I want to take you back now to… THE YEAR 2000! April 24th, 2000, to be exact. I was a teenager who was into geeky things and one of those things was anime. I’d had plenty of run-ins with anime from the ’80s onward – or as we called it, “Japanimation” (still don’t know why that didn’t stick). Some of my favourite shows as a kid were Astro Boy and Tekkaman, but at the time I had no clue they were any different from G.I. Joe or He-Man.
In my teenage years I had more of an understanding of the anime scene and would start to seek out some of the best stuff available, like Bubblegum Crisis, Akira, and Galaxy Express 999.
Most of the stuff that I wanted to get my hands on was hard sci-fi that just had a completely different look-and-feel that we didn’t get in the West. I was certainly drawn to that. The thing is, I wouldn’t say I was or am an “anime fan”. There are plenty of shows and movies that I absolutely love, which – although they certainly are anime – I don’t even really care to put in that “bucket”. I just enjoy them, because they’re awesome!
One of those shows – if not the show – is Mobile Suit Gundam Wing.
I stumbled upon Gundam Wing one night while doing my usual thing – channel surfing. I was a TV junkie as a kid and even into early adulthood. Honestly, it’s something I miss. It was totally normal for me to eat dinner and then spend the next six hours glued to the tube. On this particular day, which was Easter Monday in my neck-of-the-woods, I would’ve had a whole lazy day in front of the TV. Good times!I watched just about anything and everything, but YTV (stood for Youth Television, maybe?) was definitely a station of choice. It was the place to watch cartoons in Canada, although Fox Kids certainly gave it a run for its money in the Saturday morning market during the ’90s. I want desperately to gush about YTV and its evening programming block called The Zone, but I’ll keep it brief for this post and just say that it contained slightly more “adultish” shows for the nighttime crowd and was a place a teenager could still safely watch cartoons without losing their self-perceived edge.
At the time, the phenomenon that was Dragon Ball Z was syndicating in Canada and the US. It wasn’t the show’s first kick at the cat, but in late-1999 and onto the early-2000s the show was being re-aired uncut for the first time, so the fervor for it was reaching new heights. I had seen an episode here and there of its predecessor, Dragon Ball, which aired a few years earlier on Saturday mornings and… it wasn’t really my thing. A friend of mine was all about Dragon Ball Z and kept recommending it, so I thought I’d give it a shot – heck, what did I have to lose? I had all the time in the world back then!
On the evening in question, however, Dragon Ball Z was not being aired. In its stead was Gundam Wing. I’m assuming that after seeing the resurging interest in DBZ that Gundam Wing was a bit of a safe bet to bring to North America. Unlike DBZ, which ran for over 150 episodes, Gundam Wing only had 49 and a sequel OVA (original video animation), which is geekspeak for an “anime movie”. Producing English dubs for the whole series was likely less of a scary investment and good way to see if more of this kind of thing would stick during primetime TV blocks in North America. But what do I know!?
In an effort to give the show a foothold, on its first night airing on YTV they played it in place of Dragon Ball Z, so all the fans of that show could give Gundam Wing their undivided attention. Even better was that instead of showing one half-hour episode, they aired three whole shows back-to-back! You could even vote for the show on The Zone’s website to let the station know if it was a hit or not. This was an event night and, boy, let me tell you, event nights on TV were absolutely my thing.
I’d give you a really cerebral description about Gundam Wing and it’s incredibly nuanced story, but at the end of the day it’s a show about giant robots. Awesome giant robots. Like, giant robots with laser swords and machine guns. That’s all I really need, if I’m being honest with myself. It didn’t hurt that it had a really excellent dub, which could always be hit-or-miss with anime. In a brilliant move, Ocean Productions – the company that dubbed this series as well as earlier iterations of Dragon Ball Z – brought in Peter Cullen to narrate some promos for the show. Not only was he Optimus Freakin’ Prime, but he did the same style of narration for Voltron, so it was a really nice throwback for kids like myself who grew up on those shows.
Anime or not, Gundam Wing is just a really great dramatic action show. Sure, the backdrop is a war between Earth and colonized space structures that circle the globe where giant robots are the primary weapon, but don’t let all that get you hung up. I really think it’s a show that anyone can enjoy if they just put aside the trappings of “anime” and give it a shot.
So, why have I written 1000 words about this TV show from my youth, you ask? Well, because recently I came across a VHS tape with a recording of this very night in question! It was amazing to sit back and relive those exact moments again 20 years later and I just wanted to share some of that.
As you can see, I’ve uploaded The Zone segments that aired during the show to the VHyesterdayS YouTube channel and I plan to upload some of the commercials that aired as well, but I think that will be a post on its own. There’s some really good stuff in there! I’ve also uploaded the theme songs for Gundam Wing in all their glory. As much as I’d like to upload the episodes in their entirety, we all know how that’d end. At the very least you can get a taste for the show’s look-and-feel to see if it’s something you’d like to seek out. Sorry for the hum on the audio – it’s an artifact of the tape. I did my best to clean it up, but it still a little buzzy.
I hope you enjoyed this little walk down memory lane!
R
P.S. This tape also has the Gundam Wing OVA I mentioned called Endless Waltz: Special Edition. This did air on YTV as well, but during the later block at night so the commercials aren’t for cartoons and cereal, but ads for adult stuff like toothpaste and the upcoming Sydney Olympics. If I find anything actually interesting, maybe I’ll post some clips from this block, too.