Gubaba

I dunno...I find it hard to recommend the series to anybody these days. Personally, I thought Ender's Game was great and Speaker for the Dead was better. But Xenocide wasn't as good as the previous books, and Children of the Mind was the least of the quartet. None of them were bad, mind you, I just didn't like the last two books as much, as I was glad that Card finished the story there, rather than continuing ad infinitum. Then Ender's Shadow came out, and I read it and liked it...okay. I thought it was better than Children of the Mind, at any rate. And so I picked up Shadow of the Hegemon, and never finished it. By now the series has gotten so long and unwieldy that diving back into it is a daunting prospect...and with diminishing returns on every volume, I don't see why I'd want to dive back into it. I reread the first two books every once in a while, but that's about it.

Hmm...since I know you like Macross and Orguss, I'm going to tailor my recommendations a bit. You may have read these before (none of them are obscure); if so, I apologize. 1. Rendezvous with Rama (Arthur C. Clarke): a massive 50 km spaceship (with apparently no life forms aboard) approaches earth, and the astronauts who happen to be the closest to it are sent to investigate it before it gets too close to the sun. Don't bother with the sequels, which Clarke merely edited, but the first is a must-read. 2. October the First Is Too Late (Sir Fred Hoyle): A strange catastrophe occurs which results in different geographical areas of the earth simultaneously occupying different time periods: only England and Hawaii remain in the "present"; western and central Europe are in the midst of WWI, North America is in the 1700s, and Asia is nothing but a massive sheet of glass. I really wonder if the Artland guys read this book before they came up with the idea for Orguss... 3. The Galactic Center Saga, starting with In the Ocean of Night (Gregory Benford): Benford is an astrophysicist, and a lot of the science that ends up in his books is genuine, or a not-very-far extrapolation. This series begins in the near future, with (again) the discovery of what appears to be an asteroid but is actually an alien spaceship, and then goes farther and farther into the future. There's a space elevator in the second book, and by the end of the six-book series, tens of thousands of years have passed, and some humans (some of the last remaining...?) make a desperate attempt to reach the galactic center, where all sorts of surprises await them, including what happens to time, space, and the fabric of reality itself so near the massive black hole that resides at the core of our galaxy. Again, these aren't my favorite books of all time (I just read the Hoyle book this week...WAY too soon to tell if it's a favorite or not), but they seem to be along the lines of the stuff you're currently enjoying. And oh yeah...if you haven't read Asimov's Foundation Trilogy, do so immediately. Just the trilogy, mind you. EDIT: And the first three Dune books, as well.

Yeah. The first one (as the Youtube uploader said) is from Mari's 1984 half-live/half-studio, kinda/sorta greatest hits collection, Variée. The second is the 15th Anniversary version from the Minmay-Mylene duet single (Minmay version, of course).

Okay, I got a ticket for the Nyan Cli screening at Ikebukuro Sunshine Cinema for Friday, November 26 at 7:40 PM. If anyone's interested in meeting up, let me know.

No, I think it's just because May'n's favorite snack is Taiyaki.

Yeah, because May'n's favorite snack is Taiyaki.

Hey, me too!

Cripes...how long do you have off? I think it'd take at least a week or more to barrel through everything.

I think that's more due to how old we were when we watched the original series, as opposed to how good it was. Not that I'm saying it was anything other than amazing, of course (I wouldn't be here if it weren't). And yeah...for me, there's no time like yer first time, right? So SDFM is by far my favorite. For some reason, though, I can't really separate the '80s Macross releases in my head...it all seems like one big sundae...SDFM TV is the ice cream, DYRL is the hot fudge sauce, and FB2012 is the cherry on top. I'm also feeling that way (so far) about Frontier and its movie edition. And yeah, I'm the first to admit that I'm massively uncritical when it comes to Macross...I've found something to enjoy about nearly every Macross production. But it was Plus the drew me back into Macross after the horrendous disappointment of Macross II. And it was Frontier that inspired me to start becoming more active in the Macross fandom, so those would probably have to be ranked pretty high for me.

Weirdly enough, I've also been rewatching Orguss... I started a few weeks ago, got through the first four episodes, and then got sidetracked...but I'm picking it up again. Just watched episode six last night. EDIT: As for Renato teaching about the space elevator, I was there while he regaled both me and one of his colleagues about it. I was kinda nodding the whole time, thinking, "OF COURSE we have to build a space elevator. Duh," while Renato's colleague seemed to be shocked and totally weirded out by the very concept of it. See, guys? THIS is why kids should be exposed to science fiction...

You misspelled "Nanase."

Enh, I wouldn't say fifty percent... Personally, I wish Macross 7 had been nine or ten episodes shorter, and Frontier had been nine or ten episodes longer.

While you were listening to that, I was listening to this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDw-hTuwcvA

Huh. Really? Where did you get that information?

To give you more of what you already like, with a few surprises thrown in.

Well, why bother with that? Most people who see the movie will have already seen the show, and thus, they already know who and what Grace is.

It's not starting until December first...so it's not really doing anything in Japan right now.

Note that the news article you link to is from 2008. I think the plans have changed since then.

I'm not sure the DYRL thing as ever been settled...does ANYONE know what Tommy meant by that line...?

Again, "merchandising rights" is not what Tommy said at the time. He said, "We can release Macross the Movie as a product." Which is pretty weird phrasing, but also doesn't seem to mean "We can release products based on Macross the Movie." Check here at about the 3:56 mark: Of course, if we take Tommy at his word, the question remains...it's been six years; if you can release "Macross the Movie as a product," where the hell is it? And if you DIDN'T mean what it sounds like you mean...then, what DID you mean?

Guys! Eat your damn vegetables!

I'll rely on Tochiro for that... he does better write-ups than I could ever hope to do.

Hmm? I'm not sure I follow...

It's an Eva tradition...Death and Rebirth was essentially two movies, as was EoE.

HELL YES!!!