I've been hoping this would get an anime adaptation ever since I first started reading it! I'm honestly a little stunned that Bandai would take a chance on this, partially because they usually don't animate the things I actually want them to animate, and also because Iron Blooded Orphans seems to be darker and broodier than most TV Gundam and I'm surprised they're following that with this. Awesome news!
ShadowCell wrote:YokozunaBulldozer wrote:
well, okay, but what makes this one different from all the other One Year War stories that focus on one little piece of the war?
I think what others haven't really stressed enough is that Thunderbolt is gritty (however gritty you're imagining? Grittier than that,) and deeply psychological. The story, at its core, has to do with a Federation ace, a Zeon ace, and how the low value both sides of the conflict place on human lives affects the soldiers and civilians caught up in the war (I know this is a recurring theme in Gundam, but it's truly the focus here.) We're dealing with broken people - and this is depicted and literalized in awesome ways (the writing and the art work together to set the tone perfectly.)
The Federation pilot, Io Fleming, does pilot a Full Armor Gundam - but it's basically a one-off unit (someone was concerned about OYW Gundam-creep.) Io is the perfect image of a Feddie ace, right off a propaganda poster: he has good looks, slick hair, basically had the kind of background where he could have probably avoided service entirely but chose to enlist - and prodigious piloting skills to boot. The catch? He's basically a sociopath (at the very least, he's a nihilist.) Without spoiling anything you won't find early in the first volume, he sees the lie that is civilized society. Not only can you get away with killing, you can be applauded and awarded for it - humanity hasn't evolved past violence, and Io embraces his. He has learned how to navigate the military and its etiquette for the chance to feel alive in the cockpit, hunting and killing others before they do the same to him. Also, he listens to free-form jazz from an old-timey transistor radio in his cockpit during engagements, and seems to get off on it all. :/
Darryl Lorenz, the Zeon pilot, is his mirror image. Came from poverty. Conscripted. Lost his legs in combat on earth. After that, Zeon finds that he (and other amputees like him,) might still have some marginal use as test-subjects/test-pilots and assign him to a special unit in the backwater Thunderbolt sector nicknamed "The Living Dead". Unlike Io, who seems to thrive in war, Darryl is just... numbed. He also has an old-timey (but Zeonic!) radio in the cockpit, but he listens to pre-war pop songs and Vera Lynn style ballads.
Their supporting casts are equally colorful - just don't get too attached to every single character. This is a war, after all.
I won't spoil any more of the story, but if you like old war movies you'll love this (it especially reminds me of movies about pilots during the Battle of Britain.)