Celebrating Director Kazuya Tsurumaki's Award: "This is so emotional!" Over 9 Months Late Illustration for Mobile Suit Gundam GQuuuuuuX

On the official X account of manga artist Kenji Tsuruta, an illustration has been released celebrating Director Kazuya Tsurumaki of Studio Khara receiving the Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology’s Art Encouragement Prize for 2025 (76th edition), as well as Mobile Suit Gundam GQuuuuuuX winning the Special Award at the 46th Nihon SF Taisho Awards, sparking significant conversation.

The post is accompanied by a message: "Congratulations, Director Tsurumaki! Sorry for being so late! I was drawing this intending to post it while GQuuuuuuX was still airing! By Kenji Tsuruta."

The released image is an illustration set against a backdrop of outer space with a beautiful starry sky, featuring Shiiko Sugai (CV: Manami Hanawa) clad in an orange-based Federation pilot suit alongside a character who appears to be Sayla Mass. The characters are shown holding or wearing helmets. On the left side of the screen, the words "Congrats on the Nihon SF Taisho Award!" are written in green text, and at the bottom right, a strip-style design bears the handwritten celebratory message: "Congrats on the Minister of Education Award, Director Kazuya Tsurumaki! Congrats, Maki!"

Mobile Suit Gundam GQuuuuuuX is the first Gundam series TV anime co-produced by Sunrise and Studio Khara. Set in space colonies, it depicts the story of a high school protagonist, Amate Yuzuriha (CV: Tomoyo Kurosawa), who boards the state-of-the-art Mobile Suit "GQuuuuuuX" and throws herself into illegal Mobile Suit duels. The show features fierce battles involving characters like Sayla and the ace pilot Sugai, who is known by the moniker "The Witch."

Since the artwork was originally intended to be posted during the show's broadcast (April–June 2025), it can be considered about 9 months late. Consequently, fans have been posting both comments regarding Mr. Tsuruta's famous slow pace and praise for his outstanding descriptive power and beautiful artistic style. Reactions on social media have been varied, including: "So that's what happened?!", "Tsuruta-sensei being slow is business as usual," "Today of all days? lol," "This is so emotional!", and "What a stunningly beautiful drawing."

(C)SOTSU·SUNRISE