Harmony Gold suing Tatsunoko

[Knight26]

So, I was looking at the Den Of Geek Article regarding the newest RT comic.  They reference the actual Macross series several times, and even have links embedded that lead to articles about the VF-1 VALKYRIE (and Macross), other Macross series, and the whole Robotech debacle.  That got me thinking, even several youtubers I have seen, who discuss RT, bring up that it is a conglomeration of three separate titles.  Given that that information is now widely available and public, to anyone who cares to open their eyes, and the amount of backlash that HG gets as a result of that from casual and hardcore fans, why don't they just sell themselves out to a larger entity and call it a day?  If it is just about the money then I am sure some larger media conglomerate would be happy to gobble them up, including the distro rights to the OG Macross and send their own reps to BW to strike a deal for the rest of the franchise.  Yes, Tatsunoko would still get their OG SDF-Macross money, but if say, WB, or Amazon bought HG outright, and struck direct deals with BW, Bandai, and Arcadia to distribute the rest of the series' and merch overseas wouldn't that make everyone happy?

Yes, the hardcore RT fans might piss and moan, but even they would get easier access to merch, and of an arguably higher quality then they have in the past.

Is HG so dogmatically stubborn that they must hold onto their franchise and keep the money trickling in, I mean how much are they actually make annually, that they wouldn't accept a big cash payout to just take a hike and leave it all behind?

[pengbuzz]

52 minutes ago, Knight26 said:

So, I was looking at the Den Of Geek Article regarding the newest RT comic.  They reference the actual Macross series several times, and even have links embedded that lead to articles about the VF-1 VALKYRIE (and Macross), other Macross series, and the whole Robotech debacle.  That got me thinking, even several youtubers I have seen, who discuss RT, bring up that it is a conglomeration of three separate titles.  Given that that information is now widely available and public, to anyone who cares to open their eyes, and the amount of backlash that HG gets as a result of that from casual and hardcore fans, why don't they just sell themselves out to a larger entity and call it a day?  If it is just about the money then I am sure some larger media conglomerate would be happy to gobble them up, including the distro rights to the OG Macross and send their own reps to BW to strike a deal for the rest of the franchise.  Yes, Tatsunoko would still get their OG SDF-Macross money, but if say, WB, or Amazon bought HG outright, and struck direct deals with BW, Bandai, and Arcadia to distribute the rest of the series' and merch overseas wouldn't that make everyone happy?

Yes, the hardcore RT fans might piss and moan, but even they would get easier access to merch, and of an arguably higher quality then they have in the past.

Is HG so dogmatically stubborn that they must hold onto their franchise and keep the money trickling in, I mean how much are they actually make annually, that they wouldn't accept a big cash payout to just take a hike and leave it all behind?

In a word: yup.

[Seto Kaiba]

1 hour ago, Knight26 said:

Is HG so dogmatically stubborn that they must hold onto their franchise and keep the money trickling in, I mean how much are they actually make annually, that they wouldn't accept a big cash payout to just take a hike and leave it all behind?

YES.

Mainly, this mindset is due to Robotech being the only title in Harmony Gold's profile that they can pretend is remotely relevant.  The closest they've had to a truly respectable title is Shaka Zulu.  They can continue pretending to be a production company and fondly imagine themselves to be influential in the anime industry while they maintain Robotech in its near-death state.

Part of it is also that the people working on Robotech are themselves fanatical fans who believe their own hype about the franchise being popular, successful, and influential when it's really none of those things.  McKeever is the worst of them, having once been a troll on various Macross forums.

[Gerli]

Wow... I just read this article with an interview to Kawamori Sensei and I think this is the first time he says that in a very "Direct" way.... I'm surprised

Quote

S. Kawamori: I don’t understand, nor do I accept the fact that they took and modified my work without even asking. I can not comprehend how a pirated version like this exists. However, I feel I was very fortunate that many other people from other countries around the world were able to see Macross.

"A pirated Version..." Wow

PS: this is the article.

https://fullfrontal.moe/kawamori-40-interview/?fbclid=IwAR2G80ngqukmJdQuhNt3f_UdH6r_3NAEZzJYiraOC5KkqwL9m0pxFqspSnc

Edited August 1, 2019 by Gerli

[jenius]

I think an important distinction to make that sometimes gets lost for folks is that Kawamori does not work for BigWest so for him it's even more frustrating. BigWest feels like they ceded rights they did not intend to cede but, for Kawamori, there's a version of the thing he helped make where he's not properly credited on, was never consulted about, and received no compensation for. In fact, BW's very negative stance toward Tatsunoko may be to help them with their relationship with the artists even though it was BW that opened the door for all the problems by putting together an awful contract with Tatsunoko..

[Seto Kaiba]

Haruhiko Mikimoto made similar, but less direct, remarks back in '92 in his (English!) interview in Animerica's inaugural issue... he expressed some confusion as to why Robotech existed at all, and more or less called Robotech fans naive.

[Knight26]

So, I am pretty sure I asked this before, like years ago.  But Frank Agama is what, almost 90 years old?  What are the chances that his kids, given that I think one is CEO, since HG is a private company, might just decide to sell the company after his death?  Or at least sell the RT rights to someone else to handle all that mess?

[Seto Kaiba]

20 minutes ago, Knight26 said:

So, I am pretty sure I asked this before, like years ago.  But Frank Agama is what, almost 90 years old?  What are the chances that his kids, given that I think one is CEO, since HG is a private company, might just decide to sell the company after his death?  Or at least sell the RT rights to someone else to handle all that mess?

Yeah, Frank's gettin' up there (EDIT: he's turning 90 on 1/1/20)... I believe his daughter Jehan is the one currently holding HG's reins as President and CEO and pursuing the family business of film production tax evasion.  I know she was investigated not too long ago for failure to disclose foreign income on her taxes, so she's clearly a chip off the ol' block.

I think the odds are pretty poor when it comes to the idea of Jehan Agrama selling off the company or sell the Robotech franchise to someone.  My guess would be she probably intends to continue using it as a means to launder money the way her daddy nearly went to prison for.

Edited August 1, 2019 by Seto Kaiba

[Bolt]

Interesting article @Gerli good read. 

It’s obvious hg is a blight and a dirty little stain Kawamori San has on his shoe. 

[Gerli]

All Robotech fans on social media right now:

[spacemanoeuvres]

1 hour ago, Gerli said:

Wow... I just read this article with an interview to Kawamori Sensei and I think this is the first time he says that in a very "Direct" way.... I'm surprised

"A pirated Version..." Wow

PS: this is the article.

https://fullfrontal.moe/kawamori-40-interview/?fbclid=IwAR2G80ngqukmJdQuhNt3f_UdH6r_3NAEZzJYiraOC5KkqwL9m0pxFqspSnc

“Please support the official Macross releases.”

Damn straight

[Seto Kaiba]

8 minutes ago, spacemanoeuvres said:

“Please support the official Macross releases.”

Damn straight

Accept no substitutes!

[Sanity is Optional]

Now that they're making the BD/DVDs with english subtitles included, I'll gladly buy the discs. Well, maybe not for Delta's TV series (as it sucked), but I did buy the movie.

[seti88]

2 hours ago, Gerli said:

Wow... I just read this article with an interview to Kawamori Sensei and I think this is the first time he says that in a very "Direct" way.... I'm surprised

"A pirated Version..." Wow

PS: this is the article.

https://fullfrontal.moe/kawamori-40-interview/?fbclid=IwAR2G80ngqukmJdQuhNt3f_UdH6r_3NAEZzJYiraOC5KkqwL9m0pxFqspSnc

Thanks for the link..a nice read for macross fans and even anime fans in general, for a walk back in memory lane of a particular slice of the anime industry ..

i feel for Kawamori-san ....ganbatte!

 

 

Edited August 1, 2019 by seti88

[no3Ljm]

2 hours ago, Gerli said:

Wow... I just read this article with an interview to Kawamori Sensei and I think this is the first time he says that in a very "Direct" way.... I'm surprised

"A pirated Version..." Wow

PS: this is the article.

https://fullfrontal.moe/kawamori-40-interview/?fbclid=IwAR2G80ngqukmJdQuhNt3f_UdH6r_3NAEZzJYiraOC5KkqwL9m0pxFqspSnc

Great article! Thanks for sharing, @Gerli.

I wonder, what enemy mecha he designed in Daimos?

 

[blackconvoy_D01]

Very powerful last statement;

S. Kawamori: I don’t want to talk about it. Please support the official Macross releases.

I would surmise that Shinji Aramaki and the team behind the previous and upcoming MOSPEADA are feeling the same sentiment.

It's a (continued) call to action IMHO.

Edited August 1, 2019 by blackconvoy_D01

[Seto Kaiba]

54 minutes ago, blackconvoy_D01 said:

I would surmise that Shinji Aramaki and the team behind the previous and upcoming MOSPEADA are feeling the same sentiment.

I wonder if they would, though... since MOSPEADA was essentially a one-and-done entirely by Tatsunoko, so they wouldn't have had as big a stake in it due to its mediocre performance in Japan and they might've even been told by Tatsunoko what was happening to it overseas since it was a Tatsunoko property.  

I'd imagine they're probably pretty confused by what happened to it, though... especially Sukehiro Tomita, who was VERY confused by what'd been done to his story when Tatsunoko brought him in to help develop Robotech II: the Sentinels.  Even Harmony Gold's heavily sanitized, rose-tinted account of the Sentinels creative process admits that Tomita more or less told Carl Macek that the Robotech storyline made no f*cking sense and tried to impose some sense on it himself before Harmony Gold had the Japanese writing team that Tatsunoko had generously provided removed from the project and replaced by Harmony Gold-supplied writers.

 

Smart money says the Southern Cross development team's only reaction to learning about Robotech is "holy sh*t someone actually watched Southern Cross!".

Edited August 1, 2019 by Seto Kaiba

[Mazinger]

6 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Smart money says the Southern Cross development team's only reaction to learning about Robotech is "holy sh*t someone actually watched Southern Cross!".

I wish reboot-itis that only now seems to have made it's way from the US to Japan, would get someone interested in a more fleshed out SD Southern Cross show.  If only some one at Netflix would fall in love with it.

[Bolt]

5 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

  Even Harmony Gold's heavily sanitized, rose-tinted account of the Sentinels creative process admits that Tomita more or less told Carl Macek that the Robotech storyline made no f*cking sense and tried to impose some sense on it himself before Harmony Gold had the Japanese writing team that Tatsunoko had generously provided removed from the project and replaced by Harmony Gold-supplied writers.

Geez! WTF mate?! A clash of eastern and western story telling? Or Jekyll and Hyde?

Edited August 2, 2019 by Bolt

[Seto Kaiba]

1 hour ago, Bolt said:

Geez! WTF mate?! A clash of esteem and western story telling? Or Jekyll and Hyde?

By Harmony Gold's own account, the Tatsunoko-provided writing staff politely but firmly insisted that the Robotech adaptation was a heap of incoherent gibberish and tried to script a story based more on the originals instead.

I wouldn't call it a clash of eastern and western storytelling so much as a clash between top-shelf writers and anime's answer to Ed Wood.  Unfortunately for Harmony Gold, the hack prevailed through sheer arrogance and brought in more hacks to bring his hack vision to hack life... and a merciful premature death when the sponsors bailed, the exchange rate fell, and the hack's bosses canceled the project.  

[jenius]

Well Mospeada isn't exactly Shakespeare and there's plenty of awfully written anime and Hollywood blockbusters out there. It would be pretty jarring to get thrown onto a sequel of a story you wrote that had been rewritten and I don't know ANY writer who wouldn't insist that the rewritten parts were junk and bristle at the notion.

Edited August 2, 2019 by jenius

[Einherjar]

It would be a real shame if all that “35 more years” thing was just good old fashioned grandstanding from a couple of people known to do that a lot over the years, because the Internet has really become a different beast compared to how it was when they started.  For starters, there can be real life consequences for doing it now.

Edited August 2, 2019 by Einherjar

[HardlyNever]

21 hours ago, Knight26 said:

So, I am pretty sure I asked this before, like years ago.  But Frank Agama is what, almost 90 years old?  What are the chances that his kids, given that I think one is CEO, since HG is a private company, might just decide to sell the company after his death?  Or at least sell the RT rights to someone else to handle all that mess?

So, myself and many others on the internets believe that Harmony Gold is primarily a money laundering scheme at this point.  There is no absolute concrete evidence to support this, but there is a lot of circumstantial stuff that heavily implies that they are/were involved in money laundering.  I'm not saying they started out that way; but it is probable that the reason the company continues to exist at all at this point is to launder money for someone (we don't really know who).

So we, as Macross fans, of course focus on Robotech and why this company seems so intent on keeping out Macross, and why doesn't X company just do Y, so that we can finally get Macross in the US.  But for HG, it isn't about Robotech or Macross specifically; it is about maintaining a reasonable front as a "legitimate" company to continue to launder money.  Having the Robotech licence, and trickling out the odd product here and there, is an easy way to continue to look like a real company, at a glance, to keep away the legal authorities.  Obviously, if you dig deeper like a Macross fan would, a lot of odd things start to appear.  But the people who might investigate HG as a money laundering scheme aren't Macross fans, and so they aren't going to be looking at such a small company beyond a cursory glance.

Of course we focus on the Macross aspect on a Macross forum, but there are other considerations at play here.

Edited August 2, 2019 by HardlyNever

[Seto Kaiba]

1 hour ago, HardlyNever said:

There is no absolute concrete evidence to support this, but there is a lot of circumstantial stuff that heavily implies that they are/were involved in money laundering.

... beyond Frank Agrama's prior conviction for exactly that in 2012.  

 

1 hour ago, HardlyNever said:

I'm not saying they started out that way; but it is probable that the reason the company continues to exist at all at this point is to launder money for someone (we don't really know who).

The Italian prosecutors DID say it started out that way... that Frank Agrama and Paddy Chan Mei-yiu hatched a plan at a trade fair in Cannes in the late 70's to launder money by trading movie rights internationally at inflated prices.  Agrama dodged a second conviction for money laundering and tax evasion largely due to the statute of limitations expiring.

 

1 hour ago, HardlyNever said:

But for HG, it isn't about Robotech or Macross specifically; it is about maintaining a reasonable front as a "legitimate" company to continue to launder money.  Having the Robotech licence, and trickling out the odd product here and there, is an easy way to continue to look like a real company, at a glance, to keep away the legal authorities.  Obviously, if you dig deeper like a Macross fan would, a lot of odd things start to appear.  But the people who might investigate HG as a money laundering scheme aren't Macross fans, and so they aren't going to be looking at such a small company beyond a cursory glance.

I posted pretty much exactly that in response to an earlier question asking why the Agramas wouldn't sell the company after Frank retires or snuffs it.

Frank or Jehan will never sell, because a thorough inspection of HG's business will reveal it's one big Springtime for Hitler.

 

13 hours ago, Einherjar said:

It would be a real shame if all that “35 more years” thing was just good old fashioned grandstanding from a couple of people known to do that a lot over the years, because the Internet has really become a different beast compared to how it was when they started.  For starters, there can be real life consequences for doing it now.

It's not even that... the "35 more years" thing is Robotech fans misinterpreting a form letter "we look forward to continuing to work with you" statement as an indication of how long the license will last.

When asked, HG refuses to give any comment on the duration of their renewal/extension.

 

 

Edited August 2, 2019 by Seto Kaiba
Spelling!

[TehPW]

reading that article about the floating head makes me wish there was a video component: It would have been telling to see his facial expressions when asked those last questions. Actually, it would have been nicer to hear more substantial questions but The Froating Head is wise enough to get someone else to bite feeding hands... maybe he'll write a tell-all book (do Japanesse even have that ability to do that?).

However, can we go back to MOSPEADA for a moment? please explain how in japan a 2nd coming of MOSPEADA is in the works? links would be nice, I'm just curious.

[jenius]

1 hour ago, TehPW said:

However, can we go back to MOSPEADA for a moment? please explain how in japan a 2nd coming of MOSPEADA is in the works? links would be nice, I'm just curious.

There's not much to tell yet. Apparently Sentinel will be supporting whatever Genesis Breakers is with a line of toys. My guess is a Manga? 

To clarify a previous point I made, that Tatsunoko and HG should work together. Robotech is cobbled together from three shows. Instead of Robotech making a sequel, they should look for a fourth show to cobble in (which is why Robotech fans are always trying to glue on Macross sequels to Robotech). A sequel to Mospeada is an obvious way of doing this. Shadow Chronicles should have NEVER happened. Instead, HG should have tried to work with Tatsunoko to make a Mospeada sequel (enlisting Aramaki and crew) OR a completely new show that could feel a bit like Mospeada. They could have called any random old guy in the show Rick Hunter when they dubbed it to English and they'd be done and probably have a much better product than Shadow Chronicles.

That's from the standpoint of what HG should have done. It could have made sense for Tatsunoko too, would have helped them fund a random mech anime and, even if it did awful in Japan, there would be bigger upside if it did okay internationally as the long awaited sequel to Robotech. 

[Seto Kaiba]

1 hour ago, jenius said:

There's not much to tell yet. Apparently Sentinel will be supporting whatever Genesis Breakers is with a line of toys. My guess is a Manga? 

My suspicion is it's likely a retelling/do-over, given that the full title was Genesis Breaker MOSPEADA 2083.  The whole Inbit conflict was set in 2083, which makes a direct sequel seem unlikely.

MOSPEADA: the Origin?

Eh... even if it's just an updated toy line, it's nice to see the Ride Armors get some attention.

 

Quote

[...] Instead of Robotech making a sequel, they should look for a fourth show to cobble in (which is why Robotech fans are always trying to glue on Macross sequels to Robotech). A sequel to Mospeada is an obvious way of doing this. [...]

This might've been a viable idea 33 years ago when MOSPEADA was still relatively new and Robotech was a fresh property in an industry that still tolerated rewrites... but not today.

MOSPEADA was only ever a middling performer in Japan, it had just enough of a cult following to manage a wrap-up OVA in the golden age of the mecha genre.  Tatsunoko would not have considered it for a sequel even at the height of its popularity, never mind the at-most trivial contributions of a third-party series in foreign markets.  Now that MOSPEADA's a mostly-forgotten bit of 80's mecha esoterica and Robotech's even worse off, it's not a sound investment on Tatsunoko's part and their finances are shaky enough as it is.

 

Quote

[...] Shadow Chronicles should have NEVER happened. Instead, HG should have tried to work with Tatsunoko to make a Mospeada sequel (enlisting Aramaki and crew) OR a completely new show that could feel a bit like Mospeada. They could have called any random old guy in the show Rick Hunter when they dubbed it to English and they'd be done and probably have a much better product than Shadow Chronicles. [...] 

The painful irony here is you just described two failed Robotech projects... Robotech II: the Sentinels and Robotech: the Shadow Chronicles.

Robotech II: the Sentinels was an original series that Tatsunoko Production codeveloped with Harmony Gold USA that used a few select MOSPEADA designs and had similar themes to the MOSPEADA series.  It was a complete fiasco from start to premature finish thanks to its pathetically small budget, professional conflicts between the US and Japanese staff, and its creative direction being a mixture of naive ignorance and arrogance from Harmony Gold's side.  It was already on the rocks before the sponsors bailed, the exchange rate fell, and the entire project ended up canned shortly after the start of production.

IIRC Tatsunoko attempted to salvage some of its investment by reusing some of its original designs for the failed project in Red Photon Zillion.

Robotech: the Shadow Chronicles was an attempt to develop an (unofficial) sequel to MOSPEADA with cooperation from Tatsunoko.  The only problem being that Harmony Gold could not afford to hire Tatsunoko to do the animation thanks to the Robotech brand's decades of failures leaving them precisely zero investors, so its pathetic budget would only stretch to the point of hiring a pack of fifth string intern animators at DR Movie.  For legal reasons, they had to call any old guy Rick Hunter... because they were afraid of getting sued for even an extensive redesign of the Haruhiko Mikimoto design.

 

Quote

That's from the standpoint of what HG should have done. It could have made sense for Tatsunoko too, would have helped them fund a random mech anime and, even if it did awful in Japan, there would be bigger upside if it did okay internationally as the long awaited sequel to Robotech. 

The problem with this reasoning being that the "long awaited sequel to Robotech" is only long-awaited by Robotech's fairly small - and shrinking - fanbase.

Nobody else has been awaiting a Robotech sequel.

To turn a decent profit on their dirt-cheap Shadow Chronicles movie, Harmony Gold had to try to compel fans to buy multiple copies of the movie by packaging the glorified DVD extra dub of Love Live Alive with it instead of as a stand-alone feature.

There's no incentive for Tatsunoko to take that kind of risk working with HG, especially since if they DID develop an original mecha anime and/or a sequel to MOSPEADA and it was a hit they'd be able to keep the profits to themselves and market it as its own thing internationally.  The idea of partnering with HG only makes financial sense if the show's a failure... and they're not quite to the point of deliberately setting out to fail.  These days, if you put out a hardcore rewrite of an anime series you get sentenced to trampling under the industry brontosaurus, not rewarded.  It's seen as a bad practice.

Edited August 2, 2019 by Seto Kaiba

[jenius]

Quote

 

The painful irony here is you just described two failed Robotech projects... Robotech II: the Sentinels and Robotech: the Shadow Chronicles.

Robotech II: the Sentinels was an original series that Tatsunoko Production codeveloped with Harmony Gold USA that used a few select MOSPEADA designs and had similar themes to the MOSPEADA series.  It was a complete fiasco from start to premature finish thanks to its pathetically small budget, professional conflicts between the US and Japanese staff, and its creative direction being a mixture of naive ignorance and arrogance from Harmony Gold's side.  It was already on the rocks before the sponsors bailed, the exchange rate fell, and the entire project ended up canned shortly after the start of production.

 

That's a misunderstanding of what I was saying. What I meant was that HG should have sponsored a new show... NOT explicitly a Robotech sequel. A show that could have been a standalone product in Japan that fit the genre of all the shows that went into Robotech that then HG could give it the Robotech treatment. Basically, Robotech needed to stick to adaptations of existing shows rather than try to craft its own new material. No one at HG was suited for creating anything from the ground up and had no value to add to that process BUT they did have the funds (at one point) to pay for an entire show... Had they sent Tatsunoko a check and said "we want a 26 episode series featuring human protagonists with transforming mecha exploring a new galaxy full of hostile aliens" things could have gone a whole lot better for them.  Instead they couldn't get out of their own way.

[Seto Kaiba]

35 minutes ago, jenius said:

That's a misunderstanding of what I was saying. What I meant was that HG should have sponsored a new show... NOT explicitly a Robotech sequel.

IIRC, they did attempt to claim that one of their projects was meant to be essentially that... and that it would be sold in Japan under a different name.

(I don't remember which one, though... it might've been Shadow Chronicles.)

 

35 minutes ago, jenius said:

Had they sent Tatsunoko a check and said "we want a 26 episode series featuring human protagonists with transforming mecha exploring a new galaxy full of hostile aliens" things could have gone a whole lot better for them.  Instead they couldn't get out of their own way.

Possibly, given that Tatsunoko was willing to put Sukehiro Tomita on a new series codeveloped by HG in the 80's... they could've gotten something resembling a quality product if the budget hadn't been too small.

Mind you, that would've been a lot of extra cost for Harmony Gold and they probably wouldn't have gone for it... studio time is expensive, and rewriting and redubbing a show like that is even more expensive than a regular dub.  That extra cost is a big part of why Harmony Gold's approach to anime went the way of the dinosaur in the late 80's and early 90's.  IMO, it wouldn't have done much to forestall the inevitable if they had had a fourth show made and edited it as a continuation of Robotech.  It wouldn't have saved Robotech, and they'd have been taking flak for "ruining" four shows instead of three once the 90's rolled around and accurate dubs started to become the norm.

On reflection, the biggest problem with the idea wouldn't have even been that Harmony Gold had insufficient funds to make a professional-looking series by 1987's standards.  It would be that Harmony Gold's network partners were only willing to take shows long enough for first-run syndication.  They would've needed to bankroll three new shows, or at least two new shows the length of Macross, to reach the necessary episode count of 65+.  That's why Robotech II: the Sentinels was plotted as a 65 episode series... it needed to be long enough for the networks.  That's years of time spent on development, and a LOT of money HG didn't have.

[Lolicon]

I remember referring to Robotech as a "bootleg show" once on these forums and some nitwit got all upset about it. 

If Kawamori and Mikimoto, two of the original creators of Macross, see Robotech as essentially a pirated version of their work, then I'll take that as official recognition of the fact. 

[Gerli]

22 minutes ago, Lolicon said:

I remember referring to Robotech as a "bootleg show" once on these forums and some nitwit got all upset about it. 

If Kawamori and Mikimoto, two of the original creators of Macross, see Robotech as essentially a pirated version of their work, then I'll take that as official recognition of the fact. 

I always pictures Robotech as a Fanfic, but now we know it's a Pirated Show, it's Canon.

 

 

[JB0]

9 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

It wouldn't have saved Robotech, and they'd have been taking flak for "ruining" four shows instead of three once the 90's rolled around and accurate dubs started to become the norm.

In fairness, part of the reason Robotech takes so much flak is how much time HG has spent talking crap about Real Macross and firing dubious legal threats at Macross fans. It never ends well when you declare war on your customer base.

No one has this much hatred to spare for Voltron, because WEP hasn't been a writhing mass of self-motive dicks to the fanbase. (Also because Golion and Dairugger XV are even smaller footnotes in anime history than MOSPEADA is, but that's neither here nor there.)

[pengbuzz]

2 hours ago, JB0 said:

In fairness, part of the reason Robotech takes so much flak is how much time HG has spent talking crap about Real Macross and firing dubious legal threats at Macross fans. It never ends well when you declare war on your customer base.

No one has this much hatred to spare for Voltron, because WEP hasn't been a writhing mass of self-motive dicks to the fanbase. (Also because Golion and Dairugger XV are even smaller footnotes in anime history than MOSPEADA is, but that's neither here nor there.)

I think WEP managed to do a better job of securing the rights for both GoLion and Dairugger XV than HG's bungled hashing for Macross and such. WEP also didn't go out and try to butcher fans of either series, as I think you're referencing here. And frankly, i think WEP at least improved GoLion with a better intro theme!

[JB0]

2 hours ago, pengbuzz said:

I think WEP managed to do a better job of securing the rights for both GoLion and Dairugger XV than HG's bungled hashing for Macross and such. WEP also didn't go out and try to butcher fans of either series, as I think you're referencing here. And frankly, i think WEP at least improved GoLion with a better intro theme!

WEP has had some legal issues over the years, but it has boiled down to "Sorry, we thought we had those rights. Yeah, we'll pay you for that. No, you don't need to drag us to court." until they finally went "What will it cost to just buy the two shows off of you outright?"

Also, WEP's equivalent of The Sentinels went off without a hitch when they commissioned Toei to create an additional season of Lion Voltron.

 

There's a few HG-related incidents in specific I'm thinking of, but for a while it seemed like HG's official corporate stance was "Macross fans are scum and we must ensure they can't spread their filth or even enjoy their hobby in private, we will DESTROY THEM AND ALL THEY LOVE MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!".

I'd hoped their attitude was softening after they went back on their word and licensed SDF Macross for an official english release, but things rapidly returned to business-as-usual afterwards.

[Lolicon]

Skimming through the Kawamori interview linked above and I just wanted to say I love the comparison of Gundam to a turn-based RPG.