The 28th annual Tokyo International Film Festival announced on Friday that it will host a Mobile Suit Gundam "special program." This will be the first major screening event to offer a showcase of the Gundam franchise.

The October 22-31 event in Tokyo will screen the first Mobile Suit Gundam film as well as a few dozen other films, shorts, and television episodes. Staff from various Gundam anime will appear at the event.

The original Mobile Suit Gundam television anime premiered in April 1979, and the Gunpla plastic models debuted the following year. A trilogy of theatrical films followed in 1981 and 1982, compiling the television anime and adding new animation.

The second episode of the Mobile Suit Gundam: the Origin original video anime project, "Artesia's Sorrow," will debut in theaters in Japan on October 31. The newest Gundam anime series, Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans, will premiere on October 4.

Last year's Tokyo International Film Festival hosted an event dedicated to the works of Hideaki Anno (Neon Genesis Evangelion).