When Cellular Swimsuit Gundam: The Witch From Mercury ended earlier this year, it did so by taking a step ahead within the franchise’s historical past that few different collection had the possibility to make specific in their very own prior examinations of queer love. However after father or mother firm Bandai pushed back on what was, within the present, a textual affirmation, the collection’ personal director has pushed again in flip to remind us: these ladies are married, dammit.
Hiroshi Kobayashi, a director who labored on each seasons of Witch From Mercury, made the feedback in an included booklet as a part of the ultimate quantity of the collection’ Japanese Blu-ray launch.
Kobayashi’s feedback, discussing the creation of the epilogue to the present’s remaining episode (through Automaton Media) explicitly describes that the occasions between the conclusion of the collection and the epilogue see Suletta and Miorine wed one another. “I knew I used to be going to make an epilogue, however it was some time earlier than I made a decision upon the precise variety of years that ought to go in-between,” Kobayashi says. “The ending itself follows [the Shakespeare play] The Tempest, and depicts Suletta and Miorine getting married and turning into companions.”
As soon as once more, it needs to be mentioned that that is very clear within the precise episode itself, and never a possible interpretation of subtext. Within the epilogue, Miorine is immediately known as a sister-in-law by Suletta’s sister, Eri, and when Suletta and Miorine reunite within the remaining moments of the scene, shining silver bands on their respective ring fingers are highlighted with a glimmering sheen to convey them to the viewers’s consideration. They’re intimate and shut to one another of their presence, focus on their future collectively, and conclude the collection by going to their residence collectively. It takes an terrible lot of dangerous religion to misconstrue the intent of the scene.
And but, that’s what makes Kobayashi’s remark, in an formally launched piece of merchandise, so essential—as a result of Dawn (née Bandai Namco Filmworks) homeowners Bandai beforehand tried to misconstrue that intent. A remark throughout an interview within the July 2023 issue of Gundam Ace from Suletta’s voice actress, Kana Ichinose, the place she referred to Suletta and Miorine as married, was faraway from later print runs and a digital transcription of the interview after launch at Bandai’s request. On the time, the corporate described the language used as “based mostly on the hypothesis of the Gundam Ace editor” quite than an endorsement of the collection’ personal textual content.
“We wish you to benefit from the work by leaving it as much as every one among you who’ve seen the principle story [of Witch From Mercury],” a statement released by Bandai, apologizing for the necessity to right the difficulty launched on the time, concluded partly. The controversy prompted a vocal wave of backlash from Witch From Mercury followers from Japan and all over the world, who flocked to the social media hashtag “#スレミオ結婚,” or “Sulemio Marriage,” referring to the couple’s ship identify, and noticed the transfer as an try and censor any official acknowledgement of what’s, for now, Gundam’s most outstanding queer romance story within the franchise’s four-and-a-half-decade-long historical past.
There may be, in some way, nonetheless an opportunity that Bandai may push again on even this—simply because these feedback from Kobayashi are included within the official Blu-ray launch of Witch From Mercury doesn’t essentially shield them from being altered after the actual fact in future print runs. In spite of everything, Gundam Ace is an formally licensed Gundam journal, and the controversy over the summer season reveals that Bandai was, not less than then, keen to undergo with this type of censorship, and might be keen to take action once more.
Hopefully the truth that these feedback made it to print within the wake of that preliminary Gundam Ace controversy point out that Bandai truly listened to the response over its makes an attempt to minimize what remains to be a historic milestone for Gundam—a second that helped, as the corporate all the time hoped for with Witch From Mercury from the moment it was announced, convey the franchise again to a success and prominence at residence and overseas it hadn’t seen in a very long time.
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