sketchley

VF-17 has two sets - those in the chest, and also a pair in the arms. Lessee... there's also the one's on the VF-9 (go from the belly in jet, to the shoulder in battroid), the VA-3/VA-3M (wing necelle to palm beam cannons), the FBz-99G (wing to palms,) the VF-14 (like the VF-4, but the guns end up on the shoulders,) and the Neo Glaug/Variable Gluag (engine nacelle tips to palm/wrists.) Though, I do agree that the VF-4 is pretty "badass".

Rights = control. As in: you have the right to tell someone to not do something, or face the legal consequences. The way I understand it, the manga artist and the mange publisher agree to have equal rights over the material. If one side is in disagreement, then they both cannot proceed on a derivative project (this could even include reprinting the original work!) Re: your point - not everyone shares the same capitalist point of view. There are still plenty of people who won't do something, no matter the sum of money offered to them. Refusing to have one's work translated and published in a foreign language isn't about righteousness nor ethics. For starters, the artist(s) may not understand that foreign language - thus they have no way to verify if their work has been translated correctly, or even adequately! Outside of it's cultural context, there's also the potential of the work not being understood, being completely misunderstood, or even creating a negative stereotype towards the source culture! In the 1970's, the majority of American movies exported and shown overseas featured male characters who were more often then not drunkards and abusive to the women they had relationships with. Now, some 25 to 35 years later, there is a generation of parents in Asia (and probably beyond) who have the image that all white males are abusive drunkards. A lot of these parents refuse to allow their daughters to see, let alone date, or even worse, marry, a white foreigner! (It’s not helping that the average eikaiwa white Engrish teacher doesn’t bother finding out what work and life will be like in Japan, and end up being drunk like a skunk most every night; in addition to “wham, bam, thank you ma’amâ€~ing every girl they can get their hands on. But that’s another story.) Having grown up in the North American, or Western European culture, we all know that those movies from the 1970’s were merely characterizations to show the hero overcoming not only the villain, but the hero’s own flaws. However, outside of their cultural context, they have created a rather negative stereotype. The same thing has happened with Urutsukidoji (for a good half-a-decade, if not longer, at least one English country thought that Japanimation was only tentacle rape fluff.) In addition, how many of you have heard that Japanese (especially, but not limited to the men) are (sexual) perverts? Three negative stereotypes all formed by things viewed from outside of their cultural context. Is it righteousness? No. Is it ethics? Possibly, as the material is an ambassador (like those Eikaiwa teachers...) for the country, and may very well form the future perceptions and reactions to the culture!

Good post, lord_breetai. Very good post. Chrono, artists in Japan don't sign "away" rights like they do in other countries. I'd go so far as to say that American comic artists were (don't know if they still are) trying to copy the way Japanese manga artists and publishers deal with rights, and distribution control(s). See Image Comics. There have also been plenty of cases were Japanese manga artists do not want their artwork flipped for the left to right, top to bottom reading audiences. And others are doing such a good job at describing how they are 'not getting it' that it's not even worth commenting upon any further. But I will add this: "One man's garbage is another man's gold." And "It's all in the eye of the beholder."

Me too. For the Macross II line, I believe the following are part of the official timeline: SDF: Macross 2036 SDF: Macross Eternal Love Story Macross True Love song (not 100% certain about this last one.)

Thanks TheLoneWolf. I'm getting the impression that MW members are confusing 'some of the', 'most every', and 'most' as meaning 'all' or 'every single one'. Long answer short: no, and my post using those terms was deliberately structured so as to imply 'many, but not all' (or 'the majority, but not every one'.) Anyhow... yes, Basara is a lone wolf, a rebel, a nail that sticks up in the face of society. However, he is a 'cool' rebel, as he does it in a non-confrontational manner; the very opposite of the cool-for-the-individualistic-culture(s) characters of Macross Plus. Perhaps that is why Basara is so villified by MW members, but yet he is the *star* of almost half of the Macross anime produced to date?

Is this kind of comment really necessary? Of the many things it says about you, I read it as: why bother trying to have an intelligent discussion with you. Enjoy the solitude.

Don't you mean that Yamato (a toy maker) will stop making toys? Even then, it runs contrary to Bandai having stopped making both toys and models for Macross, and both Yamato and Hasegawa currently making them. There may be some contractual agreements that even Bandai cannot break. Of course, their is the possibility of Bandai getting the rights to make the cheap or low quality toys and models, while Yamato and Hasegawa retain the rights to the high end stuff. However, given that Bandai has stayed away from Macross every since Macross 7... I don't think they are interested in it any more.

Hold yer horses. Reaction Weapons = nuclear bombs, and in Japan (and hopefully the rest of the world!) there is a stigma against their use. http://macross.anime.net/story/encyclopedi...apon/index.html THIS article explains why there is a lack of reaction weapon use in Macross. It's not so much in-series tactics, but tactics in the real world to allow Macross production to be viewed and to continue being produced. Uhm... Zinjo, we already went over the VF thing a page or so back. Studio Nue VFs are both role specific AND combat theatre specific. VF-4 = space optimized, VF-5000 = atmospheric optimized. Anyhow, sidestepping this depate (topic for another thread, IMHO) the VFs in Macross II have one fatal flaw - lack of internal weapons bays and missile launchers. Yes, the Metal Siren has them, but it's a prototype. By 2012, the VF-4 had conformally mounted missiles (a VF common to both timelines.) The VF-5000 had internal missile launchers by 2020. Internal weapons bays came into existance with the VF-14 in 2028. Those dates are all when they had a first flight/entered mass production. Designing started in 2005, 2011, and 2025 respectedly. Anyhow, Zinjo, Keith was presenting facts. Fact: the only battleship we see the YF-19/YF-21 come close to engaging is the Macross, and that's already after an extended battle depleting ordinence. (Macross Plus) Fact: The VF-2S's FAST pack has a beam cannons, so too does the VF-1 strike FAST pack. (DYRL) Fact: Macross II VFs are never seen travelling from surface to orbit under their own power, nor do they appear to be able to enter combat without attachements (FAST packs and/or missile pods.) Macross Plus has the YF-19 and 21 doing those. (Macross Plus)

Two Japanese expressions that may help members to better understand the Japanese preference of producing anime for the age (peer) group of the audience, as opposed to marketing a show about adults to kids, and why Macross Plus was not a success in Japan: "If we all cross together, there's nothing to fear." "The nail that stands out will quickly be hammered down." Japan is not the individualistic culture of many to all North Americans. In fact, it is quite opposite. Yes, you can give the culture the derogatory label of 'group oriented', but it misses the point of the freedoms and comforts that the individualistic cultures don't have that the culture provides. Macross Plus was about a bunch of 'nails standing out,' and they were not cool, as some of the nails that stand out in Japan can be, simply because the Macross Plus young-adults-but-still-kids-at-heart made trouble for everyone else in the process of standing out. For this very reason, Macross Plus is successful in individualistic cultures. It is also one of, if not the main reason why we will most likely never see another Macross like it. This is also why the idea of the further adventures of The Jamming Birds has a lot more merit than posters are giving credit. Jamming Birds = team. A team that faces challenges and the trials of growing up together. That immediately gives something that ALL Japanese, no matter the age, can instantly identify with. After all, having your audience identify with your characters is a make-or-break point with any production. Will the next Macross animation be aimed at the international market? Doubtful. It, like most every other anime, is created for the Japanese market. Any international sales are a bonus. The inclusion of foreign musical artists and foreign languages in anime in most cases isn't done to assist potential foreign sales, but to give a production an exotic air, and the use of English (written or otherwise) is generally accepted as cool. I'd compare it to the inclusion of alien languages in Star Trek and Star Wars - another layer to the rich story tapestry that is being created. Aegis, growing up = character development, but not all character development = growing up. Macross Plus is about three university age kids facing up to problems they made for themselves in high school. MW members may disagree with the three characters in Macross Plus being labelled kids; at best, I could call them young-adults, but as they lack responsibility and run away from their problems... like kids do... and the entire show is about them coming to terms with their childhood... thus "growing up" in a way that is so un-Japanese, that it was nigh impossible for the target audience to sympathize with their plight... making it rather unsuccessful in Japan.

Star Wars and adults? Luke Skywalker was what - a married 30 something? To stay away from tangents - I think it should be defined what exactly is adult-themed, teenage themed, and child themed. In Macross we have coming of age stories a plenty: Macross Zero: Shin's story. SDF:M: Hikaru, Max, Kakizaki, Misa, Minmei, etc., etc.. DYRL is the same. Macross Plus: Dyson, Guld, and Myung all growing up to face their past actions. Macross 7: Basara, Mylene, Gamlin, etc., etc., all growing up. Macross 7 Movie and Dynamite are the same storyline. The ONLY Macross that isn't about growing up is Flashback 2012. Yes, none of them are kid characters in a show aimed at kids. However, neither are the majority adults in a show aimed at adults. The vast majority of characters and show themes are growing up, and coming of age. Prime material for the 12 to 25 year old demographic. The same demographic (with similar themes and storylines it should be added) as LotR, Star Wars, the Matrix, Harry Potter, and pretty much any of the major movies released since 1977 (aka the release of Star Wars and the realization of the teenage market.)

Perhaps the Supervision Army* is the name of the task force or fleet sent to the scientifically advanced planet (of the Protocultures) just after the Evil Series Zentraedi were possessed, and took control (brainwashed) the populace of the entire planet? Yes, speculation on my part, but it gives a logical explanation for the name. * This is why I prefer the more literal translation 'Inspection Army'... it's meaning is more clear in English!

An adult-themed production would be better, but in all honesty, the demographic of anime is generally not adults, but children through to teenagers. If anything, we are going to get something along the lines of Macross 7: youthful coming-of-age A-stories for the main characters, with adult-themed subplots for the mature (not necessarily adults) in the B-stories. Anyhow, wwe'll have to look at Engage Planet Kissdum closely. If reception of it is good, then the new Macross will be similar. If it's received badly... then the new Macross will go another direction (probably revert to the 'tried and true' formulae of past successful productions *cough* Macross 7 *cough*.)

Again -> see Kensei's post + my speculations on Kawamori Shouji's motivations of why not to see it. Please also keep in mind that kawamori Shouji's a busy guy, and is in high demand. I doubt that he wants to *waste* his free time watching similar anime to what he does at work when he can do something else. I, and I'm sure many other members of MW, along with those at Studio Nue, leave work at the workplace. Zinjo's speculations kind of also confirms my suspicions why Kawamori may never say that he has seen it, as it brings up the whole arguement about Studio Nue being unimaginative, and copying other people's ideas.

Don't have time to read that huge post. However, your very first line makes me wonder if you have even seen Macross 7. Protodevlin are not people, nor Protocultures. They are specially designed, experimental "next generation" Zentraedi called "Evhil Series" that were possessed by entities from another dimension. From the Compendium: http://macross.anime.net//story/chronology...0000/index.html

The big reason, and I'm not sure that it's been mentioned yet, and it probably should be considered the ONLY reason, is the limitations on creative freedom that Macross II puts on the creative people behind successive Macross productions. Removing Macross II gave (continues to give?) the creative people behind Macross Plus, 7, Dynamite, 7 Movie, and (possibly) the new series/production a clean slate.* A clean slate is what any creative person wants. Kawamori Shouji's "I haven't seen it," may be a white lie - but I genuinely think that he hasn't; so as to keep the Studio Nue view uncompromised and not effected by the stuff in Macross II. Complete creative freedom. *I'm excluding Zero because it is deliberately set in an era contained within both Studio Nue cannon and Big West Cannon. Despite the spiritia, Protoculture, and Protodevlin references and extrapolations contained within it, the events of the series could not fundementally alter what followed it; SDF:M, DYRL, and Flashback 2012.

Uhm... no. What little of Earth* we do see is mostly in Macross Plus. Of that, it is mostly crater filled wasteland, with only a few megapolises. In fact, we only see two large cities, and a few small settlements; which may or may not be suburbs or offshoots of the large cities. This is definitely not indicitive of Earth having been repopulated, and the effects of the war erased. An image of Earth as seen in Macross Plus: Evidence of SWI is hardly erased, and the lack of cities or settlements is painfully obvious. * As DYRL and Flashback 2012 are considered cannon to both versions, I'm only focusing on the differences that crop up later.

Zinjo, I am really unclear what point you are trying to make about VFs in both Macross II and the Studio Nue canon. I may be misunderstanding, but your posts on the subject conflict each other. As for the other stuff - excellent posts, Noyhauser! The only thing I'd like to add (and is oft neglected) are the space colonies and L4 spaceship construction yards that survived SWI.

You may wish to change that subscription. The compendium (I believe it is in the timeline) says something along the lines that the Zentraedi were created to fight by proxy for the Protoculture. In more words: the Protoculture were split into many factions that were fighting with themselves (something very similar to what is indicated as happening to humans, as hinted at in Isamu Dyson's history,) and the Protocultures decided that they didn't want to use their own race (either no-one felt motivated to die for their group, giant warriors were deemed better for war, or a combination of both.) Therefore, it is extremely unlikely that any Protoculture were present on any of the many Zentraedi fleets (they cloned giant soldiers to do those jobs, and like any good politician, told the soldiers what to do from a great distance away.) As for fighters: VAB-2 stealth bomber/heavy attack specialized. VA-3M (under)water specialized VB-3 bomber/heavy attack specialized VF-3000B bomber specialized VF-4 Space combat and interceptor specialized. VF-5000 atmospheric combat specialized. VB-6 long range bombardment specialized. VF-9 special forces specialized. VF-17 space combat specialized. etc., etc., etc.. Most of the VFs in the Studio Nue cannon are specialized, some are very mission specific with little chance of being used in other roles. Very few are multi-role.

There is a possibility, though extremely remote, that this is correct. The Japanese have a word for flyer - ãƒãƒ©ã‚· - after all.

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<sigh> http://www.macrossworld.com/mwf/index.php?showtopic=142 I was bringing attention to this. I'm glad to see the moderators are aware of this issue, but am disappointed at their reaction to it. Zen = Ch'an = someone elses religion and is a misrepresentation of someone else's religion, as it's not in Macross Zero. The issue was pushed further into the religious direction, when Gunny opted to not check facts first and force the issue with more ignorant comments on a collection of world religions. Perhaps if Christianity or Islam was used instead of Zen, the reaction would have been different, no? I agree that this is not the best manner of approaching the issue, nor is this the best place to continue discussing it. However, in the interest of keeping MW members from accidently or inadvertantly offending people of other religions, I am posting it here as a reminder. Now then not to make this post completely off topic, as I endevour to post something relevant to the topic of the thread in all my posts: we've been given a potential name for this new series: マクロス　フライヤー = Macross Flyer. I also suggest expecting some kind of announcement or even lineart for the new series on March 12th; as per: http://www.macrossworld.com/mwf/index.php?...c=21926&hl=

フライヤー = Fulaiya- (or Furaiya-). Romanized into English: Flyer (or Fryer) I'm guessing Flyer, as that makes more sense in the context of Macross. There's been some discussion on this topic for some time here: http://www.macrossworld.com/mwf/index.php?showtopic=21563

It could just mean that some to all of the old releases will be remastered and released on Blu-Ray... with only a little bit of new animation being released... Hmmm... adding to my last post: maybe the requirement of acting in the voice actress call is for doing motion capture work? I don't agree with BW 'playing close to the wire.' The 25th anniversary of Macross is not 2007, but Oct. 3rd, 2007. I don't expect any 25th anniversary celebrations until that date, and after it; not before. As it's still only the beginning of March, we still have about 7 months - more than half a year! Plenty of time, IMHO.

Not necessarily. It takes both time, and more materials (computers with sufficient processing power and memory, software, energy costs) to create CG animation. Remember - EVERY detail must be hand drawn or placed by a CG modeller, then another CG animator must make them fit into the animation (with a bunch of other CG models in such a way as to give the illusion of movement) and only then, the computer has to be told to render every single frame. Depending on the resolution and the amount of detail (shading, dohickeys, etc.), it can take anywhere from a few seconds, to a day to produce a few seconds or minutes worth of animation. Que should be taken from live action movies like the Lord of the Rings, the Matrix, and Star Wars. How much of those movies, despite being effects heavy, are entirely CG? Not much - in fact, only objects that alter their appearance (characters, essentially) are CG. The rest, from cityscapes to spaceships, are still hand-built, hand lit, and photographed models. Regarding Macross Zero - yes, there is a lot of CG animation in it. The CG also doesn't look like it is motion capture. In other words, all the little movements in every single frame are done by the animators. IMHO, the CG in Macross Zero is the main reason why there were the large gaps in between the releases of the episodes of the series. Macross Zero isn't Star Wars, and BW cannot afford an army of animators to produce a few minutes of CG animation in a short period - instead, they have one or two guys doing it for months. This is also why there are hand-drawn action sequences - due to time constraints (possibly budget constraints too,) it was faster and cheaper to hand draw short sequences. And as Radd mentioned - most, if not all of the hand drawn animation was done on a computer (or scanned into a computer) and 'hand painted' in a computer. There is a section in Tenjin Hidetaka's book on Macross Zero, showing his 'hand painting' of some of the cell animation in Macross Zero. Of course if the new Macross production is motion capture (a la the "Appleseed" movie,) then production time will go down - but render time will still be needed, not to mention the hardware and software... so costs will still be as high, or higher than hiring artists to hand draw the animation...

Actually, it makes perfect sense. Macross 7 is aimed at two demographics: young people, hopefully bringing in a new market for Macross, AND old(er) fans of the original series. Those older fans would have been, or were well on the way to being married, and experiencing some of the same trials and troubles that Max and Milla were undergoing in the series. It was also a way for the two to get so much screen time in the series. Drama = conflict. Conflict = viewer interest. Viewer interest = good!