(Originally published on Blogspot on February 20th, 2023. Updated July 9th, 2023)
For whatever reason, lately I’ve heard a few people I know debating or joking about the best way to get into the Gundam series, so I figured it’d be fun to try a guide of sorts.
The answer I would normally give for getting into any series is “watch by its production order,” but I feel that’s not necessarily the best for Gundam considering how varied and huge it is, and there's still a lot of shows I haven't seen. This is not a recommendation on quality or show style. Instead, I want to more directly explain how these shows relate. I have my own opinions on a lot of these, but I figure a more objective guide is better as a starting point.
Here’s three of the main things to keep in mind when approaching a show.
Anything in the “Universal Century” (UC) takes place in a larger shared timeline and setting.
Anything that doesn’t is an “Alternate Universe” (AU) that is totally standalone, unless one of those standalone shows had a sequel.
Most UC stuff that isn’t a full TV show is usually self-contained.
Gundam seems complicated because there’s so many shows, movies, OVAs, and other formats that it can feel overwhelming, but it’s rather straightforward if you know these rules going in. It’s very easy to hop around to different entries because most of them aren’t connected at all. Almost every show has its own slate of characters and a different setting, even those in the UC timeline.
Every show features robots and mecha of some kind, and most of them have the name “Gundam” in the title and for one or some of its robots. The main thing all the entries share are some general themes and iconography, but they each have their own aesthetic spins on mecha and character design.
Most entries center around wars and conflicts with a somewhat serious tone, but this can also vary depending on the show. The uniting element of all the entries is more so the “Gundam” branding than anything else even if there are similarities, homages, or reinterpretations between them.
Mobile Suit Gundam (1979) is the first entry in the UC timeline and takes place during a conflict called the “One Year War”. It has a sequel show called Zeta Gundam (1985) that takes place a few years later and has some returning characters. The show Victory Gundam (1993) is also in the UC timeline, but it takes place much later and has no characters from either of those shows that it can be watched without having seen the others. The OVA The 08th MS Team (1996) takes place during the UC’s “One Year War” but has an entirely different location and cast of characters than Mobile Suit Gundam, working as a side story of a much larger conflict. Most UC entries are standalone, especially so if it’s an OVA.
The AU shows are almost all independent of each other. The AU show G Gundam (1994) takes place in its own “Future Century” timeline and is centered around a battle tournament. Gundam X (1996) takes place in its own “After War” timeline with a post-apocalyptic Earth. The recent Witch from Mercury (2022) takes place in its own “Ad Stella” timeline and is centered around a tech school. None of them have anything directly in common aside from sharing the name “Gundam” in the title and for one or some of their robots.
Sometimes, an AU show is popular enough that it will get a sequel in the same universe. Gundam Wing (1995) has a sequel OVA called Gundam Wing: Endless Waltz (1998). Gundam Seed (2002) takes place in its own “Cosmic Era” timeline, but it also has a direct sequel called Gundam Seed Destiny (2004) that occurs after that series. The AU sequels have the name of their preceding entry in their title, so it’s not hard to keep track of them.
The best comparison is the Final Fantasy series. Every game in the series has its own unique world, setting, and characters, and the only shared elements are a few general designs or tropes. A few games have larger connected universes, like the large amount of spinoffs surrounding Final Fantasy VII, or Final Fantasy X having a direct sequel X-2, but almost every other entry is self-contained.
The Partial List of Entries and Timelines
Black is a series, blue is movie, green is compilation movie, red is an OVA/ONA.
Some of the OVA’s have compilation movies, but I’m mostly excluding them because they’re inessential. Almost all OVA’s are standalone. Not every OVA is included because I want to feature the primary ones.
Production dates included for perspective but featured with in-show chronological order.
Universal Century
Mobile Suit Gundam: The Origin (U.C. 0068-79)—2015-18
Mobile Suit Gundam (U.C. 0079)—1979-80
Mobile Suit Gundam I—1981
Mobile Suit Gundam II: Soldiers of Sorrow—1982
Mobile Suit Gundam III: Encounters in Space—1982
Mobile Suit Gundam: Doan Cru Cruz’s Island (U.C. 0079)—2022
Mobile Suit Gundam: The 08th MS Team (U.C. 0079)—1996-99
Mobile Suit Gundam: Thunderbolt (U.C. 0079-80)—2015-17
Mobile Suit Gundam 0080: War in the Pocket (U.C 0079)—1989
Mobile Suit Gundam 0083: Stardust Memory (U.C. 0083)—1991-92
Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam (U.C 0087)—1985-86
Mobile Suit ZZ Gundam (U.C 0088)—1986-87
Mobile Suit Gundam: Char’s Counterattack (U.C.0093)—1988
Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn (U.C. 0096)—2010-14
Mobile Suit Gundam Narrative (U.C. 0097)—2019
Mobile Suit Gundam: Hathaway’s Flash (U.C. 0105)—2021
Mobile Suit Gundam F91 (U.C. 0123) –1991
Mobile Suit Victory Gundam (U.C. 0153)—1993-94
Future Century
Mobile Fighter G Gundam (F.C. 60)—1994-95
After Colony
New Mobile Report Gundam Wing (A.C. 195)—1995-96
New Mobile Report Gundam Wing: Endless Waltz (A.C. 196)—1998
After War
Mobile New Century Gundam X (A.W. 15)—1996-97
Correct Century
Turn A Gundam (C.C. 2345)—1999-2000
Cosmic Era
Mobile Suit Gundam SEED (C.E. 70)—2002-03
Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny (C.E 73)—2004-05
Mobile Suit Gundam SEED C.E. 73: STARGAZER —2006 (C.E. 73)
Anno Domini
Mobile Suit Gundam 00 (A.D. 2307, 2311)—2007-09
Mobile Suit Gundam 00 the Movie -A Wakening of the Trailblazer (A.D. 2314)—2010
Advanced Generation
Mobile Suit Gundam AGE (A.G. 115, 140-42, 164)—2011-12
Build Fighters
Gundam Build Fighters (B.F.)—2013-14
Gundam Build Fighters Try (B.F)—2014-15
Gundam Build Divers (B.F.)—2018-19
Regild Century
Gundam Reconguista in G (R.C. 1014)—2014-15
Five Compilation Movies—2019-22
Post Disaster
Mobile Suit Gundam Iron Blooded Orphans (P.D. 315)—2015-17
Ad Stella
Mobile Suit Gundam The Witch from Mercury (A.S 122) —2022-2023
For a bit more guidance, I have some thoughts on which entries work better if you’re totally blind trying to get a feel for Gundam as a whole. This list is based on accessibility relative to other entries. A few of these descriptions have value judgements, but I’m mostly avoiding them otherwise. This is also not comprehensive, but I wanted to get most of the major entries.
Mobile Suit Gundam (The original series that started it all. The three compilation movies truncate some parts but are decently paced and capture the story well)
The Origin (More recent, it’s a slight alternate take on parts of the original series for newer fans, and it’s a prequel without getting into too many references.)
08th MS Team (Self-contained side war story)
Thunderbolt (Self-contained war story)
Wing (Standalone, first one brought into the US)
X (Standalone but uses new spins on some terminology from older shows)
SEED (Standalone, but it is a then-modern take on some parts of the original series)
Iron-Blooded Orphans (Standalone)
Witch from Mercury (Standalone)
Zeta, ZZ, Char’s Counterattack (All sequels with each other and to the original series, though CCA is a bit more standalone than the others)
SEED Destiny (Sequel to SEED)
Build Fighters (Kind of a meta series where kids build Gundam toys and control them in battle. Very stylistically different and geared towards people familiar with the franchise)
Narrative (Tied into Unicorn’s events)
War in the Pocket (Stand-alone, but is a war side story focusing on civilians that’s different from a lot of other shows)
0083 (Mostly stand alone, but has a few slight connections to 0079 and Zeta)
F91 (Somewhat truncated movie that’s mostly unconnected)
Victory (Fairly stand-alone)
G Gundam (Intentionally made to be different and is a tournament fighter, not representative of the rest of the series)
Turn A (Very different stylistically, but some parts near the end work better having seen other series)
Unicorn (Takes place later in the UC without large connections at the start, but more towards the end)
Reconguista in G / “G Reco” (Standalone, but is a more peculiar vision of the original series’ creator)
Doan Cru Cruz (Alternate take on a notorious episode of the original show. Mostly self-contained but banks on familiarity with the show’s cast)
I didn’t want to make this post too long, so I didn’t include the streaming options, especially since they’re very scattered and shifting between different services at the time of writing. Almost all of these have physical American Blu-Ray releases via RightStuf, which can be a bit pricey but are good option to at least own them. The Gundam Info Youtube channel will occasionally make some entries available to watch there for a limited time. Gundam is a big franchise, so its entries are also easy to find online on unofficial sites as well.
The baseline recommendation I’d give is to follow those three rules, and then just look at an intro description of a show that looks interesting and head from there. Chances are if you don’t like one entry, there’s another more to your tastes. Gundam encompasses a lot of entries and properties, and once you get over the initial scale of the franchise, getting into it is as simple as finding a show that looks cool.
(Edit 7/9/23: Moved G-Reco from "Bad Place to Start" to "Either/Or", updated compilation movies listing, edited some descriptions to be less opinionated)
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