New Macross TV Series in 20xx (sometime this decade)

[peter]

On 10/26/2018 at 2:50 AM, Graham said:

I fell in love with Macross 37 years ago, when I was 12 years old.  Up until Delta I was an avid fan eagerly awaiting each new TV/Movie/OVA/Toy/Model/Book/CD release.

However, after Delta I honestly find myself struggling to maintain interest, even though I loved the Delta mecha designs.

Don't worry, I hit that wall when 7 came out, yet here I am, still clinging on, lol!

 

[Sailor Arashi]

23 hours ago, ScrambledValkyrie said:

Speaking of 7, I finally finished watching it, and I have to say that overall I enjoyed it, even with its flaws. This makes Delta the only Macross I haven’t seen, and based on the comments here, I don’t know if I’m up for it.

Don't let the comments here influence your decision.   It used to be you couldn't say "Hello" here without someone telling you how much Macross 7 sucked, and yet you enjoyed it regardless of those opinions.   Delta's flaws are arguably no worse than 7's, and quite a few people seem to enjoy it.   The best idea is to just start watching it and stop if you don't like it.  

[Sandman]

14 hours ago, Graham said:

Episodes 1-13 and 25-26 of Delta are kinda decent.

You can just skip episodes 14-24 if (a) you like seeing mecha and (b) you dislike characters behaving stupidly.

Damn this the second time this week I’ve tried to upvote you and realized your posts not offer up voting.

[Sandman]

25 minutes ago, Sailor Arashi said:

Don't let the comments here influence your decision.   It used to be you couldn't say "Hello" here without someone telling you how much Macross 7 sucked, and yet you enjoyed it regardless of those opinions.   Delta's flaws are arguably no worse than 7's, and quite a few people seem to enjoy it.   The best idea is to just start watching it and stop if you don't like it.  

7 kills Delta. There is mecha scenes in almost every episode. And the music ROCKS!

[Seto Kaiba]

18 minutes ago, Sandman said:

7 kills Delta. There is mecha scenes in almost every episode. And the music ROCKS!

As someone who used to be one of the most vocal critics of Macross 7 on these forums... Macross 7 is substantially better than Macross Delta.  Their premises and mechanics are very similar, but Macross 7 is light years ahead in terms of the quality of its story's execution.  

(Fittingly, the fold amps Walkure uses are derived from Dr. Chiba and Dr. Lawrence's research from Macross 7 and Macross Dynamite 7.)

[Sailor Arashi]

43 minutes ago, Sandman said:

7 kills Delta. There is mecha scenes in almost every episode. And the music ROCKS!

But it's the same mecha scene in every episode

 

[Seto Kaiba]

32 minutes ago, Sailor Arashi said:

But it's the same mecha scene in every episode

 

Yeah, but at least they remembered that variable fighters transform... you could almost have passed Delta off as an Ace Combat anime crossing over with IDOLM@STER like Bandai is so fond of doing.  

[Sanity is Optional]

Comparing 7 and delta, I'd say they're within spitting distance of eachother.

The difference is that 7 starts bad and gets better, while Delta starts decent and gets worse. Watching a decent series slipping into crapdom is far worse than watching a bad series become decent.

[kajnrig]

52 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

you could almost have passed Delta off as an Ace Combat anime crossing over with IDOLM@STER like Bandai is so fond of doing.  

I think I'd have liked it better if it were.

[Sandman]

1 hour ago, Sailor Arashi said:

But it's the same mecha scene in every episode

 

Have you watched through the whole series?

Edited October 31, 2018 by Sandman

[treatment]

M7 anime is a very very VERY STUPIDLY LOW bar to surpass.

Delta anime still went "hold my beer" on it...

[Karaoke Ninja]

It's interesting the western fanbase hates titles like 7 and Delta so much while the Japanese fanbase loves them but the Japanese fanbase dislikes Zero and II which the western fanbase seems to love. I mean 7 even has the most animated content out of all the Macross shows due to it's massive popularity. Is it because the Japanese fans are more interested in the character and music side of the franchise and the western fans care more about the sci-fi aspect of it?

Edited November 1, 2018 by Karaoke Ninja

[Podtastic]

39 minutes ago, Karaoke Ninja said:

It's interesting the western fanbase hates titles like 7 and Delta so much while the Japanese fanbase loves them but the Japanese fanbase dislikes Zero and II which the western fanbase seems to love. I mean 7 even has the most animated content out of all the Macross shows due to it's massive popularity. Is it because the Japanese fans are more interested in the character and music side of the franchise and the western fans care more about the sci-fi aspect of it?

Well you cant generalise but for me that would be true.

SDFM is my favourite thanks to introducing the awesome concept of the alien Zentradi, plus their cool  designs, and the only thing I disliked in it was "Min Mei"

What I saw of 7 seemed goofed to me.  

 

[AN/ALQ128]

I personally love both the designs and the music aspect of Macross, so M7 is one of my favorites.

[Seto Kaiba]

13 hours ago, Sandman said:

Have you watched through the whole series?

To be fair, Macross 7 does reuse the same handful of action shots of the VF-19 Custom transforming and VF-11Cs getting blown up in practically every episode...

 

10 hours ago, Karaoke Ninja said:

It's interesting the western fanbase hates titles like 7 and Delta so much while the Japanese fanbase loves them but the Japanese fanbase dislikes Zero and II which the western fanbase seems to love. I mean 7 even has the most animated content out of all the Macross shows due to it's massive popularity. Is it because the Japanese fans are more interested in the character and music side of the franchise and the western fans care more about the sci-fi aspect of it?

I'm not sure those two can be put on an equal footing for the sake of comparison.

Macross 7 was a success in Japan on the merits of the series as a whole.  If you look to its fanworks and merchandising, you'll find a well-balanced collection of artbooks, albums, audio dramas, doujinshi, character goods, model kits, toys, and other collectibles.  Macross Delta seems to be coasting entirely on the popularity of the idol group Walkure.  I doubt it's even the actual characters in the show, given that three of the five members of Walkure got token or zero character development.  Coverage of the non-Walkure parts of Delta is token and of almost universally poor quality, low in detail, and generally short.  We've had one artbook that was exclusively character-focused and with minimal coverage outside the main trio's profiles and Walkure's.  The one "artbook" for the mecha, Variable Fighter Master File: VF-31 Siegfried, was about 50% plagiarized from the VF-25 Master File and the other half was a terrible mess that contradicted the series and itself.  Character goods are almost exclusively Walkure.  Magazine articles?  Walkure.  Promotional art?  Walkure.  It's all Walkure all the time... like the other 90% of the cast aren't even there.

 

Now, that said, I suspect it has less to do with audience interests and more with what shows set the tone... the series they saw first.

In Japan, you'll see a major influx of new fans every time a new Macross series airs so the fandom is always balanced between old and new fans.  The western fanbase is mostly made up of long-time fans who were introduced to Macross via locally-available licensed releases.  The three most commonly available licensed releases were the Robotech localization of Super Dimension Fortress Macross, the heavily UC Gundam-influenced Macross II: Lovers Again OVA, and the action-focused Macross Plus OVA.  All three of those are a good deal darker and more serious than the average Macross fare... and that's what the western audience derives its expectations from. 

The Gundam franchise had a similar, but reversed, problem in the not-too-distant past with Reconguista in G.  Fans the world over were so used to Gundam shows, and the Universal Century shows in particular, being dark and gritty and depressing that when a more lighthearted and optimistic Gundam show came along in that same timeline they simply couldn't get their heads around it.  It felt strange and out of place, and the lightheartedness felt silly and wrong.  

[Sanity is Optional]

1 hour ago, Seto Kaiba said:

The Gundam franchise had a similar, but reversed, problem in the not-too-distant past with Reconguista in G.  Fans the world over were so used to Gundam shows, and the Universal Century shows in particular, being dark and gritty and depressing that when a more lighthearted and optimistic Gundam show came along in that same timeline they simply couldn't get their heads around it.  It felt strange and out of place, and the lightheartedness felt silly and wrong.  

I'm not sure being lighthearted was Reconguista's problem. Having watched it, I'd go more with the absolute mess that the plot and characters were, and heavy reliance on support material to explain WTF was going on.

[davidwhangchoi]

i came over here thinking 2018 is almost over. i guess this is not coming in in 2018

[no3Ljm]

Just now, davidwhangchoi said:

i came over here thinking 2018 is almost over. i guess this is not coming in in 2018

Me too. I keep on checking this thread but no actual news about it. So I don't think they will release any deculture like episode in December, which I think they usually do, since they haven't announced anything.

 

[Lorindor]

25 minutes ago, Sanity is Optional said:

I'm not sure being lighthearted was Reconguista's problem. Having watched it, I'd go more with the absolute mess that the plot and characters were, and heavy reliance on support material to explain WTF was going on.

Yeah, I've never heard a complaint over the lightheartedness of G Reco. (Is it really THAT lighthearted even?) That the show's a hot mess, on the other hand, is a very common complaint.

[davidwhangchoi]

1 minute ago, no3Ljm said:

Me too. I keep on checking this thread but no actual news about it. So I don't think they will release any deculture like episode in December, which I think they usually do, since they haven't announced anything.

 

fingers crossed

[Seto Kaiba]

3 minutes ago, no3Ljm said:

Me too. I keep on checking this thread but no actual news about it. So I don't think they will release any deculture like episode in December, which I think they usually do, since they haven't announced anything.

As I've said in many previous posts, we'd expect an announcement that a new series was in the works around the end of October.  No such announcement was forthcoming, so we're probably not getting a new series after all.  Just another Delta movie.

 

2 minutes ago, Lorindor said:

Yeah, I've never heard a complaint over the lightheartedness of G Reco. (Is it really THAT lighthearted even?) That the show's a hot mess, on the other hand, is a very common complaint.

It's always been the #1 complaint I've seen about the series... that they were so determined to be upbeat that Bellri doesn't react to anything like a sane person.  

[Sanity is Optional]

Just now, Seto Kaiba said:

It's always been the #1 complaint I've seen about the series... that they were so determined to be upbeat that Bellri doesn't react to anything like a sane person.  

Is it that they were trying to be lighthearted? Mainly it just felt like they had plot points to get through, and screw trying to explain it, or have the characters react to it.

It felt like the main characters were on a ride visiting different displays, but not reacting to them, and without any given room on the ride affecting the next.

[Bolt]

Wow. Still no news. Hopes fading..

[no3Ljm]

7 minutes ago, Bolt said:

Wow. Still no news. Hopes fading..

Don't be. They're still releasing Macross Valkyries. So we're all still good.

 

[Bolt]

Good point..

[Karaoke Ninja]

9 hours ago, Sanity is Optional said:

Is it that they were trying to be lighthearted? Mainly it just felt like they had plot points to get through, and screw trying to explain it, or have the characters react to it.

It felt like the main characters were on a ride visiting different displays, but not reacting to them, and without any given room on the ride affecting the next.

I remember watching G-Reco with a friend and we dropped it around episode 4. The dialog was just so weird and it was hard to follow what was happening. I remember this one scene where the main character is speaking with his mom with that girl in the same room and they're both having completely different conversations despite talking directly to one another? I was like "This is not how human beings speak. What the hell is going on...". I think Tomino has gone off the deep end in his old age but then again a lot of his older shows had really weird unnatural dialog too.

[Graham]

On 11/1/2018 at 11:11 AM, Karaoke Ninja said:

It's interesting the western fanbase hates titles like 7 and Delta so much while the Japanese fanbase loves them but the Japanese fanbase dislikes Zero and II which the western fanbase seems to love. I mean 7 even has the most animated content out of all the Macross shows due to it's massive popularity. Is it because the Japanese fans are more interested in the character and music side of the franchise and the western fans care more about the sci-fi aspect of it?

I actually love M7.

DYRL, M7, Plus OVA and Frontier TV+Movies are my favorite Macross animes.

[Graham]

7 hours ago, Karaoke Ninja said:

I remember this one scene where the main character is speaking with his mom with that girl in the same room and they're both having completely different conversations despite talking directly to one another? I was like "This is not how human beings speak. What the hell is going on...". 

That sounds normal to me..

You have obviously never been in a conversation with my wife and teenage son.....LOL

[brouken]

I've been lurking this thread from time to time to see if there's any new info or announcement of the new Macross series. So there's no news at all?  I understand there's going to be another Delta movie instead?

[Seto Kaiba]

53 minutes ago, brouken said:

I've been lurking this thread from time to time to see if there's any new info or announcement of the new Macross series. So there's no news at all?  I understand there's going to be another Delta movie instead?

That's the gist of it, yes.

[Marzan]

On 11/1/2018 at 4:11 AM, Karaoke Ninja said:

It's interesting the western fanbase hates titles like 7 and Delta so much while the Japanese fanbase loves them but the Japanese fanbase dislikes Zero and II which the western fanbase seems to love. I mean 7 even has the most animated content out of all the Macross shows due to it's massive popularity. Is it because the Japanese fans are more interested in the character and music side of the franchise and the western fans care more about the sci-fi aspect of it?

I don't think the western fanbase loves Zero and II to be honest. They're both pretty anonymous and hardly anyone except the most hardcore of Macross fans (basically the people in here) have watched them.

For the record I love Macross 7. It took me a couple of watches, but I ended up surrendering to it's relentless energy an on point message. Basara is a force of nature that just ends up overwhelming you. And the music rocks. 7 by itself probably has more memorable songs than any other Macross iteration (excluding orchestral stuff of course.

On 11/1/2018 at 5:15 PM, Sanity is Optional said:

Is it that they were trying to be lighthearted? Mainly it just felt like they had plot points to get through, and screw trying to explain it, or have the characters react to it.

It felt like the main characters were on a ride visiting different displays, but not reacting to them, and without any given room on the ride affecting the next.

Spot on. That is exactly how I felt watching it. I can imagine people working on Reconquista thinking that the dialogue and character interactions were jarring if not nonsensincal at times, but how the hell do you tell a living legend like Tomino that his work is not very good.

On 11/2/2018 at 10:42 AM, Graham said:

That sounds normal to me..

You have obviously never been in a conversation with my wife and teenage son.....LOL

LOL, I think a lot of us have been there with something similar.

[Mazinger]

58 minutes ago, Marzan said:

For the record I love Macross 7. It took me a couple of watches, but I ended up surrendering to it's relentless energy an on point message.

I sometimes wish some fan with serious editing chops would take the whole series and whittle it down to something like an 8 hour fan edit.  I really like it but there is more than a bit of redundant footage and pacing issues.

[isamu]

No news yet?

[Bolt]

As a westerner, Loved M ll and Zero.

With M7, at first, I was like WTF? But it really grew on me!  BOMBA!

Delta , for me , had very few great moments..at least we got some more cool VF’s out of it.

Frontier was WAY better!

 

[Seto Kaiba]

2 hours ago, isamu said:

No news yet?

None.  They're either following a different release timeline than on previous installments, or the series has been back-burnered in favor of the second Macross Delta movie which was announced around the time we would've expected the series to be announced.