Macross Δ (Delta) Movie Gekijō no Walkūre (Passionate Walkure)

[Zx31]

4 hours ago, Jasonc said:

I'm happy for this news. Delta opened up and expanded a much wider environment for the story. It spans multiple planets, space, fleets, a colony ship. With that, there can be a lot to cover, especially with so much plot they can still cover. It was never fully resolved. In any case, I suspect the first movie will be recap, although I'd really like to see it continue and wrap up, or be something that goes into the next series.

It seems like a few here are upset that it's not made just for them, but frankly, and I've said it before, it's really not made for any of us, so there goes that  I'm glad it brought in a whole new group of fans, and with the success of Walkure alone, this move is well warranted. I was waiting for this announcement, so it didn't surprise me, but happy nonetheless.

Finally, some positivity

[ZOR prime]

Finally.

Mutiple planets mega cruisers 

Modfied vfs

Like Macross 7

 

 

Edited August 7, 2017 by ZOR prime
none

[jenius]

4 hours ago, dizman said:

I have a bit of hope for the movie if it's a recap of Delta. If they cut out the all wasted episodes and needless dialogue of the series and stick to the main story it could make for a fun fast paced movie with good music and one good fight scene.

This is why I proposed it would make a great 2 movie series with the 1st movie actually being a prequel that covered all the stuff that kept getting alluded to in the series. Then the series itself could just deal with the fruition of everything from the 1st movie. It would also be a great way of doing things so that a 'cold' viewer could essentially hop right in.

[dizman]

The only problem with a prequel is that I don't think there is enough story to warrant a 90 minute movie, though if it gets us a DX toy of the SV-154 you can count me in.

[Seto Kaiba]

11 hours ago, Lorindor said:

They should have killed of Freyja. Sure, let her win the love triangle if they must, but then let her nobly sacrifice herself in the last battle when she realizes she has not long time to live anyway. A tragic but heroic end. That would have made an impression on me at least and could have made me change my opinion on her as a character. Now she's just awful.

I'd kind of expected them to do that in the TV series... since she started going all crusty right before the end, I figured we were going to be left with a decisive Walkure victory at the expense of Freyja self-crystalizing into a statue.  It would've been a more poigniant end than her short-lived romantic victory, but probably too dark for Macross.

 

10 hours ago, Jasonc said:

I'm happy for this news. Delta opened up and expanded a much wider environment for the story. It spans multiple planets, space, fleets, a colony ship. With that, there can be a lot to cover, especially with so much plot they can still cover. It was never fully resolved. In any case, I suspect the first movie will be recap, although I'd really like to see it continue and wrap up, or be something that goes into the next series.

That's one of the show's problems.  While it created this huge playground for itself in an attempt to out-Frontier Macross Frontier with its own rendition of what was basically the exact same plot, it neglected the hell out of said playground.  Twenty-something inhabited worlds and we only see a handful of them, most of which look exactly the same.  

The setting development is wonderful, especially if you're in Macross RPGs which it almost seems to be for, but they could've made do with a less huge setting to give their story more focus.  Kind of develops the Star Wars problem of "a million worlds, but only four that matter".  In the case of Delta, it's Ragna, Windermere IV, Voldor, and Al Shahal.

 

[kajnrig]

15 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

I'd kind of expected them to do that in the TV series... since she started going all crusty right before the end, I figured we were going to be left with a decisive Walkure victory at the expense of Freyja self-crystalizing into a statue.  It would've been a more poigniant end than her short-lived romantic victory, but probably too dark for Macross.

If they go this route, ie Freyja "wins" the triangle but their relationship is short-lived, I'd hate for them to then make Mirage the rebound. She has too much potential as a character to be relegated to that role, though I have a sinking feeling that that's exactly how it would play out. For "romance's" sake.

I actually think she and Messer could work well, in a sort of sex-only relationship that is much more about pragmatism than romance. They both have physical urges but have distaste for the social practices that come with it. It would fit well with their existing character traits (and make for more soap opera material, of course). Then maybe as the series progresses they start to realize that maybe there's more between them than they care to admit, and Hayate only complicates things further. It would at least help to reframe Messer's dickishness toward Hayate: maybe he's jealous, or maybe he sees what Hayate's doing for Mirage and is trying, in his own way, to encourage it.

And of course there's Kaname, who has less of a direct relationship to Mirage, but the Mirage/Messer ship could influence how he interacts with her and Arad, and that little triangle can get a bit more juice as well.

The characters in this show really do have a lot of interesting threads. Mikumo's supreme confidence and singing power contrasted with her utter lack of understanding of anything that she does. Makina and Reina fighting to keep the two of them insulated from the drama surrounding them (and getting more substance than "be the lesbians, do the lesbian things everyone likes"). Chuck coping with his sister's death as well as being the single father figure to his four younger brothers.

[WaferMouse]

16 hours ago, kajnrig said:

Makina and Reina fighting to keep the two of them insulated from the drama surrounding them (and getting more substance than "be the lesbians, do the lesbian things everyone likes").

Confession: Makina and Reina are my Delta platonic OTP. I'm hashtag Team Mirage, but nobody in the main triangle is as likeable as those two.

More Walkure and Mikumo tracks would be nice, best music Macross ever had IMO.

Edited August 9, 2017 by WaferMouse

[jenius]

Reina is the "hacker" right?  I thought they should take her out of the band and make her a bridge bunny or something... She didn't add much for me. 

[Focslain]

2 minutes ago, jenius said:

Reina is the "hacker" right?  I thought they should take her out of the band and make her a bridge bunny or something... She didn't add much for me. 

Reina doesn't want to be in Wlakure anymore then you want her to. The reason for her inclusion in-universe is explained during the anime.

But it basically boils down to two things:

1) She is very fold sensative

2) She can handle the stress of combat (most likely due to the bond built between her and Makina)

[jenius]

Right, so she can be dropped with virtually no harm to the story... i think it would actually improve things.  If she were a bridge bunny you can still wedge in the lesbian thing too.

[Focslain]

21 minutes ago, jenius said:

Right, so she can be dropped with virtually no harm to the story... i think it would actually improve things.  If she were a bridge bunny you can still wedge in the lesbian thing too.

Wrong actually.

Only way to remove Reina is to remove Makina as well since they need each other (not just to check box the tropes, but in story as well). Don't believe me? Just watch ep 21.

Now if they drop Walkure to just three, then sure as you can drop makina and Reina and keep it with just Mikumo, Freyja and Kaname. That is if the group is just for singing.

If they actually do missions like in the series then Makina and Reina's skill sets are needed.

[Seto Kaiba]

22 hours ago, kajnrig said:

The characters in this show really do have a lot of interesting threads. Mikumo's supreme confidence and singing power contrasted with her utter lack of understanding of anything that she does. Makina and Reina fighting to keep the two of them insulated from the drama surrounding them (and getting more substance than "be the lesbians, do the lesbian things everyone likes"). Chuck coping with his sister's death as well as being the single father figure to his four younger brothers.

Personally, I'm inclined to disagree that the characters could cultivate interest... most of them are so painfully underdeveloped that their bios on the official website actually offer more detail than the show itself does.  Most of them are playing to very simple cliches.  Mikumo, instead, is simply a combination of two existing characters: she's Sheryl Nome by way of Mina Forte.

 

 

2 hours ago, jenius said:

Reina is the "hacker" right?  I thought they should take her out of the band and make her a bridge bunny or something... She didn't add much for me. 

IMO, both she and Makina could be removed from the story outright without changing a damn thing.  They're both only there to tick off some arbitrary checkboxes on the standard fetishes checklist.  They don't even live up to the minimal promise of their official bios on the website.  Makina's allegedly the crew chief on the Aether, and yet the only time she's ever shown to do anything is the first OP and is otherwise just a transport and life support system for a pair of gag boobs (while somehow also managing to be even less plot-relevant than Nanase, who filled that role in Macross Frontier).  Reina's supposed to be some kind of elite hacker, but the only times she ever succeeds at it are when the enemy wants her to break in.  Every other time she gets busted right away, which is how she ended up working for Xaos in the first place.  Their elite super-hacker couldn't beat a single electronic door lock and one dozy rent-a-cop.

 

 

2 hours ago, Focslain said:

Reina doesn't want to be in Wlakure anymore then you want her to. The reason for her inclusion in-universe is explained during the anime.

It's actually even less complex than that.  She tried to hack Xaos for some reason, got busted, and was given the standard cliche "work for us or go to jail" ultimatum.

Edited August 9, 2017 by Seto Kaiba

[kajnrig]

6 hours ago, WaferMouse said:

Confession: Makina and Reina are my Delta platonic OTP.

I dunno if that's a typo or not, but I'm actually liable to agree. They're presented in the show more as really close/intimate friends even though they're ostensibly in a romantic relationship.

2 hours ago, jenius said:

Reina is the "hacker" right?  I thought they should take her out of the band and make her a bridge bunny or something... She didn't add much for me. 

That's not a bad idea, now I think about it... Maybe she and Makina can be backup members of Walkure, there to sing when needed. If Mirage found her way into Walkure too like I thought she would be, a reserve group wouldn't be a bad way to ease her into the role.

31 minutes ago, Focslain said:

Now if they drop Walkure to just three, then sure as you can drop makina and Reina and keep it with just Mikumo, Freyja and Kaname. That is if the group is just for singing.

Well, the group IS more or less just for singing. The paramilitary/covert ops missions they went on were silly and never felt fully-realized.

22 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Personally, I'm inclined to disagree that the characters could cultivate interest... most of them are so painfully underdeveloped that their bios on the official website actually offer more detail than the show itself does.  Most of them are playing to very simple cliches.

Underdeveloped, indeed. But I was talking about their potential, not the realization of said potential. If these movies are a chance to retell the story, it's a chance to better realize what these characters could be.

[jenius]

Moving Makina and Reina into background roles feels like a positive to me. I'd also prefer a more military personality for Reina which would suit her background role better. I hate any depiction of hacking so hopefully the movie can stay away from that nonsense. 

Oddly, I enjoyed that Mirage floundered and didn't join the group. If the love triangle were better sorted it could have been nice for her to go Hayate style super saiyan in the conclusion and save the day true Jenius style saving Hayate but losing him to Freiya. A better character arch might have been for her to be jealous of Walkure and particularly Freiya only to accept in the end that she walks the warrior's path. 

[Focslain]

Let's be honest here though. Regardless of what we them to change for the movie, we all know that they aren't going to fix anything other than the pacing.

[Marzan]

I'm hoping that they fix the pacing/lack of story issues that plagued the series in the film. Alas, they will not not do anything about the Knights, the most boring and substanceless antagonists in Macross history.

Redo/recap film followed by new series?

[Focslain]

2 minutes ago, Marzan said:

Redo/recap film followed by new series?

That's what it's looking like.

[Seto Kaiba]

36 minutes ago, Focslain said:

Let's be honest here though. Regardless of what we them to change for the movie, we all know that they aren't going to fix anything other than the pacing.

... and probably not even that.  Delta's story was pretty fundamentally broken in that respect.

[Focslain]

6 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

... and probably not even that.  Delta's story was pretty fundamentally broken in that respect.

Especially towards the end. I'm just expecting a recap movie with a bump in animation quality, less repetation of songs, and no filler.

Basically what the Frontier movies gave me.

[WaferMouse]

4 hours ago, jenius said:

If the love triangle were better sorted it could have been nice for her to go Hayate style super saiyan in the conclusion and save the day true Jenius style saving Hayate but losing him to Freiya. A better character arch might have been for her to be jealous of Walkure and particularly Freiya only to accept in the end that she walks the warrior's path. 

I kinda felt that what you described is what happened, though perhaps not as "true Jenius" as either of us would have liked. Everyone was ready to give up before Mirage chewed out their fold-connected-minds, triggered Freyja's musical space magic defense response, won the war but lost the triangle.

5 hours ago, kajnrig said:

I dunno if that's a typo or not, but I'm actually liable to agree. They're presented in the show more as really close/intimate friends even though they're ostensibly in a romantic relationship.

No typo, I think you probably did an even better job of describing what I meant 

[Bolt]

I wonder what the majority of Japanese fans want? Or if that Matters even. 

Culturally speaking, most here are looking for the same thing. Some would argue it isn't cultural. That its basic storytelling that needs to be executed. 

Why wasn't any of this an issue in 1984?

haha , rehtorical. 

 

[kalvasflam]

would be hilarious if Kaname dies, and Messer lives.

Or better yet, after episode 9, it was all a dream sequence, a la Bobby Ewing.

Mirage wakes up, walks to the shower, and there is Hayate... wait, that didn't make sense.  

 

[Sildani]

It's ok. You lost me at "Mirage walks to the shower" anyway. 

[Seto Kaiba]

7 hours ago, kalvasflam said:

would be hilarious if Kaname dies, and Messer lives.

Somehow, I think that would end badly for Messer too... emo boy literally lives to protect Kaname.

 

 

Quote

Or better yet, after episode 9, it was all a dream sequence, a la Bobby Ewing.

"No, Messer.  It wasn't a dream.  You're still in high school, and this is the greatest misdirection play of all time."

The next hour and a half of the movie are a generic coming-of-age sports anime.

EDIT: At least it'd explain why he goes through the entire series wearing kneepads...

 

 

Quote

Mirage wakes up, walks to the shower, and there is Hayate... wait, that didn't make sense.  

...

 

 

1 hour ago, Sildani said:

It's ok. You lost me at "Mirage walks to the shower" anyway. 

I think he just wants to see her in the shower.  Or maybe he wants to see Hayate in the shower.  I dunno.

Edited August 10, 2017 by Seto Kaiba

[kalvasflam]

1 hour ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Somehow, I think that would end badly for Messer too... emo boy literally lives to protect Kaname.

 

 

"No, Messer.  It wasn't a dream.  You're still in high school, and this is the greatest misdirection play of all time."

The next hour and a half of the movie are a generic coming-of-age sports anime.

EDIT: At least it'd explain why he goes through the entire series wearing kneepads...

 

 

...

 

 

I think he just wants to see her in the shower.  Or maybe he wants to see Hayate in the shower.  I dunno.

I am clearly dating myself here... any kid who was around for the 80s and had parents who watched campy soap opera knows Dallas, and the whole season was a dream sequence... and it ends in a shower scene.

heh heh.  That's ok, you young uns....

[frothymug]

I'm sure most of us are old enough or know enough pop culture to have gotten the joke.  I hate that plot device so much. I think it was Family Guy that put it so succinctly: "It's like a big middle finger in your face." I happened to be watching the last Twilight movie at a hotel a few years ago. I WAS CURIOUS. They did the same kind of lazy writing and I literally yelled at the TV when the big reveal was made. What a sh*t movie.

[kalvasflam]

12 minutes ago, frothymug said:

I'm sure most of us are old enough or know enough pop culture to have gotten the joke.  I hate that plot device so much. I think it was Family Guy that put it so succinctly: "It's like a big middle finger in your face." I happened to be watching the last Twilight movie at a hotel a few years ago. I WAS CURIOUS. They did the same kind of lazy writing and I literally yelled at the TV when the big reveal was made. What a sh*t movie.

I'm sure it had to do with ratings....  OMG, the ratings suck, quick do something dramatic like bringing back a dead character and retcon the whole thing out of existence.

[Seto Kaiba]

1 hour ago, kalvasflam said:

I am clearly dating myself here... any kid who was around for the 80s and had parents who watched campy soap opera knows Dallas, and the whole season was a dream sequence... and it ends in a shower scene.

heh heh.  That's ok, you young uns....

's a bit before my time... I was all of about five years old when that show was canceled.  That was, IIRC, the inspiration for The Simpsons "Who shot Mr. Burns?" thing tho, wasn't it?

I certainly understand frothymug's attitude towards the "it was all just a dream" thing, but as the Macross Delta series didn't so much jump the shark as ramp off the shark's burning carcass while dressed like extras from Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon and emptying dustbins of useless exposition into the horrified upturned faces of the audience it could hardly make matters worse...

Edited August 10, 2017 by Seto Kaiba

[kalvasflam]

39 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

's a bit before my time... I was all of about five years old when that show was canceled.  That was, IIRC, the inspiration for The Simpsons "Who shot Mr. Burns?" thing tho, wasn't it?

I certainly understand frothymug's attitude towards the "it was all just a dream" thing, but as the Macross Delta series didn't so much jump the shark as ramp off the shark's burning carcass while dressed like extras from Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon and emptying dustbins of useless exposition into the horrified upturned faces of the audience it could hardly make matters worse...

heh heh, yeah, if that was the case, you'd have clearly missed the Bobby Ewing shocker.

I agree with the Delta comments, while the first dozen episodes were ok, even then you could clearly see how lazy they were about the action, most of it was generic contrails scissoring in the sky.   So, in this case a plot device to erase the mistake of the Delta series is not a bad necessarily a bad thing.

That'll happen the same day Amuro wakes up in his class and realize that the entire UC was a horrible dream sequence.  

[kajnrig]

13 hours ago, Bolt said:

I wonder what the majority of Japanese fans want? Or if that Matters even. 

Culturally speaking, most here are looking for the same thing. Some would argue it isn't cultural. That its basic storytelling that needs to be executed. 

Why wasn't any of this an issue in 1984?

haha , rehtorical. 

 

I actually wonder about this a lot of the time, too. The same tropes are ridiculously popular there, and it doesn't seem like "good storytelling" is anything even remotely approaching a priority for the Japanese.

...but then I have to take a step back and realize how limited my perspective on their pop culture is, and how it probably actually mirrors our own to a phenomenal degree.

2 hours ago, kalvasflam said:

I'm sure it had to do with ratings....  OMG, the ratings suck, quick do something dramatic like bringing back a dead character and retcon the whole thing out of existence.

From what I've gleaned thanks to this show's meme-ness (Power Rangers kid here), the ratings sucked, so the producers abruptly canceled the show, giving either one season or one episode to wrap everything up. The writers, knowing that they had been given an impossible task, basically decided "frakk it" and did whatever they wanted.

[Bolt]

2 hours ago, kajnrig said:

what I've gleaned thanks to this show's meme-ness (Power Rangers kid here), the ratings sucked, so the producers abruptly canceled the show, giving either one season or one episode to wrap everything up. The writers, knowing that they had been given an impossible task, basically decided "frakk it" and did whatever they wanted.

Is this true?

i too wonder about the drive to please the mainstream Japanese audience .

part of my misconception is not fully realizing how mainstream Macross is!

duh!

but so is Gundam, (of course!) so why do I like thunderbolt so much??

another rhetorical...

Edited August 10, 2017 by Bolt

[kalvasflam]

1 hour ago, Bolt said:

Is this true?

i too wonder about the drive to please the mainstream Japanese audience .

part of my misconception is not fully realizing how mainstream Macross is!

duh!

but so is Gunfam, (of course!) so why do I like thunderbolt so much??

another rhetorical...

I'm not sure I would necessarily call Macross mainstream, until this recent iteration, they've taken the approach of less is more, and so the long period between Frontier and Delta.  Of course, if they put out a shitty product, then they have to go with quantity.

I don't pretend to know what mainstream in Japan really is, if I had to guess, Gundam with their every year must have a new season mentality could be considered mainstream.  And they do have some quality shows.  For example, even though the one year war has been done to death, they still manage to come up with some good stuff like MS IGLOO, even if a lot of it was retconning the original. 

[Seto Kaiba]

51 minutes ago, kalvasflam said:

I'm not sure I would necessarily call Macross mainstream, until this recent iteration, they've taken the approach of less is more, and so the long period between Frontier and Delta.  Of course, if they put out a shitty product, then they have to go with quantity.

All told, I think Macross finally became properly mainstream starting with Macross Frontier, which really increased public awareness of the metaseries to unexpected levels.  The long intervals that usually occur between Macross series are more down to the eccentricities of its creators than the property not being well-regarded.

Kawamori has always been resistant to the idea of doing direct sequels, so every new Macross is inevitably set in a different place and time with as little direct connection to previous shows as he thinks he can get away with.  It's kind of like a one-man equivalent of a shared universe.  I guess he isn't interested in getting caught up in a by-the-numbers sequel production rut like the Mobile Suit Gundam franchise has been for ages... he seems to prefer maximum creative freedom to the idea of a clockwork gunpla meal ticket, while leaving the more traditional sequels and side stories for the hands of the light novel authors, mangaka, and video game developers.

I can't say that part hurts my feelings any.  It feels like Kawamori's kind of pulling away from the metaseries again, and there were rumors a while back that he was quietly grooming Hidetaka to take over as Macross's top dog.  Either way, I think he's probably feeling the pressure now that there've been two recent high-profile Macross successes.  The sponsors probably feel that there's enough of a hungry audience to go to more frequent releases.

[dizman]

3 hours ago, Bolt said:

but so is Gundam, (of course!) so why do I like thunderbolt so much??

another rhetorical...

The funny thing about Thunderbolt is that in a recent interview the creator said that he made it closer to how Americans view war (that's kind of how he worded it anyways) so that might be why it gained so much popularity so quickly.

[Bolt]

47 minutes ago, dizman said:

how

 

48 minutes ago, dizman said:

The funny thing about Thunderbolt is that in a recent interview the creator said that he made it closer to how Americans view war (that's kind of how he worded it anyways) so that might be why it gained so much popularity so quickly.

Very interesting. It worked. 

I guess the very big difference also , I think, is in most Macross series' it always feels like a watered down, bubble gum  portrayal of war. Which, again, is probably apropriate(?) considering the Japanese fan base/age .

I will be waiting patiently, as always, to see what this Delta movie is going to do for the overall story thus far.