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Flights of Fanciful Fandom: Gundam Horror
May. 31st, 2022 10:18 pmAfter watching Mobile Suit Gundam: Ages (most of it) with my husband this weekend, I started thinking about some of the other Gundam series past. Among other things.
I’ve seen a dark version of magical girl anime: Puella Magi Madoka Magica. Why couldn’t there be a horror version of Gundam?
One might argue Neon Genesis Evangelion does this, but I was thinking of something which took the Gundam tropes and twisted them. Too often young boys are the Gundam pilots. The machine seems to attract a boy who’s innocent, pure-hearted, who yearns for peace. Amuro Rey, Kira Yamato, and all three of the boys in Age fell into this category. No, not every pilot is like this, but there are enough to suggest the Gundam has a taste for this sort of victim, err, hero.
There’s an attack on some sort of a peaceful colony. Often that colony is hiding the Gundam. The boy is forced to get into the mobile suit to protect that place and its people. Many of those people are defenseless without his help. Even the local military is no match for the enemy. They need him. The environment is tailored to force him to choose the Gundam. The setting may be deliberately manipulated to draw out the sacrifice. What if this manipulation went deeper? What if his time in that colony was deliberately orchestrated to goad the sacrifice into choosing to sacrifice himself?
Finally there’s the enemy. Overwhelming, frightening enough to compel the boy into getting into the Gundam, yet far more human that he expected. The boy gets to know this enemy, if he isn’t already close to certain members. He may even love them. Being forced to fight them makes him grow stronger, stronger than he ever would if he didn’t. He’s scarred, though, changed by the experience. His innocence is slowly sucked away, perhaps by a hungry force waiting to drink it.
What if the mobile suit fed on all of the boy’s pain to get stronger? To make the boy stronger? What if the mobile suit was a kind of war god, trapped in machine form? It regains its power through the boys piloting it. It’s gotten a taste for a particular kind of sacrifice in a particular kind of scenario. Oh, it will give the boy his power, but it creates the scenarios, the situations which tempt the boy to seek power. It recreates certain settings over and over, draws in certain types of people over and over.
This war god may be responsible to tempting a powerful enemy to become aggressive, attacking wherever the boy is. It may offer power and knowledge to hungry civilizations, knowing those who seize it will draw out his sacrifice with their actions. The man in crimson, the man in the mask may be a key element to drawing out the boy’s power. This man may be a sacrifice as well, part of the scenario created to feed the god.
There’s something about that boy’s willingness to sacrifice himself which reminds me of so many martyrs throughout history. Giving up their lives so the land, the people can live. Sacrificing their souls for others.
It’s a noble inclination. Epic and legendary. It’s also one that can be taken advantage of. I keep thinking of how Kyuubey and the incubators took advantage of the Magical Girls in Puella Magi Madoka Magica. The energy so many of the young pilots generate when they battle, when their hearts are broken; I can imagine that being of value to similar entities.
I suggested the Gundam might be a war god, but this could be another mask as much as the mobile suit is. It could be something alien which finds its way to the earth and decides to feed upon those willing to accept its gifts, its power. Something which creates situations which pushes young boys into accepting them.
This has the potential to be quite the horror story, especially when I consider who might be in league with this force, helping to create the situations and the settings which push the sacrifice into sacrificing himself.
In some ways it’s not too far removed from the canon. Perhaps it doesn’t have to be a tale of pure horror. Perhaps it could be a tale of hope as these boys figure out ways to free themselves from this cycle, see past the manipulation, and change into something different than the god/entity planned.
Again, this isn’t too removed from the canon.
I’ve seen a dark version of magical girl anime: Puella Magi Madoka Magica. Why couldn’t there be a horror version of Gundam?
One might argue Neon Genesis Evangelion does this, but I was thinking of something which took the Gundam tropes and twisted them. Too often young boys are the Gundam pilots. The machine seems to attract a boy who’s innocent, pure-hearted, who yearns for peace. Amuro Rey, Kira Yamato, and all three of the boys in Age fell into this category. No, not every pilot is like this, but there are enough to suggest the Gundam has a taste for this sort of victim, err, hero.
There’s an attack on some sort of a peaceful colony. Often that colony is hiding the Gundam. The boy is forced to get into the mobile suit to protect that place and its people. Many of those people are defenseless without his help. Even the local military is no match for the enemy. They need him. The environment is tailored to force him to choose the Gundam. The setting may be deliberately manipulated to draw out the sacrifice. What if this manipulation went deeper? What if his time in that colony was deliberately orchestrated to goad the sacrifice into choosing to sacrifice himself?
Finally there’s the enemy. Overwhelming, frightening enough to compel the boy into getting into the Gundam, yet far more human that he expected. The boy gets to know this enemy, if he isn’t already close to certain members. He may even love them. Being forced to fight them makes him grow stronger, stronger than he ever would if he didn’t. He’s scarred, though, changed by the experience. His innocence is slowly sucked away, perhaps by a hungry force waiting to drink it.
What if the mobile suit fed on all of the boy’s pain to get stronger? To make the boy stronger? What if the mobile suit was a kind of war god, trapped in machine form? It regains its power through the boys piloting it. It’s gotten a taste for a particular kind of sacrifice in a particular kind of scenario. Oh, it will give the boy his power, but it creates the scenarios, the situations which tempt the boy to seek power. It recreates certain settings over and over, draws in certain types of people over and over.
This war god may be responsible to tempting a powerful enemy to become aggressive, attacking wherever the boy is. It may offer power and knowledge to hungry civilizations, knowing those who seize it will draw out his sacrifice with their actions. The man in crimson, the man in the mask may be a key element to drawing out the boy’s power. This man may be a sacrifice as well, part of the scenario created to feed the god.
There’s something about that boy’s willingness to sacrifice himself which reminds me of so many martyrs throughout history. Giving up their lives so the land, the people can live. Sacrificing their souls for others.
It’s a noble inclination. Epic and legendary. It’s also one that can be taken advantage of. I keep thinking of how Kyuubey and the incubators took advantage of the Magical Girls in Puella Magi Madoka Magica. The energy so many of the young pilots generate when they battle, when their hearts are broken; I can imagine that being of value to similar entities.
I suggested the Gundam might be a war god, but this could be another mask as much as the mobile suit is. It could be something alien which finds its way to the earth and decides to feed upon those willing to accept its gifts, its power. Something which creates situations which pushes young boys into accepting them.
This has the potential to be quite the horror story, especially when I consider who might be in league with this force, helping to create the situations and the settings which push the sacrifice into sacrificing himself.
In some ways it’s not too far removed from the canon. Perhaps it doesn’t have to be a tale of pure horror. Perhaps it could be a tale of hope as these boys figure out ways to free themselves from this cycle, see past the manipulation, and change into something different than the god/entity planned.
Again, this isn’t too removed from the canon.
