jenius

You can't think "earth-centrically" when pondering life/evolution beyond the scope of Earth. You could say "but Earth is all we have to judge our experiences on" which is a fair enough start but it's nothing near concrete. The problem is that hives structured as described could just as likely be something unique to Earth. It is not at all logical to deduce that, with the infinite of variables that go into every component of life, that something similar would be emulated elsewhere. From a writer's standpoint though you could use the hive, as it is known on earth, as a convention easily enough (hives make great aliens, it's a time-honored tradition) and as a reader/viewer we can recognize that convention and make assumptions based on it (which is what everyone is doing with the Vajra) but the only thing that keeps writing conventions from getting stale is the ability to tweak them. So now the creator's of Macross Frontier may decide to leave their Vajra hive creatures as perfect mimics for hive creatures on Earth and stick strict to the convention but they could just as easily throw the earthbound hive to the wind and create their own completely unique (alien, if you will) structure. Just because we recognize a convention doesn't mean it has to be strictly adhered to and just because something congregates in hives does not mean it might not end up having a completely alien sociological system. All that said, you're right that one grand ruler seems unlikely due to the scattered nature of how the Vajra have acted. So we're left to theorize why it is Frontier is being coerced into constantly doing battle with groups of Vajra and why the members of Grace are so intent in causing hatred. While the queen/king theory may be incorrect, it still seems like Grace and crew are trying to provoke something that will create the opportunity they are looking for. Something that queen/king theory also didn't touch on was why Frontier was chosen. We know that Grace and co chose Frontier because it could be easily contaminated as it was all natural...

It's just another theory to put out there. Since the Vajra aren't on Earth there's no reason to believe that their hive society should be held to the restraints of Earth's hive socieites (so my original quote should have been: "that's how all hives work in the whole universe" so it didn't sound as grandiose as the workings of the universe itself). Really though the theory doesn't have to hinge on this bigger/worse Vajra being a King, it could just be a more grand queen or some sort of ranking that doesn't have any earth equivalent whatsoever (nor indication of sex). It's not like we really know much about Vajra reproduction at this point other than the fact it involves eggs often times left in the hulls of ships.

Lol... huh? How? Just 'cause something works one way on Earth it'd be a pretty lousy extrapolation to say that's how the whole universe works. After all, our whales don't fly through space and fold. I mean yeah, if you're pandering to a pretty basic audience (which almost every show does) then you may want to stick with things people will recognize but Macross doesn't seem to bind itself too tightly to that. Now, if we learn Vajra are a human construct modeled after something on Earth then yes, it'd make a lot of sense for the Vajra to behave like hives you and I would recognize from Earth. Otherwise, for all we know, hives on Galia IV are patriarchal societies with queen initiated colonies.

If there's anything for sale... I want it!

Gubaba, he did answer about his avatar, it's a video game reviewer on the webzine zero punctuation, hilarious stuff. By the way, I switched to Media Player Classic and rewatched the episode... so much nicer.

I'd check out my review: by clicking here.

Yes, .mkv on VLC was exactly the set up on a PC. I think I have Media Player Classic somewhere so I'll give that a go.

It's just another idea. I don't see any reason why a group of creatures in space would have to resemble earth-borne hives.

I put this in the 16 thread but I'll reiterate it here. Maybe there's a super Vajra we haven't seen yet. A king to the queen. Galaxy needs to find this King and have it killed to eliminate fold irregularities and so they're using Frontier to do the dirty work for them. Frontier will engage in war with the Vajra that will cause the emotion index to peak at some point which will awaken the king vajra. When it appears to lay the deathblow to Frontier, Galaxy will show up and eliminate the king thus ending all fold disturbances. If the plot were to go this direction at all, I would think Galaxy's plan would be undone by Ranka finding a peaceful way to reach the king vajra.

Can someone tell me how to (or if it is possible) fix an issue I'm having with subs? It seems like whenever a song is playing the subtitles of the song's lyrics get layered right on top (or below) the subtitles of the dialogue. The result is a stack of letters right on top of each other that is utterly illegible. This was especially annoying in Lunar's subtitles for episode 15.

If my subs are right there's a line that says something to the effect of: "We will accomplish what the protoculture hadn't in 500K years" so I don't think we're working up to a big protoculture reveal. We also have some odd emotion index thing that Grace appears to be monitoring. Her desire to see raging hate likely has something to do with this emotion index. Maybe all fold distortions eminate from one thing in the universe. Maybe that thing is related to the Vajra. Maybe Galaxy wants to eliminate that thing but the only way to do it is to wake it up by generating a certain level of emotion. They create the rouse that they are under heavy attack so that they can go somewhere safe and then ensure that Frontier gets dragged into a nasty war with the Vajra. At some point Galaxy would then be hoping to sacrifice Frontier to get their hands on the real target whose elimination will put humanity beyond the technological reaches of the Protoculture.

I see now that you've come to reailze that I wasn't taking a jab at you but instead of just apologizing for your misunderstanding you're going on the offensive. The fact of the matter is that if you actually read the reply from the person my comment was directed most at there was no issue for you to get riled up about in the first place. Stop lashing out, relax, drink a cold one, and know that if I ever do feel like picking a fight with you I'll call you out directly.

The statement is made immediately following Miriya's statement. Instead of making a direct response to Miriya I made a more broad response as to say that the whole board needs to get over that sort of thing. Stop being so defensive.

Wow, a little sensitive? It was a general statement not meant to single out any member or mod or even this instance of a person having their opinion returned with insinuation.

jeebus, can we kill that kind of comment already. MW is pro-Yamato enough without everytime someone says something positive about another manufacturer members and mods here trying to undercut that person for their opinion accusing them of having some sort of ulterior motive.

clearly not legitimate, note all the Japanese...

I also don't agree with ShaggyDog on this one. I will note that the Toynami 1/100 seems to borrow a lot (engineering-wise) from the Kaiyodo Gashapon Regult (not the Revoltech). The Gashapon figure isn't all that bad to pose so while it may not be as insanely fun (or frustrating depending on your POV) as the Revoltech it probably isn't as bad as some may suspect.

They didn't really "shelve" that old MPC, it came out years and years ago now and its product lifecycle has expired. I'd say it is smart they didn't try to go Yamato's version 2.0 route and make an MPC 2 and instead are just pushing the chunkies. Good ol' chunkies.

i like that they put a fin on top of the red Beta's head... although I'm sure some will hate it. Hey, we never saw one in the anime, why not have fun with it?

I hope you mean to ask if I'm buying *just* one. Of course I'm buying one. There's a friggin' avalanche of new crap right now but I'm planning on keeping up with the hobby and working on lots of new stuff for the blog.

The funny thing about the pink Alpha is they just repainted an Aoshima Zeta Legioss toy. Isn't it supposed to have the the Shadow Fighter chest intakes like the Marcus version does next to it?

It looks like the Beagle might have serious shoulder articulation issues... I hope not. The way it *should* work, yes, the domestic release will be cheaper and you'll have a shot at customer service if something goes wrong. This hasn't really held true of Toynami's redistribution gig so far. At the very least you should save on shipping. Instead of it being $199 + $30 to ship it to you it'll be $199 + $15 to ship it to you.

Wow, Toynami 1/100 Max TV VF-1A, 1/100 Regult/Battle Pod, POSSIBLY 1/100 Cannon Fodder GBP, and MPC Betas that look like they're made of plastic instead of resin? Some day Toynami might actually start producing toys again! If this were by any other company I'd be thrilled but as it is, I'm just very curious. Note - no shoulder missiles on the MPC Beta, just chest missiles.

I always thought the planes were Alpha and Omega respectively.

It's probably good to have a healthy bit of skepticism. Lots of toys are conceived that never get made so I'm just hoping for the best. Thanks for the props. I'm editing a ton of comparison pics as I type (well, nearly). SOoooooooo many toys to review and pictures to edit... it's a good time to be into these shows. I've preordered the MH Yellow and the CMs Yellow so we'll see if either company made enough tweaks to change my mind on anything.