Seto Kaiba

We tried SO hard to forget... and you had to go and remind us. Seriously though, even the Gamma Fighter isn't an original design either. True to form, Tommy took an existing design from the original shows, modified it a bit, and tried to pass it off as something original. In the case of the VF-13 Gamma fighter, it's just a transforming version of the non-transformable Mars Colony AF-03 Combat fighter from the original Genesis Climber Mospeada. Like pretty much all of the other "new" stuff he's come up with during his tenure, it's something old that's been tarted up as though it was new and original... a process that's been Robotech's stock in trade since 1985. It's not just you... though I'm still not convinced the Silverback is original either. I can't shake the feeling that the "vehicle" mode looks a bit like a Mospeada-style clone of Halo's Warthog, and the "robot" mode puts me in the mind of Psalm of Planets: Eureka 7's LFOs. Hell, it could also be the horrible mutant offspring of that "Scorpion" jeep thing from Unreal Tournament 2003. (On a pseudo-related note, I think I found a Mospeada reference in Five Star Stories of all the strange places...)

It's been a month since Harmony Gold's tasteless attempt to use Macek's memorial service to promote the live action movie. All the fuss died down pretty fast, and Harmony Gold only managed to get a handful of pieces of wildly inaccurate borderline hagiography out the door, most of which contain less fact than a fortune cookie. Oh come on... that was AWESOME. That and the fact that they seem to have stolen fairly half their new cast from Star Trek: the Next Generation and other sci-fi from the same period. ('s why I call the redesigned Janice "DData") Oooooohhhh... so THAT'S why all the Haydonites talk like graduates of the Emperor Palpatine Memorial College of Divination. Always with the "foreseen"...

From the look of things, Saraphys and I are probably the only ones who actually picked up on it. The way people on here react to anything Macek-related these days, you'd think you wandered into some kind of Bizarro-MacrossWorld, where all the people who usually treated the man like an inept con artist get up in arms about anything that could be perceived as being disrespectful to him... even if that person is making a perfectly valid point. It's bad enough we have to put up with the borderline-hagiography about the man from the idiot brigade on various Robotech sites, but now even illustrating the simple fact that Macek's death has become Harmony Gold's new raison d'ineptitude is suddenly being classified as hitting below the belt here? At the rate we're going, it won't be too long before some overly-sensitive soul puts out their own tearful "LEAVE CARL MACEK ALONE!" video on YouTube. Y'see... part of the problem is that this sudden "Don't speak ill of Carl Macek now that he's dead" trend is conducive to exactly what SHOULDN'T be allowed to happen... covering up the fact that the man was a talentless hack who spent most of his career telling lies to take credit for someone else's work and exaggerate the extent of his involvement and input. It's not "sinking low" to point out the simple fact that Harmony Gold will likely continue using Macek's death as an excuse for their lack of new material and as a means to promote their doomed projects. So he made the point with humor instead of with the usual air of exasperation and annoyance that normally marks this thread? So what? And yet... it's still some of the best writing Robotech has ever had. Scary, isn't it? Aren't low-budget productions fantastic? This just in... Robotech: Shadow Rising will be a direct-to-YouTube video feature done entirely with sock puppets. Sources close to Harmony Gold have confirmed that as a cost-saving move, the all characters will be voiced by a drunk intern from the mail room, and Janice Em2's singing voice will be provided by a tone-deaf budgerigar with an inner ear infection. Well of course the death of Daryl Taylor is traumatic... after all, he's voiced by the most talented voice-actor on the entire cast, and he's the only one whose dialogue isn't taken from a badly-written Star Trek-Robotech crossover fic. Of course, it gets even funnier when you notice that they didn't bother with antialiasing when they added texture to the CG models, so every ship, fighter, and mecha in the film ends up surrounded by a minute haze of gray and white pixels, like an amateur-hour photoshop project.

No, Rob Liefeld is a genius... not an artistic genius by any means (unless you're counting "suck" as a genre of the fine arts) but rather a wizard at self-promotion whose talents allowed him to make frankly embarrassing amounts of money and become one of the most recognized figures in comics despite having only marginal artistic talent. So, given his usual PR tactics, by new Robotech "projects" he means "new toys" or "new reprinted comic books". As he's already admitted that Harmony Gold is sitting on its collective hands waiting for Warner to fix the franchise's horrific reputation so they can get decent financial backing for the next animated movie, and the voice actors are maintaining that they were told Shadow Rising is on hiatus and haven't been contacted since, it's rather unlikely that the "new projects" are anything to do with continuing their lackluster Shadow Chronicles OVA. Considering they unashamedly used the man's death AND funeral proceedings to pitch the Robotech-in-name-only live action movie, I think anything anyone here has to say is pretty much fair game and in far better taste than anything that's come out of the Harmony Gold offices in the past month or more. Oh puh-leeze... the man was an incompetent hack and a shameless liar who spent the vast majority of his career attempting to take credit for someone else's work. I'd say by now the man is fair game again, especially since Harmony Gold is gleefully and quite unashamedly riding his corpse's coattails in the name of promoting their crappy movie.

Really? I didn't get the same "stripperific" vibe from her that I got from Ariel and most of the other girls in Shadow Chronicles and Prelude. To me, the uniform looks more like an attempt to hide his usual stripperific drawing style under something that almost looks military-like.

Yes, that would be my recommendation... there are some good-quality fansubs out there for that one, and it was once released in the US too, so it shouldn't be that hard to find. I would recommend watching the shows in rough production order, so you get a good feel for the timeline of Gundam's Universal Century. Some of the OVAs later come back and fill in the gaps between shows. (And the OVAs are where I personally feel the franchise shines... and many number among my favorite Gundam titles... there and only there will you find a giant robot pilot laid low by something as mundane as a plate of carrots) Above all else, just make sure to pace yourself... two, maybe three episodes a day tops will get you through it at a decent enough pace, and you'll be able to take everything in without it becoming overwhelming or frustrating. You can find a summary of the production order here, along with their availability outside Japan, but it mixes all of the AUs in with the UC continuity shows: http://www.mahq.net/animation/gundam/gundam.htm A reasonably succinct list of which ones belong to the UC can be obtained here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Century#Universal_Century_Gundam_series_and_films

Indeed... but this thread still needs more Ishtar... I'll have to set up my scanner and post some of those great watercolors of her Mikimoto did as promo art for Macross II and for the novels.

Sounds interesting... didn't like Sheryl very much during the first few episodes, but she really grew on me later in the series. I'll probably pick up the collected edition of the manga when it comes out. I was hoping they'd get around to expanding on Sheryl's history, didn't expect they'd actually do it, so I'm kind of looking forward to this.

If you look at the early concept art, it's pretty clear that's really a function of his complete inability to comprehend fiddly anatomical matters like the way spinal columns work and that wrists really shouldn't be as thick or thicker than the person's biceps. His early drafts of Vince Grant look like The Incredible Hulk, and there's still something wrong about how most of his female sketches have them standing ramrod straight, with their chests thrown out in a posture scientifically designed to cause intense lower back pain.

Speaking of obnoxious things that don't mix it up, would you kindly come up with a new ad hominem attack? That one lost all its bite a loooooooong time ago. Seriously... even though Macross II was, by all accounts, a sequel that played it safe and didn't try to mix it up as much as subsequent efforts did, it still had a hell of a lot more originality than most of the later UC Gundam shows. There comes a time when, even if you have a winning formula, you still need to mix it up a little to keep things from getting stale. Gundam doesn't exactly do that a lot, and on the rare occasion it does, it's usually an alternate universe story. As a result, the whole UC timeline is a parade of samey conflicts against space fascists (and usually the same bunch of space fascists at that) who usually want to drop some kind of large stellar mass on Earth's surface and/or commit genocide, broken up by the occasional rebellion against the corrupt Earth Federation when they get too heavy-handed trying to keep the space fascists in line. Like I said (and you apparently ignored), it's a winning formula and they're smart enough not to screw with it just because they can... but it's best to take it in small doses to keep the conflicts from running together and the standard-issue whiny protagonist from driving the viewer up a tree. It's the same problem Evangelion has... it's a classic show, but the average viewer can only take so much whining per day, so it's best to pace yourself when you're watching it. This is actually what I suggest for Macross 7 as well... it's not a BAD show, it's just not a show most people should try watching all in one sitting. Eh... Quirky? Yes. Awesome? No. To be entirely fair to ZZ Gundam, if you prefer the somewhat grimmer tone of the rest of Gundam then you'll find the second half of ZZ Gundam much more enjoyable. The first half is, as you said, similar to the Macross 7 TV series. In particular, it has that lightness of tone and silliness that occasionally crosses the line into what some might consider full-blown stupidity, and others might consider highly amusing anarchic comedy. It's all down to taste, but I'll be surprised if anyone seriously attempts to defend the Moon-Moon episodes as anything but a clandestine attempt to weaponize bad writing. The "better mechanical designs" thing is really down to taste too... Gundam 00's got a lot less recycled footage. I don't deny that the second season was a steady slide towards a train wreck ending, but the first half was an extremely well-executed show. I can't really say the same for Wing, which never really bothers to explain why the protagonists are wrecking Earth's poo and killing everybody until the wrap-up OVA, and tosses new factions in and has characters make knee-jerk faction changes whenever they run out of ideas. If you'd read my whole post, you'd realize it's not a double standard at all. Both shows have a formula that works for them. The difference is that Macross makes a concerted effort to mix it up a bit with each iteration, trying new things with the characters, the mechanical designs, the love triangle, etc. They take their concept to new and interesting places. Gundam doesn't make as much of an effort to try new things, which can leave some of the shows feeling like the only thing that changed were the names of the characters, and sometimes not even that much (like the jump from Mobile Suit Gundam to Zeta Gundam and from Zeta Gundam to the latter half of ZZ Gunadm).

Okay... for a completest, Gundam is probably a really bad franchise to attempt to get into. It's just too massive for anyone to try tackling all at once. I guarantee that if you attempt to marathon your way through any Gundam show more than 13 episodes long or, god forbid, attempt to watch multiple Gundam shows back-to-back, you'll quickly find yourself heartily sick of protagonist du jour's whining and the way the franchise treats endlessly recycling the same handful of plots and set pieces as an appropriate substitute for innovation. In practice, I suppose it's really more the protagonists who ruin attempts to marathon the Gundam shows than it is the recycled plot devices. After all, if you've got yourself a winning formula, why screw with it? The problem is that, with very VERY few exceptions, the Gundam protagonists are basically cast from the same three basic molds. You've got your whining, naive, immature pubescent boys with daddy issues who'll fall into the cockpit of a super prototype and then whine about how tough their life is afterward (basically a proto-Shinji, ex.: Amuro Ray, Camille Bidan); personality-less, gun-toting, stoic child soldiers (Setsuna F. Seiei, Heero Yuy); and pointlessly badass robot action heros who do six impossible things before breakfast just because, and who really just underline how depressing everyone else is (Domon Kasshu, Tobia Arronax). To be frank, what I'd recommend is that you go in production order (start with the 1979 Mobile Suit Gundam or the compilation movies), and watch at most two episodes a day. That way the grimdark, the whining, and everything else won't have a chance to get to the threshold where watching the show feels more like a chore than a leisure time activity. While I'm sure the completest in you will rebel against this idea, I would say that you could probably skip several shows as superfluous or just plain not worth watching. For starters, if you didn't like Macross 7, you'll probably want to skip Mobile Suit ZZ Gundam, the first half of which is painfully dull and kinda stupid. You'll probably also do yourself a favor by skipping the whole Cosmic Era (Gundam SEED), since it's basically "Universal Century for Dummies" brimming with implied bromance for the yaoi crowd. You can skip Gundam Wing for similar reasons... LOTS of implied bromance and you can get the same basic story without most of the suck by watching the Gundam 00 TV series instead. If you're down on super robots, you might wanna give Mobile Fighter G Gundam a wide berth too... since it's the domain of manly men with long sideburns who shout a lot and wear spandex to pilot their giant robots. (If that's your bag, or you just have an anarchic sense of humor, you may find Mobile Fighter G Gundam weirdly compelling) To paraphrase Gioacchino Rossini, Gundam has some good moments... and some bad halves of an hour.

Actually, lots of the characters who are supposed to be getting up there in years were designed fairly young for RTSC. Tommy Yune credits this to some wisdom from Tatsunoko, which was something to the effect of "write old, design young". Vince Grant is supposed to be like 54, but he doesn't look a day over 25.

Isn't that old news? I remember seeing some of Kawamori's early sketches of the VF-25 Armored Packs where they said it was inspired by the Stampede Valkyrie. The Tornado Packs look more like a mix of design aesthetics from the Valkyrie II's Super Armed Pack and the VF-0's Ghost Booster.

Oh ho... I see what they did there... Of all the Macross shows, Macross II is the one that draws most heavily on its Gundam roots, and its lead mechanical designer was fresh from his work on the Char's Counterattack movie when he started working on it... so this appears to be an extremely unsubtle Gundam reference. Under that silly "New Era" calendar they had for a while and then ignored, 2091 corresponds to year 0079 of the New Era. The original/correct date of 2092 was a reference to its status as an anniversary OVA. It was for the 10th anniversary, and was set 100 (10^2) years in the future (from the modern day), making it 2092. The last Zentradi attack that the U.N. defeated was ten years ago, in 2082 (2082 - 100 = 1982, the year SDF:M TV aired). I know, I know (Just teasing about how stuff from Macross II keeps cropping up as though it was new and original material in later Macross shows)

Indeed... Macross II is a sequel to DYRL, not SDF:M TV, but the rest are sequels to the SDF:M TV series. I'll second that motion... Nah, they were just sort of quietly deleted from the end of Mospeada as though they'd never been present... which is probably even less dignified.

Does that thing even HAVE armaments? I mean, it's basically the Meltrandi equivalent of Basara's VF-19 Kai. Emilia probably replaced the forearm guns with some theatrical glitter dispensers or something. Okay, I know I'm probably going to regret asking this later... what year(s) does the timeline sheet allege the events of the Macross II OVA took place in? If they really did their research this time, it should be 2092. What, no mention of the VF-2SS? Now that's a damn shame, since the VF-2SS was the first VF in Macross to have that ability... Damn... no mention of Macross 2036 or Macross: Eternal Love Song? Weird that they'd remember the Wonderswan games though.

Okay, I'm lost... I've been staring at this for like five minutes and I still can't be certain what you're talking about. Are you saying you'd rather see a live-action DYRL? Something else? What? I wouldn't be too concerned about Tommy Yune's "pen hand" in the Robotech-in-name-only live action movie, since Harmony Gold's creative team are pretty much just bystanders in the whole process. They're sitting on their hands and waiting for Warner to make someone care about Robotech. Given what little has been said on that matter by the likes of Yune and McKeever, the decision to omit any pre-existing characters who weren't plot-critical was probably a cost-saving measure during the production of the film. The voice actors who worked on Robotech back in the 80s are members of the Screen Actor's Guild now, and as a result their rates have gone up. With such a small budget, having a more than a few of the original VAs reprise their roles would've been impossible. On the other hand, the decision to redesign the plot-critical Macross cast member (Rick Hunter), and either kill off or otherwise remove the rest of the cast was, though Harmony Gold will never admit it, done because they can't use Macross characters in animated or live-action works. Even though they used the Sentinels redesigns, they probably didn't want to take any chances, since the whole Big West v Tatsunoko legal tiff had only recently started to wind down.

Odds are they'll axe the singing part anyway... remember, one of the areas where Macek asserted that he "improved" Macross was by reducing the importance of, and the emphasis on, the singing aspect of the series. The "Robotech-in-name-only" live action movie will almost certainly be a mindless summer sci-fi/action flick positively brimming with Robotech's usual pro-war, pro-military, xenophobic "message". Has anyone confirmed that the re-release of Prelude actually contains new content? From the sound of the marketing blurb it's just a condensation of the garbage printed in the original per-issue release. In any competently-run franchise, wasting a good three years faffing about and then trying to pass off a compilation of stuff from eight years ago as new and exciting content would get you sentenced to be trampled by the company brontosaurus... but not in Robotech. Robotech fans are so inured to having nothing new or interesting to talk about that they honestly believe that this it the way a franchise should be run, and that this behavior is a recipe for success.

Quality is, was, and always will be more a function of the show's budget than any other factor in the production process. Was the original 1982 Macross series animated somewhat haphazardly? You bet. Are shows today animated just as badly? ABSOLUTELY. I've actually got a graphic somewhere that shows side-by side comparisons between old and new high and low quality/budget productions.

*sigh* I suppose she'd need something with less personality to make her stand out as something other than wank material, so sticking her next to whatever ugly redesign of Macross's VF-1 they come up with should work... I'd still prefer to keep her as far removed from anything even tangentially Macross-related as humanly possible...

Huh... looks like an interesting issue after all... Technology sheets for "Variable Fighter Genealogy", and "Macross-class ships and successors". Mechanic sheets for Mk.I Monster destroid, SDF-1 Macross (DYRL?), Az-130A, VF-25S, VF-2JA, and Meltrandi military vessels. A timeline sheet called "Milestones in the history of mankind", character sheets for Minmay and Global, an Operation Minmay history sheet (M2?!), and a Protoculture worldguide...

Well, yeah... now that they've licensed the merchandising rights to DYRL they're in no danger of having some other company license DYRL and its merchandising rights and trying to undermine Robotech with content and merchandise that doesn't suck. So now they can profit from their own malfeasance by importing and selling Macross toys from SDF:M and DYRL to Robotech fans, who'll eagerly snap them up because the only part of Robotech 99% of the fandom cares about is Macross... so anything VF-1-related is practically guaranteed to sell.

If you're talking about the extent of their actual contributions to the Robotech fandom, then that sounds about right. Tommy Yune's sole contributions have been a lousy direct-to-DVD movie, trying to broaden the show's appeal by eroding the differences that set it apart from its Macross origins, and trying to pretend that things are going great. Bendo, well... he's Bendo. That's all that needs to be said, and all the evidence necessary to rank his contribution to the fandom as slightly less than an inanimate object.

Okay yeah... that almost does sound like a dig at Harmony Gold and Carl Macek... Really, that's proved to be a bit of a pattern with the more belligerent and/or ignorant members of the Robotech fandom. Whenever things aren't going their way, they drag out the tired old "Macross purist troll" straw man as a convenient blame figure so they can carry on believing that the reason nobody wants to be around them is that the Macross purists are conspiring against the "true Robotech fans". No surprise, the idiot responsible for calling said side "MacrossWorld 2.0" was banned a good six months ago, and has since attempted to come back under four or five different alts, only to be outed and banned before he can make even a dozen posts, despite his frequent protests that trying to sneak back on under alts is beneath his dignity. Macross Frontier... I think Grace's version of Aimo first appears in episode 16 (and can be found on Macross Frontier OST 2 and OST 3. I believe the redone DYRL song is also on OST 2 and 3, and appears in episodes 24/25 of the series.

Oh, that was us? Seriously... the evil cabal that guy says I'm the overlord of must be working overtime to pull something like THAT off. All this time I thought putting all of the deleted gore, innuendo, and nudity back into Robotech was Mr. Tommy Yune's handiwork, and that Harmony Gold and the majority of Robotech fans considered it a rousing success. I know they don't sell the non-remastered version anymore... the RT.com store doesn't carry anything except the Protoculture Collection and Robotech Remastered. If all that was our doing, and my army of sinister Macross purist infiltrators have replaced THAT much of the Robotech fanbase, why the hell are we still having them pretend to be Robotech fans? Honestly... I need to have WORDS with my Evil Human Resources people (haha, department of redundancy department) about their recent staffing decisions. I bet it really burns his ass that Tommy Yune has been trying to make Robotech conform more closely to Macross since 2001... even going so far as to try changing the VF-1's fuel from the assumed protoculture powerplant to thermonuclear fusion.