After making a deal with Sunrise, the North American retailer and licensing group, Right Stuf Inc, has secured the distribution rights for Mobile Suit Gundam UC. The seven-episode OVA-series (or original video animation) will be releasing stateside starting in August 2013.
Mobile Suit Gundam UC had originally debuted in 2010, and will be releasing simultaneously on Blu-ray and DVD for both Japan and North America. Right Stuf’s DVDs will ship in four volumes, with three of them containing two episodes per disk, and its final episode — set to release in Spring 2014 — in one disk, plus bonus additional features. The first two DVD releases, containing episodes 1-4, will be available at August 20th. They will contain both English and Japanese audio options with English and Spanish subtitles. The DVDs are available for pre-order right now with a pre-order price of $17.99 each; retail prices will run at $29.99.
So this is good news for North American Gundam fans, who will have a chance to continue watching Mobile Suit Gundam UC, even after Bandai Entertainment has lost its distribution rights due to restructuring. Hopefully with Right Stuf acquiring the license for this series, we may see more Gundam license-rescues by this company, like 08th MS Team, 0083 Stardust Memory, and even Turn A Gundam, which was supposed to be released in English.
Mobile Suit Gundam UC is based on the novels by Harutoshi Fukui, and directed by Kazuhiro Furuhashi (Le Chevalier D’eon, Hunter X Hunter), with music by Hiroyuki Sawano, the composer for Monolith Soft’s X.
