The Lack Of Burgers In Witch From Mercury Is Giving Credence To My Theory That Burgers Are Not So Much

The lack of burgers in Witch from Mercury is giving credence to my theory that burgers are not so much a calling card for Gundam as they are a calling card for Yoshiyuki Tomino. Stay with me here.

Burgers most prominently feature in the original Mobile Suit Gundam, in Zeta Gundam and in Gundam ZZ. Each of them have multiple episodes with burgers, and in many cases, those burgers are explicitly addressed — not incidental details. Zeta Gundam, famously, has Bright chowing down on a burger while Emma drops some psychoanalysis of Kamille on him, but it also has Bright being told off for eating a burger on the bridge. Burgers are all over ZZ, including a scene where Judau hands them out to the crew from a basket. And MSG has a burger as Sleggar Law's death flag, but also an entire episode dedicated to Bright trying to procure salt to make the ship's burgers taste better — both of which were iconic enough to become meals in the Gundam cafe.

And one thing these three shows have in common is that they were all written and directed by Yoshiyuki Tomino.

Four examples of burgers in early Gundam works. The top two are from MSG; the bottom two are (L-R) Zeta and ZZ

Tomino doesn't feature them as prominently in other works, but they do still appear. For example, Victory Gundam still includes a scene of characters eating burgers, and Gundam F91 has a burger on a sign in the background. That second example doesn't seem like much until you remember that F91 was originally planned as a full TV series before being compressed into a movie, and has little opportunity for characters to have downtime — so that one appears at all feels very intentional.

You can also see burgers on display in another Tomino work from the period, Space Runaway Ideon.

L-R: Victory Gundam, Gundam F91, Space Runaway Ideon

Meanwhile, when Tomino was kicked off the franchise, the burgers went with him. In G Gundam, Domon is offered a pizza, and there is no sign of burgers. In Unicorn, Banagher takes Aubrey to get some fast food, but they visit a hot dog stand. In Gundam Hathaway, Hathaway and friends get fried chicken. And in Witch from Mercury, the only food on display — aside from the tomatoes — is cafeteria grub and, uh, slabs of ham.

Really, the only instances I know of burgers appearing in a non-Tomino Gundam are in Wing, and all that has is a burger on a billboard and a Wacdonald's sign — both blink-and-you'll-miss-it background details. While on the surface, this may seem comparable to F91, it really isn't: when you have forty-nine episodes and a movie to work with, you can do a lot more than a sign.

Gundam characters pointedly eating something other than a burger

And what happened when Tomino returned to the franchise with Reconguista in G?

The burgers came back too!

Reconguista in G

There is a single exception here: War in the Pocket, not directed by Tomino, does prominently feature burgers (and I don't mean the meme). But that, itself, may be telling. War in the Pocket was the first Gundam series to be made without Tomino's involvement; were the creative leads perhaps inspired to add a gratuitous burger scene to evoke the spirit of Tomino?

All that said, the reason this is still only a theory, and not a master's thesis, is that I don't have all the data yet. I haven't seen every post-Tomino Gundam series (though, frankly, I have no real drive to see what I've missed), and the only one of Tomino's non-Gundam works I've seen is the aforementioned Ideon. If burgers show up in Xabungle, L-Gaim or King Gainer… then I'll really know I've cracked the code.

For my 3D production class I had to create a three shot short that was a remake of an existing movie scene- with muppets. I ran out of time to do the particle water effects, but this is basically Pacific Rim anyway.

*Nonspecific G-Witch Spoilers*

It is kinda surreal to realise that part of Guel’s whole billing as an ace pilot is him surviving fights he really shouldn’t. Whether he’s against professional pilots, outnumbered, outclassed or facing an absolute combat monster, he always manages to pull through and live through his experiences.

It’s kinda nice to see Guel’s identity as an ace divorced from him just shooting down a bunch of enemies.

Plus, I suppose that this means that the moment he actually gets a properly good ms, he’ll probably do really well in fights.

Huh. So I had a think about this a while ago, with an eye towards putting together a Model Display, but what Gundam Frames look like they did in the calamity war? So if you were gonna put together a display of Calamity-War Era Gundam Frames, what would it look like?

Though this list is mostly focused on Gundam Frames, since they’re the ones we know the most about about in relation to the calamity war, I would like to quickly call out the the base Hugo is explicitly stated as being a thing during the Calamity war, if you wanted some grunts to back up your gundam’s.

Also, as of writing I haven’t seen any of Urdr Hunt, and I’m working mostly of what’s stated in the model kit manuals for suits from those. So if someone offhandedly mentions the calamity war in that, I don’t know about it.

Known - suits that we explicitly know to have existed as they are now during the calamity war.

Bael - piloted by Agnika Kaieru during the calamity war, presumably the first deployed, with Mcgillis explicitly restoring it for his coup.

Flauros (Calamity War Ver.) - explicitly is as it appeared in the calamity war.

Kimaris Vidar - The only version of Kimaris stated to have existed since the calamity war. It’s possible the others did as well, but I can’t say for certain.

Asmoday/Asmodeus - explicitly called out as being the same as it was in the calamity war, and the suit that prompted this whole thought experiment.

Marchosias - explicitly as it was in the calamity war.

Possible - Suits that you could make the argument they look the same as they did in the calamity war, but not explicitly known.

Astaroth Origin - I assume so? Due to the name “origin” and presence of Nanolamiate sword? But honestly it’s only stated that the Warren family recovered it, so they could’ve done some restoration work in the interim. Hence me hedging my bets and putting it here.

Barbatos (1st form) - I’m assuming it’s appearance in the first episode is how it was excavated, I don’t think Maruba would armour it if he was just gonna use it as a generator, and Gundam frames are impressive enough I don’t think he would for a buyer either.

Dantalion - It’s design can’t have changed much since the calamity war, since it’s build around utilising such a wide variety of optional equipment. Another one I’m just uncertain enough about to put here.

Gremory - As with Dantalion, we know it’s design can’t have changed much since it’s built around the Nanolaminate Coat and Battle Anchor. Though you might choose to restore the battle anchor, I don’t think it’s strictly necessary. Another example of me hedging my bets.

No - suits that we explicitly know looked different during the calamity war

Gusion - recovered by the Brewers and armoured with what they had available, ditto when Tekkadan armoured the Gusion Rebake. All we know is that it probably had long-range weaponry (Dainsleif?).

Vual - Recovered by Rosario Leone armourless, later armoured by him and Ville Klassen.

Honestly most of the ones under Possible I’m confident enough about, I just can’t find anything that makes it explicit that they haven’t changed since the Calamity War. I reckon the Astaroth Origin (minus the Warren family markings) and Gremory’d for right in though.

Sorry to sound like a “um, actually” guy, but it’s a plot point in 00I that innovades have been around for at least a couple hundred years, since they have to be regularly rotated out of human society before anyone notices that they don’t age. One of the characters in the story, Lars Grise, is an innovade who goes rogue and spends roughly a century killing other innovades before he’s stopped.

The HRL Superhuman institute is essentially the earliest attempt to create innovators via the use of quantum brainwaves (though at the time they’re just looking to create a better soldier), but the only “successes” we know about are Soma Peries and Hallelujah/Allelujah, who are both fairly young, thus implying that the project hasn’t been around long.

Given that I’ve been talking about it a bit lately, I should probably give my opinions on Gundam Seed (and Seed Destiny), shouldn’t I?

While I like both shows, my principal comment about them is that they’ve aged rather oddly. The stock footage and stylings dates them somewhat (not that that’s necessarily a bad thing), but several of the topics they bring up (the cycle of violence, discrimination and designer babies) I think are just as relevant now as they were then.

I think that the Cosmic Era has a fascinating world, with ripe opportunities to explore all these topics and more besides. I love how each faction is clearly defined and how they have clear motives to hate each other, making war an inevitability between them, with everyone else just trying to survive. Because it works so well into the feeling of powerlessness. Of war as this inevitable, world-destroying thing. It helps that both sides are antagonistic to the protagonists, furthering the view that war has no clear winner and that each side will sink to extremes.

And then, having made this wonderful world in which to play around in, the series proceed to do none of that.

I get that there’s different priorities, it just feels like there’s so many interesting topics here that just get ignored. Coordinators are essentially applied Eugenics, there’s stuff there. They haven’t been legal long, so a lot of them were made illegally. Maybe by the ruling elite, with the money and influence to make it happen and ignore the laws, possibly posing a class debate? Nope.

We hear tales of coordinators being made for specific purposes, like combat. Would this lead into a possible caste system, where different “strains” of coordinators have friction with each other? Nope.

Oho! But coordinators aren’t sustainable past a few generations! After that things start going wrong and the become less and less viable, leading to things like organ failure or sight loss. Surely this is - nope, it’s only brought up in side materials and never resolved.

And that’s all just with coordinators as the sole topic. There’s other medical avenues, mobile suit development (think all the fancy newtype tech in UC), themes of dehumanisation, realpolitik between nations and different factions of the government. How did the Nuclear Jammer Cancellers impact Earth? There’s all these details that could be explored, so Kira and friends just grabbing the biggest stick they can find and browbeating everyone else into oblivion kinda just feels lacking (I know I’m oversimplifying here, I know).

I’m also not really the biggest fan of the mobile suit designs. I’m not really sure why. I think it’s because they all share just a few too many design elements that I think they end up looking too similar? I do love the Infinite Justice, simply for the novelty of having a Pink Gundam (it helps it’s cqc focused), but other than that I struggle to really focus on any of the gundam’s (maybe the Aegis) other than the Providence. But Seed Destiny making units patterned after the old Zeon ones really works against it, since I just prefer the old designs.

In a nutshell: The Cosmic era has so much potential, but the plots we get out of it really feel like they’re not making the most of the setting, and the Gundam MS designs are just so-so.

(I’ll do another post talking about some of the ms designs I like)