Ginrai

Appleseed has an amazing soundtrack. (Well, I don't care about disc 2.) I was already pretty into Basement Jaxx and Adult, but I really got into Boom Boom Satellites after that soundtrack, and AtomTM is amazing, so I've been getting into that too. And it's Paul Oakenfold, BTW, who is a pretty big name in electronic music, but he doesn't usually do it for me, but his track on this album was pretty good.

Update on my Garland: I sent it into Yamato for replacement, and have yet to see receive a replacement.

I like Hades Project Zeorymer a lot. The mecha are amazing. Moriki, the same designer for the SNES game Xardion, the Gundam Hathaway's Flash novels, and other totally obscure crap. Space Warriors Baldios is a totally obscure movie version of an even more obscure mecha show that totally bombed and was cancelled early. They made a compilation movie out of it and animated an ending for it, since the TV series just stopped short. Techno Police 21C is a cheesy, goofy combination of caper movie and high tech police movie with robots. One of the earliest efforts from Artmic, the studio that would later go on to be famous for Mospeada, Bubblegum Crisis, Megazone 23 and more. Phoenix 2772 is an amazing movie based on Osamu Tezuka's masterwork, the Phoenix (Hi no Tori) series. Weird mix of serious, dramatic, emotional sci-fi, mythology and almost Disney attitude. Circa 1980, retro-futurism. Awesome.

danth: THANK YOU. That's exactly what I've been saying!

Pfft, the story on the back of the box has nothing to do with how well the toy sells. More likely they wound up at bargain prices because they were ten year old toys for a different TV show.

Well, you're wrong. Kinryu, whether he's in a VF-17 or a VF-11 or what, rocks the house. And I'm not sure you can say Kinryu was a womanizer. It's not like one bridge bunny was his girlfriend and he was going out with another behind her back. He was LITERALLY sleeping with two bridge bunnies at once. Like one on each arm, you know? Go Kinryu.

You know, I watched Exo-Squad back in the day, but I don't recall anything about "dark matter" and while I certainly bought the Exo-Squad Robotech toys, the little story on the back of the box just seemed like marketing crap meant to sell the toys, not a serious continuation of the story.

Also sleeping with two bridge bunnies at once. Kinryu is awesome.

You know who's awesome? Kinryu.

Domestic abuse is awesome.

I've read this like five time and I still can't make -any- sense of it. What?

Uh? I still see lots of anime on Cartoon Network. Ghost in the Shell, Eureka 7, Samurai Champloo, blah blah blah...

Max and Miria's colors appeared in Crusher Joe The Movie, also with Kawamori designs that are totally different than the manga. They look a lot like Valkyries...

Skullsixx, that makes no sense whatsoever considering Harmony Gold's Robotech.com store is selling Yamato's Garland.

Tatsunoko didn't "somehow strongarm their way" into DYRL rights. Like the original SDF Macross TV show, Tatsunoko helped bankroll the production. As part of the deal, they got international distribution and merchandising rights. The argument is over whether it extends beyond that.

What the hell? Why did that guy tell you about improved arms and just tell me to mail it to him? Grr, Yamato, you're losing some goodwill here.

The Italian one is definitely a bootleg (I can't recall the exact company name... Capetti or something, but I can check when I get home), but the Spanish 1990 Super Valkyrie is -NOT- a bootleg. It is made by Bandai, and it even has a Bandai copyright on the toy itself and on the box. The Taiwanese bootleg (which as someone pointed out is a bootleg of the original Takatoku/Bandai VF-1S not the later Bandai 1990 one) doesn't have Bandai on it, nor does the Italian one. So no one saved pictures of the Spanish one? Come on, guys!

You guys have it more or less right. My site is down since I have nowhere to host it, but if you want I can paste the info here?

I feel vindicated now. Yamato definitely wants me to mail my broken Garland in for a replacement, which kind of pisses me off since I'm out the shipping.

That's it alright. There are a few packaging/naming variations on it, but that's the right thing.

Guys, guys, I'm -not- talking about the Taiwan bootleg with dark blue armor and Hikaru's DYRL colors. I'm talking about the toy that is the exact same thing as the Japanese release of the 1990 Super Valkyrie only the box has Spanish writing on it instead of Japanese.

Hey folks, a few years ago I remember seeing the Spanish release of the Bandai 1/55 Super Valkyrie on one of the toy websites (I thought it was VF1X.com, but I checked it in archive.org and I was wrong). The box looks the same as the Japanese one, except translated into Spanish, and IIRC the missiles are missing and the spring is missing from the gun. First off, does anyone have some good quality pictures of this? Second, what countries was this released in? Mexico? Spain? Latin American countries? Thanks much for any help.

Excuses excuses. That movie was still a stinker. The basic concept was totally vapid and stupid, none of the acting is any good, the plot is garbage, and the action scenes are just not very impressive. You can't polish a turd, as the saying goes. I really, REALLY do not want to see an extended version of this movie. It was already too damn long.

Like I say, I don't dislike Tennant, but he does not have the right chemistry with Piper. And for that one shining moment, the Tennant/Piper/Barrowman chemistry was, well, brilliant. If Tennant and the new companion hit it off and have great chemistry -and- they actually develop their relationship then I'll probably be happy again. While I loved last season, it wasn't all perfect to me. I really, really did not like The Unquiet Dead. And the fart jokes in Aliens of London/WWIII annoyed the hell out of me. As did the burping trash can in Rose. But other than that, I pretty much loved last season. I thought Rose especially was a great reintroduction to the series that brought fun and excitement Doctor Who hasn't had since the 70's. This season doesn't have as a good a record with me. New Earth was pretty bad, Tooth and Claw was pretty bad (ugh CG werewolf go away), and I was kind of unimpressed by Rise of the Cybermen/Age of Steel. I mean, it wasn't bad, but it was just kind of generic and been-there-done-that. Yawn, evil mad scientist creates cyborgs and tries to take over the world, his own creations turn on him, yadda yadda. The Idiot's Lantern I thought was pretty creative, but the solution to stop The Wire was just gibberish to me. What? I didn't hate Fear Her, though it was alright. Certainly a unique monster, but the olympic torch thing at the end was pretty stupid. Also, yo, RTD, what the hell happened to that Empire of the Wolf stuff you were hinting at? One more thing, I'm also annoyed that Rose's dad is conveniently alive again by way of alternate reality. That's just kind of cheesy and takes some of the sting out of Father's Day. And that sting is part of why I loved it.

I liked it, but the plotting was uneven. The Daleks and Cyberman get all this build up and then just got brushed off. There's no real climax with their fight. Bad Wolf/Parting of the Ways had great build up and tension. Dalek is good and all, but it's still a pretty straightfoward "trapped in a sealed military installation with a monster" that we've seen in a jillion b-movies... I definitely think the best thing this season has been School Reunion (not so much for the fan service, but because the Rose/Sarah Jane/Doctor triangle was awesome), Impossible Planet/Satan Pit (moody and cool), and Love & Monsters. I -really- liked Love & Monsters. Very offbeat and fun. Overall I was happier with season 1 because of the stronger character writing, specifically between Rose & The Doctor. This season was much more episodic and didn't really build their relationship very much. Also better chemistry between Eccelston & Piper, but next season will be interesting. Maybe they can get that kind of chemstry going with the new companion. Last season I loved Father's Day, too, soooo...