Robotech

[LessonInMachismo 0]

I picked up the first DVD (not set) in the Robotech series today. It was used and inexpensive. Is this series really as good as some people claim?

[razazteca 0]

Macross > Gundam

[Insane Bump Machine 0]

Have never seen any of it, but I often read that Gundam SEED is the only Gundam/Robotech worth watching.

 

razazteca is right, of course. Macross Plus and Zero especially.

[razazteca 0]

Let me put it this way J-pop sirens is alot better than angst teens in the military wanting genocide and discussing politics. Oh and Macross 2 never happened. If you are a fan of Robotjox then you might want to check out Gundam G.

[JasonX 0]

I picked up the first DVD (not set) in the Robotech series today.  It was used and inexpensive.  Is this series really as good as some people claim?

Depends; Robotech is basically three different shows editted together to create a three-generational "epic". As a result, the quality and consistancy of the story is all over the place and a healthy "suspension of disbelief" is a must to get over the numerous changes/plot holes that pop up do to the haphazard nature of the series....

 

My take is that you should buy the first five Robotech Macross Saga DVDs and stop as soon as you get to episode 26, since the last 10 episodes are pure garbage do to the fact that the show was originally supposed to end with episode 26 and that the last ten episodes were produced on the fly after Macross became a huge ass hit in Japan, not to mention the fact that the US dubbing episode 36's "Die Die Everyone Dies" battle to the death do to the shitty voice-over of DOOM derailing the episode and the holy shit tension of everyone getting killed off left and right.

 

"The Masters" Saga is under-rated mainly because there are huge plotholes from where they dubbed the show from a series that has nothing to do with Macross as the second act. But it's charm comes from it's being a good old fashion, depressing as fuck war story, has a unhappy ending where the main male hero (who's story is filled with nonsensical plotholes do to the haphazard nature of the reworking of the story)'s suicide attack to stop the bad guys ends up making things even WORSE for everyone involved, the main heroine is annoying as shit for the first half of the story before she gets to be likable upon realizing that the military higher ups sent her and her team on a suicide mission so as to kill them, and the only likable character is a fucking Michael Jackson circa "Off the Wall" analoge who goes by the name Bowie (as in David Bowie). Pick up the uncut/uneditted version "Southern Cross Calvary" instead since the story is worth seeing in it's un-mangled form.

 

"The New Generation" is liked by fans mainly because the writers didn't have to do as much tap-dancing like they did with "The Masters" Saga but it's anti-climatic as fuck since the story is predicated on the survivors of "Macross" coming to save the day only for the ending to not have any of them show up. Still it has some interesting concepts but again, splurge on the Mosepeda box set instead.

[razazteca 0]

Now try to explain how "Proto-culture" is the major storyline that combines the 3 sagas into one. I think the best thing to do is to find the Robotech movie on tape at the local video store under the name of "Clash of the Bionoids".

[Masked Man of Mystery 0]

The Gundams I've seen are generally pretty good, and you can get them much more easily in subtitled form than you can get Macross(the other two got released in box sets by ADV, but Macross got put out by Animeigo, if I recall, and they just have all kinds of trouble getting thier stuff out, it would seem). I'd recomend seeing if you can rent Gundam Wing, at least. That way you won't have to worry about the Universal Century continuity while you're trying to get into the mood of the show, grab the UC stuff(which is most everything not Gundam Wing or G Gundam, not sure about Seed) later

[JasonX 0]

Now try to explain how "Proto-culture" is the major storyline that combines the 3 sagas into one.

 

Nonsensical deux de machina device used to create a common link between the three Robotech Sagas together.

 

I think the best thing to do is to find the Robotech movie on tape at the local video store under the name of "Clash of the Bionoids".

 

Clash of the Bionoids (AKA "Macross: Do You Remember Love", an ultra-condensed version of Macross told with all-new animation) isn't an official Robotech film, as it was released in the US by a company that wasn't Harmony Gold. It's also ultra-rare and by all account will never see the light of day in the US outside the next to impossible to find 80s VHS release do to the liscencing problems.

 

That being said, an "official" Robotech movie exists in the form of a redubbed/re-editted version of Megazone 23 (which was produced by the same people who did Macross). "The Robotech Movie" was Megazone 23 re-editted with footage from Southern Cross and 13 minutes worth of all new, specially commissioned animation that would make the film serve as a "Robotech Hidden Years" story to bridge the gap between "The Macross" Saga and "The Masters" Saga.

 

Sadly "The Robotech Movie" was shelved shortly after Harmony Gold finished re-editting it and aside from a single preview screening has never seen the light of day. According to urban legend, the audience at the preview screening absolutely HATED the film for all of the usual anti-anime reasons (it was too violent, too dark, not children appropriate) and fearing losing money, Harmony Gold decided to shelve the film. The 13 minutes of all new footage eventually saw the light of day in Japan, as the footage got incorporated into an English language dub of Megazone II that was used inside of Japan to teach kids English.....

[Masked Man of Mystery 0]

Did they feed it to a Robotech watching audience? I mean, they HAD to know what they were walking into.

[El Psycho Diablo 0]

Y'know, I don't think I've ever actually finished watching Macross. If you're going to get it on DVD, buy it now, because it's going OOP, likely for good. TRSI has it going for $37 a box (3 boxes), which is the cheapest you'll find it anywhere. These things were much, much more than that when it came out.

 

As far as Gundam goes, I've seen most of them.

 

Gundam SEED's okay, if you don't mind the main character being a crybaby. The unfortunate thing is that it takes half the series (30 eps) to get good. The mecha designs are also uninspired for the most part, and the CG is ugly. The character designer also seems to have only one face..

 

I don't like Wing, so I'll keep it short. It's a bunch of pretty boys running around in basically invincible robots, with some really intolerable writing.

 

G Gundam's great. Especially because it's so different from the rest of Gundam, and has a minimum of angst.

 

So are the original Gundam (the only subtitled release are the movies), and Zeta Gundam, which was just released. I know some people don't like the older animation, but screw them.

[starvenger 0]

Now try to explain how "Proto-culture" is the major storyline that combines the 3 sagas into one.

 

Nonsensical deux de machina device used to create a common link between the three Robotech Sagas together.

The best explanation that you'll ever get from Protoculture is from the novelizations/original novels from the Brian Daley/James Luceno tandem. Obviously, being able to write without the restriction of being a half-hour show helps them out a lot. I don't think their explanation is canon, though.

 

"The Masters" Saga is under-rated mainly because there are huge plotholes from where they dubbed the show from a series that has nothing to do with Macross as the second act. But it's charm comes from it's being a good old fashion, depressing as fuck war story, has a unhappy ending where the main male hero (who's story is filled with nonsensical plotholes do to the haphazard nature of the reworking of the story)'s suicide attack to stop the bad guys ends up making things even WORSE for everyone involved, the main heroine is annoying as shit for the first half of the story before she gets to be likable upon realizing that the military higher ups sent her and her team on a suicide mission so as to kill them, and the only likable character is a fucking Michael Jackson circa "Off the Wall" analoge who goes by the name Bowie (as in David Bowie). Pick up the uncut/uneditted version "Southern Cross Calvary" instead since the story is worth seeing in it's un-mangled form.

The story I've heard is that Southern Cross was actually cancelled and thus never had a proper ending, and so the Robotech "creators" needed another show to bring the total number of eps to the magical syndie number of 65, and thus, Mosepeda was tacked on.

 

Anyways, "The Masters" sticks out like a sore thumb as far as the three Robotech generations go, and like Jason X I'd say to just get Southern Cross and be done with it. The other two are fine to watch in their Robotech versions.

[razazteca 0]

I remember the Robotech movie was supposed to be released on DVD around 2000 when ADV was distributing the series..........man, Robotech II: The Sententials was crap. I must now go out and find the Megazone videos.

[LessonInMachismo 0]

I watched the first episode, "Booby Trap," and I found it watchable. I don't like it as much as I like Star Blazers, though.

 

BTW, guys, pretty much every reply in this thread is Greek to me.

[JasonX 0]

Actually Southern Cross got completed as planned, they just had to dump all of the character development they had planned for the second half of the series and go into plot overdrive (which was a GOOD thing since the early episodes with them focusing on the characters sucked donkey balls).

 

It was Mosepeda that was the iffy one. Originally they were going to bring Super Dimension Century Orguss in along with Southern Cross and Macross but they found that they couldn't reconcile Orguss with Macross and Southern Cross together into a single storyline. Mosepeda was bought along with Macross when Harmony Gold planned on releasing both serieses direct to video as-is and that after their plans to sell Macross direct to video with a straight-up dub fell apart, they still planned on going ahead with releasing Mosepeda direct to video (and even dubbed the first episode as such, which can be found on the bonus disc of the first three disc New Generation set). It was their desperation for the magic number of 85 that made them to assimilate Mosepeda into Robotech (and them getting the people who made Southern Cross to commission half an episode worth of new animation for the first episode of "The Masters", so as to set up the Southern Cross main heroine as Max's daughter).

 

As for Robotech II: The Sentinels, two things need to be taken into consideration: 1. The thing was made from three episodes of the aborted Sentinels sequel series (that eventually got done as a series of comic books) and 2. the Japanese Animators blatantly tried to downplay the presence of the Macross characters in the series since they wanted to release the series as a stand-alone series instead of as a sequel to Macross.

 

It's definately flawed but most Robotech fans admit as such, which is why a lot of them perfer the Sentinel comic series over the movie.

[Conspiracy_Victim 0]

Here's something that's been bugging me for a while. I was downloading various things (mainly music) a long time ago and came across two "Macross Zero" files called, appropriately, 01 and 02. It was awesome looking (CGI graphics, what not) and got me interested, although it dived headlong into the whole "Man vs. Nature" argument that anime seems to veer into with alarming frequency.

 

Anyway, how many Zero episodes are there? I've been looking everywhere online, and I'm not having a whole lot of luck. It's killing me because it ends on a cliffhanger of sorts

[El Psycho Diablo 0]

5.

 

http://www.animesuki.com/series.php/16.html

 

That site's great, because it's got loads of subbed anime. It's all unlicensed stuff, though.

[Conspiracy_Victim 0]

Sweet. Gracias.

[Black Lushus 0]

The Macross Saga is my second all time favorite cartoon series behind Transformers...

[Special K 0]

Zeta Gundam and Char's Counterattack are the shit, and the best things by far I've seen out of either series.

 

Macross Plus is pretty awesome too. Yoko Kanno w00t. Haven't seen Macross Zero.

[Conspiracy_Victim 0]

Well I must say I'm disappointed. I downloaded all 5 episodes of Zero and watched them. IMO, it kinda comes unglued in the last couple episodes. Everything goes to crap, characters jump locations from scene to scene, then they have to have flashbacks to show HOW the characters got to the new location. Then of course, we get the "Man is irresponsible and destroying the environment" morality lesson that seems to happen ALL THE FRICKIN' TIME in anime.

 

Plus, Heaven forbid they should have a purely happy ending. Yes I know the Japanese see this differently from us and have a different mindset, but come on! Would it kill them to pander to the U.S. crowd once in a while? (yes that's sarcasm but also frustration)