is a Japanese novel series by Harutoshi Fukui with character designs by Yoshikazu Yasuhiko and mechanical designs by Hajime Katoki. It was serialized in Gundam Ace from 2007 to 2009 and compiled into ten volumes, with an additional volume released in 2016; the story is set in Universal Century 0096 as a sequel to Mobile Suit Gundam: Char's Counterattack.
An OVA adaptation by Sunrise ran in seven episodes from March 12, 2010, to June 6, 2014, and pioneered Bandai Visual’s day-and-date international Blu-ray strategy, with Episode 1 and later volumes marketed for near-simultaneous overseas release. A television recompilation titled Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn RE:0096 aired on TV Asahi in 2016.
The project became one of the defining Gundam hits of the 2010s. Corporate filings and partner releases report cumulative novel circulation of roughly three million copies in Japan and combined OVA DVD and Blu-ray shipments of about 1.9 million, alongside strong paid streaming totals. The RX-0 Unicorn Gundam itself became a pop-culture landmark, commemorated by a full-scale transforming statue installed at Odaiba's DiverCity Tokyo Plaza in September 2017.
As one of the few UC installments adapted directly from prose and positioned to bridge Char’s Counterattack to later works, Unicorn helped reset the franchise’s on-screen UC continuity for a new audience while popularizing a distinctive psycho-frame, transformation-centric mecha aesthetic. The eleventh novel volume, Phoenix Hunting, was loosely adapted as the 2018 animated film Mobile Suit Gundam Narrative.
Plot
The story begins in Universal Century 0001, when a terrorist attack destroys the Laplace space colony, site of the inauguration of the Universal Century calendar, killing the Earth Federation's Prime Minister and sparking the drive to birth NC, which masks the secret “Laplace Charter.”
The main action unfolds in U.C. 0096, 16 years after the One Year War, 3 years after Char’s Counterattack, and 27 years before Gundam F91.
Banagher Links, a student at Industrial 7 colony, meets Audrey Burne, a mysterious figure tied to the anti-government Sleeves. She's actually Mineva Lao Zabi, heir to Zeon's legacy, and warns him about Laplace's Box, a hidden document capable of shaking the Federation's legitimacy. Banagher becomes the pilot of the RX-0 Unicorn Gundam, whose psycho-frame may be the key to unlocking the Box.
The conflict intensifies as Full Frontal, leader of Neo Zeon (the Sleeves) bearing a chilling resemblance to Char Aznable, pursues the Box to reshape the world order. Banagher wrestles with the destructive power of the Unicorn's NT-D system and the weight of Laplace's legacy, culminating in pivotal confrontations over morality, identity, and humanity's path forward.
At the climax, Banagher is confronted by Syam Vist, the original discoverer of Laplace's Box, and given control of it, symbolizing his role as a potential catalyst for systemic change. He faces off against Full Frontal for the future of humanity, positioning Unicorn as both a narrative and ideological bridge in the Universal Century timeline.
Media Novel Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn originated as a serialized novel in Gundam Ace magazine between 2007 and 2009, conceived as a direct sequel to Char’s Counterattack and one of the few Universal Century installments to debut in prose form. Author Harutoshi Fukui was invited by Sunrise and Kadokawa to create a work that would both deepen the UC setting and attract veteran fans of the franchise while remaining accessible to newer readers. Fukui has described structuring the narrative around “Laplace’s Box,” a mystery tied to the Federation's founding charter, as a device to survey “one hundred years of the Universal Century.” Two pivotal creative choices, naming the story “Unicorn” to emphasize both the UC acronym and a mythical symbol, and designing the RX-0 Gundam to transform from a non-Gundam form into a psycho-frame-driven unit, were cited by Fukui as helping the project “click” with Sunrise and Bandai's producers.
In production interviews, Fukui explained that he worked closely with Sunrise producer Naohiro Ogata and later OVA director Kazuhiro Furuhashi to align the novels and animation, ensuring consistency of themes and plot architecture across media.
Fukui also authored two side stories: (bundled with the Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn video game's Special Edition on March 8, 2012) and (first published with Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn GREAT WORKS III episode 7 on June 23, 2015). The former is set two years before Episode 1 and recounts Full Frontal's origins and the Sinanju theft; the latter depicts “Operation Phoenix Hunting,” a classified mission preceding the OVA's final battle. Both stories were later compiled as the eleventh volume of the series on March 26, 2016, with the latter also being loosely adapted into the Gundam Narrative animated film in 2018.
Manga A manga adaptation titled was serialized in Kadokawa Shoten's Gundam Ace from January 2010 to December 2016. The manga was written by Harutoshi Fukui and illustrated by Kouzou Oomori. Its first volume was released on July 26, 2010, and the seventeenth and last was released on February 25, 2017. A three-volume prequel manga by Fukui and Oomori based on The Postwar War novel, Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn Bande Dessinée Episode: 0 was serialized in Gundam Ace from September 2017 to September 2018 and compiled into three volumes.
Anime
In the June 2009 issue of Gundam Ace (published April 2009), Sunrise confirmed an anime adaptation of for late 2009; production shifted to spring 2010. The OVA was directed by Kazuhiro Furuhashi with series scripts by Yasuyuki Muto. Mechanical design was led by Hajime Katoki, joined by Junya Ishigaki, Mika Akitaka, and Nobuhiko Genba. Yoshikazu Yasuhiko's character designs were adapted for animation by Kumiko Takahashi, and the score was composed by Hiroyuki Sawano. Behind the scenes, Furuhashi and producer Naohiro Ogata described aiming for a work that would satisfy long-time UC fans yet remain legible to newcomers, with a tone closer to the original Mobile Suit Gundam and a focus on political and military drama anchored by Banagher's coming-of-age.
Originally planned as six 50-minute episodes with a near-simultaneous worldwide rollout, the project was expanded in 2012 to seven episodes to properly conclude the story. Ogata and Fukui later explained that structural adjustments from prose to screen, plus the desire to stage the La Vie en Rose and final battle material at full length, drove the episode increase.
Sawano has discussed building distinct leitmotifs for Banagher, the Unicorn's psycho-frame, and the political mystery around Laplace's Box, mixing Latin choir, electronic percussion, and strings to convey “sacred” intensity during transformations and large-scale battles.
Promotion and release strategy were unusually aggressive for an OVA. Sunrise and Bandai Visual announced near-global day-and-date Blu-ray sales, five subtitle languages, and an English dub on disc. Episode 1 received two-week “premiere review” theatrical screenings in eight cinemas across five Japanese cities beginning 20 February 2010, with on-site advance Blu-ray sales and a parallel PlayStation Store digital premiere on PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Portable. Episode 1's disc shipments surpassed 75,000 Blu-ray units and 35,000 DVDs at launch, topping the Oricon weekly charts and signaling strong OVA demand. Subsequent episodes continued the pattern of advance theatrical runs before Blu-ray release, culminating in Episode 7's event screenings in May and June 2014.
Internationally, Episode 1 premiered on PlayStation Network Japan on 20 February 2010, and the Blu-ray went on sale worldwide on 12 March 2010 with multilingual options. Bandai Entertainment released the first four episodes on DVD in North America before exiting the market in 2012. Sunrise and Right Stuf later reissued the complete OVA on DVD beginning August 2013.
In 2016 the OVA was re-edited as the 22-episode television series , which aired on TV Asahi from 3 April to 11 September 2016. The broadcast added limited new cuts, recap segments, previews voiced by Shuichi Ikeda as Full Frontal, and new opening and ending themes by SawanoHiroyuki[nZk].
Video games The RX-0 Unicorn Gundam is one of the playable secret mobile suits in Mobile Suit Gundam: Gundam vs. Gundam Next. For the PlayStation Portable port Mobile Suit Gundam: Gundam vs. Gundam NEXT PLUS, the Unicorn is joined by the NZ-666 Kshatriya. The Unicorn is part of Dynasty Warriors: Gundam 3,http://gundam-musou3.jp/ along with the Sinanju and Kshatriya (DLC only). The Gundam UC is a playable story mode in Dynasty Warriors: Gundam Reborn, where one can play as Unicorn Gundam, Sinanju, Banshee, Kshatriya, Delta Plus, Geara Zulu (Angelo), Geara Zulu and the Unicorn Gundam Full Armor is playable as DLC. The Unicorn, Kshatriya, Sinanju, and the Delta Plus are the initial UC units included in the arcade game Mobile Suit Gundam: Extreme Vs., and were later supplemented by the Banshee and Rozen Zulu, then again by the Full Armor Unicorn and the Banshee Norn. In the PlayStation Vita game Mobile Suit Gundam: Extreme VS Force, the Neo Zeong appears as a boss unit. In the Wii and PlayStation Portable game SD Gundam G Generation World, the Unicorn Gundam, Kshatriya, Sinanju, Delta Plus, Loto, Rezel, the Jegan units and Geara Zulu (including Angelo Sauper's custom) are playable units. In SD Gundam G Generation Overworld, units from episode 4 and 5 are now included with some units from the PlayStation 3 game, such as Gundam Delta Kai, Delta Gundam and the Sinanju Stein. This suit is also in SD Gundam Capsule Fighter Online.
An action game based on the first three episodes of the anime adaptation was developed by From Software and was published by Namco Bandai in Japan on March 8, 2012.
Toys/models The first models to come from the series were the 1/100 Master Grade "Ver. Ka" (Ka stands for series mecha designer Hajime Katoki) kits of the Sinanju and the Unicorn in 2009, which were followed up with the Full Armor Unicorn in December 2011, the online exclusive Unicorn Banshee "Final Battle" version in March 2012, and the Sinanju Stein in February 2013. All four kits appear as depicted in the novels, while recolored versions based on the OVA were released. A 1/100 Sinanju rocket bazooka is packaged with the eighth issue in the novel series while a 1/100 Armed Armor DE is a free item for the eighth Bande Dessinee volume. The company also produced all of the OVA series' mobile suits (plus the UC MS Variations and Bande Dessinee manga series) in its HGUC line of 1/144 model kits (including the Base Jabber transports); some are special glitterized or colored transparent-plastic kits marketed as online exclusives or as "Theater Limited" items (sold at select moviehouses on the day of an episode screening). The prizes for Bandai's Gunpla mid-year 2014 campaign include clear-plastic HGUC versions of the Unicorn and Banshee (both in Destroy Mode), the Full-Armor Unicorn, Sinanju, Delta Plus, and the Kshatriya. The line also includes the biggest HGUC kit yet - the Neo-Zeong, which stands 86 centimeters high and 50 cm wide, and includes the Sinaju itself. A Real Grade version of the Sinanju was later revealed in 2016 Shizuoka Hobby Show and be fully released in August 2016.