go ahead with an anime right after the books were published.
Personally, I think this looks superb. It also looks like it's done in 3D with some clever shading to make it work.
Going 3D also makes a lot of sense, as the Xi Gundam and Penelope are incredibly complex mobile suit designs.
The recent movie version of the first novel is much flatter in terms of the shading, with more modern character design. It's still great, but part of me now wishes we'd had Hathaway's Flash adapted back in the 90s.
Space Boy also did a video a few months back of the Messer mobile suits from the Hathaway's Flash novels. These are effectively the grunt mobile suits of Mafty and also pop up in the movie version.
Talking of the movie version, you can watch the first Gundam Hathaway movie over on Netflix. With the second movie set for release this Winter.
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