I think i figured out Macross7

[Ginrai]

I don't know if you can really call Macross hard sci-fi. Even the original Macross is a show where a teenage girl sings evil aliens into becoming friends with earth. It's kind of sort of Care Bears, you know?

Edited September 14, 2009 by Ginrai

[RedWolf]

I don't know if you can really call Macross hard sci-fi. Even the original Macross is a show where a teenage girl sings evil aliens into becoming friends with earth. It's kind of sort of Care Bears, you know?

Do you recommend they go Kill-em-All Tomino? No thanks.

The musical aspect became Macross' trademark.

[dreamweaver13]

I don't know if you can really call Macross hard sci-fi. Even the original Macross is a show where a teenage girl sings evil aliens into becoming friends with earth. It's kind of sort of Care Bears, you know?

You must be referring to the Robot Chicken version, with Bodolza being the Ultimate care bear. talk about ethnic cleansing. "Hooray for murder!"

[Ginrai]

I'm not criticizing Macross for that. I love Macross, but it's kind of silly and not hard sci-fi.

[Gubaba]

I'm not criticizing Macross for that. I love Macross, but it's kind of silly and not hard sci-fi.

Oh, come ON! What could be more grounded in reality than giant blue- and purple-skinned humanoids, planes that turn into robots, and huge freakin' battleship robots punching the lights out of space cruisers?

[anotheran]

Oh, come ON! What could be more grounded in reality than giant blue- and purple-skinned humanoids, planes that turn into robots, and huge freakin' battleship robots punching the lights out of space cruisers?

LOL.... i didn't like macross 7 until Max and Milia got into their valks and fought

The Macross7 movie wasn't any better.

[Gubaba]

LOL.... i didn't like macross 7 until Max and Milia got into their valks and fought

The Macross7 movie wasn't any better.

Um...I was talking about SDFM.

I'm with Ginrai. Macross 7 is a good show; it's not my favorite Macross by any stretch, but it's a lot of fun.

[anotheran]

Um...I was talking about SDFM.

I'm with Ginrai. Macross 7 is a good show; it's not my favorite Macross by any stretch, but it's a lot of fun.

oops sorry i was reading most of the thread and replied to yours at the end...

yeah green huge aliens... that seems more likely than aliens stealing spiritia that you attack by singing to them... i think they took the idea of singing way too far in macross7

I finally got a chance to watch SDFM all the way thru this past weekend and I like it a lot more than DYRL... but that's for another thread

[Keith]

Oh you guys, ORE NO UTA WO KIIKE!

[VFTF1]

You know - this issue of how "realistic" it is...

I'm probably in the minority - but I find most anime to be realistic. Maybe that's because I always got really bad grades in science classes and in Math. I just couldn't get passed how science sounded like a bunch of rules that people had to follow. "This is the way it works kid" - the end. I think I instinctively rebelled against that approach. It probably helped watching and reading SCI-FI where there was a much more open, experimental and joyful approach to science than what I remembered in school....

Anyways - I have never been bothered by the idea that something is unrealstic. In fact, to me "realism" - when it is presented on screen - is just another word for "boring."

Because whenever I see people trying to make something "realistic" it seems to always end up being about nothing at all. All scientific progress - real world scientific progress - came about because of people who were "unrealstic" and imagined that things could be done differently and then tried to apply their thinking to reality.

In fact, science is actually all about understanding the universe in order to bend it, change it, make it more the way we want it to be - not to be its' passive bystander victims.

So...what is so unrealstic about Macross 7? Music is a powerful force in our world. How many people do you know who absolutely completely never ever listen to ANY music? Do you know anybody who doesn't have a favorite song? Who isn't atuned to listening to some form of music which in some way makes them happier?

There are space ships in existence - they can't go very far and they're pretty primative - but they do exist. Just like robots. There are robots in existence which convert. There are "mecha" in existence which do simple things (like cranes and stuff).

There are rock musicians with character traits similar to Bassara...

And there there are millions of boring, mundane, "realistic" people in the world - in other words cannon fodder.

I dunno - I would defend Macross, and most anime as being a vision of what reality we could be living in if we chose to stop letting conventions define our view of what is and isn't "realistic."

Pete

[Gokurakumaru]

I don't know if you can really call Macross hard sci-fi. Even the original Macross is a show where a teenage girl sings evil aliens into becoming friends with earth. It's kind of sort of Care Bears, you know?

It's an unlikely story, but I don't know how two races making peace makes it any less hard sci-fi. If anything about the show is goofy it's the transforming planes.

Oh and Minmay didn't sing them into becoming friends with Earth. Mutineering troops forced a ceasefire and Bodolza wanting to annhilate the Vrlitwhai fleet instigated a defection.

[Gokurakumaru]

Because whenever I see people trying to make something "realistic" it seems to always end up being about nothing at all. All scientific progress - real world scientific progress - came about because of people who were "unrealstic" and imagined that things could be done differently and then tried to apply their thinking to reality.

Amen. Hard to believe just over 100 years ago there was no theory of general relativity and that people thought the universe was filled with an aether. I mean even after general relativity it's almost unbelievable from an everyday point of view that time is nothing but an illusion.

Although with that said the Vajura ignoring the laws of general relativity bugged the hell out of me, so maybe I'm a hypocrite.

[Gui]

I usually don't actually read the sub-titles, or even look at what's going on. I just stare at Misa when she's on screen and dream about her when she's off screen.

Pete

And what does your wife think about this?

[VF5SS]

I think part of the problem with the show's perception is a lot of people looked to things like Gundam or Macross II and thought they were just going to continue the franchise with the same format and style. Most Gundam shows feel pretty similar with a few exceptions. At best you may feel comfortable with this and at worst you may hate it as endless rehashing.

Arguably Plus is what changed the direction of the series. It isn't really the same kind of show as SDF Macross or DYRL, its a 90's OVA like Fatal Fury or Detonator Orgun. It was kind of a proven formula when Plus came out. And then you get Macross 7 which had to have been in development around the same time as Plus and it aired very soon after the OVA finished (IIRC from Super Robots View Broadly 98). I find it is difficult to really articulate what I like about the show so I'm going to use the all mighty anecdote.

I started a friend on DYRL, then the series, and then he watched Macross 7. Recently I had asked one of the Central Anime fansubbers (the infamous Otaking, creator of the fansub documentary) as to why he called Macross 7 one of the most amazing things you'll ever see during his video. These two very different people said the same thing.

Macross 7: truly unique.

bomba

[Ginrai]

Oh and Minmay didn't sing them into becoming friends with Earth. Mutineering troops forced a ceasefire and Bodolza wanting to annhilate the Vrlitwhai fleet instigated a defection.

Give me a break. The troops decided to mutiny based on their love for microwaves and pop culture BASED AROUND A TEENAGE GIRL SINGING.

What war in history ever featured beaming a teenage girl's pop song directly to the cockpits of enemy and allied fighters alike? I love Macross, but it is not hard sci-fi.

[RedWolf]

Then what is your definition of Sci-fi?

Alan Dean Foster's books even if you have to make a great suspension of disbelief is still considered Sci-fi.

Sci-fi is pretty simple to parse - Science Fiction.

Edited September 15, 2009 by RedWolf

[Keith]

WTF is hard sci fi?

-Star Trek? Magic out the wazoo.

-Star Wars? Also Magic ou tthe wazoo

-2001 Technology so advanced that it's indistinguishable from magic.

[Killer Robot]

Give me a break. The troops decided to mutiny based on their love for microwaves and pop culture BASED AROUND A TEENAGE GIRL SINGING.

What war in history ever featured beaming a teenage girl's pop song directly to the cockpits of enemy and allied fighters alike? I love Macross, but it is not hard sci-fi.

On the first point, not true. The troops decided to mutiny on lots of broadcasts and words from the returning spies. Unthinkable customs, strange devices, men and women living together, and above all this incomprehensible concept of "civilian" life outside of warfare and military duties. Minmay and music were a part too, but those served more as a symbol those yearning for the idea of culture to point at in shorthand. Not unlike "guitar-controlled Valkyries" is usually shorthand for a whole lot of different things about Macross 7 rather than the whole of the show. Or how many times in history a symbol has been chosen which represents broader concepts yet comes to be held as central in itself.

On the second point, it's strange, but remember that it was in essence a particular communications jam that was known to be distracting in the short term to the enemy, and wasn't being done to convert them but to throw them in disarray long enough to nuke their flagships. Look at some of what real militaries have looked into as ways to distract and/or demoralize enemies and it's less bizarre than many.

Also, "that never happened in history" isn't a very good qualifier for what counts as hard sci-fi. It's a genre about what could happen, not about what already has.

Seriously though, I agree Macross isn't hard sci-fi. It isn't because it has ten meter humanoids capable of shrinking down and breeding with humans, transforming jets, psychic vampires, space bugs that "evolve" immunity to antimatter explosions, and people whose singing can fight giant extradimensional beings. The ability of cultural conflict and influence to swiftly shape the outcome of a war is way, way down the list of what makes it implausible.

[Ginrai]

Kids, I said HARD sci-fi, which Macross is totally not.

[RedWolf]

Kids, I said HARD sci-fi, which Macross is totally not.

Then pray tell us what Hard Sci-fi means. (Unless you're pulling the term out of nowhere.)

[Ginrai]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_sci-fi

"Hard science fiction is a category of science fiction characterized by an emphasis on scientific or technical detail, or on scientific accuracy, or on both.[1][2] The term was first used in print in 1957 by P. Schuyler Miller in a review of John W. Campbell, Jr.'s Islands of Space in Astounding Science Fiction.[3][4][5] The complementary term soft science fiction (formed by analogy to "hard science fiction"[6]) first appeared in the late 1970s as a way of describing science fiction in which science is not featured, or violates the scientific understanding at the time of writing."

And the opposite:

"Soft science fiction, or soft SF, like its complementary opposite hard science fiction, is a descriptive term that points to the role and nature of the science content in a science fiction story. The term first appeared in the late 1970s and early 1980s and indicated SF based not on engineering or the "hard" sciences (for example, physics, astronomy, or chemistry) but on the "soft" sciences, and especially the social sciences (anthropology, sociology, psychology, political science, and so on).[1] Another sense is SF that is more concerned with character, society, or other speculative ideas and themes that are not centrally tied to scientific or engineering speculations. A third sense is SF that is less rigorous in its application of scientific ideas, for example allowing faster-than-light space travel in a setting that otherwise follows more conservative standards."

Macross is an excellent example of a series with poorly explained pseudo-mystical technology and is very much more concerned with character and society than it is in realistically predicting the science of the future.

Is it a realistic prediction that in 1999 an alien spacecraft piloted by giants will crash on earth giving us the power to create transforming robot jet planes? No. Was it a realistic prediction in the '80s? No.

Also, I'm not the one who brought up hard sci-fi originally, I was just disagreeing with the guy who did because Macross is totally not hard sci-fi.

[VF5SS]

I think the big distinction Ginrai is missing from the complaints is that is that even with Minmay songs they still had to BLOW UP Boldolza with weapons. So some people have the interpretation that is was very much a military victory won by soldiers using relatively conventional means (i.e. bombs)

In Macross 7 the point is what happens when the bombs don't work. I feel Frontier was a little weaker for trying to be more traditional anime sci-fi where the bombs still work for the most part and the singing is really just a pump you up moment.

[RedWolf]

Is it a realistic prediction that in 1999 an alien spacecraft piloted by giants will crash on earth giving us the power to create transforming robot jet planes? No. Was it a realistic prediction in the '80s? No.

You do realize they reverse engineered right? The Supervision Army was the enemy of Zentradi using the very same tech base. (If not a bit more advance.)

The concept of Overtechnology (alien exploited tech home brewed) has been around in Japanese fiction for years.

Plus today Big West puts out the overly detailed Macross Chronicle for the technical front.

[VF5SS]

You do realize they reverse engineered right? The Supervision Army was the enemy of Zentradi using the very same tech base. (If not a bit more advance.)

The concept of Overtechnology (alien exploited tech home brewed) has been around in Japanese fiction for years.

Plus today Big West puts out the overly detailed Macross Chronicle for the technical front.

That's really no different than the standard sci-fi fairy dust that makes the plot work. Reverse engineered is highly overused and rarely used correctly. The way Sci-fi uses it is like saying you could give Leonardo DaVinci a jet engine and he could replicate it.

Another point is that it seems like a lot of people here like the Macross shows where the badguy gets blown up.

Boldolza, Sharon Apple, Ingues, and Grace all get the smashy-smashy in one way or another. As in they die.

In 7 and Zero the badguy was coaxed into stopping. It's not as climactic to some.

[Ginrai]

And what about aliens mucking with the evolutionary cycle of earth despite the fossil record to the contrary and giant shape changing aliens being sexually compatible with humans and a million other ridiculous things not the least of which is rocking space aliens to orgasm.

[RedWolf]

And what about aliens mucking with the evolutionary cycle of earth despite the fossil record to the contrary and giant shape changing aliens being sexually compatible with humans and a million other ridiculous things not the least of which is rocking space aliens to orgasm.

Watch Macross Zero they cover this with a virus augmentation theory. Also Macross Dynamite 7 introduced a third offshoot race like Humans, the Zolans, who evolved from marsupials rather than primates.

Also read up on the Precurssor Trope, which fits the Protocultue to a T.

[Mr March]

Another point is that it seems like a lot of people here like the Macross shows where the badguy gets blown up.

Boldolza, Sharon Apple, Ingues, and Grace all get the smashy-smashy in one way or another. As in they die.

In 7 and Zero the badguy was coaxed into stopping. It's not as climactic to some.

I think the distinction about Macross is more fundamental. The whole purpose of creating a military fighting robot is to fight. A story which denies your military fighting robot sabotages the entire endeavour of creating a military fighting robot story. The whole crux of the story then becomes functionally impotent. It's like sex without an orgasm. Should there by any wonder why audiences scream bloody murder? Of course not.

[nexxstrait]

Also Macross Dynamite 7 introduced a third offshoot race like Humans, the Zolans, who evolved from marsupials rather than primates.

??? Where does this come from? Aren't Zolans simply the inhabitants of planet Zola, or in other words a bunch of human-zentradi colonists?

[nexxstrait]

I think the distinction about Macross is more fundamental. The whole purpose of creating a military fighting robot is to fight. A story which denies your military fighting robot sabotages the entire endeavour of creating a military fighting robot story. The whole crux of the story then becomes functionally impotent. It's like sex without an orgasm. Should there by any wonder why audiences scream bloody murder? Of course not.

But that's what makes Macross Macross. The coolest robots ever created and they are not even remotely the main focus of the story. Heck, in the original series, there are episodes where we don't even see a Valkyrie transform. I like that (exept when the alternative to Valkiries is Ranka. Then episode 25's mecha orgy is a real life saviour ).

[Ginrai]

Watch Macross Zero they cover this with a virus augmentation theory. Also Macross Dynamite 7 introduced a third offshoot race like Humans, the Zolans, who evolved from marsupials rather than primates.

Also read up on the Precurssor Trope, which fits the Protocultue to a T.

Yeah, that's not IN SDF Macross, now is it?

[VF5SS]

Should there by any wonder why audiences scream bloody murder? Of course not.

That depends. By the time Macross 7 came out there was at least 15 different shows with that premise. Its not like Japan had a serious drought of military robot shows. And there were still plenty of mooks in the show to blow up. The beauty of stock footage.

[Gubaba]

??? Where does this come from? Aren't Zolans simply the inhabitants of planet Zola, or in other words a bunch of human-zentradi colonists?

No, they're descended from marsupials, like everything else on Zola (listen closely to the "Zomeo and Zoliet" radio show that plays in the background occasionally during Dynamite 7).

[nexxstrait]

No, they're descended from marsupials, like everything else on Zola (listen closely to the "Zomeo and Zoliet" radio show that plays in the background occasionally during Dynamite 7).

I can't uderstand a word of japanese and the radio show wasn't subtitled, that's why I missed it! But isn't Z&Z just a fictional story? Maybe [speculation starts] it's just that each colony planet tried to come up with a personal backstory or mithology.

[Gubaba]

I can't uderstand a word of japanese and the radio show wasn't subtitled, that's why I missed it! But isn't Z&Z just a fictional story? Maybe [speculation starts] it's just that each colony planet tried to come up with a personal backstory or mithology.

Really? Strange...it's subtitled in the Central Anime version of Dynamite 7, and I thought that was the standard fansub...

Anyway, Zomeo decides he's going to leave the Macross 9 Fleet, stay on Zola, marry Zoliet, and live the life of a hardworking Zolan. Zoliet's rather taken aback by this and says, "But..we can't have children." Zomeo asks why, and Zoliet says, "Well...you don't have a pouch."

Then the radio-show narrator breaks in and explains that humans and Zolans can't mate.

Which makes Michael's canonical human/Zentradi/Zolan heritage a bit of a mystery...

[Mr March]

But that's what makes Macross Macross. The coolest robots ever created and they are not even remotely the main focus of the story. Heck, in the original series, there are episodes where we don't even see a Valkyrie transform. I like that (exept when the alternative to Valkiries is Ranka. Then episode 25's mecha orgy is a real life saviour ).

No, the robots just have everything to do with style which has always dominated the substance of Macross.

That depends. By the time Macross 7 came out there was at least 15 different shows with that premise. Its not like Japan had a serious drought of military robot shows. And there were still plenty of mooks in the show to blow up. The beauty of stock footage.

If Macross 7 is parody, it wouldn't matter how many shows are like it, how many mooks are blown up or how much footage is recycled: the cannibalism of itself for parody would make it all a pointless endeavour for any other reason. Like I said.

Really? Strange...it's subtitled in the Central Anime version of Dynamite 7, and I thought that was the standard fansub...

Anyway, Zomeo decides he's going to leave the Macross 9 Fleet, stay on Zola, marry Zoliet, and live the life of a hardworking Zolan. Zoliet's rather taken aback by this and says, "But..we can't have children." Zomeo asks why, and Zoliet says, "Well...you don't have a pouch."

Then the radio-show narrator breaks in and explains that humans and Zolans can't mate.

Which makes Michael's canonical human/Zentradi/Zolan heritage a bit of a mystery...

Wow, this is coming as a revelation. I gotta take note of this for the Macrosspedia.