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Dio

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  1. Dio
    I keep telling myself how Macross 7 came off as ridiculous at first, but became my favorite series after I followed it through several episodes. Delta has that same potential, to be sure, and I won't write it off early. I'll give it... half the season before forming a strong opinion, outside of some catastrophic failure like introducing Jar-Jar Jenius or such.
  2. Dio

    Bandai DX VF-31

    Dio replied to UN Spacy's topic in Toys

    If it folds up like a taco shell for stowage, I could see it having that profile from the top. We haven't seen a good side view yet, so it's possible (likely, IMHO) the stowed configuration is not a rectangular box with flat underside.
  3. Dio

    Bandai DX VF-31

    Dio replied to UN Spacy's topic in Toys

    I noticed a VF-5000G mixed in with those photos, who makes that?
  4. Dio
    Or like "End of the Circle?"
  5. Dio
    Has it been at all posited that Lady M might be Myung? It would make sense for her to be involved with behavior-influencing music targeted at calming down Zentradi, given her past, and a position in charge of Walkure seems like a logical progression from a promoter/producer 30 years prior. Also, if we take into account that SK wants Delta to be a mashup of Plus and 7 (figuratively), Myung would be an interesting callback. Of course, she would be aged appropriately just like Mao was for Frontier. I know it's high-school-lunch-table level speculation, but sometimes Macross likes to surprise us with out of the box thinking. [Edited heavily due to being completely wrong about Lady M's position... serves me right for watching the raw version once and commenting an hour before seeing the subbed version. Still, after being corrected I think there might be more validity to the theory than before.]
  6. Dio
    I'm of the opposite opinion, the music in TFA to me seemed to invoke the appropriate moods much more than the other films. The OT music was thematic, but repetitive across the trilogy, and the PT music I do not even remember outside of the main theme and Duel of the Fates (which saturated every fanfilm after Ep I for quite some time). TFA was the first movie since ANH where I felt a sense of what the score was trying to convey.
  7. Dio
    I don't suppose there is a Decepticon logo with claw marks through it? Sort of like RotF Jetfire's emblem, but purple. That would get you the best of both worlds.
  8. Dio
    Lone Wolf had some pretty bad reviews, you might think twice about that one. I went with the upgrade set for the Hasbro figure and am pretty satisfied, though it destroys the leg articulation (haven't figured out a good fix for that yet). Personally, for starting on a 3P collection I recommend Perfect Effect's Warden figure if you can find it. Closest thing to perfection I've seen in a 3P non-combiner figure.
  9. Dio
    Not sure if that's just a temporary display for the photo, but you might want to move the aft right-hand flightpose leg off of the painted red band. Those clear caps can dissolve it over time.
  10. Dio
    Man, all this hate for Ares... I am highly satisfied with mine, but I collect WfC/FoC aesthetic in scale close to CHUG, so I'm a bit of an outlier. It looks awesome opposite my PX Dinobots. The only issue I've had is the loose knee connector pegs on Nemean, still trying to figure out a good way to lock those out but it's just a matter of jamming something in there. Feral Rex, I just couldn't get past the SD proportions in combined mode. It's straight out of a Super Robot Taisen game, but adheres to the geewun demand of all 5 figures being the same size while Ares commits the sacrilege of making Nemean a larger core bot.
  11. Dio

    Bandai DX VF-31

    Dio replied to UN Spacy's topic in Toys

    Put me down for Delta 01 as my favorite pick. Second favorite is 04, and availability will decide which 1 VF-31 I pick up. Thankfully, the SV-262 toys will be much easier to choose between as far as color schemes.
  12. Dio
    My criticism of Delta actually has nothing to do with the specifics of the content (ie how realistic the tech is) or the target audience. What I don't like is the trend in contemporary anime to jump wildly from one mood to another. A perfect example of this is FMA Brotherhood, where you get characters dealing with extremely deep emotional impact, resurrection of dead loved ones and the consequences of their very mature decisions, and then you spontaneously get scenes where the animation turns into grade-school doodles with tears streaming out across the screen. The same thing happens constantly in another couple of recent anime I watched, Kekkaishi and Soul Eater. I remember remarking to my wife that I felt like those shows had a bit of ADD going on, because they couldn't maintain a steady trajectory for me as a viewer to stay hooked on. Conversely, Macross 7 had a completely zany premise (weaponized song energy), but maintained a consistent tone throughout. Even though it was lighthearted, it took you along for the ride and worked the serious moments into the story with good narrative pacing and logical story progression. Probably the most mature moment in the series was Gamlin dealing with Physica's loss, but it had perfect context to accompany it and wasn't interspersed with sight gags. Macross Frontier had a concert, then a space battle, teen high school drama, space battle, an episode centered around the fight to reclaim Sheryl's underwear, then a guy getting torn in half and a main character graphically sacrificing himself to save his grieving lover before the final couple episodes of space battle. Very back and forth. Delta is, to me, following the trend of jarring the viewer between wacky over-the-top situations and serious ones, which makes it very hard to stay focused on as a viewer. In this episode we had some well-paced character introduction of Freya and Hayate (light pacing), but then the Var activates and it's the Walkure Super Spies jumping into action with their VF-31 backup dancers to combat it (zany). Spontaneously, the unknown enemy Valkyries show up, destroy some military vessels, and it's back to Macross aerial dogfights (serious). All of these styles can work effectively, and I've enjoyed shows developed around all of the same elements, but jumping between them makes me feel like I'm changing the channel every few minutes. I hope Delta can rein that in and carry me between the moments of seriousness and levity, rather than yanking me between them like anime post-2005 has seemed to track towards. Knowing the trends (as well as the otaku culture that has more say in what's popular) has me a little worried though.
  13. Dio
    Complete agreement here. It's not only reasonable given the current facts, but there are very few alternate explanations that make any kind of literary sense. Those alternatives would also hinge on some kind of bombshell revelation dropping on us, which would easily alienate fans like the PT did. Obi-Wan having a secret grandchild, Ren having a mystery sister that Han or Leia didn't know about, etc all hinge on some pretty shocking out-of-character actions on the parts of OT icons that would amount to heresy among fans. Given that some of the more popular elements from the old EU have already been pulled into the new canon, Rey being the Skywalker scion makes the most sense. There are also way too many personalized hints in Rey's Force visions, that would have been much more general if she was being narratively portrayed as an outsider. If she wasn't related to someone to-be-revealed, there would be no "waiting for her family" element written for the character.
  14. Dio
    In the "backpack options" photos, does that look like the hand-held gunpod stowage? Or is it a hard-mounted cannon? Based on how the pod folds up, the cannon would be ventrally mounted like typical gunpods on most other models (same place as the YF-30 stowage). The VF-31 transformation scheme (arms outboard of the legs in F mode) lends itself to nice takeoffs from B mode, almost like it just straightens out upward. One of them does this when they first take off to meet the Drakens.
  15. Dio
    That was... interesting. It felt like Macross to me, but it also felt like contemporary anime in a lot of the ways that I don't quite enjoy. I'm more a fan of consistent tone in a show with paced segues/flow between levity and seriousness, but this seems like it's going to bounce back and forth jarringly. The Drakens seem much more bad@$$ than I expected, easily on par with the VF-27 dogfights in Frontier and with some nice aggressive pilots. As a fan of Mac7 above the others, I have to give Delta a chance, so I'm not going to form too strong of an opinion based on the preview special. However, I hope it doesn't adhere too strongly to current anime tropes and instead follows a style similar to its predecessors.
  16. Dio
    I was looking for the grave marker on my second viewing, and the jagged stone definitely stands out in the very final, sweeping shot before the credits. In the scenes before that it seemed more ambiguous, but it's roughly knee-high and stuck in at an angle none of the other stones are.The stuff Rey happens upon before finding Luke all seemed to me like a lunch tray on the ground, giving the viewer some indications that the area was inhabited, and Luke had been here for a little while. I just finished the novelization, and it adds a bunch of content I think was probably cut from the film due to pacing or relevancy issues. Most of it is fluff action scenes or extra blustering from the villains, but there were a couple of gems in there:
  17. Dio
    Fair enough, and I think we're really in agreement over the generalities,
  18. Dio
  19. Dio

    Bandai DX VF-31

    Dio replied to UN Spacy's topic in Toys

    Looks like it has a rotating Gerwalk joint similar to the 19 Advance. I hope the backpack can fold more flush when the pod is removed, that will help with the appearance. Since the wing root parts are not super integral to other mechanisms, I wonder if one of our skilled Shapeways artists might be able to rig up some 19-style folding wings that can be swapped in? I'd buy an extra 31 just to work that kitbash.
  20. Dio
  21. Dio
    What got me was the superb attention to detail. Everything the sabers touched either went up in steam, sparked or caught a little fire, from nearby tree branches to piles of snow that were just whicked with the tip as the saber spun.I'm still trying to figure out
  22. Dio
    Upon second viewing, I noticed a couple more things: Not related to the story, but a little nerd overlap:
  23. Dio
    Masterpiece as a line pretty much amounts to roughly Ultra size class versions of old figures with better articulation and truer-to-TV details. The problem getting into the Beast era chronologically is that the detail and articulation of toys at the time was much closer to the current standard (barring the BM line that was pretty much just given up on). Primal is probably not going to be as much of an upgrade as the G1 MP's, relatively speaking, so I'm tempering my expectations on it.
  24. Dio
    I had some similar thoughts:
  25. Dio
    Something just dawned on me regarding future directions they can take one of the lead characters:
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