HG and Robotech Debates

[VFTF1]

It's not like it would be any kind of a loss for him or any of the others... the odds of him ever using it are at best minimal. About the best he could hope for would be to end up like Maverick_LSC, whose harridan of a wife treats his Robotech hobby as something shameful to be concealed from their family, friends, and neighbors. (Now if only she could extend the same treatment to her husband himself, we'd all be better off) Otherwise, the best he could do would be to follow in the footsteps of Jeebers*, whose only social interaction with women comes from trying (and failing) to flirt with the rare and plainly uninterested women on Rt.com and paying $7 a letter to write to "women" at long-distance dating services in the former Soviet Union.

Hell - I live in the former Soviet Union...well..ok...technically I don't...but they didn't call it the Warsaw Pact for nothin'!

Tell him to send ME the 7 bucks and I'll give his letters to beautiful women here on the spot!

PM me for my paypal. No hidden fees, no hassel! Lots of beautiful women all over the place! I'm on the Straight Shooter list and will even help with VISA formalities if things go there.

Jeebers is well-known for his insistence that he's an expert on every field from acoustics to zoology, his attempts to pass off his ultra-left-wing political views as irrefutable fact, and his total inability to distinguish between official canon and the material he came up with for his "original" Robotech RPG, which is just D20 Future with many names changed.

This guy sounds awesome! Why hasn't he shown up in this thread yet?

Edited January 7, 2010 by VFTF1

[Seto Kaiba]

But...but...he's the Rosa Parks of Robotech fandom!

Nah... I'd say our dear friend Donovan is much more like the Al Sharpton of the Robotech fandom, he'll blow any criticism or insult directed towards Harmony Gold or Robotech out of proportion and make a lot of pointless noise about how Robotech fans are the victims of unfair discrimination so he can continue to pretend he's a crusader for justice instead of a cack-handed twit with a tenuous grip on reality.

Tell him to send ME the 7 bucks and I'll give his letters to beautiful women here on the spot!

PM me for my paypal. No hidden fees, no hassel! Lots of beautiful women all over the place! I'm on the Straight Shooter list and will even help with VISA formalities if things go there.

Heh... that'd be a step up for him. Until I pointed it out, he had no idea that the beautiful woman who he thought he was writing to was a picture gleaned from a department store catalog and that the responses he'd been receiving for six months (at seven bucks a pop) were mass-produced templates copied out by part-time workers in a modest flat somewhere in the Ukraine.

This guy sounds awesome! Why hasn't he shown up in this thread yet?

I'll wager it's because he's scared that you'll all turn out to be like me... fact-driven people who don't buy his liberal bullshit (usually consisting of how the Army is full of nothing but a dumping ground for violent offenders) or his attempts to substitute his fanfic RPG for official canon.

[VFTF1]

the responses he'd been receiving for six months (at seven bucks a pop) were mass-produced templates copied out by part-time workers in a modest flat somewhere in the Ukraine.

That's 'cause all the cute Ukrainian girls are in Poland now

He was probably writing letters to their grandmothers

I'll wager it's because he's scared that you'll all turn out to be like me... fact-driven people who don't buy his liberal bullshit (usually consisting of how the Army is full of nothing but a dumping ground for violent offenders) or his attempts to substitute his fanfic RPG for official canon.

I just want his seven bucks is all

Pete

[Marzan]

Nah... I'd say our dear friend Donovan is much more like the Al Sharpton of the Robotech fandom, he'll blow any criticism or insult directed towards Harmony Gold or Robotech out of proportion and make a lot of pointless noise about how Robotech fans are the victims of unfair discrimination so he can continue to pretend he's a crusader for justice instead of a cack-handed twit with a tenuous grip on reality.

Heh... that'd be a step up for him. Until I pointed it out, he had no idea that the beautiful woman who he thought he was writing to was a picture gleaned from a department store catalog and that the responses he'd been receiving for six months (at seven bucks a pop) were mass-produced templates copied out by part-time workers in a modest flat somewhere in the Ukraine.

I'll wager it's because he's scared that you'll all turn out to be like me... fact-driven people who don't buy his liberal bullshit (usually consisting of how the Army is full of nothing but a dumping ground for violent offenders) or his attempts to substitute his fanfic RPG for official canon.

Seto, you seem to be scaring the beejesus out of all these fascinating characters who could potentially grace this forum with their baseless speculation, uninformed opinions and violent teenage angst. I feel I must know read through miles of robotech.com posts to read what I've been missing.

Please refrain from your fact driven, double checked, carefully argumented posts so they feel the urge of joining up

[Einherjar]

Yeah, I find it wrong that english speaking fans categorize the term like that. The same with manga,manhwa and manhua. What do you think they call comics in their own language?

I'm finding it more and more disturbing that we're totally comfortable with generalizations when describing anything, which in turn makes a lot of people look prejudice or racist, yet acceptable.

Shadow Chronicles was made by a Korean animation firm paid for by Americans, but not enough it seems. HG touted buzz words like OVA and anime to attract the anime crowd and link it to either Robotech and Macross. But really, it's a direct to DVD movie with the quality of a Sci-Fi or UPN original movie. They were just willing to spend more money to make people think otherwise.

For crying out loud, it had Mark Hamill acting like a character from many of his non-Star Wars and non-DC roles.

[Funkenstein]

ScyFy original movies at least have the charm of being goofy and cheesey (Like Megashark vs Giant octopus, or whatever it was called, and the one about Nazi gargoyles). RTSC had no redeemable qualities, mixing 1980's mecha design with 1990's (television quality) CG. I couldn't contain my laughter from seeing the terrible CG of the first 10 minutes or so. At least ScyFy originals try to harken back to the hay-day of monster movies. RTSC harkens back to CD-I Zelda and Mario.

[MastaEgg]

What makes anime an anime to begin with isn't the way it looks- it way it feels because it was made a a very different culture than our own. The visual style, the way it's told, and all those, as Macek calls them, "cultural gestures", are just reflections of this. Just because you made it "look" like anime (which is a bad generalization, look at shows like Shin-chan) doesn't make it feel like anime.

[Seto Kaiba]

Seto, you seem to be scaring the beejesus out of all these fascinating characters who could potentially grace this forum with their baseless speculation, uninformed opinions and violent teenage angst. I feel I must know read through miles of robotech.com posts to read what I've been missing.

Please refrain from your fact driven, double checked, carefully argumented posts so they feel the urge of joining up

A thousand apologies...

Shadow Chronicles was made by a Korean animation firm paid for by Americans, but not enough it seems. HG touted buzz words like OVA and anime to attract the anime crowd and link it to either Robotech and Macross. But really, it's a direct to DVD movie with the quality of a Sci-Fi or UPN original movie. They were just willing to spend more money to make people think otherwise.

It's not entirely fair to say that a show animated in Korea can't be anime, since rather a lot of the more tedious parts of the animation process (tweening) are frequently done by South Korean studios as a cost-cutting measure. It is rather an ironic choice for Harmony Gold to select a Korean studio to do ALL of the animation work, considering Korea's reputation for treating the intellectual property of Japanese studios with light-fingered contempt... a methodology that lines up well with Harmony Gold's own business plan, I guess.

All the same, we'd be hard pressed to justify calling it anime, because while it may be loosely based on something that was created in Japan, and a Japanese studio might've been consulted in the earliest phases of pre-production, the actual creative work was done in the US by US writers who understand neither the style nor the process. It falls into that odd category of "imitation anime"... animation produced outside of Japan that imitates many of the stylistic choices usually associated with anime. Western audiences usually have little in the way of patience for shows that try to ape the anime style, though some have had reasonable success in America, though usually only because of tie-ins to well-established franchises (DC's Teen Titans, Transformers Animated). The French seem to have had an anomalous degree of success imitating the anime style for their kid's programming (Totally Spies, W.I.T.C.H., Wakfu), but it generally ends up getting condemned by most anime-watching audiences.

I expect that Harmony Gold decided that calling a spade a spade and advertising it as "imitation anime" probably wasn't going to sell the movie, so they left the "imitation" part out. The choice to refer to it as an OVA was probably because it lacks the negative connotations associated with the term "direct-to-DVD movie".

[VFTF1]

All the same, we'd be hard pressed to justify calling it anime, because while it may be loosely based on something that was created in Japan, and a Japanese studio might've been consulted in the earliest phases of pre-production, the actual creative work was done in the US by US writers who understand neither the style nor the process. It falls into that odd category of "imitation anime"... animation produced outside of Japan that imitates many of the stylistic choices usually associated with anime. Western audiences usually have little in the way of patience for shows that try to ape the anime style, though some have had reasonable success in America, though usually only because of tie-ins to well-established franchises (DC's Teen Titans, Transformers Animated). The French seem to have had an anomalous degree of success imitating the anime style for their kid's programming (Totally Spies, W.I.T.C.H., Wakfu), but it generally ends up getting condemned by most anime-watching audiences.

Damn Seto. No wonder they banned you at Robotech.com.

Logic and facts are one thing - most guys got 'em. But the ability to write a conscise summary....it's like a one-two-Muhamed-Ali...

did Muhamed Ali use one-two?

Or maybe all boxers do?

I don't know anything about boxing really. Just played NES Mike Tyson's Punch out and watched all the Rocky Movies. And some boxing matches on Youtube.

Pete

[eugimon]

It's really not fair to blame the poor animation on Dr Movie, they do work for major studios like Ghibli and no one complains about that.

[kung flu]

What makes anime an anime to begin with isn't the way it looks- it way it feels because it was made a a very different culture than our own. The visual style, the way it's told, and all those, as Macek calls them, "cultural gestures", are just reflections of this. Just because you made it "look" like anime (which is a bad generalization, look at shows like Shin-chan) doesn't make it feel like anime.

Isn't anime just the japanese term animation/cartoon. Just like manga is comic in japanese i think.

Anime may seem special in the west but its just ordinary stuff in the east. The only difference i can tell is that the east is more willing to use animation or comics to deal with more mature themes, like war, relationships etc.

Also since pokemon and all that jazz, japanese style animation is all the rage now. So making a show look like "anime" is just part of the trend.

[Einherjar]

It's not entirely fair to say that a show animated in Korea can't be anime, since rather a lot of the more tedious parts of the animation process (tweening) are frequently done by South Korean studios as a cost-cutting measure. It is rather an ironic choice for Harmony Gold to select a Korean studio to do ALL of the animation work, considering Korea's reputation for treating the intellectual property of Japanese studios with light-fingered contempt... a methodology that lines up well with Harmony Gold's own business plan, I guess.

I should have put more emphasis on the money part and HG's irresponsibility in my post, which is their real method of getting anything done. They don't know what they're doing, having never done animation at all by themselves and just throwing money and the law at everyone to deal with it instead. Plus, they're frugal, so that money they're throwing isn't enough, but they're willing to downright cannibalize things.

Edited January 7, 2010 by Einherjar

[Seto Kaiba]

Damn Seto. No wonder they banned you at Robotech.com.

Logic and facts are one thing - most guys got 'em. But the ability to write a conscise summary....it's like a one-two-Muhamed-Ali...

It's nothing special... Robotech.com used to have a fair few people capable of that same feat, but most of them got sick of waiting for Harmony Gold to stop giving each other piggyback rides and produce a sequel that didn't suck, and the few who remained got on the wrong side of the deadly dimwit duo of Maverick_LSC and MEMO1DOMINION for daring to voice uncomfortable truths about Harmony Gold's ability to use material from Macross that left Harmony Gold and the dimwit duo looking decidedly foolish.

I don't know anything about boxing really. Just played NES Mike Tyson's Punch out and watched all the Rocky Movies. And some boxing matches on Youtube.

Beats me, I don't know jack about most sports... the only ones I follow are the ones I don't completely suck at... mostly martial arts and golf.

It's really not fair to blame the poor animation on Dr Movie, they do work for major studios like Ghibli and no one complains about that.

What DR Movie does for Studio Ghibli and company is exactly what I said it was... the most tedious, time-consuming and generally unrewarding part of the animation process: tweening. They're VERY good at tweening. Producing their own key animation or CG... not so much.

[VFTF1]

Well - they did get Mark Hamil to voice somebody....and wasn't it them who organized Mari Ijima to do the english voice over (that I've not heard) for Robotech?

Don't get me wrong - I'm not suddenly becoming a Robotech fan here - it's just that... I seriously almost feel compelled to defend the cartoon itself sometimes for all the lousy reputation Robotech is getting/has gotten thanks to the Divine Comedy that is MEMO/Doug/etc etc etc ...

It is getting so bad that somebody has to step in and say something nice for the actual product itself.

If only the Harmony Gold crew were not so hyperbolic about their product though - I mean ... they think people who watch this show are functioning in a bubble.

I actually liked Protoculture's take on one thing - namely - this idea of closing out the Robotech story arc for the older fans from the 80s. Fine. That's a nice idea.

And instead of harping on RSC and SR as the greatest epic in the history of mankind - these guys should be playing it a bit more low key....

I mean - if they weren't so in your face "this is the best" + Macross is illegal about it then they might actually generate some sympathy.

HG has an image problem that is posioning their product.

They should be marketing themselves as the little company that could - that tried to bring some good anime to America back in the 80s and still has these licenses and likes to play around with them and their old story.

People would have fun with Robotech if HG would lighten up and let Macross in and not be such bums about it

Contrary to their fears, Robotech would actually not be "crushed" because Macross fans in general are also anime fans who might have a passing interest in other mediums and MIGHT actually pick up some Robotech stuff to see how the "American version" that grew out of Macross is coming along.

Seriously.

I know Gubaba will disagree - but I wonder if he is sure what he'll be disagreeing with. My point is not to hold Robotech up to Macross and say "EQUAL."

My point is to say that when you hold Robotech up in one hand and Doug/Memo/etc up in another hand -- they are not equal.

Robotech is better than retarted FANBOYZ on a witch hunt for pedophiles.

Notice how many Robotech fans we have here - the problem is - because they have been thrown out of their own fandom, they're here bitching and moaning - and this entire thread is more about HG and its' crap website and crap business practices than it is about Robotech.

It's gotten to the point where it seems even intelligent Robotech fans have forgotten what it was like to just have a discussion about Robotech as such.

Good job HG and great job Robotech.com crew for running a website that looks inviting to people who sniff glue for breakfast and not only running off your smarter fans, but making them so bitter that they spend more time putting you down than talking about your TV show.

way to go guys

Pete

Edited January 7, 2010 by VFTF1

[azrael]

All I'll say is this, if responding to RT.com people requires "dumbing it down" to their level, then it probably isn't worth responding to. It probably requires getting a lobotomy too. If it requires that much work, I have to ask, is it really worth it then? Don't answer that.

[Einherjar]

Well - they did get Mark Hamil to voice somebody....and wasn't it them who organized Mari Ijima to do the english voice over (that I've not heard) for Robotech?

Don't get me wrong - I'm not suddenly becoming a Robotech fan here - it's just that... I seriously almost feel compelled to defend the cartoon itself sometimes for all the lousy reputation Robotech is getting/has gotten thanks to the Divine Comedy that is MEMO/Doug/etc etc etc ...

The money and fanfare used to get those people to contribute to the productions could have been used better. By doing that, I accuse them of intentionally baiting people to buy their crap. Especially with Shadow Chronicles, they could have saved the money to get Mark Hamill, since his role was very unnecessary, to improve everything else.

But who was the bigger attention grabber for that film, Mark Hamill or Rick Hunter? Were people psyched up to see one or another or both? Unfortunately, they couldn't have both for longer than 5 minutes on screen and were left to stomach something else entirely.

Edited January 7, 2010 by Einherjar

[terry the lone wolf]

Shadow Chronicles is an Anime & it's also an OAV. In Japan Anime is a broad term that encompasses many animated shows; I.E. Batman & Spawn would be considered anime there. Only in the west we tend to marginalize it to a sub-culture niche set. Just because it was animated in Korea and paid for by Americans deems it not a anime? I don't agree with that especially since most animes are animated in Korea, Taiwan, and even China nowadays. The only difference being that these productions are paid by Japanese firms.

Please stop with the Robotech is bootleg of Macross. With that logic Voltron is a bootleg of Golion or Starblazers is a bootleg of Yamato, etc, etc, etc,.... Robotech is a product of the early 80's anime boom with western companies grabbing up inexpensive animated programs from Japan for broadcast in the U.S. Yes most of these were horribly edited or even translated but I feel RT did fare better than most.

Edited January 7, 2010 by terry the lone wolf

[EXO]

In japanese terms yes... but in American terms anime refers to Japanese cartoons just like manga refers to Japanese Comic books. You don't go into the anime or manga sections of stores to look for The Hulk or Iron man. It's just another word that gets a whole new meaning when used by another culture.

Bootleg on the other hand is more of an insult term used in this forum. I'm pretty sure by now everyone knows about how all these shows came to the US. But it refers to how the US company refuses to credit the Japanese creators and give themselves credit for creating "a whole new cartoon" out of three seperate ones.

[eugimon]

What DR Movie does for Studio Ghibli and company is exactly what I said it was... the most tedious, time-consuming and generally unrewarding part of the animation process: tweening. They're VERY good at tweening. Producing their own key animation or CG... not so much.

I don't think that's fair either. Their work on x-men, spawn, bat man, JLA, etc was all very good. Their opening for Ragnarok is pretty solid as well. Granted the character design etc, isn't as good as what Japan puts out but it's FAR cry better than what they did for Robotech.

[terry the lone wolf]

In japanese terms yes... but in American terms anime refers to Japanese cartoons just like manga refers to Japanese Comic books. You don't go into the anime or manga sections of stores to look for The Hulk or Iron man. It's just another word that gets a whole new meaning when used by another culture.

Bootleg on the other hand is more of an insult term used in this forum. I'm pretty sure by now everyone knows about how all these shows came to the US. But it refers to how the US company refuses to credit the Japanese creators and give themselves credit for creating "a whole new cartoon" out of three seperate ones.

I've always felt that Shoji Kawamori & Shinji Aramaki's names should be listed above Ippi Kurri's name on the closing credits of Robotech. I don't think that Tatsunoko Productions was putting it out there some of anime productions they were distributing didn't come from their studio. I'm not naive into believing that HG was totally ignorant of Macross's origins but I can see how names got lost in the shuffle. Though in Robotech ART 1 Shoji Kawamori was credited in creating Macross & Shinji Aramaki got a mecha creator credit in Shadow Chronicles & the Art of the Shadow Chronicles.

Edited January 8, 2010 by terry the lone wolf

[Einherjar]

I don't think that's fair either. Their work on x-men, spawn, bat man, JLA, etc was all very good. Their opening for Ragnarok is pretty solid as well. Granted the character design etc, isn't as good as what Japan puts out but it's FAR cry better than what they did for Robotech.

Then just put all the blame on HG for not giving them enough financial motivation and direction over a long period of time for the animation firm to really give it the quality people wanted it to have. They're really busy people to have to do job from a small, yet American firm who can't realistically pay well, in dollars no less. It did take many years for it to come out, and HG got what they could pay for with their budget.

[Beltane70]

Since these douchebag's don't listen to Internet facts, may I ask of people who are on these boards who are from other countries to tell of there Legal age for sex Laws? Just incase Douchebag the Hut wants to come play and explain itself like an evolved creature... And yes, i would play nice should it come...

Even here in the US, laws differ from state to state. In most states, my own (NJ) included, the age of consent is 16, so a sexual relationship between Ranka and Alto would be perfectly legal. Plus, most states also have exceptions if the older member is within three or four years of age from the younger member, i.e. it would still be legal if a 17 year-old was involved in a sexual relationship with a 14 year-old.

Pizza is the last person that should be talking about sexual relations since it's so clear that he knows absolutely nothing about anything. Sadly, too many people in the US are as stupid as Pizza is.

[anime52k8]

Even here in the US, laws differ from state to state. In most states, my own (NJ) included, the age of consent is 16, so a sexual relationship between Ranka and Alto would be perfectly legal. Plus, most states also have exceptions if the older member is within three or four years of age from the younger member, i.e. it would still be legal if a 17 year-old was involved in a sexual relationship with a 14 year-old.

Pizza is the last person that should be talking about sexual relations since it's so clear that he knows absolutely nothing about anything. Sadly, too many people in the US are as stupid as Pizza is.

too many people EVERYWHERE are as stupid as pizza is. just look at the guy you're quoting; he ACTUALLY thinks that Pizza and Douge Bendo are representative of what most Americans are like in real life.

[eugimon]

Then just put all the blame on HG for not giving them enough financial motivation and direction over a long period of time for the animation firm to really give it the quality people wanted it to have. They're really busy people to have to do job from a small, yet American firm who can't realistically pay well, in dollars no less. It did take many years for it to come out, and HG got what they could pay for with their budget.

Yeah, I think it just came down to money. If HG paid more, Dr. Movie probably would have delivered on par with the work they do for other companies.

Just looking at the director and producer from Dr. Movie, these are really the B or C team guys... not the same people who worked on the DC shows.

So, you pay for newbies, you get newbie work.

[Seto Kaiba]

But who was the bigger attention grabber for that film, Mark Hamill or Rick Hunter? Were people psyched up to see one or another or both? Unfortunately, they couldn't have both for longer than 5 minutes on screen and were left to stomach something else entirely.

As the addition of voice actors who'd previously worked on Star Trek and Star Wars was, along with the blatant and pointless cheesecake, a ridiculously transparent attempt to make the Shadow Chronicles movie appeal to groups more mainstream than the small and rapidly dwindling Robotech fanbase, a tactic that failed spectacularly, I think it safe to say that the return of "Rick Hunter" was probably the bigger draw for its target audience. Granted, Mark Hamill is a big name in sci-fi because of Star Wars, but he hasn't really done much for the genre since the 80s, and his character dies after only half a dozen lines in the first fifteen minutes of the movie. The one who hoggest most of the screen time was virtual nobody Chase Masterson (probably by dint of being cheaper)... whose sole Star Trek acting credential was to play a ditsy minor recurring bar girl on Star Trek: Deep Space 9.

In japanese terms yes... but in American terms anime refers to Japanese cartoons just like manga refers to Japanese Comic books. You don't go into the anime or manga sections of stores to look for The Hulk or Iron man. It's just another word that gets a whole new meaning when used by another culture.

Exactly... this is the line we're drawing here. We're not using the Japanese definition of the word, which would apply to any animated show. Rather, we're using the conventionally-accepted Western usage of the word to refer specifically to animation done in the Japanese style.

Bootleg on the other hand is more of an insult term used in this forum. I'm pretty sure by now everyone knows about how all these shows came to the US. But it refers to how the US company refuses to credit the Japanese creators and give themselves credit for creating "a whole new cartoon" out of three seperate ones.

Two for two... we're using the term "bootleg" pejoratively here. We're well aware Robotech isn't literally a bootleg, but we call it one because of Harmony Gold's frequent attempts to ignore the existence of the originals, handwave them aside as inferior to their slipshod adaptation, and their occasional attempts to pretend that everything in Robotech was their idea.

too many people EVERYWHERE are as stupid as pizza is. just look at the guy you're quoting; he ACTUALLY thinks that Pizza and Douge Bendo are representative of what most Americans are like in real life.

lol, I've known Saraphys for a while, and he's pretty much taken to heart the commonly-held stereotype (abroad) that Americans tend to be on the stupid side... of course considering my own experiences with my fellow Americans, I'm inclined to agree to a somewhat less extreme extent that the stupids do tend to outnumber the intelligent, decent folks by a rather frightening margin.

[VF5SS]

Robotech is a niche cult series that exists at the expense of a legitimate franchise.

that's it.

Edited January 8, 2010 by VF5SS

[Saraphys]

too many people EVERYWHERE are as stupid as pizza is. just look at the guy you're quoting; he ACTUALLY thinks that Pizza and Douge Bendo are representative of what most Americans are like in real life.

Y'know, you might be right...

Problem is, every American news program, every American news website, every other forum with American members has these un-informed, evolutionary-intellectually abscent members who share these qualities with the likes of those trash from RT.com. And y'know what? I'll give you that maybe not all American's are like that...but all the loudest ones are. So from the outside...what are we suppose to think? That you put all your most retarded people in positions that the world can see, for the purpose of the Worlds best act of Misdirection? And the things they say!?!?!!!

You people dont control these people, and heaven's forbid someone should use a cuss word to your baby-language

Im not saying that there arn't stupid people of that level in other countries...I can think of several Australian media personalities off the top of my head, in fact, who have acted like your news people (they usually come back because they can pay their fine)...

But I digress...

Going back to my original point, even in some parts of America (Thanks Beltane ), that relationship between Alto and Ranka is perfectly legal...

I believe it was VFTF1 or Protoculture...sorry, i forgot...earlier that wanted these people to expound on just what exactly they ment by their short-ended statements; "Robotech rules, Macross sucks"...okay...but WHY?

I really want an answer to that from those things... Since I draw the line at a dozen or so BANHAMMERS, I cant exactly go there to get answer's...

So where's MEMO? Where's Mav? Where are those of power who are allowing that particular thread in RT.com's Warzone to continue, so they can ban a bunch of "Macross Purists"? Even that ass, Steve Yun, is letting that thread go on its way... all in the name of the "4th Holy Robotech Crusade" (get it? 4th...as in the 4th Robotech War? ...nevermind... )

[Freiflug88]

Well - they did get Mark Hamil to voice somebody....and wasn't it them who organized Mari Ijima to do the english voice over (that I've not heard) for Robotech?

It was ADV, not HG, who cast Mari Ijima to do the English dub of SDF Macross when they found out she was in LA. Also according to Mari Ijima her two kids grew up on Robotech while it was on Cartoon Network and were excited that she would be voicing Minmay again.

As for Mark Hamil they literally hired him so they could have him utter "Break off and Attack" from Wing Commander... in the trailer for RSC and then they changed the line for the actual movie.

I don't think that's fair either. Their work on x-men, spawn, bat man, JLA, etc was all very good. Their opening for Ragnarok is pretty solid as well. Granted the character design etc, isn't as good as what Japan puts out but it's FAR cry better than what they did for Robotech.

FYI X-Men TAS and the first Season of Batman TAS were done by Akom Productions, not DR Movie. AKOM's work on Batman TAS was deemed unsatisfactory though and Warner Bros droped them in favor of DR Movie whom they have been using ever since.

Yeah, I think it just came down to money. If HG paid more, Dr. Movie probably would have delivered on par with the work they do for other companies.

Just looking at the director and producer from Dr. Movie, these are really the B or C team guys... not the same people who worked on the DC shows.

So, you pay for newbies, you get newbie work.

Its not just a difference in pay. For the DC Show the charater designs and Key animation were done by in house animators at Warner Brothers then send to DR Movie for in between jobs. For Shadow Chronicles it was pretty much just Tommy Yune, the only real artist at HG, drawing all the character designs and spending months in Korea overseeing the DR Movie animators. It was a newbie directing animators into drawing a newbie piece of animation work.

As an inbetween studio DR Movie is geared around drawing EXACTLY what they have been directed to draw through charater designs, key animation, etc. Not to sound mean, but the animators are literally human scanners not original artists. When Animation studios send character designs and key animation to Korean studios they expect the Korean in between animation to match the artwork they supplied. If its not the Korean Studios are dropped out of a contract and the Korean animators find themselves out of a job.

[RedWolf]

Contrary to their fears, Robotech would actually not be "crushed" because Macross fans in general are also anime fans who might have a passing interest in other mediums and MIGHT actually pick up some Robotech stuff to see how the "American version" that grew out of Macross is coming along.

Pete

Pete, looking over Space Battles forum Robotech is much more of a general sci-fi fan niche driven by nostalgia.

There is fics there where Robotech is crossovered with B5.

There is a Robotech/Gundam Seed fic in the first page now of the Creativity forum.

Yeah the Gundam franchise's fans outnumber even us.

Another fic is weirder being a Robotech/Macross II/Macross 7.

Multi-universe hijinks as it were.

Macross fics there usually involve the Macross or its decendants crossoverering via fold misjump.

nBSG is a favorite crossover for Macross and its sequels, there being contrast and comparison between tech and story circumstances.

[eugimon]

Well, that's not quite right. Dr Movie's work for x-men and bat man started at the layout stage and through post. They have also done other productions from development through post.

[taksraven]

Robotech is a niche cult series that exists at the expense of a legitimate franchise.

that's it.

Thats exactly right. And thats how you can explain why Macross is superior to Robotech with just one reason. Who needs eight when this simple fact alone is enough to torpedo all pro-Robotech arguments.

Taksraven

Edited January 8, 2010 by taksraven

[Jasonc]

What DR Movie does for Studio Ghibli and company is exactly what I said it was... the most tedious, time-consuming and generally unrewarding part of the animation process: tweening. They're VERY good at tweening. Producing their own key animation or CG... not so much.

When RTSC was first in being talked about and maybe in pre production, the anime HG was looking at replicating was something like Yukikaze. While (I think it was) Gonzo did the A-list work and key animation, DR Movie was the B or C team, doing in between and clean up. What happened with HG, is that when they got a cost estimate from Tatsunoko to do Mospeada II,,,I mean, RTSC, they passed on having them do it. With the budget they got, DR movie, that same B or C team company, became not only the A-team to work on RTSC, but the only team. So, I don't know if you've seen Yukiaze, but compare that to RTSC, and you see just how short they really fell.

As for the thread on rt.com, I wouldn't expect it to get locked anytime soon. It's a thread making a feable attempt to validate a bootlegged series. While I do like Robotech, I gotta call it as it is,,, a legal bootleg. But that thread is just one of those threads that is their attempt to validate their lives that they've wasted on believing in a faulty, poor franchise. Neptunekittie said it right when she mentioned that Robotech has failed at rekindling the "magic" that it had back then. She seems like a realist. Seems like everyone else is simply trying to psych themselves up into believing that what they're saying is real and valid.

[chrisk]

Sorry if this was covered before, but what benefits, if any, are there in delaying Shadow Rising? Why not just outright say it got cancelled? Why must Harmony Gold constantly hammer it into people's heads that Shadow Chronicles was such a mind-blowing success (if not sequel is being developed as late as 2009)? Can anyone deduce HG's gameplan?

[Saraphys]

Sorry if this was covered before, but what benefits, if any, are there in delaying Shadow Rising? Why not just outright say it got cancelled? Why must Harmony Gold constantly hammer it into people's heads that Shadow Chronicles was such a mind-blowing success (if not sequel is being developed as late as 2009)? Can anyone deduce HG's gameplan?

General concensus is that HG is looking to sell-off their "Robotech" product to someone else, and so they're making it seem like the franchise is thoroughly alive and kicking...

...even if its as dead as the Roman city of Pompeii...

Someone could give you a more serious answer...

[Jasonc]

What HG says (sometimes), is that they are wanting to time Shadow Rising with the LAM. So, while they say that it isn't on hold, it is on hold cause they're gonna wait for the LAM. Where it gets tricky, is that they are still in the early stages of preproduction, still trying to figure out what the story is gonna be about. Work hasn't been going on with it, unless you count talking about it, and that seems more like it's being on hold, or hiatus...same thing. As for a benefit, I don't think there's a benefit, unless they're doing it cause WB says to, which seems like the case. It's just one of those things that strengthens the case, and theory that HG wants to pave the way for WB to have a successful movie, in order to want generate interest to possibly buy the franchise. Robotech may not be with HG forever. Frank Agrama is old, and with all his legal troubles, I don't think he'll be interested in continuing with a questionable franchise for too much longer.

The only benefit there could be, is that if they were, in fact, working on Shadow Rising, they would be able to refine it much more than the first movie. However, since that isn't the case, they're only losing their fanbase, and losing touch with potential cash.