inside of the girl's heart

series manga

The Gundam Wing anime was adapted into manga form by Koichi Tokita, and because it was condensed into only 3 volumes, much of the story is changed or written out completely. So because of this, many things including important plot points in Relena's growth are left out.

Relena's opening scene in the manga is written with leaving out the conversation with her father before Heero's attack with Zechs. And when Relena sees Heero's body washed up on the beach pages later, her introduction scene is gone and replaced with a quick say of her name to Heero, who is too worried about having his face seen. A battle in sues between Duo and Heero next, as Relena can only stand on the beach and watch the Gundams fight.

When she returns to school that same day, Heero gives his 'I'll kill you' line without the invitation scene even played out. After this, Relena finds Heero in the mountains outside of the school and takes her chance to ask him who he is. Then she says, while pulling Heero's hand to her throat, that if he promises her to be his last victim, he can kill her right now. She can already see that Heero is a kind person, the same day she meets him, which doesn’t really fit with the flow of the story. Relena goes to space again with her father, who is killed quickly and then taken by Doctor J. He tells her many of the same things, but while still in J's care, Heero attacks and kills the Alliance leaders and she watches Heero self-destruct his Gundam; something she never knows happens during the series.

Relena goes to Antarctica and tries to stop Heero and Zechs, but not under the pretence of giving Heero a letter written by Mrs. Noventa. Her reasoning is simply because she wishes to see him, something that during the series Relena only does until Heero disappears his second time.

During the last two volumes of the manga, Relena does more and more reckless things while battles are going on. When we see her again, she is flying a plane with Noin through a battlefield, trying to get the mobile suits to leave the area. When Heero shows up and 'saves' her, she runs up to him, hugging and crying. Nothing is covered in Relena's time as the princess of the Cinq Kingdom until Romefeller's OZ troops circled the castle in an attack. Relena goes out to the front lines, dressed in a gown and tiara, telling OZ to leave the kingdom. She is shot at, but the suit misses and she tells them that '[she Relena Peacecraft is] the symbol of peace.'. Which Relena never really considers herself a symbol of peace, but just someone trying to make a difference with her views of pacifism, and the Peacecraft name only seems to matter to her during her last talk with Dorothy in the series. Her actions don't make any sense either and her character would have never dressed up in such an outfit as the Princess of Cinq in the first place and defiantly not have gone on the front lines to try and speak with OZ soldiers.

In the final volume, Relena leaves the Cinq kingdom after this to speak with Duke Dermail and this is when he tells her that she should surrender the kingdom, because both it and the Gundams are now under attack. So she makes a tearful surrender of the kingdom over the air. This angers Heero and he takes the Epyon to the Romefeller building Relena is in. He crashes into the building with Zechs and the three of them have a short reunion. Heero asks her if she is really working for Romefeller and tells him yes, but then begins to cry, telling him she cannot die yet but for him to come and kill her someday. The two of them seem to come to an understanding and Heero and Zechs quickly leave, with Relena giving a solemn goodbye to both.

Relena's time as Queen is breif, and Dorothy soon brings Treize to meet with Relena and take over her position. Relena's meeting with her brother is fairly similar with the series. Relena stays in the control room of Libra, until Quinze pulls a gun on her and Heero shows up right on time to save her. Relena says to Heero 'I didn't expect you to come and save me,' after this, which is something Relena probably never doubted. She kept thinking about Heero while on Libra during the series, though she smiles as she says this to him and it could be taken as a little joke. Heero then takes Relena and gives her to Quatre to keep her safe. Relena and Heero don't have a touching last scene together and Relena doesn’t protest his going off and fighting either.

After the battle is over, Relena is seen in a colony saying goodbye to Heero and the others. She tells him she'll be waiting for him, and to 'come and kill her again sometime,' while they have a tearful goodbye as Heero leaves with the rest of the pilots. Their destination, unknown.

Tokita writes Relena overly dramatic in the manga, and very emotional as well. He has her cry when she wouldn't over something like saying goodbye to Heero in the last scene. She's not the same character anymore. A part of her spirit still remains, but we don't really see her grow at all and become strong. Even at the end, she still seems very dependent on Heero, which she's not in the series ending. And the running repeating of the ‘I’ll kill you’ line between Heero and Relena is changed to more of a promise that they will see each other again, while it’s never something returned to after the series’ mid-way point. The author does seem to enjoy the Heero and Relena pairing, making their romance seem more canon than the anime ever did. Though it's hard to capture character development covered over a 49 episode series in 3 manga volumes, both the art and writing are not all that interesting or pleasing for Relena’s character.