There were a few life-sized Gundam head replicas on display at Tokyo Game Show 2009 (September 24th - 27th), which prompted the website's interest in finding out fans' opinion on what they think is the most outstanding Gundam head design they have seen.
* Not exactly the right translation of the title of the survey actually, which is 東京ゲームショウに実物大ガンダム立像の頭部現る！ところで頭に特徴があるガンダムといえば？ "It is ..full-scale Gundam statue.. ..head.. ..showing.. [ru] in the Tokyo game show. By the way, does Gundam that has the feature in the head?". I take it that it means which feature is the most outstanding for fans.
7,637 responses to this online survey, which ran from September 28th till October 4th. The result of the poll as below:
(1) Bearded Turn A Gundam ------ 41.72%
(2) High Mega Cannon on Double Zeta Gundam ------ 15.31%
(3) Long haired Nadleeh ------ 13.16%
(4) Horn separation and transformation on Unicorn Gundam ------ 9.09%
(5) The back? Head? Body? of Seravee ------ 5.90%
(6) Face Open on Gundam F91 ------ 5.65%
(7) Energy rechargeable forehead of Impulse Gundam ------ 5.35%
(8) Villainous face design of Gundam GP02A ------ 3.12%
(9) Pilot cockpit inside the head for Psycho Gundam and Psycho Gundam Mk. II ------ 0.83%
Turn A Gundam easily wins the poll with his beard. XD Quite true in my opinion. If you line up all the main Gundams from previous TV series, Turn A Gundam will definitely be the most noticeable one. Most people will notice him because of his height first, then they will go "Ah, a beard!" XD
The most unconventional Gundam head design all this while I believe, with some people still unable to accept if for almost a decade now. I guess that's why we never get to see another Gundam similar to Turn A coming out so far. ^^;
Then again, I'm surprised that the poll didn't include the like of Gundam Head from "G Gundam", or Gundam Ez8 from "the 08th MS Team". Featured in their respective anime series, I thought they would be legitimate candidates to this survey (as opposed to tons of MSV units with even more unique design but never made it to the anime). The earlier's transformation gimmick of the very conventional Gundam-type face to a evil mouth full of fangs seem really special to me; Gundam Ez8's lack of V-Fin as the protagonist Gundam, plus a very thick chin is equally memorable for me.
On a related note, another very interesting survey currently underway on Gundam Dot Info is on the most anticipatable new Gunpla release shown at the 49th All Japan Plamodel Radicon Show.
The result at the moment (October 14th, 8:56AM):
(1) MG Victory Gundam Ver. Ka ----- 1,366 votes
(2) PG 00 Raiser ----- 1,230 votes
(3) HGUC Unicorn Gundam ----- 398 votes
(4) HGUC Kshatriya ----- 284 votes
(5) MG Astray Blue Frame Second Revise - 232 votes
(6) HGUC ReZEL ----- 168 votes
(7) 1/100 VS Astray series ----- 70 votes
(8) HGUC Geara Zulu ----- 62 votes
While most forums I read, as well as the fans messages on this blog indicated some negative responses to the design of MG Victory Gundam Ver. Ka, it has become the most anticipatable Gunpla release from the event, ^^ followed by the huge PG 00 Raiser.
What happened to MG Astray Blue Frame Second Revise? ^^;
Well, one important note about the survey (or any survey based on voluntary responses) is that they cannot be used to interpret the will of the population. Many of us do not know about the existence of the survey, let alone participate in it when we don't know how to read Japanese. ^^; The survey regarding the most anticipatable Gunpla cannot be used to predict the sales result of the actual releases.
Information and images are from Gundam Dot Info.
