The next chapter of the Gundam franchise is on its way. Earlier, San Diego Comic-Con attendees got the chance to see the premiere of the first new Gundam anime series in seven years, Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch From Mercury. The new anime will be a first in the franchise, as it will star the first female main protagonist! The trailer and synopsis for the series can be viewed below.

A.S. (Ad Stella) 122―An era when a multitude of corporations have entered space and built a huge economic system. A lone girl from the remote planet Mercury transfers to the Asticassia School of Technology, run by the Beneritt Group which dominates the mobile suit industry.Her name is Suletta Mercury. With a scarlet light burning in her pure heart, this girl walks step by step through a new world.

The new series will be directed by Hiroshi Kobayashi (Kiznaiver) and Ryo Ando (Food Wars! Shogeki no Shoma) as co-director. Ichiro Okuchi (Code Geass, Sk8 the Infinitiy) is credited as scriptwriter. Takashi Ohmama is credited with composing the music for the series. Credited with art directing is Ayumi Satō with Tomoaki Okada, Kenichi Morioka, Kazushige Kanehira, Yasuyoshi Uetsu, and Junichirō Tamamori as art designers.

The anime has also employed mecha designing veterans such as Kanatake Ebikawa (Gundam: Build Fighters), Ippei Gyōbu (Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans), Kenji Teraoka (Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion), and Takayuki Yanase (Gundam Build Divers). Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury will feature the voice talents of Kana Ichinose, Lynn, Atushi Ono, Hiroshi Tsuchida, Mamiko Noto, Miyuki Ichijou, Naoya Uchida, Sachiko Kojima, and Yō Taichi.

Related: Gundam Live-Action Movie Is Happening at Netflix with Kong: Skull Island Director

Traveling Through Space and Across Continents

Mobile Suit Gundam the Witch from Mercury
Mobile Suit Gundam the Witch from Mercury

The Gundam franchise was born in 1979 with the Mobile Suit Gundam TV series. The series is well known by anime fans as the definitive “mecha” franchise, the genre defined by its use of giant battling robots. The popularity of the show spawned a franchise that has stretched various television shows, films, OVAs, mangas, novels, and video games. And this doesn’t include the vast industry of plastic model kits fans are known to collect! Currently, there is also a live-action film in the works with Netflix and Jordan Vogt-Roberts directing.

At the panel, Naohiro Ogata, Gundam series executive producer, announced that the series will take place in an all-new century, Ad Stella, in the Gundam canon. The reason for this is to bring in new fans for the Gundam franchise. The series was also announced to be simulcast, though no announcement was made as to what streaming service will be carrying the show. A representative of Anime News Network was able to attend the screening of the prologue of the new series, describing the twenty-minute prologue which starts in a training montage and ends with some pretty intense fighting!

Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch From Mercury is scheduled to premiere in October of this year. Time will tell if the new show will succeed in bringing in new fans as well as impressing veterans of the franchise.