Woos of Bandai

Let's get back to the Gundam topic for a sec. Has anyone realized that BandaiNamco is slowly reducing its Gundam involvement recently? No, I ain't talking 'bou the US...that's dead like 2 years ago. I'm talking 'bou Japan! Bandai Museum will close at the end of Aug. That's with a lot of Gundam stuff, plus Ultraman and Mask Riders too. However, in case you don't know, none of those really found any big success in the recent years.

Forget 'bou M.R., but Ultraman hasn't really been a strong hit since Tiga. I guess a lot of Ultraman fans don't like the idea of having "hybrid" Ultraman that involves DNA and alternate universe line, as those aren't really Ultraman per se. And now that they are going back to the original line...well, sort of...how many Ultramans, or Ultramen, does the show need in 1 theme? I mean, look, when Mebius' losing its fight, a brand new Ultraman shows up from no where! In the past, guest appearance of other Ultra brothers had occurred, but not a common thg, not to mention the fact that viewers can relate the various Ultramen together! But now, it seems to be the trend of a brand new Ultraman popping up suddenly and fighting in more than 1 episodes. The fact from OLD Ultramen data states that multi-Ultra occurrence is rare, since there's not enuf Ultras patrolling the Universe.

As for Gundam, really nothg since Zeta (ZZ was bad; Gundam Wing was even worse; V Gundam wasn't really for kids-hence low viewership; Turn A - what happened to that show? After War was never fully supported by Bandai, and you may guess how it turned out at the end; Seed was ok until the end- which became quite bad, hence a big drop in viewerships; and its sequel Seed Destiny received nothg but complain (again, thus low viewerships ultimately) from Gundam fans). Remember, I ain't counting on Char's Counterattack, F91, etc. since those are movies. I believe that the big drop in Gundam viewerships (thus the franchise) is the result of too much expectation. You see, the 1st MSG had an excellent story line - now you may complain 'bou the animation, but remember, that was 30 years ago, and it was considered GREAT anime at those time! All the new Gundams basically improves on ONLY and SOLELY 1 thg - the animation! As a result, the story itself begins to suffer (due to the fact that Bandai tries to have a new story/timeline every time, but essentially falls back to the same old song, and the "hybrid" theme really doesn't synchronize well). I watched V, Wing, After War, etc., and seriously, nothing beats the good old UC "Amuro VS Char" line (i.e. from MSG to CCA). Continuity is minimum requirement from them, and so you can actually find most Gundam merchandise (both regular and MS-V lines) on the UC time line from MSG to CCA. What Bandai needs to do with Gundam is:
1. Let it die in grace (no more Gundam - Whatever); or
2. Redraw the 1st few Gundams into today standards (such as 08th MS Team).

Oh well, that's just my 2¢.