Live Action Gundam Wing Announced
Following the success of Beez’s Anime Legends release of the Gundam Wing series, it has been announced that Sunrise Studios and creator Katsuyuki Sumizawa are looking to revive the Gundam Wing legacy with a live action adaptation, utilising some of the big names in Hollywood at the moment.
“I am very excited to have been asked to be involved with this project,” Sumizawa said when the announcement was made. “Gundam Wing was a great project, and there was always more I wanted to do with it.”
Casting is still taking place, however they have confirmed the people playing the five pilots, the choice which will set the tone for the whole adaptation.
Zac Efron as Heero Yuy. Efron has been linked with several other live action adaptations, including an update of the film Akira.
Daniel Radcliffe as Duo Maxwell. Perhaps the most risky choice, Radcliffe has expressed his excitement about the role. “It’s something very different,” he said. “You’d can’t get much further from wizards than giant robots.”
Jason Dohring as Trowa Barton. Dohring rose to popularity in the cult show ‘Veronica Mars’.
Alex Pettyfer as Quatre Raberba Winner. Sumizawa is said to have requested Pettyfer for the role as soon as the project was suggested.
Harry Shum Jr. as Wufei Chang. It was Shum’s acrobatic prowess which won him the role of Wufei. “The fact that Harry will be able to do most of the stunts himself will really help us to sell Gundam as live action,” a spokesperson for Shum said.
Whilst there is no other casting news, it has been rumoured that Amanda Bynes has been approached for the role of Relena Darlian/Peacecraft, whilst 90210 star Ryan Eggold has expressed an interest in playing Treize Khushrenada.
Sumizawa has also expressed a hope to film as much as possible without CGI. “We are hoping to combine the ingenuity of Japanese design, with the make it happen attitude of Hollywood,” he said. “In Japan, we already have real life Gundams. With the help of Hollywood, we can bring them to the world.”
Mobile Suit Gundam Wing was originally broadcast in 1995, coming to the USA in 2000. It was followed by an OVA, “Endless Waltz”, and has also had several short manga series released to fill in story around the series. There are several full size Gundam models in Japan at present, including the RX78 Gundam in Tokyo.
UPDATE: Please see this post for more information.
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[…] First up was this one where Manga Market had posted a cast list for a live action gundam wing with Herro being played Zac Effron. Clearly a joke but as this was the first one I found today it almost caused a explosion of nerd rage which could have leveled Suffolk. If you want to see the rest of this fake cast list check out Manga Market. […]
Manga Market 
I can’t decide if this is going to be amazing or terrible, y’know…
Some interesting casting choices!
lol clearly a joke
So, is this an April Fool’s joke???
Sadly yes, although it would be wonderful if it wasn’t! 🙂
haha, better it was just a joke, efron no thanks
He’s already rumored to play the lead in every other rumored live action adaptation! 😉 (With the exception of the supposed “Cowboy Bebop” one.) 😛
I LOL’d.
Some interesting “casting choices” there, though I personally think Pettyfer’s not pretty enough to play Quatre. Though I doubt there’s a human on the planet who would be 😛
Those actors are nobodies for me except for Radcliffe, though it’d be intriguing to see him play a funny character, as the only roles I’ve seen him in he’s a pretty un-funny guy.
Congrats for the April Fools’ prank!
It’s hard finding someone with that specific colouring and hair shape! I spent ages trying to match people to photos though – it was a while before I twigged that I wasn’t going to find anyone with Trowa-hair!
i love the idea, just wish you would have said when
this is the worst casting ever done GUNDAM WING is my favorite anime and choosing such wrong people to the pilots will ruin it, for starters Heero Yuy is Japanese sorry but that guy up there no way is he even close Duo Maxwell AMERICAN hello, Trowa Barton is European, and Quatre Winner is ARABIAN, i don’t see how these guys match at all, and the boys are 15 years old sorry but wrong age much if this is the best they can do scrap it and wait for some young talent to do it and a mobile suit is not a robot u fucking toss