Final Vegeta

No, it was even canceled from Compendium. It became an "alternate dimension" mecha. We have to keep remembering it the mecha that once was there for the next generation. FV

Well, it's a new Valkyrie, and like the VF-17 the transformation works. I still think wing's leading edge should'n be saw-tooth, though, but except for this the Fighter is nice and has the savage look of a prehistoric bird of prey. The Battroid has indeed thin limbs. At the end I think it looks like a "first wave" enemy that should have been replaced by powered-up versions. The pointy head also makes think of a Nazi grunt. The SV-52 maybe would have had a more "heroic"/"arch-enemy" look. Overall I think the SV-51 really shines over others for its real world inspired design and realistic looking. FV

The problem is that as a transforming toy Valkyries are hard to make and thus expensive and often they simply won't look as good as the anime. Gundam mecha design helped in that sense. FV

In this regards you are right, even though if you had to name a country which has an army bigger than the US you would find some of them: North Korea, Iran, Pakistan... Actually, I doubt the US can't anymore. The dollar was strong at first because it was tied with gold, and then it was strong because it was still tied with oil. Now Iran and other countries (like Iraq) have started to sell oil in Euro, and US dollar is falling against the euro while gold prices are rising. Some economists have already started worrying the US dollar may become paper poo in the very next years if the US doesn't change its politics (which is not gonna do). During WWII US economy was 50% weapon making and 50% agriculture. Now it's 2% agriculture, 18 industry and 80% services. A soldier doesn't consume services, so even a world war isn't likely to do any good to US economy. I believe the empire game is over for the US. There is always someone trying to conquer the world. One century it was Spain, following century was France, then United Kingdom, now United States' turn. Everyone lasted a century, then it couldn't grow anymore and collapsed. There is no reason to think history has changed that much. Starting a WWIII would be easy, though. Someone just need to give weapons to Arab countries to attack Israel, then US would intervene and attack even Iran. Now, Iran was chosen by China as its strategic oil reserves, so that would bring even China in the game (the other way to harass China are North Korea and Taiwan). Now, US has key firms gaining profit from China (including even weapon making). If China chose to freeze US assets that would be the final blow to US economy, unless US would do as it did during WWII. Since news may differs from country to country every analisis I found which isn't based on real knowledge of the history of propaganda myths like the good army, the good treatment of prisoners, the good treatment of conquered lands and the "we are the best ones" that every country that call itself civilized got, such analisis can't made good guesses about real future outcomes. A good war must be swift and "luminous". Nazi army was crushed by Russians at Stalingrad battle. WWII was already lost before D-Day, but both US and Nazi military might was boosted (and Japanese were strong but they have an embargo on their oil). Iraq had the weakest army of the region after the embargo, but I've heard someone said Saddam's was supposed to be one of the strongest army of the world. Now the US has its two "major theatres of war" already occupied, so for now it won't able to do much else because it just lacks men. Besides this it just doesn't seem Americans have an imperial spirit. The British fought on in World War I accumulating over 900,000 souls for heaven or hell, with over 3 million casualties. Entire villages and towns in England were denuded of their manhood. The “cowardly” French suffered even more horrific numbers killed and wounded. It doesn't seem Americans won't stand such death toll unless there are directly invaded, which isn't likely to happen if not by land from Canada or Mexico. Third world countries are to be considered the only countries that a civilized nation can attack or install a dictatorship into. Enemy fighters are most likely to go down in the first round, after this you just need bombing and drones are more than enough for that. No-one should dare to attack a big fish country to which you can sell your products. Buy the way, US Federal Reserve is owned mostly by London banks. Actually neo-cons are not gonna let NATO or AMPO fall. They like a net of global control as it is, and they would even like to plant more nodes. P.S.: About the Balkan threat, that was simply propaganda. Americans had to feel compelled to intervene simply because of the military-industrial complex. Europeans weren't much worried, aside from a matter of oil ducts. FV

I was not saying that he chose to do an almost literal retelling of Japanese myths, but the cultural basis is the key in understanding small details that go unnoticed. For instance, in Escaflowne the earth dragon is a lindworm, an oriental type of dragon. The pearl as a source of power for a dragon inspired Dragon Ball. Izanagi and Izanami myth is how Bible was framed in Evangelion, that's why there is a spear. The Birdman is a name that comes from Eastern Island rituals, even though it doesn't have anything to do with Macross Zero. FV

Since we are talking about a Japanese author, I think we have to go for his cultural roots... Izanagi and Izanami. FV

Mostly non-variable mecha (i.e. destroids and ghosts) and spaceships, but also many other things like YF-19's and YF-21's cockpit, protodevilns, bird people, he even refined some of Kawamori's design. In Macross there are more Miyatake's designs than Kawamori's. FV

I am kinda broking the rule of not replying, but I think the idea was a flame over Macross 7, and this is not. The aspect of Satan as we know it was taken from Greek Pan, the god of Nature. Baal was the god of sun of another religion who was turned into a demon by Jews. Also Tiamat was a mother goddess, a positive diety, who was turned into another demon. It was a common practice at the time, I suppose. The serpent was actually the most canniest beast, but it was not evil in the sense we mean it. Satan was one of the "sons of men" who tested the love -err, what is Giobbe's name in English- had for God. Christianism fashioned itself with many flavours to lure peoples. In the beginning was the Word because the Word is the Greek "logos". The idea of resurrection also met resistance with Greeks because they find unrational that one should resurrect with an aged body. Take Christmas. It was chosen 25 December as its date because that was the feast of Mithra. At the end Christianism's victory over Mithra cult was simply political though (if you don't live in Italy maybe you can't understand it. Italy is the country of political bribes, although a lot of people are tired of this. We've had 56 governments in 50 years, no leader has yet exhausted his mandate by law terms). While English countries had Halloween, Christianism replaced it with the day of mourn for our dead. Now Halloween is replacing this festivity again, after all it was the original one. At one times Popes even sold indulgences to "atone" sins. Since Hell was too cruel they invented even the Purgatory. It seems one Pope had interests in the market of fish so he invented a long period where nobody was allowed to eat meat, except those who bought permission from the Church. When Rockefellers bought Britannica these kind of details disappeared from it, who knows why. There was even the legend of a woman Pope (the rule didn't allow for this) who was discovered because she bore a child. This kind of satire has always plenty of reasons behind it. At the end Popes' best weapon was that they prevented people from reading Bible, which was also written in Latin. When press was invented and people started reading the Bible in their language Protestantism was born. Obviously Popes persecuted it as they persecuted Valdeses, Donatists and other "alternative" Christians. The same happens in Arab countries, I've heard; one of the things they censore from internet asides from porn are religious discussions, history teaches that there may be scisms. In Italy the news they found Jesus' brother James' ossary in 2002 is not yet arrived. Officially there were different Mary in the gospels, each one with his children. Unofficially it was the same Mary who had at least 7 children. The movie "The Snatch" also speaks of a mistranslation of "young woman" into "virgin". Now in Germany they don't speak of Catholicism anymore, just Christianism. In Italy the Pope is still ruling firmly though. Well, yes, Zoroastrism. Now that I think better of it, maybe Christianism cannibalized it. Philip Dick wrote that according to Judaism Good and Evil are just two players of a game. The Good purifies the Evil and the Evil purifies the Good. Theorically there should be even a purpose in this game. If this is Judaism view on it, it looks kinda like a Taoism. After all ancient cultures have a common Indoeuropean origin. I came to think they knew the world better than modern Westerners; if Kawamori believes it then it's good enough for me. Hitler? He evaded taxes. Besides this he was just a puppet claimed to be an economic genius when in fact money came from abroad. By the way, have teachers taught you in your school that his body was never found despite everyone says he commited suicide? One day I have to explain you what really happened in those 2000+ years of war and lies. Can you tell me one thing? Is it true that for protestants success and money are considered signs of the love of God? This seems to be called Calvinism. In the Simpsons there was a joke about San Francesco being the most over-rated saint. The saint who gave all his wealth to poors. I took that like Murdoch's propaganda, like the anti-French statements. Evil has the power of looking and speaking like Good to fools (and it would still talk of peace and liberty), and more importantly to lure people who follows it into thinking they are Good too. Fatima legend says that the next Pope will be the Anti-Christ. Not someone dressed like Marilyn Manson. FV

Err... yes, it's a typical sci-fi blunder. FV

I like when Basara sings Totsugeki Love Heart. It feels like his mecha is at max power. Signs of power are not necessarily how many mecha you can destroy; FLCL does it best, as signs of power there is the color red, the symbol, the chainring, the guitar. When you see the signs of power chosen by that anime you know a character is powerful. When Popeye ate spinach you know he was become powerful. Popeye episode's storyline is the basics of everything episodic: a crisis followed by a resolution. In Popeye the tide turned when Popeye ate spinach. This is not the only approach, but it may be exalting. In Macross 7 it's funny to see the same thing happening even though there is not a real resolution as we would mean it. Enemies didn't go away because Basara sang, but the sudden change in music influenced the mood. It's weird, but I like it. I also like the VF-19KAI, not as design (although it's not that bad), but as an "alternative" unit. I'd always liked to make an abstract-like chessboard wargame using Kawamori's mecha anime, and I like that all "units" has kind of different abilities other than attacking. I find Macross 7 flawed but I liked its originality of this hero who sings. It's over the top, but I find it really funny. I like in the first episodes of Macross 7 how Basara faced different situations and managed to sing every time to solve them. Yet I still think things could be handled better despite this is a long series (and despite it clearly aimed to nod old Super Robot anime), and that's why I think Macross 7 is an original but mediocre series. "Concentration" would have improved Macross 7. 49 episodes are too much. This is mostly a comedy series which relies on cameos, like Veffidas cameos, flower girl cameos, Michael cameos, tongue-in-cheek jokes like "Karaoke Ninja" and the like. Recursivity is a good trick for a joke, but you must vary minor details everytime, and 40 variants of the same gag are frightening even to be thought. I too would have liked if there were more and longer "standard" action scenes, and especially if they were Macross usual style of action. In other Macross Valkyries don't take all these missiles without blowing, and this is why I think this is director Amino's work. It's weird how mecha walk this slow in Macross 7 compared to other Macross, but obviously speed of animation depends on budget. Overall though I liked the story and I really liked the ending, with Basara walking away like nothing really important happened, after all the times he sang to make something happen. I really like his attitude. The Protodeviln design really sucked. I wish they could be remade DYRL style. The spiritia is presented with Hollywood-style effects, but India Yoga adepts believe in "Prana", which is a Sanskrit word literally meaning 'life-force' the invisible bio-energy or vital energy that keeps the body alive and maintains a state of good health. Polynesians called it "mana", Chinese called it "Chi" and they use this principle in acupunture; in Japan the energy is called Ki and it from this word that Reiki is named. In Hebrew is "Ruach", in islamic countries "Barraka". Some individual healers have called it Animal Magnetism, Archaeus. Doctor Reich called it "Orgone", and in the 50ies he and his works were persecuted in the US and he died in jail. Reich said that while there was good orgone (POR) there was also some bad orgone (NOR). He created a device which could provoke rain by sweeping bad orgone out of the sky, and it is said plants started growing immediately after that. Now, what Reich may have achieved is likely to be simply a myth, but in modern scientific theories unify all atomic interactions as waves (see this for example. There is also an explanation of why black holes can't exist. In fact even Hawking recently saw something was wrong), and this waves are also used by cells to comunicate with each other. The influence of Earth magnetic field in humans may be grossly misunderstood, for istance. You could say that some kind of high frequency waves are the good orgone while some kind of low frequency waves are the bad orgone. It does even make sense. Consider another famous scientific case, the central dogma of molecular biology which states: 1. The DNA replicates its information in a process that involves many enzymes: replication. 2. The DNA codes for the production of messenger RNA (mRNA) during transcription. 3. In eucaryotic cells, the mRNA is processed (essentially by splicing) and migrates from the nucleus to the cytoplasm. 4. Messenger RNA carries coded information to ribosomes. The ribosomes "read" this information and use it for protein synthesis. This process is called translation. Proteins do not code for the production of protein, RNA or DNA. The basic idea was that one gene coded one protein. Recently, the human genoma project found only 20,000~25,000 genes in human DNA. Scientists expected to find some 100,000 genes, because that was the number of human proteins. So few genes means that human DNA is 99% similar to that of a mouse. The genome of Amoeba dubia, a unicellular creature as simple as yeast, dwarfs the human genome by 200-fold. In fact central dogma is WRONG. Some scientists already discovered it years ago. DNA is just some kind of notepad for the cell; life created DNA and not the opposite. Proteins do help coding for the productions of DNA. With alternative splicing informations are rearranged and from a single gene you can get thousands of proteins. This is also the reason why GMOs are not safe: you won't ever be able to modify a specific information, alternative splicing will mix informations up. GMOs technology is based on a science which is 40 years old. But then, you have a lot of patents, and you can't throw them away. In fact, Monsanto does GMO grain so that they can resist herbicide Roundup, which is done by the same Monsanto. Actually, the modified genes can spread to the weed you are fighting so they can resist Roundup too, but that's another problem. Another sign that central dogma is wrong was the discover of prions (short for proteinaceous infectious particle) which are infectious self-reproducing protein structures lacking nucleic acid. How do they reproduct is still a mistery if you stick with the old theory. Many scientists prefer to do it, or maybe they are not scientists but they are simply paid to look like them. This tendency is going on even in other sectors of science. Try to imagine the full picture. The pharmaceutical industry turned it into a racket of epic proportions. The AIDS is the most notorious case. Article: In South Africa, which with some five million HIV/AIDS infections has the highest AIDS caseload in the world, the disease kills more than 600 people each day, activists say. Despite the mounting death toll, few public figures in South Africa or other African countries have personally come forward to say that AIDS has affected them or their families. Deaths from the disease are usually attributed to a "long illness," pneumonia, or other secondary causes. How silly for these Africans to refuse to officially demonstrate by numbers Africa is the country most plagued by AIDS. But, then, how can you recognize AIDS? What are its symptoms? Wikipedia states that this diseases are commonly associated with AIDS: *Candidiasis, disseminated or of the oesophagus and/or lungs *Coccidiodomycosis, disseminated or extrapulmonary *Cryptococcosis, extrapulmonary *Cryptosporidiosis, chronic intestinal *Cytomegalovirus (CMV) disease, disseminated or CMV retinitis *Herpes simplex virus (HSV) infection, chronic or HSV bronchitis, pneumonitis or esophagitis *Histoplasmosis, either disseminated or extrapulmonary *HIV-related dementia or encephalopathy *Kaposi's sarcoma (KS) and Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus-related diseases including primary effusion and multicentric Castleman's disease *Chronic intestinal isosporiasis *AIDS-related lymphoma, Burkitt's or primary lymphoma of the brain *Mycobacterium avium complex (MAC) infection or M. kansasii infection, disseminated or extrapulmonary Mycobacterium tuberculosis, disseminated, any site *Mycobacterium, other species, disseminated or extrapulmonary *Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia (PCP) *Progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy (PML) *Recurrent salmonella septicaemia *Neurological toxoplasmosis. Plus there are many other symptoms, like diarrhea, loss of body weight, sleeplessness, feeling tired and such. -or- one can be asymptomatic, meaning that one can be perfectly healthy. How do you recognize how many people in Africa died by AIDS every year? You do a poll, asking to 100 persons how many of them have AIDS? You really test some 25 millions of corpses to find out if they had HIV? Or you simply think that they don't die because of pneumonia, they must have been killed by AIDS. You add all those who have died of some other disease and you get a big number. That should do it for raise funding. The reality about AIDS is that AZT killed a lot of people, but then, Prozac can urge some people to commit suicide, there were lawsuits about this and Prozac is still sold. You can easily tell who is behind World Health Organization. When questions arises about a medicine, tests have already shown years before that medicine could seriously damage health, and then it was patented. While HIV is true retrovirus, like many else, there is no such thing as AIDS. People dies for something like tubercolosis or other lethal diseases but it is always called AIDS. Then SARS was invented. On Italian TV a doctor said that the disease spreads only from birds to humans but not from humans to humans; maybe he has still to discover something more. Then it was invented ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder), although I don't recall having heard much of it in Italy; the medicine used to counter it however was supposed to be banned in Italy due to collateral effects (among which there was dependance). This is the real face of privatization. I don't think you would imagine what defense contractors do to raise profit margin. The same kind of things Big Pharma do, but with different names. This poses also an interesting view on the difference between cultures. Western culture was invented by Catholic Church from something that was not the Bible. The Catholic Church created the Devil and the Hell. The Bible created the myth of Evil as opposed to Good. It turned into a brainwashing experience that really helped wars, but that's another matter. Easterners saw that everything was connected. The Yin and the Yang were the two principles that constitutes everything, but every Yin has a bit of Yang and every Yang has a bit of Yin. Everything has a function for the whole. Italian doctor Basaglia said that madness is diversity or fearing diversity. Madness is a human condition as much as reason. A society so called civil should accept madness as much as reason, instead it turns madness into a disease to eliminate it. Once upon a time they said diseases were carried by evil spirits. Then Pasteur came and people started talking about bacteria. Not everything could be blamed on bacteria so people find out even virus. And now there are things even virus can't be blamed of so people discovered smaller evil spirits called prions. Stopping for a second, what was the reason of being for diseases? Why Nature should bother creating them? Why they keep multiplying? Dr. Ryke Geerd Hamer is a German doctor with his own practice in Rome, Italy. His 17-year old son Dirk was shot while on holiday in the Mediterranean. Three months later, Dirk died and shortly after, Dr. Hamer, who had been healthy all his life, but who was utterly devastated by this catastrophe, found he had testicular cancer. Rather suspicious about this coincidence, he set about doing research on the personal histories of cancer patients to see whether they had suffered some shock, distress or trauma before their illness. For what he discovered now he is in jail in France. The New Medicine of Hamer "Through the millennia, humanity has more or less consciously known that all diseases ultimately have a psychic origin and it became a "scientific" asset firmly anchored in the inheritance of universal knowledge; it is only modern medicine that has turned our animated beings into a bag full of chemical formulas." The disease is a special biological response to an unusual situation, and when the ‘shock’ situation is resolved, the body sets about returning to normality. The greatest example of this is cancer. In Italy scientists talk about "kankropoli", although you won't never heard about it on TV. "Tangentopoli" (city of bribes) was a scandal about Italian political class, Kankropoli is the scandal about medicine for cancer that turned into another racket. It's funny how we can't heal cancer but so much is known about substances that provoke cancer. An istance of this happened when Italian ex-health minister Veronesi said GMOs could heal diseases and blindness. He said there was an insect which left on grains a mildew which was a powerful carcinogenic (in fact I don't think it is safe to bet GMOs always work against insects, I think this is a disinformation). Don't get the picture wrong. According to Hamer a disease is a reflection of your psychological state, and can harm you if you don't try to heal it. Also, reparation fase can be sometimes more harmful than the disease. Besides this disease are born also from intoxication of external agents (like pollution or vaccines) or from genetical causes. Western medicine is still useful, it just has to acknowledge that immunitary system is not first weak then strong, immunitary system is what cause microbes to attack human body and then order them to heal it. But then, Western medicine should also acknowledge most of its drugs are potentially harmful. At the end Western medicine heal symptoms, not the disease. It's like the joke about the evidence of malfunction where the evidence is removed. I don't know if it's true or false, but Hamer's theory explains Nature better. Also Masanobu Fukuoka (who was quoted in Earth Girl Arjuna) did this in agricultural department. At the end the world as we know it is false and invented. A different version of history is taught in every country (someone wrote a book on history schoolbooks). The official version of everything, even only in the scientific department, often doesn't make sense, and there is a reason for this, there is also a reason for what official version can't find reasons for. Gandhi said: "To me, Truth is God and there is no way to find Truth except the way of nonviolence". Wars after all are just a lie after another ("A man never lies as much as after a hunt, during a war, and before an election." Otto von Bismarck), and you fight lies with Truth. Gandhi is (conveniently) remembered only for his peace manifestations, yet he even thought of a model of civil society where love and truth works as in private as in public institutions, where there is not such lame excuse as "I am just doing my work". Listening to much to the media and people will side with oppressors against the oppressed, and they will also grow anti-intellectualism to blind themselves so that they won't see the full picture. I think Gandhi would have liked Basara, although he could have find him noisy. FV

The subbing. No subber knew how to spell AFOS until the name was written in a shot. I suppose it's some kind of acronym (something like "Alien Flying Object S..."), but officially no explanation was given. I don't know what you are meaning, but the anime shows he survived. I think this is the kind of detail authors didn't think of, but it's a good rational explanation. FV

Exactly. Compendium states: During its enemy search operation for Supervision Army survivors, the fleet happened to detect traces of an Supervision Army gun destroyer's (Macross's) defold reaction from 10 light years away and came in pursuit. Thinking better of it, the AFOS folded, not defolded, so that should exclude it completely. FV

That's a good one. I didn't mean to support MS. Not that much, and after the first time for the site you just click on the picture and nothing else. In the long term is not bad. FV

They look like CG even for me. FV

While as a system an active stealth could be technically implemented in every mecha of Macross, in the description of Monster MkI found in Nanashi's website it is said the Monster was too hot so it couldn't be concealed and even flares didn't work. Maybe the same was true for Koenig Monster. It definitively needs air support. Maybe it does. What space really improves is speed, since a steady thrust turns into a steady acceleration. Turns something in space requires you also to cancel your existing vector, that is the direction where you were going. Agility is affected by the number of vector thrusters and their power, but the Monster is really cumbersome. Logic would say that especially in space bigger things would be slower that smaller things, even if in anime the opposite works. FV

I think explanation will be given in the Compendium. Usually Kawamori doesn't give all details in his anime. FV

I think my method is the simplest: with IE I go to "internet options" then "protection" tab then I paste Nanashi's site URL in "websites with restrictions" (I don't know the exact English names). Now (after refresh) the mouse can right-click again because the applet doesn't work anymore. Optionally you can play with settings for the whole internet. Enjoy. FV P.S.: I too can't go online every time, anyway I just keep them in my harddisk "for private purpose". I think Nanashi does a wonderful work.

The Yamato version has too long legs in Battroid. It seems also a problem of Bandai VF-19. I think this gimmick would work nice to shorten legs in Battroid mode, but this model appeares to have a swappable crotch. AFAIK no YF-19 toys yet made the crotch transformation right. This 3D version tries but it has a fugly Battroid mode. Overall there are also problems in Fighter mode to keep the profile low since the rear knee and the chest should share the same area. The SHE version uses several gimmicks to make up for this. I think the YF-19 overall has enough anime magic that it won't never look like the anime, but gimmick over gimmick someone might get a model big enough to work, and maybe even keep the transformation smooth. FV

It would be nice if there was a scene of a Battle 7 with two gunships. FV

In Aquarion he is not the mechanic designer even though he should be the director. In Eureka 7 maybe yes, but his role seems more limited. Can't really say I like these mecha for the moment. The second one looks like an Eva clone crossed with Digimon. Aquarion seems more decent, and I hope it has a good story even if it seems a SR. FV

Before the thread dies I wanted to make some notes. First of all "magic" is a term which I find an improper and misleading label. Kawamori expressed some of his ideas about the deceptions born from language in both Arjuna and Macross Zero. In Macross Zero the leaf is called "leaf" even if it once had different names, but ultimately not even "leaf" is leaf's true name, yet civilization sticked with "leaf", even if this doesn't help understanding the leaf better. In some way this may be a reference to Hindu principle "Truth is One, though the Sages know it as Many." — The Rig Veda (Book I, Hymn CLXIV, Verse 46) Hindu thought distinguishes itself by strongly encouraging tolerance for different beliefs since temporal systems cannot claim sole understanding of the one transcendental Truth (I have heard however that there were some wars over religion in India). I associate "Magic" with sword & sorcery. In sci-fi settings usually you talk about "psionics". Basically it's just a matter of canons: magic is usually associated with magical artifacts (wards, pendants) while psionics is born from the mind (making a person become the magic tool). Fantasy has mythical monsters, undeads, golems while sci-fi has aliens, genetically engineering, mutants and machines. I think that from a cultural point of view, for Westerners fantasy is about good and evil, while sci-fi is mostly about truth and lies (can aliens and machines be considered true human? This was a point in Macross and Macross Plus). In Japanese anime you can see that their magic (even within technologically settings) is represented by something like magic seals and ghosts or oni, while instead of ESP there is something related to ki or spiritual force. I don't know exactly how Japanese see these things; I think they regard them as manifestation of nature. I've read an essay where someone said anime magical girls are often in trance, because they act only as a medium of a greater force. The same mecha are kami of nature that lend a hand to the character (the character in himself doesn't have any power at all); it goes as far that many of them are actually gods in their anime. I percieve a lot of mecha like an energy oni covered by a metal shell. Seeing Evangelion I think that's really their cultural image: mecha trap in themselves the very essence of atomic bomb. On this side I think that Kawamori really differs here more than other authors, and this is true even in Macross Zero; Valkyries are more tools than kami. Now that I've mentioned about canons, it's obvious to say that Macross 7 was less conventional on these canons, at least for Westerners: on one side the "psionics" have the same visual canon of energy weapons (which in Japan is no problem because ki beams are also considered energy beams), on the other hand the power must be "triggered" by singing (again, Japan is the country that invented karaoke, so they have no trouble with that). Macross 7 unluckily got together some potential flaws of "uncanonicity": 1) colored beams and no particular emphasis on physics 2) battle not resolved by defeating the enemy. No real point in having a better mecha 3) wacky jokes and mecha. Singularly one of these points may have been handed with only some mild protests, but together from the beginning they may be hard to swallow. I blame this on director Amino, while I consider the basic ideas behind Macross 7 still coming from Kawamori, and indeed handed better in Macross Zero. On the other side, Macross 7 also doesn't really have state-of-the-art animation, it's a long series so it's easy to have problems with pacing and direction is not really inspiring. At the end I don't consider it a master work, but it's different enough to deserve a mention. Talking about troubles with accepting Macross 7, I would say that, ignoring the butt-ugliness of Grabil (by the way, I ignored the existence of this Gabil), the main trouble may be the colored beams. I think that, if authors instead went for making them work as a kind of magnetism (that is, invisible to eye), they would be accepted more easily. I said magnetism because, while the classical four atomic interactions have their official carriers (photons, gravitons, W bosons, gluons), apparently the magnetism has only something like an "unknown vessels of force" (in fact no-one has yet observed any graviton). In scorning Macross 7 many people don't know that our current physics, medicine, economic system and other things still don't work well. From times to times someone discovers something that would force to review a whole system; these men obviously gain a poor end. Ezra Pound tried to warn people about international bankers, and he ended up in a Federal institution for the insane without even a trial. In the case of floating stones, two facts are worthy mentions: one is that if a respectable English professor said on TV that there is a place on Earth where rocks float, millions of people, at least in the US, would believe rocks could really float. The other fact is that the history of humanity presents numerous cases of giant structures like Machu Pichu whose stone blocks were carried from kilometers afar. Actually this was done even in this century, see Coral Castle. I think Kawamori refers to this kind of myths since there was a drawing of pyramids and Stonehenge. How Coral Castle was done it's not my business, though. Now, the question of "magic". Well, first of all it's not the same thing in Macross 7 and in Macross Zero. In Macross 7 it's something so explicit it's even used in battles. In Macross Zero instead is mainly background, and its role was to mean that not everything can be understood by current science, and in this sense I feel OverTechnology should obey to Clark's law. Macross Zero is good because it compensates supernatural elements with hard edge technology, but in its way it's even more supernatural than Macross 7, which insisted only in a concept of life energy without making it a real miracle. SDF Macross was shortened and then lengthened; someone says authors chose to change the plot that should have been after Earth's final battle. I am not sure if this is true, but I think it's likely, and when Macross characters would have found some Protoculture ruins, as it was supposed they would have explored the galaxy, Kawamori surely would have inserted some OverTechnology jokes of near magic technology. Then Kawamori really changed his mind. This period is not after Macross Plus but before Macross Plus, during Kawamori's trip to India. At first there was simply Hindu-style minor designs (like Gabil), but now Kawamori seems to study even Indian philosophy. He indeed got more extreme; Macross Zero is akin to shamanism and spiritism, and in its way it's even more "magical" than Macross 7. There is an interesting article written by Kawamori himself which you can find in Escaflowne movie's booklet (there are scans in Tsubasa no Kami's site). For the development of "supernaturality" in Kawamori, it is worth remembering that Japanese culture already has its kind of "superstitions", like believing that when something has existed from a long time it gains a life on its own (the aforementioned spiritism), or sneezing when someone is talking about you. And then there are simply many other anime shows to compete with. In a general sense every show usually takes its degrees of liberty in representing an "embellished" reality. A character could keep firing even if he should have exhausted his ammunition/missiles. Everything can be blowed up. Some typical scenes in American movies are opening a door by shooting at the door lock, or erasing the content of an encrypted CD if you fail hacking it; this wouldn't work in reality, but it's not questioned in fiction because the public sees an action and then a reaction, and anything is fine with this. Conjurers use similar tricks: they pretend they are putting a coin from one hand into another and instead they are keeping it in the first hand, yet the public is watching what is doing the other one. Everything in anime from physics to character development can have gaps or be stretched. This can't be claimed as "magic" (even though we are no more in a realistic domain), and at the end I won't try to convince people there was "magic" in SDF Macross (even because I don't see it as magic) however I think it's more a "bon ton" in willing suspension of disbelief than anything else (and in this regards Macross 7 was ill-behaved). Macross Plus did indeed added mind control (input and output of informations from the mind). Wouldn't the next step be mind control without helmets, or would it be too big a leap? Then after this you can have telepathy. In real world growth of economy doesn't mean a good thing in itself, yet even Macross has to "grow" adding more and more new things; you could argue it's not becoming better, but it has grown. For another note, Macross Zero's ending presents clear staples of Kawamori. For istance a lot of Kawamori's works, including even Macross Plus, has a giant last opponent. Lastly, about Sharon Apple: Philip Dick wrote in an article that what you are worth depends on how much you give when one needs it. "When you give, when you really give, nothing comes back". For him the machine, the droid, is not a matter of being mechanical. The droid is the one that stands still and watches you suffer without doing anything (this is enforced in the principles behind the Voigt-Kampf test in Do Droid Dream Of Electric Sheep). It may happen that sometimes a machine stops its cycle to help you, but that's not the point. Dick was painfully worried that humans are becoming machines. Sharon Apple maybe could pass Turing tests after Turing tests; in the future maybe machines will, too. The conception of what a human is should not be taken for granted; indeed even now dehumanizing use of name calling is spread by media. A male mind revolves around the concept of justice, a child is pissed when someone is not playing by the rules. A male mind is good in abstract thinking. Yet media depict as signs of manhood guns, cigarettes and artificially pumped muscles. It reminds me of 1984, where most people ended up small, fat and dumb. PS: Before talking about Pink Peckers, you should mind your own neighbourhood FV

I think you should read at least this essay: Prison of self consciousness FV

Actually, IIRC it's no big merit, I read it on Compendium's chronology FV

Have you ever heard of liquid metal? This obviously doesn't mean the Macross one is technology of near future or ever feasible But then, maybe I mistook your question. FV

Have you ever heard of liquid metal? FV