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Seto Kaiba

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  1. Seto Kaiba
    You do realize that Southern Cross's story was about the human characters of the Southern Cross Army, right? Who cared about the human mecha? Almost nobody cared, and that was the problem that got the show cancelled. If you're making a mecha anime series and your audience hates your main characters and finds your main character mecha designs hideously unappealing, you're screwed. The one Japanese fan this show had is all about the Auroran. Nobody gives a toss about the Bioroids. As we've noted, your tastes are more or less completely at odds with practically everyone's. The things you dismiss so ready are usually the main selling points for a given series. Now that's unfair. The story of Southern Cross makes sense. It's just incredibly derivative and badly executed. Journey to the Center of the Earth... whether you like it or not. I'd call that unfair. Compromises can lead to highly desirable end results as long as everyone is working towards the same end. Star Trek would've been an unwatchable mess if Gene Roddenberry hadn't been forced to compromise on his vision for it by D.C. Fontana, Gene Coon, and others. Same for Star Wars and George Lucas. Southern Cross wasn't a victim of compromise, it was a victim of uncaring laziness.
  2. Seto Kaiba
    It never hurts to follow the money. It does, however, hurt to own stock in CBS/ViacomCBS/Paramount. Quite a bit, in fact. The damned fools tanked their own stock price to prop this mess up. I'm probably not going to watch... I really really don't want to see more childhood heroes as depressed old people desperate to relive better days. Maybe we will finally get an answer to Odo's question... do they still sing songs of the Great Tribble Hunt?
  3. Seto Kaiba
    It's leftover bad blood from the days when MacrossWorld was a rougher community than it is now. Some people just aren't ready to let go of that animosity, even though Macross's main themes are pretty darn clear about that being a bad idea. (Hell, some of the guys I used to fight like cats and dogs with on here back in the day I'm now on quite friendly terms with.) On an interesting side note, the aforementioned countervernier system is indicated to have been deemed unnecessary and replaced with sensors because its function could be adequately delivered by the other verniers on the airframe. Master File does some bizarre things with the VF-1 later on, like adding more powerful or just more sensors of that type. It starts to get weird in the Squadrons book.
  4. Seto Kaiba
    "It's just another of one of the main things about this franchise." That sentence needed to end a bit earlier than it did. YouTube Music as well, apparently. We had a few of those not so long ago... the Evolution Toy VF-2SS and the Bandai Hi-Metals.
  5. Seto Kaiba
    Presumably they had planned to make use of the helicopter mode later on in the story... the half of the story that never made it to production thanks to the show's cancellation. Either that or I fell into another Dearborn pothole. There's acceptable kinds of process optimization and cost-cutting... and then there's what Tatsunoko did. Of course, The Price of Smiles is kind of proof positive that Tatsunoko learned NOTHING in the thirty-five years since Southern Cross.
  6. Seto Kaiba
    On the bright side, at least this means Geordi isn't dead. There was a very popular fan theory that Picard had killed off Geordi off screen during the Utopia Planitia attack in the Short Treks since he'd been established to be working there in the years Picard was in charge of the Romulan evacuation. Also, this may confirm what the show's promotional material said about Worf becoming Captain of the Enterprise E after Data's Search for Spock escape clause (B4) was reconned into a red herring.
  7. Seto Kaiba
    I guess now we know where the season two effects budget went...
  8. Seto Kaiba
    I see "Macross Fan Central" continues its downward spiral apace since they started to ban anyone who knew more than the group admins or actually cited sources. Might as well rebrand as Misinformation Fan Central. Anyhoo... no, there is nothing on the specified page about that. Nothing even remotely resembling that, in fact. Page 45's brief section on the ROV-20 concerns itself entirely with the lasers on the monitor turret (head) and the engineering challenges faced when integrating that system into the Valkyrie in terms of the aiming system and capacitors which provide its power. There is a bit on page 41 under cutaway item 34 "Nose Sensor Pod" that mentions that was originally a blister for a reverse-thrust vernier that was eliminated early in the VF-1's development and replaced by a mount for a super-telephoto and infrared camera which was the standard production fixture. It does note that mounting a laser in their place is something considered on an experimental basis for models with enhanced engines, but that's as far as it got before the idea was scrapped. (This being Master File's nod to the animation error that showed the VF-1 firing lasers from the blisters in the original series.) In the official setting, it's just an animation error. The VF-1's nose blisters were originally intended as verniers but in production were used as mounts for the aforementioned high powered telephoto camera and infrared camera systems. The only place where the laser thing is canon is the R-word series we don't talk about.
  9. Seto Kaiba
    Remember when Star Trek: Picard's creators said, on no uncertain terms, that the series was not going to be a TNG cast reunion? I do. Turns out that statement aged like milk.
  10. Seto Kaiba
    The horrible part is that this is basically canonical for both Robotech and the original Southern Cross. Even the promotional materials for Southern Cross describe the Logan as an ineffectual, if not downright useless, fighter. That's why I took care to note that the Auroran's helicopter mode is not actually used in space at any point. The Auroran's a spacefuture Sikorsky S-72 "X-Wing". VTOL and low-altitude, low-speed flight like a heli. High-altitude, high-speed flight like a jet. In space, it does all its business in its jet or robot forms. It's been a while since my last watch-thru of the series, but I don't recall the helicopter mode ever actually being used. 90% of the mechanical designs for this series just kinda did nothing... except run towards each other in the OP. Most of them don't even appear in the animation proper, and all but a few were so minor they didn't even get named. Part of me wants to be incredibly pedantic (business as usual) and note that since the Zor are mutated humans, there technically aren't any alien designs in the series... But hey, shamelessly knocking off iconic designs that've remained iconic for over 40 years probably has higher odds of success than a semi-original design done by someone who really didn't have the design chops for transformables. (If anything, I feel bad for Ammonite. They were in so far over their heads on this one their feet were sticking out the other side.) Would've been better if they'd just done Science Fiction Sengoku Saga and used all that armor in its original context where it could shine as a main design.
  11. Seto Kaiba
    Considering the Klingons canonically weaponize basically everything in their daily lives, I can only imagine the Klingon microwave likely has a suspicious amount in common with a disruptor pistol.
  12. Seto Kaiba
    ... at first I was like "didn't he die, though?". No, no that's what you meant. I guess it all depends on how much "timey wimey ball" you assume is in play. The Klingons seem to take it as read that Pike is going to end up an overcooked burrito in a high-tech foil wrapper no matter what. They were pretty clear that, if he takes the time crystal, that is how he's guaranteed to check out.
  13. Seto Kaiba
    IIRC, most Macross titles get reruns on the major anniversaries.
  14. Seto Kaiba
    Eh... it is a matter of record that Netflix tried to initiate a de facto cancellation of Star Trek: Discovery by withdrawing its financial support from the series at the end of the show's first and second seasons due to its poor reception among international audiences. Discovery's second and third seasons got funded anyway because CBS twisted Netflix's arm using the threat of a lawsuit for breach of contract if they bailed early. Netflix got away with reducing the show's budget, and eventually backed out successfully after the show's third season. That poor performance also saw Netflix pass on Picard and Amazon offer far less money for it, leading to the show's seasons being reduced to just 10 episodes. I strongly suspect the reason this mess is allowed to drag on the way it has is that CBS - now Paramount - is a mixture of two factors: Star Trek is what's keeping the lights on at Paramount+. Star Trek: Discovery was created specifically to be the service's flagship original programming, and even years later the Star Trek shows are about all Paramount has to show for its proprietary streaming service. If they cancel it without a replacement on deck to take over as the service's - what's the TV equivalent of a "killer app"? - main draw then the business case for Paramount+ evaporates and it's just an overpriced library of forgettable sitcom reruns. Star Trek shows have a history of doing poorly right out of the gate and being vindicated in later seasons (or by reruns). While they're massively upside-down on Kurtzman-era Star Trek right now, I think their hope is that if they keep the ball rolling and keep retooling until they find the right stuff that draws the lifelong Trekkies back in they'll get their money back with interest in the end like they did on TNG, DS9, and VOY. Paramount shareholders are already upset. That much is VERY clear from the reaction to CBS's big stock sell-off to fund streaming development (and likely cover the money they were no longer getting from Netflix) that erased years of gains in the stock price virtually overnight, the repeated downgrades in the stock's rating, from reactions to demo reels at shareholder meetings, and the very existence of Star Trek: Picard and Strange New Worlds as very calculated attempts to recover the fanbase that was such a rich vein of merchandising revenue done on much tighter budgets and in the latter case recycling the props and sets already constructed for Discovery. Because this is streaming, and not dependent on ad revenue and Nielsen ratings, Paramount can take more risks with it without immediate consequences. With Paramount itself funding the production, it's not going to get canceled until or unless the show(s) completely crash and burn or the stars decide they're done with it. The latter is the reason that we got for why Picard is slated to end after season three... Sir Patrick is apparently done with it and ready to move on. Otherwise, it might as well be cancellation-proof until they run out of money or the share price falls enough to put them in violation of their merger agreement. As noted above, the overwhelming majority of the Paramount+ library is the collections of underwhelming sitcoms and such that the network airs on broadcast and streaming. It has relatively few original-to-streaming properties.
  15. Seto Kaiba
    Far from it. In fact, that Southern Cross's mechanical designs are so ugly and so obviously ill-conceived even in-setting is a VERY strong contender for the #1 complaint about the series thanks to the Robotech adaptation sparing its viewers from most of its "original" story. The view that the Southern Cross mechanical designs were blatantly flawed and extremely unlovely was so widely held among Robotech fans during the franchise's brief renaissance in the early 2000s that it ascended to canonical status, with the official Robotech setting making it official that they were badly designed in-universe too. They're held in such low esteem that the series that is easily responsible for 99.9% of Southern Cross's total viewers made them into hard evidence of corruption and incompetence on the part of the military operating them. One of the most frequently revisited topics about the "Masters Saga" is how stupid the Spartas's design is, it being a frontline tank that inexplicably leaves its operator exposed to battlefield hazards from every side including the front (AKA "the end that faces the enemy and the direction of incoming fire") and that it seems to also be missing any means of keeping its operator from being violently and unintentionally ejected in the event of a crash. The cheap shots, of course, are always taken at the Logan's robot mode being short and topheavy and the Auroran being a "space helicopter" despite the helicopter mode not actually being used in space.
  16. Seto Kaiba
    It was a training cruise... not the sort of thing you get assigned to out of the blue. Moreover, he seemed to have at least a vague idea of when too, at least in Discovery. Meh... I'm just tired of this modern Star Trek and its unrelenting misery. Nobody gets to be happy or have any kind of a fulfilling life. Everybody has to be broken and depressed, living with some kind of terrible trauma that causes them to seclude themselves from the rest of the galaxy and wait to die. The whole reason Pike stood out on Discovery was that he was the only one around who wasn't a damaged, self-loathing soul wallowing in misery with people he hated. This world sucks enough as it is, let us have a happier future at least in fiction, y'know?
  17. Seto Kaiba
    Instantaneously-effective medication is kind of a Star Trek gimmick... all the jokes about instant sedation and the so-called "off button" hypospray, y'know? It is a bit out of place in the modern day, though, but I'm so used to it in regular Star Trek that I guess it sailed right past me. Of late, I feel like we've reached the point where Kurtzman Trek has alienated everyone it's going to alienate - which is to say, most of the established fandom - and the ones left to talk about it with anything more than the morbid fascination of a rubbernecker looking at a car accident they're driving past are the ones who'd gushingly praise the series with no regard for its content or quality. The J.J. Abrams movies didn't really resonate with most Trekkies, and especially not the die-hards who were driving the franchise's merchandise empire. Discovery's first season drove most of the fans away from the franchise, and everything since has been a desperate attempt to recapture that lost audience as licensees and investors desert the franchise because most of the fanbase has moved on and it's no longer profitable. If they're just denying that your complaints are valid, I'm not sure that's gaslighting by the accepted definition... gaslighting would be insisting those problems don't exist at all and trying to make you question your sense of reality. The thing is, the investor disclosures Paramount Global (fmrly. ViacomCBS) is required by law to make and guarantee the accuracy of paint a much less rosy picture of the entire situation. Paramount+ is losing over $1B/year (US) on Paramount+ right now and that amount is expected (by Paramount) to increase until at least 2024. Kurtzman's Star Trek is supposed to be Paramount+'s flagship property, but it's not proving to be the draw they hoped it would be. They've gotten in trouble in the past for inflating the subscriber counts for Paramount+ by including "free trial" subscriptions bundled with other companies services. Merchandising apparently isn't much help to cover the shortfall, since sales have been slow and the exodus of licensees between Discovery's first and second seasons hindered things somewhat as well. The sudden move to take Paramount+ global and their decision to raise $3B with a massive stock sell-off that tanked their share price may have been motivated by Netflix's third, final, and ultimately successful attempt to terminate their involvement in Discovery as its financial backer in light of the show's ongoing poor performance on their service in international markets. Picard is reportedly set to end at just 30 episodes, Discovery is limping badly, and Strange New Worlds is an unknown quantity that investors were reportedly not terribly happy with when demo reels were shown. While I'm sure there are some fans who are undeniably stoked about various bits of production-related celebrity news... a lot of the business-side news definitely seems to be not-so-positive.
  18. Seto Kaiba
    The first round is already on offer... the worldwide Macross VF-25.
  19. Seto Kaiba
    He'd have to get the crystal back first... that was what was powering Burnham's imitation-brand Iron Man armor, meaning she took it 800+ years into the future when she left.
  20. Seto Kaiba
    There's the thing... in Star Trek: Discovery's second season, it was made clear to Pike (and the audience) that if he took the *gags* "time crystal" on Boreth the future he saw when he touched it would be immutable. His destiny is written. His fate preordained. In theory, this means Christopher Pike is practically bulletproof. He can't die or even suffer an untreatably severe injury because the timeline says But Thou Must! on the matter of him surviving to lead that disastrous training mission that leaves him a vegetable in a spacefuture iron lung. I don't think they're redoing TOS... they tried that once already and it got crucified by the fans. This is just another ill-advised prequel.
  21. Seto Kaiba
    Ech... perhaps because the author of this article seems to have single-sourced his research from a three year old YouTube video, they miss some pretty important points. Most of what the article - and the YouTube video it's copying from - list are the symptoms of the underlying condition that ensured failure was the only option: Southern Cross was a low-effort cash grab. Tatsunoko Production wanted a piece of the booming real robot genre and they wanted to get it in a way that would let the monopolize the profits. So they rushed the series through development, keeping costs down by recycling as much as they could from previously-rejected series concepts and having in-house staff do as much of the work as possible even if they lacked the necessary skills to do the work they were being assigned. Naturally, what they ended up with was a complete mess so heavily and so transparently derivative of Gundam and Macross and so rife with bad ideas that it flopped miserably despite a great time slot and the popularity of the genre as a whole. Oh my, no. Southern Cross was a ratings disaster. No amount of toys were going to pull the series out of that death spiral. (Toys and such were delayed by the late freeze of production designs for the series, but most of the planned merchandise was ultimately cancelled precisely becuase the show's ratings weren't so much in the toilet as halfway to the wastewater treatment plant. Toy and model kit companies decided it was less painful to take a loss on the license fee and move on than risk even greater losses rolling out product for a show nobody was watching.)
  22. Seto Kaiba
    Available for order on CDJapan and other sites, FYI.
  23. Seto Kaiba
    While I am undeniably happy to see Anson Mount back in the center seat, I feel like it's not particularly congruous that he knows when, where, and how he will be incapacitated yet he claims it's making him hesitate? He basically knows he's bulletproof, predestined to meet a very specific fate at a very specific time and place. If anything, the knowledge that fate refuses to let him end any other way should make him overconfident.
  24. Seto Kaiba
    Master File straight-up calls it a 6th Generation Valkyrie... and the reference to derivatives of it as 5.5th Generation would tend to support its position. No, it's called The Strongest Valkyrie... at least, in Macross Delta: Absolute Live!!!!!'s promotional materials. What you're probably thinking of is the 5th Generation Valkyries in general being referred to as the "Last Manned Valkyrie" in a reference/nod to the way 5th Generation fighter jets were expected (at the time Macross Frontier was made) to be the "last manned fighters" the US military would use. That belief, of course, goes back a ways to the development of the 5th Generation fighters referenced in Macross Plus and the competition between the 4th Generation Valkyries and unmanned fighters like the Ghost X-9 and Neo Glaug. For now, anyway. The main thing that makes it so expensive is the ultra-large, ultra-high purity fold quartz that is necessary to manufacture and operate the fold wave system. The required size and purity were/are only readily available from the carcasses of Vajra queen forms, so the investment of resources necessary to aquire it makes the production of the YF-29 an absolutely bank-breaking endeavor. Even worlds with access to large stockpiles of fold quartz like Uroboros only have the resources to manufacture a few of them, so it's the inability to synthesize fold quartz the way they can synthesize fold carbon that ultimately makes the YF-29 an unattainable super-prototype unfit for even limited production. (Master File suggests the VF-31 Siegfried type's fold wave system was an innovative redesign of the fold wave system that was able to function with much less fold quartz than a regular fold wave system, but at the cost of reduced performance and losing the ability to activate the system at will the way the YF-29 could.)
  25. Seto Kaiba
    There is nothing "crazed" about it. The movie's title and the design of its title card were careful and deliberate choices intended to support the film's marketing. Why would there need to be? The licensing roadblocks in China and southeast Asia were cleared years ago, and Macross releases are already well underway there. For Europe, Australia, and South America, the licensing of anime and manga titles tends to flow through North American distributors to their subsidiary companies or localization/distribution partners in those regions. We'll be seeing releases announced for those markets in fairly short order once the North American releases are announced.
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