Gundam Build Fighters and the Power of Toy Anime

Gundam is a mecha franchise that's been going strong for decades with amazing entries in all kinds of styles. Gunpla is a contraction of “Gundam plastic” and refers to the plastic model kits based on the mechs that appear in the anime. It's been a prominent part of Gundam merchandise and the fandom for a while, and it's easy to see why. A lot of these designs look damn impressive and bring back memories of their iconic stories. Who wouldn't want a detailed, customizable, poseable statue of them that you can assemble piece by piece? The anime we'll be talking about today though is about the plastic toys themselves rather than the giant mechs, so it's a toy show through and through. It also just happens to be some of the most fun we had with an anime in a long time! This is The Cartoon Cipher here with Anime News Network to reminisce about Gundam Build Fighters.

Before Build Fighters came Model Suit Gunpla Builders Beginning G. This was a short and sweet 3-part OVA produced to celebrate the 30th anniversary of gunpla, and is set in a variation of the real world where you can put the Gunpla you've made into a scanner then use VR to actually pilot it and battle others. The protagonist Haru is on a journey to be worthy of challenging a mysterious yet skilled rival, and along the way discovers how expansive and creative Gunpla can be.

These are essentially toy fights without grave stakes, however the passion behind what it means to build the Gunpla is put front-and-center, and a lot of key moments felt like “the heart of the cards” but for Gunpla. I think a lot of Western fans my age grew up with shows like Yu Gi Oh!, Beyblade or Pokémon, and the way Beginning G delivers these positive morals aimed at children will really hit that nostalgic sweet spot. The battle scenes are about giving things your all and the importance of new challenges, so by the end the fights escalate into absolute insanity with all manner of Gundam weapons and strategies deployed at once for an incredible spectacle. Meanwhile the building scenes show you how being passionate about Gunpla can create new friendships as you all strive to hold each other up. Beginning G also made sure to show how accessible Gunpla is for beginners, including some of the tools you'll need and basic customization. Overall however, the storyline was nothing ambitious and the characters were honestly pretty forgettable outside the one who looks like Quattro Bajeena. Maybe this was down to the limited runtime, but Sunrise would soon revisit this concept in anime form a few years later, with room for many more interesting ideas…

Gundam Build Fighters season 1 began airing in fall 2013. Instead of VR, scientists in this world have developed special particles called Plavsky Particles which seem to react to the kind of plastic Gunpla is made of. With this, the model kits can be brought to life and fight just like the mechs in the Gundam anime. The protagonist Sei Iori hopes to be a legendary Gunpla battler like his father, but while he is an expert at creating and customizing Gunpla, he's not so great at controlling them. Suddenly, a boy named Reiji mysteriously appears from another world (don't worry, that's not a plot twist) and it turns out that he's great at controlling Sei's Gunpla in battle. The two boys decide to team up and take on the world of Gunpla together, facing opponents from all over the world, making plenty of friends, rivals, and even love interests along the way. Obviously this is nothing like the war stories and space adventures of the main Gundam shows, including the more lighthearted ones. You could compare it to the tournaments in G-Gundam but even then there aren't any political stakes this time. Though keep G-Gundam in the back of your mind, as it will become relevant later.

Being a giant homage to Gundam's legacy there's obviously tons of references and inside jokes scattered throughout both seasons, such as background cameos, lines of dialogue, or Ramba Ral straight-up being a prominent character in this story. He acts as the mentor to the protagonists, always dispensing words of wisdom and generally being a lovable Gouf-ball. The series has a nice even mix of characters who know all there is to know about Gundam, and total newcomers who wouldn't get a Char reference if it hit them in the face at three-times the normal speed. Build Fighters has fun lamp shading that disconnect, but is still committed to the idea that Gunpla can and does bring all kinds of people together. It's just as fun watching some characters get bamboozled by the references as it is watching the Gundam junkies go full-otaku at a moment's notice, and because of the variety you're bound to find characters to relate to no matter how much Gundam you've seen.

Likewise, it's just plain cool to see so many different Gundam elements from different series united in one place and playing off each other. There's the Trans-Am System, funnels, backpacks, transforming, combining, any weapon you can imagine but as a laser beam, a whole different style for the SD Gundams, and that's not even getting into how different environments can be used to your advantage! A variety of strategies and formats also keeps things fresh so that it's not always possible to blast your way out of a problem. Some fighters stay hidden for the majority of the fight, some go into battle with no guns at all, and some people… straight-up cheat. If you're in a race, you need to optimize your Gunpla for speed. If you have a unique ability, all the other fighters are going to start adjusting their strategies against it. If you're on the ropes then you need to weigh surrendering versus fighting on because remember, the plastic models are fighting for real so any damage they take is also for real and you'll have to repair it yourself afterwards. The show truly believes that Gunpla is freedom and is committed to show you as many possibilities as it can squeeze in, no matter how out-there.

Build Fighters season 1 was directed by Kenji Nagasaki, written by Yōsuke Kuroda, with music by Yuki Hayashi, and if that combination of names sounds familiar it's because they've worked together before and since, most notably on a little show called My Hero Academia. Particular mention needs to go to the soundtrack by Yuki Hayashi. While Beginning G's music felt like a more straightforward film score, Hayashi's music is incredibly hype-inducing, with energetic beats and the occasional fusion of genres in certain tracks. If you remember our video on the Bastard!! anime you'll know Kuroda has been a writer on many great anime adaptations but he's also no stranger to Gundam, having written for the popular Gundam 00 series in the mid-2000s.

The journey of Sei and Reiji is a classic of polar-opposite protagonists who complete each other. Sei is so passionate about his Gunpla that it hurts his piloting because he subconsciously doesn't want to damage his creation, and his time with Reiji is what helps him become a more complete person by the end. Meanwhile Reiji is pretty inconsiderate at the start of the show, but his time with Gunpla teaches him a great deal of respect for those around him. Much like the story, the characters are each quite straightforward but executed incredibly well. The relationships they share are the true highlight, whether it be Sei and Reiji completing each other and covering each other's weakness, or the lighthearted comedy and especially the romantic teases elsewhere in the show. Both seasons invest a lot in the romance department and it's always either hilarious or wholesome, never bogging the story down either. It's usually fairly obvious who will win any given fight in this show, but in the best of matches I always found myself feeling for the rival who couldn't win because they're still so likable. Even side characters who aren't that involved in the actual battles come across as really charming in a way that enriches the optimism of the anime. The main villain is also evil in a fun way, essentially being a giant baby who you can't help but laugh at despite his plans being corrupt and going against what the protagonists stand for.

So then what does the show stand for? This may sound contradictory, but it's about the freedom to have fun… by taking things seriously. I feel like that's an important theme to get right, and it makes Build Fighters a great, emotionally-healthy show for kids (if you're older like me though it will still speak to your inner child). Despite all the battles and conflicts the show is just incredibly uplifting, with the main goal simply being to have as much fun as possible. Most of the antagonists are usually fighting for ulterior motives such as business moves, or just winning by any means necessary. Like Beginning G before it, there's a lot of “heart of the Gunpla”-esque moments about competing for the right reasons, not taking the easy way out, respecting your opponent, and everything else that made me feel like I was a kid watching Yu Gi Oh! for the first time, and loving every second. A big takeaway from each match is that winning or losing doesn't matter as long as you're having a good time. That doesn't mean slack off and do things lazily by any means though. And its that idea of getting serious for fun that solidifies so many of the best relationships in this show from romances to rivalries, whether it's through building together, training together, cheering together and yes, fighting together.

Obviously the show is doing all this to get people to buy more model kits, but the expansive nature of Gunpla and exploring new relationships through the hobby can be a good message about life in general. Not only is it for everyone but there's all sorts of things you can do with it. Some people enjoy Gunpla battling and as we've seen there's plenty of ways to go about that, but others prefer to be more artistic, creating displays based on scenes from Gundam stories. With this being a world with Gunpla at the center, we got to see a lot of custom designs that take the pre-existing ones from the show and build upon them. These both look awesome while adding twists to the battles, and Build Fighters doesn't stop there. The freedom of Gunpla is expressed all over society and culture as well: there's Gunpla in the arts, Gunpla idols and rock stars, fashion models who do shoots with Gunpla, you can even flirt and settle property disputes with Gunpla!

The battles themselves are all flashy and fast-paced, with most of them actually getting wrapped up within a single episode. This not only keeps the action exciting but also stops things from dragging too much. This allows the show to have plenty of down time for comedy and character arcs to build, with the battles essentially being the big climaxes of those arcs, complete with hype music and hype animation. Whether it was on the battlefield or on the shelf, all the Gunpla in this anime looked vibrant and sharp. Only one machine in both seasons was done in CG, and the effects animation does a lot to make the action scenes pop. In fact, the entire show both in and outside the arena is full of vibrant colors which really adds to the fun and lively vibe of the overarching story. The character designs are striking, the environments are vivid, even the explosions of defeated Gunpla look fun!

With such an enjoyable 25 episode run coming to an end in 2014, Gundam Build Fighters Try would come along in fall of that year to add some new twists. This sequel season is set seven years later at Sei Iori's school. At first, Fumina Hoshino is just trying to save her beloved Gunpla Battle Club from being shut down. But with the help of her childhood friend Yuuma, and a hot-headed kenpo fighter called Sekai (who may look familiar to Build Fighters fans), she puts together Team Try Fighters to compete in the Japanese Under-19 division. It retains a lot of the strengths and themes of season one however Kenji Nagasaki wasn't the director this time, with an at-the-time newer director by the name of Shinya Watada taking up that role. Try still has homages to various Gundam anime but it leans into G-Gundam's influence in particular, not just with direct references but with the overall bombastic tone and greater focus on martial arts.

A big shake-up to the Build Fighters comes in the form of battlers having to form teams of three, making teamwork a more prominent theme this time around. Each member of Try Fighter has a distinct relationship with each other as well as having their own, more personal character arcs: Yuuma with his identity crisis, Fumina finding her own strength while also supporting her friends, and Sekai needing to appreciate this brand new world he's stepped into. Their personalities are also well reflected in their fighting styles and signature colors, making for a very robust dynamic. As a consequence of this focus on teamwork though, many side members of opponent teams weren't as fleshed out as the rivals in season 1. Either their team leader would take most of the focus, or all three of them would only show up very briefly, being tied together by an identifiable design theme, which would still be neat on its own. That isn't to say Try Fighters are the only decent characters though, as the rivalries and romances this time were just as good if not better than in season 1.

The motto of the show is still very much “Gunpla is freedom” however this time it's also expressed through the idea of constantly breaking limits. The episodes are always building up bigger and bigger rivals for Try Fighters in the background, because if Gunpla is freedom then like the first OP song says… “There are no limits.” Unlike season 1 there was no overarching villain working against the main characters, however this was made up for by certain rivals having especially twisted dispositions which lead to enough dark moments to keep things interesting. The escalating skill of the rivals also drives home the notion that there's always a bigger fish out there, which sometimes hits our protagonists hard. But that in itself leads to another important message of getting back up when you fall. And with the characters constantly breaking their limits, the intensity and absurdity of the fights escalates with them. The sheer concept of what was happening in some of these fights was delightful, and it all kept building and building right up till the final battle where the hype absolutely exploded. I don't want to give too much away because it truly was that good, but suffice to say it was a perfect resolution to the main rival AND team dynamics in an amazingly animated package. Even if some of the Build Fighters from other teams weren't as developed as season one's cast, the sheer hype made up for that in spades. Speaking of which, there were quite a few season one cameos in Try and all of them felt very rewarding. However looking back on Try almost 8 years later, it is a bit disappointing that what those cameos brought to the table never went anywhere.

After Try ended, both it and season 1 eventually received a longer-than-usual OVA set after their respective events, those being Island Wars and GM's Counterattack. They have elements that made their respective seasons shine, but are both essentially scenarios set up so that the good guys can deploy all their Gunpla at once for a huge battle. There was also Gundam Build Fighters: Battlogue which was a series of five short episodes exploring different parts of the Build Fighters world. I found a couple of them fun, but less so for the other three. There's a spin-off manga called Gundam Build Fighters Amazing about Tatsuya Yuuki's childhood, as well some light novel series' called Honoo and Honno Try that are also side stories from what I can gather. So while we have gotten more, so far it hasn't been substantial enough to match my hopes for a third season tying everything together. Without spoiling Try, certain promises were made about exciting future battles that we never got to see. Then there's the mysterious nature of Reiji, his connection to Sekai, and the parallel world he comes from. I imagine not everyone's gonna feel the same about this in particular; this is a show about magic fighting toys after all so a boy traveling from a kingdom in a parallel world doesn't seem that farfetched. What we got from Build Fighters was pretty much all excellent so while I can't criticize it for not having more, it's because it was so good that I wanted more. I don't play that many video games but at the very least, perhaps the Gundam Vs. or Super Robot Wars video games are satisfying fans' desires to see mechs from different series' duking it out.

Then there's the next spin-off Gundam Build Divers, which personally I never got very far into. While Shinya Watada stayed on from Try to direct Divers, the writing and musical staff are different. Maybe the reason I couldn't get into Divers was because of the departure of those key staff members, maybe it's because I wasn't up for yet another cast change after Try, or maybe it's because the technology of Divers was so different. Regardless, if we want to discuss Divers, we're gonna have to do it another time because we've been talking about fighting Gundam toys for way too long. It's unknown where the series will go from here but here's hoping that it never loses that kinetic fun and optimism! Gundam Build Fighters and the first season of Divers are available right here on the Gundam.info YouTube channel for free, although unfortunately both Try and the second season of Divers have recently been taken down from there.