#Mobile Suit Gundam Seed Freedom Passes 2.68 Billion Yen At Box Office

After roughly two weeks at the Japanese box office, Mobile Suit Gundam Seed Freedom has become the highest-earning Gundam movie (ignoring inflation adjustments) with a gross of over 2.68 billion yen (~US$17.9 million). It also has a moviegoer count of 1.63 million.

At the February 9 to 11 weekend box office, the long-awaited sequel to 2002-2003’s Mobile Suit Gundam Seed and 2004-2005’s Mobile Suit Gundam Seed Destiny flew back to the top spot of the rankings, after being pushed to second place by Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba -To the Hashira Training- last week. It scored 309,865 moviegoers and 554,722,150 yen (~US$3.7 million). 

The previous record holder for highest-grossing Gundam movie of all time (via Oricon News) was 1982’s Mobile Suit Gundam III: Encounters in Space, the third compilation movie of the original Mobile Suit Gundam series. It made 2.3 billion yen, or roughly 3 billion yen today.

Mobile Suit Gundam Seed Freedom began screening on January 26 and earned 1.06 billion yen (~US$7.09 million) during its opening weekend. 4DX, MX4D, and Dolby Cinema screenings started on February 9. The movie takes place in year 75 of the Cosmic Era, just four years after the beginning of Seed and two years after the start of Seed Destiny. The plot is set into motion when the Kingdom of Foundation, a nation that was formerly part of the Eurasian Federation, approaches Lacus Clyne’s peacekeeping organization C.O.M.P.S. with a plan to take on the base of the anti-Coordinator faction Blue Cosmos.

• Director: Mitsuo Fukuda (returning)
• Scriptwriter: the late Chiaki Morosawa (Seed and Seed Destiny series composer)
• Scriptwriter: Ryuu Gotou (Seed Destiny novelization author)
• Scriptwriter: Mitsuo Fukuda
• Character designer: Hisashi Hirai (returning)
• Mechanical animation director: Satoshi Shigeta (credited as chief mechanical animation director for the series)
• Art director: Shigemi Ikeda (returning)
• Art director: Yukiko Maruyama (art board artist on the series)
• Compositing director: Takeshi Katsurayama (returning)
• Mechanical designer: Kunio Ookawara (returning)
• Mechanical designer: Kimitoshi Yamane (returning)
• Mechanical designer: Kazutaka Miyatake (design assistance on the series)
• Mechanical designer: Junichi Akutsu (design assistance on Seed)
• Mechanical designer: Hiroyuki Taiga (design assistance on Seed)
• Mechanical designer: Manabu Shintani (Mashin Eiyuuden Wataru: Shichi Kon no Ryuujinmaru)
• Mechanical designer: Shiba Zen
• Mechanical designer: Takuya Io 
• Color designer: Akemi Nagao (Hinomaru-Zumou)
• Music composer: Toshihiko Sahashi (returning)
• CG director: Shigenori Toyooka (Ayaka)
• CG director: Matsuhiro Satou
• CG director: Kensuke Kushida
• CG director: Tomohiro Fujie (Mobile Suit Gundam Hathaway co-CG director)
• Animation production: Bandai Namco Filmworks

Cast

• Souichirou Hoshi as Kira Yamato
• Rie Tanaka as Lacus Clyne
• Akira Ishida as Athrun Zala
• Kenichi Suzumura as Shin Asuka
• Maaya Sakamoto as Lunamaria Hawke
• Nanako Mori as Cagalli Yula Athha 
• Yukari Tamura as Aura Maha Khyber
• Hiro Shimono as Orphee Lam Tao
• Yuuichi Nakamura as Shura Serpentine
• Sumire Uesaka as Ingrid Tradoll
• Misato Fukuen as Redelard Tradoll
• Yoshitsugu Matsuoka as Daniel Harper
• Kentarou Tone as Liu Shenqiang