DestroidsRage

Drifand! That is /incredibly/ awesome!!! The Standard Calibur has always seemed incredibly cool to me. You did a freakin amazing job with it. Have you actually seen Dorvack before? As I said, I've only seen 5 episodes but I like it a lot. I take it you collect a lot of Dorvack stuff? Like the Mr. News modeling mini-books? Its so freakin cool to be back on Macross World, I learn /so much/ about my favorite mecha shows it just boggles the mind!! I thought I'd been to every Dorvack site, but I guess I didnt look hard enough, as I never found your Standard Calibur page. Anyone else have any Dorvack sites that are good? I dont think theres enough of them -BEN-MAN-

Ahhh! Thats very interesting. Im sure Kawamori must have been wondering why people keep thinking Dorvack is synonomous with his name. Which makes me wonder, what other mecha has 'Itabashi Katsuki' done??? He must have been working for Ashi Productions when he did the Dorvack designs, but the only other Ashi show that he might of worked on is Dancougar, however we all know Masami Obari did those designs. Be cool if he did mecha for other shows also. Thanks for the information McBride!! This has been a very informative day for me. -BEN-MAN-

Wow Drifand!!! I seem to be proven incredibly wrong!!! But then why are literally /dozens/ of sites saying he /did/ work on Dorvack??? I figured /that many sites simply cant be wrong/! And yes, I've been to just about every Dorvack site out there. Toybox DX's page on it is very good. -BEN-MAN-

If its designed to follow in the footsteps of Macross, I'll betcha a few things. -Its a real robot show. -It'll have some kind of innner meaning. -It'll have transforming mecha. -There will be romance in it. Those are /facts/, as far as Im concerned. Its the formula Shoji has done with most of his mecha anime. -BEN-MAN-

GaoGaigar is awesome if you like Brave series shows. If you watch it and find it to be just a tad too silly for you, like I do, check out Brave Train Might Gaine. Its definitely one of the most awesome shows I've seen recently, although its hard to track down. Awesome characters, /beautiful/ animation style, and cool music, and its more adult than most other brave shows, and the entire feel of the show is very great. Definitely a must see for all mecha fans. But yes, do go see GaoGaigar, and I definitely recommend Might Gaine if you like that. Might Gaine is my favorite Brave show. -BEN-MAN-

Masami Obari is aweful. Megazone 23 Part 3... Platnimhugen Ordian... Gravion... They all have so many similarities - and thats NOT a good thing. I dont think I'll give Gravion a single chance. It doesnt look good, and Obari is aweful. But thats just me. Any of you who dont mind any of Obaris work should definitely check this out, as far as robot anime goes I guess its ok if you dont mind Obaris style of work. -BEN-MAN-

He designed all of the variable mecha in it Opus. The Calibur, the Gazzette, the Tulcas, and all their variants. I mean, come on, it came out around the same time as Macross, and at that point he was the /only person/ that could create cool transforming mecha. Of course he did those designs. I dont think he had /anything/ to do with the actual show, just in the designs. -BEN-MAN-

StealthLurker, to the best of my knowledge, Dorvack was never released, ever. Not on DVD, not on VHS, not on Laserdisk, not VCD, not /anything/. Finding Dorvack episodes is about as hard as it gets. I have episodes 1-5 on VHS, copied off of TV in the 80s. Thats about all thats out there. And the quality aint too high either. So yah. The best we could do was lobby for Animeigo, or US Manga Corps, or CPM, or Software Sculptors to licence it. If someone wants to set up a poll, im sure many people would sign it. Cause thats probably the /only/ way we'll ever get to see it. -BEN-MAN-

Yah!! I had the Calibur, but it didnt transform, it was only around 5 inches tall, and I remember that there was quite a bit of metal in it, and it came with a little rifle, and some optional parts. But I dont remember it comming in any fancy packaging I dont think... Maybe we had the same toy UN Spacy My incredibly fond memories of that toy are what got me hooked on Dorvack -BEN-MAN-

Bob, that little thing towards the middle of Melos No Youni is /awesome/. It makes it even more dramatic and adrenaline pumping. David screaming "help me! HELP MEE!!!!!", then the song picking back up into its awesomeness, its /SO BLOODY COOL/. I cant believe you dont think so. Airmail From Nagasaki is a seriously awesome band. I have the opening and ending done by them. Note that the ending is usually a female singer, I have a version done by Airmail From Nagasaki, and its cool ^__^ It pisses me off that Manga International only released the first 24 episodes though. Theres over a THIRD of the show that they still need to release. And yes, Dragonar is infinitely awesome. I prefer the second opening, Starlight, more though. Its just so bloody cool. I've been looking for Starlight but so far I've only been able to find the first opening.. Dorvack has an incredible opening also. I have over a minute of the full song if anyone wants it :;... If anyone wants me to upload it someplace, I'd gladly do it. Your not likely to /ever/ find it any other way. Its the full version of the song, but my copy gets cut off after the end of the lyrics you hear in the TV size version. Its odd... -BEN-MAN-

I hope its another pioneer of Real Robots. There hasnt been a /REAL/ real robot show since Votoms and Patlabor (dont worry, i know im missing out on a lot). I want to see more mecha that could actually exist. No more crazy 'black technology', no more Escaflowne. Im sure it will be original no matter what it is. So it will have to be awesome. I just want another realistic Real Robot show. There arent that many of them. I sure as poo hope its more like Macross 7 than Escaflowne. Escaflowne was annoying. People who dont like Macross 7 just dont get it. But thats just my exper oppinion ^__^ Either way, its gonna be awesome if theres mecha in it done by Kawamori. Ya never know, maybe it will be Dorvack II, LoL (although I dont think Kawamori did /anything/ on that series except design the mecha..) -BEN-MAN-

Masaru San is /the/ funniest show out there. It is absolutely hilarious in every concievable way, although you'd have to love a very specific type of humor in order to enjoy it. Its definitely not standup comedy. It is full of the most crazy hilariousness to ever grace the world of animation. Most people who think theyre going to watch something "cool" or "meaningful", or something with a shred of sanity, will be utterly completely dissapointed. And its animation is fine, it would be retarded to give a show that insane nice animation. What would be the point? None of the jokes require nice animation to be funny anyways. People are too hung up on animation these days. If I ever have a kid, and he refuses to watch something because of the "bad animation", im going to say "Your going to watch Xabungle, /and your going to like it!!!/", and I betcha he would. To poo with animation. Xabungle and Masaru San are two prime examples of shows not /needing/ good animation to be awesome. -BEN-MAN-

The first 7 episodes of Full Metal Panic Season 1 were awesome. Total seriousness, awesome characters, dramatic scenes, it was wonderful. After that, it decided to become like most other shows and started adding in the comedy. Now.. I like comedy.. But I dont like shows that change the entire feel of themselves after 7 episodes. The entire feel of FMP changed after that 7th episode... And thats why I dont like FMP at all now. It annoys me, I dont like what they did with it... But I've seen it, so I'll probably stick around and watch season 2, after all, I am a total mecha head so I cant hate it that much . -BEN-MAN-

As you grow more interested in Mecha Anime, you start to wonder, "Is this all there is? Gundam and Macross?". You stat delving deeper and deeper, realising that so many wonderful shows have been forgotten by the sands of time. You decide it is your duty to try to resurrect these fallen crusaders of Robot Anime. However, the sands of time are rather unforgiving. Sometimes a show was never even released on Laserdisk or VHS. Such is the case with Tokuso Kihei Dorvack. (Special Powered Armor Troop Dorvack). Dorvack is a show that seems like its the 4th lost relative to the Super Dimension anime's. All transforming mecha are designed by Shoji Kawamori, and I have no proof, but all of the secondary mecha really look like Kezutaka Miyatake's work, of Orguss fame, and designer of the Destroids. The animation is very nice, typical of Ashi Production, who also did Goshogun, Baldios, Dancougar, and Machine Robo. If you ever watch a mecha show, and notice a certain 'shiny' aspect to it, much like Dancougar, it was probably done by Ashi Production. The character designs are very nice, with the guys looking cool, and most of the girls looking pretty. The plot is rather simple. A transforming robot troop has been assembled to test out the idea of transorming vehicles. Meanwhile, th Idelians have been wandering around space in their massive ship for thousands of years. Their ship is running out of energy, so they have to find a planet to colonize before their ship gives out and they all die. Their final hope is to settle in our solar system - on earth. The Idelians attack earth and none of the advanced fighter aircraft the earth forces can throw against them slow them down at all. While the Dorvack team are out on a mission, they get jumped by Idelian attack robots. The Dorvack team initiates transformation of their advanced vehicles and then proceed to destroy the enemy in robot form. The Dorvack Team is the only unit capable of winning against the advanced Idelians, and with that, their duty to defend Earth has begun. Of interest, is that Sho Hayami, who voiced Max Jenius and a bunch of other famous character, does the voice for the blue haired 'bishounen' leader of the Idelian forces. The real shine of Dorvack comes from its awesome (if a little odd) mechanical designs. To form a versatile attack force, the Dorvack Team consists of three transforming vehicles, the Calibur (a jeep), the Tulcas (a tank), and the Gazzette (a helicopter), piloted by Musato Mugen, Pierre Bonapatre, and Loise Ovelon, respectively. There is just a certain somethin you have to love about the mecha in Dorvack. To top it off, you never get tired of the mecha action, because in robot mode the Dorvack Team use physical attacks almost as often as using their heavy weaponry, and try to military vehicles, there are several options the mecha can be fitted with depending on their mission. And for all you Powered Armor lovers out there, Dorvack is swamped with some of the most awesome power armor out there. As the military attempts to catch up to the Idelians in technology and firepower, they resort to advanced powered armor infantry, which is always a good change from the typical fighters and tanks. Here are some pictures of the main mecha from Dorvack, from Toybox DX's page on the Dorvack line of toys. http://www.toyboxdx.com/data/takatoku2/ima...5caliburbox.jpg http://www.toyboxdx.com/data/takatoku2/ima...55tulcasbox.jpg http://www.toyboxdx.com/data/takatoku2/ima...5gazettebox.jpg I managed to aquire 5 episodes of this awesome series taped off of TV, in reasonable quality. I have bought two extremely hard to find model and lineart mini-books from it, and I plan to copy my episodes of Dorvack into high quality digital video and upload them to some anime servers at some point, because Im sure people want to see this show, but it is almost impossible to find it. If anyone has any Dorvack merchandise, in particular any of the transforming toys, or model books, I would be very interested in buying them off of you. When I was 8 years old or so, I aquired my first Anime Mecha toy. A die cast simple little un-transformable figure of the Calibur. It was my favorite, and I remember it vividly, until, like a stupid little kid, I lost it. So I kind of have a weird obsession with Dorvack because of that. Thanks for reading this! I cant wait for your replies And for everyone who remembers me - The Rage is back on the page. -BEN-MAN-