Final Vegeta

Actually, I don't think Kawamori was involved that much. Kanno herself only did the opening, so maybe even Kawamori left early. You probably will enjoy this anime, but I think of it as one of the worst ever. I am a sincere anti-fan of Evangelion, but after seeing Rahxephon I had to admit it Eva was a lesser evil. Rahxephon has the SAME characters of Evangelion split in TWO, sharing either flashbacks, roles or antics. Half of characterization each, so that is not much to start with, but they still pretend they were not ordinary characters. The Rahxephon itself is so ugly it has to cover its face. His enemies are worse: totally removing their limbs is not a guarantee for a good fight. And obviosly conventional forces are totally useless, for less reason that Eva had. Rahxephon is the fanboyish version of Eva, like Final Fantasy VIII was to VII. You have the berserk, the pseudo-universal sentences and even the bloodtype blue. What you do not have are pseudo-reasons for what you see on screen and an attempt to being original. And anyway, it is not like Rahxephon tried to be more clear than Eva.

http://io.spaceports.com/~tower/guymodelsh...heetoreades.JPG The main page btw is http://io.spaceports.com/~tower/guymelef.html There you can see the line art of the shovel melef. Seen from the front it doesn't look like a regult, but from the side now I can see some slight resemblances, although only slight FV

Yes, the mine energist episode was #8, but there was no regult, although Escaflowne was done by Kawamori. It was just a work melef. As for quotations, Fushigi no umi no Nadia by Gainax had captain Global. FV

Actually, the hammer is held by Jet Alone Kai. The JA itself was a quotation of Boss Borot from Mazinga Z, so it is obvious it should look ridiculous. I found the serie design ugly like all organic mecha, but now I see bad taste and eye hurting colour scheme are the bases of Eva. FV

Actually, the thing in the chest, when seen from near (at the end of ep. 2), does suspiciously resemble Escaflowne's energists. The whole birdman thing recalls Escaflowne, and even Shin as a character recalls Van. At the same time there seems to be some connections with Arjuna and Macross 7. I view Macross Zero as a symbolic sum of Kawamori's works. FV

Wasn't Isamu using his wing lasers against the ghost?

The story obviously required two fighters build with different philosophies in mind, different but evenly matched. I'll say that the YF-21/VF-22 was overall superior, but it was obviously lot more expensive. Only in anime an elite wins the war alone. The YF-21 had an active stealth superior to the YF-19's one, but after the Super Nova contest VF-19s acquired it. I think that VF-22s have an even more powerful active stealth. Excaliburs look like better fighters than Sturmvogels, though. The YF-19 should be more suited to atmospheric flight, while the YF-21 was likely more suited to space (due to Queadluun inertia vector control system), although it could kick ass even in atmosphere. The Sturmvogels can miss limbs and still fly, and that is a big plus; however, Sturmvogels' cockpits are not protected like those of Excaliburs in Battroid mode. They are the most exposed cockpits of all VFs, dunno why. The YF-21 seems to be more armed than the YF-19. It has lot of micromissiles loaded in the shoulders. The VF-22 has even a dorsal weapon bay in fighter mode, it can be used without losing stealth. Sturmvogels have powerful lasers that can fire both forward than rearward; the use of energy weapons seems to be derivative of its space connotation, even VF-4 and VF-17 have energy weapons on the arms. The laser on the head of YF-19 however should be a bit more powerful than one of those (judging on the number written in the Compendium, REB-30G), and YF-19 has even wing lasers (REB-23, while YF-21's lasers are respectively AAB-7.5 for the head and REB-22 for the arms). Since YF-19 has more powerful engines, that makes sense. As for bds/bdi, I think it had some limitations. To send orders to the mecha it seems that the pilot had to consciously exclude his own body (meditation pose), and that requires lots of concentration, which means not all pilots could do it; plus, that seems to stress the brain a lot. I don't think the real advantages were reaction time (a further stress which seems to be used only in extreme cases, like shown in the movie), but "omni-vision" and simultaneous access to all controls. Personally, I like YF-19 the best because I think it is the kewlest

Have someone already noticed that on the back of the legs there seems to be some additional fuel tanks? It would be the proper place, and since it can't fly it would be helpful to increase operational range

I find Escaflowne the best mecha series for its outstanding mecha merits. One of these is, for istance, the tactics. I don't mean tactics as a group of well co-ordinated soldiers, or the deploy of squadrons. These things fall in a military department I gladly couldn't care less. I mean tactics as the choices of attack, defense and counterattack. These choices don't need to be manifested to watchers ("He did that, now I'll do this"), like it was a Pokemon® match. They are simply there. -When Alseides attack with flamethrower, Van draws back. -When Alseides attack with Klima Claws (from mid-range), Van divert them with his sword. -When Alseides attack with a sword, Van fight with his sword. These are the only chances Van has to hit the enemies. -When Alseides use Stealth Mantle, Van has to find a way to defeat it. And so on. Every action has a different graphic countermeasure. Every move and countermove flows incessantly without they focus on it. Obviously, there can be other animes that do tactics better than Escaflowne, but I still have not found them. Escaflowne established an own awesome battle system. Other than that, there are some aspects which constitute a good mecha series from the point of mecha. I think that Kawamori focus on one aspect over the others in each series. In Macross TV the goal was creating many different type of realistic and somewhat new mechas: there are the variable humanoid mechas, the walking tanks, the non humanoid mechas, and the power armors. There are even numerous spaceships and a lot of non mecha units, like AI controlled fighters, AWACS units and so on. In Macross 7 Kawamori focused on an alternative technology. Starting from an unusual premise sound equipments, somewhat self-parodistic, get a foothold, and for both armies they become now a key factor. This series explores also the way this technology affects people. It's the Murphy's first law of combat: "If it is stupid, and it works, then it wasn't stupid". In Macross Plus, the goal was realism in technology. There are realistic jet manouvres, with some designs which seem like futuristic planes while in fact they are based on existing designs. Even an advanced feature like mind control system is presented in a feasible way, contrary to SRish mind control system. In Escaflowne the focus was on the path of progressive skills. Van must learn not only how to fight well, but even how to countermove some particular weapon. In Escaflowne figures like Balgus and Allen give a sense of scale in how Van is become more skillful. At the same time, there is also the psychological aspect of being a warrior. But talking about mecha is somewhat self-indulgent. I say Escaflowne it is the best series Kawamori has done because of quantity of inter-relations and chara-development, lack of filler scenes (not episodes, scenes) and abundance of plays of simmetry. Escaflowne wins for storytelling. And it has also a nice epic scope indeed, I found in Escaflowne the most beatiful death scenes. Escaflowne is unique in anime because the leading character is in a mecha world but she doesn't ride a mecha; even in similar animes like Rayearth and Leda the protagonists, albeit female, always get a mecha. This is something only Kawamori can do, other authors stick the protagonist in the best mecha, whether he is actually a good pilot or not. Escaflowne annoying, predictable? Well, every show I know has had someone talking good about it and someone talking bad about it. It is sorta good that are personal points of view so different, but usually they are too personal to be really meaningful. Escaflowne weird? The Hell if Kawamori don't like to be weird In his works everything is feasible according to the premises, and there are a lot of actual technology undeniably feasible, but Kawamori like to show reality from a different point of view with an own sense of wonder. Even when his trust in technology was at his best, Kawamori never portrayed that technology alone could win. Realistic Robot? Well, the ones in Escaflowne are mostly realistic even for our world. That's why Escaflowne isn't a proper fantasy but rather a steampunk. They simply aren't military mechas. The whole premise of totally eliminate guns is one way to resolve gun combat. Star Wars had espers diverting laser beams with light swords, Gundam had Minowsky particles reducing combat to sight range, Evangelion had psychic barriers against ranged attacks and Matrix had limbo style moves to evade bullets. I think that Americans have an hystorical warrior figure, the cowboy. I am not American, I don't think that guns are that cool. Deadly close combat is the most spectacular one, but it's not always justifyed; in Escaflowne it was. Final note: as Einstein said, "I don't know with what World War III will be fought (Valkyries?), but the fourth will be fought with clubs, and the fifth with Guymelefs" I could rambling for hours talking about Escaflowne, about his meanings, about some little details that can't be learned on Compendium, about the bounds between Escaflowne and the other works of Kawamori, but I think that this would be too OT in this forum, and besides I am not English mothertongue so I don't know if I am intelligible enough. I knew that not all like Escaflowne, but Kawamori's animes themselves give me the strength to go against consolidated critic systems. My favourite character is Basara (he teachs us that being a badass is not about killing people) Besides, this thing is sort of funny because Kawamori is retaliating: Shin Kudo is the Van Fanel of Macross As for proto-Escaflowne, on www.mahq.net I saw that even VF-9 and VA-3 were intended to be in it (Kawamori has so much designs and so few animes). There is even an unseen mecha, small enough in size to be an obvious cannon fodder, which transforms in a YAK-36/F-104: maybe it was originally one of the lightweight VF after VF-4 Knowing Imagawa I think though that Air Chronicles would have been not only medieval, but even wuxia About Kawamori's new anime, I have liked every work of Kawamori I have seen, for it had been done by Kawamori (ie, I dislike Macross II. Even the Escaflowne movie had only little Kawamori in it). I am a gifted, a blessed. So, everything Kawamori will do, I'll like. By the way, was it an Escaflowne sequel, and I would be glad of it, I think Kawamori will do it Macross way, that is Hitomi and Van won't be in it. This is the best thing to do, and Kawamori knows it and already did it.