VF5SS

It's still the best weapon for bludgeoning your foes.

Much to Seto Kaiba's chagrin, probably the reason why Macross has stuck around for so long is because they didn't continue down the Macross II path. Other than the fact it clearly petered out towards the end, the fact is the era of the Yamato/Gundam style Space Opera was coming to a close. Roger and I have tried to pin down the exact show and we think it probably went out with the end of Legend of the Galactic Heroes or Nadesico (which really is a send up of the whole genre). Much like the pop music that plays a major role in the series, the show plays up to the feeling of the times. Plus feels like a 90's OVA while Frontier feels like a 00's show. Which is Robotech's biggest problem is that there's so little progress in the franchise so it is forever stuck in the 80's. Their latest endeavor was them trying to recapture the feeling of a dead genre without any of the talent do so. Also I found this interesting tidbit from anime ubernerd Steve Harrison. I'm not sure how true it is, but it sounds like that "audible clunk" in Robotech was bad for business. Now regardless of your feelings on Southern Cross as a show unto itself, think of how much Macek and Co set it up to be the failure. The made their own bleedin' clip show of all the Max and Millia moments and stuck it next to scenes of a young woman who is supposed to be their daughter. Basically the audience's first introduction to Southern Cross is the Robotech writers crying, "Remember those awesome characters you used to watch? We so wish we still had them. But hey, here's their daughter! She's going to be cool just like them! You can tell because we've edited clips of them being cool around her being annoying to some black kid! By the way, that black kid is related to that black chick so he's awesome too right?" They seriously hacked that show so badly and you know what's the ironic thing? All that hacking is where most of Robotech's story resides. All the altered stuff in Mospeada and Macross amounts to nothing but throwaway lines. Mospeada and Macross still get to take place on Earth, the characters are largely the same, and the stories came out relatively intact. Southern Cross gets chunks taken out of it, characters wholly rewritten into bizarre off-screen demigods, and it doesn't even get enough respect to unfold on the same alien planet as it originally did. Yet within all those changes are the foundations of Robotech like Zor, flowers of life, and other weird crap. So in essence the show that is most important to Robotech is the one the fans hate the most. And that's so deliciously ironic.

The lower arm rotates 180 degrees about the shoulder to bring the hands out front. You see this in Macross Zero episode 3 during the Sv-51 attack on the Asuka II. A Cheyenne uses one hand to lean over the side.

Using the phrase "anime magic" makes you automatically wrong.

That's just modeling error. All the models and toys show it works fine.

ECA doesn't have anything to do with the transformation.

The Touhou Doujin anime had more 2d animation in 30 minutes than all of Shadow Chronicles did in 90 minutes and it's actually good too.

The Touhou doujin anime was better than Shadow Chronicles.

Just to add to this the VF-1 is the only Valkyrie where parts actually detach and reattach somewhere else.

Doug Bendo is a creepy stalker. He's making phone calls to people he doesn't like.

Jason, your explanation on page 13 of this thread doesn't fit with the one you posted on page 12. And the last time you posted these images wasn't over two years ago, it was one year ago like on page 3. :3

No that's just SCIENCE.

I dunno man, you're starting to froth like that 1st Border Red Devil/ Brooklyn Reg Leg guy does over Southern Cross. Gotta make like Touhou and take it easy. I know this may sound strange but maybe you should scan those books and put them out there for other people to see. I've seen a lot of translation going on 4chan's /m/ board. Even Dougram and Xabungle are getting love over there.

Careful man, you're starting to sound like a Robotech fan.

My only problem with Ohnogi's involvement that he should have come up with a better way for Sheryl to cheat death. Especially since they spent so much time establishing that she was going to die.

Hey now Southern Cross isn't that bad on its own. I think a lot of the ire comes from how the show was mangled by Macek and co. Out of all three, its arguably the one with the most changes. Not only did they not even allow it to take place on a alien planet like its supposed to, they made Dana a thousand times more annoying than Jeanne. Coupled with the the fact that the first episode of Robotech Southern Cross is a friggen clip show of how awesome Max and Millia are is basically Macek going, "boy I wish we had more Macross to adapt, this sucks." When the producers of the show are brow beating the audience with how much they hate it, its hard to expect the audience to disagree. Don't get me started on the character assassination of Seifriet. Robotech had no idea what to do with him and Zor Prime is the most convoluted character in this mess. As for the "epicness' I think most of it comes from the supplementary comics and novels since all of the backstory in the show amounts to nothing more than throwaway lines. When you add twenty years of not real activity in the franchise and you've got zealot fans ready to defend Robotech to the last edit. Honestly if you took out all the story elements that were merely part of the original shows, all you'd be left with is a mangled Southern Cross and barely a page worth of dialog from Macross's and Mospeada's edits. Which is really the big disconnect between Robotech fans and the rest of the world since they don't seem to realize that Robotech has no story of its own and was successful because they didn't alter the shows that much outside of Southern Cross. Can you imagine if Robotech was done like Macek's magnum opus "Macron 1?" Yeah right. Even Gundam does "epic" better than that.

The Silverback strikes me as a thinly disguised Amdriver ripoff.

Ya really. Maybe Tommy should've had his horny Korean animator friends pull a Gainax bounce trick. Of course, the animation couldn't fix Maia Sterling's awful voice. On another note, I find it hilarious that the big new Mospeada design in SC was just a retread of some concept artwork. That's some John Romero level creativity.

Mospeada in Japan is more or less on the same level as other third tier (assuming Gundam is first tier and stuff like Macross and Votoms is second tier) stuff like Dorvack, Vifam, or Orguss. It has its dedicated fans, but the lack of any new material keeps it down in the long run. It's probably closer to Dorvack since the designs in the show have more or less outlived the content of the show.

They must've been really disappointed when all the shots of women feature rock hard boobs. Do we even see characters walking? I recall the total BS scene where Stick and Superfly Johnson... I mean Vince had to run up a flight of stairs but there didn't even bother to show it. They just cut from before they started to just after they made it up. Even cheap poo anime like Akikan can afford to show dynamic movement.

It's just fanart.

Interestingly enough, someone brought up this type of comparison when I was bashing RT:SC on my review. Basically the idea was Robotech was as legit as SRW. Having had the chance to play translated SRW games (non Original Generation of course) I can tell you those games are like the worst fanfic mashups ever. They're fun to play, but when you have Roy Focker being chums with Monsha from Gundam 0083 and the Titans from Zeta Gundam taking over the Macross, the entire story becomes an exercise in what more ridiculous twists can be made by the end. Maybe it's a good thing Tatsunoko never lets any Japanese game makers do anything with Mospeada and Southern Cross lest the Robotech fans get even more confused.

That guy is always just ridin' the snake.

I'd caution anyone on the MP Thundercrack. The one I just got from HLJ had some QC issues. Lots of sprue marks and loose parts.

Just make Independence Day where the planes turn into robots. And then Rick can welcome the aliens to Earf.