Kelsain

Is it just me, or does that warehouse look like the one where the Ark is housed? I have yet to see this Crystal skull picture floating around, but I did notice the crate marked Roswell, NM 1947. Maybe aliens will be involved. I hope not, but if they do it well, I'll accept it (as I believe in the existence of aliens more than gods). However, it could be that this alien thing is a red herring - perhaps it is a supernatural phenomenon (which would be in-canon), but not extra-terrestrial. I guess we'll just see...

Yes, let's not forget the power of computers displayed in AUTOMAN!

I was a little surprised myself when it slipped out - and it was at one of those times when everyone else was screaming in surprise. Not like I was going on through the whole movie. My friends never forgot it though, and still go on about it 11 years later. Nowadays, I'm more subdued, and usually deal with painful inaccuracies with a smack on the forehead. So I take back the feces hurling - 10,000 BC would more likely give me a concussion.

Yeah, my friends insisted on tagging along to Jurassic Parks 2&3. There was some shouting...

While I did enjoy the Stargate movie when I was 17, I've yet to see anything from these guys that wasn't a derivative, unimaginative piece of crap. Hell, they're even ripping themselves off now, as they've ALREADY made an origin of the pyramids movie. Add to that, the fact that I'm an amateur paleontologist, and I get the feeling that I'd be hurling feces at the screen.

I'm on the fence now about the 171. I kinda miss the anime magic on this one. It looks like the VF-17 has gone on the Jared diet; and is skinnier, sure, but it looks a little out of proportion. I understand and expected the slenderizing of the legs, and I can get used to that. My main issue is with the arms. Maybe it's just the angle/pose, but the elbows look ridiculously flimsy. It's also hard to pick out details on the face, due to the color scheme and print quality. I bet when I see it in action, in context, I'll like it just fine though. The problem may be that I am used to seeing the lineart with a dynamic pose. These shots of the 3D models just look too static to really make a grand first impression. I do like the update of the Qrau, though. I wonder what the story behind them will be.

At least SDFM and Zero had an excuse for the teen aces: All the vets were already dead in the Unification Wars. Roy was the "old man" at 25. Now that there's been 50 years of human expansion, prosperity, and valkyries; you'd think we'd have more than a few capable older guys. I keep hoping that we'll see the cannon-fodder pilots learn to adapt. It's silly, I know...

I too was surprised at how much better it looked when I played it on my TV, instead of the computer. If only I could figure out how to keep the TV from cutting off an inch on either side...

I will grant you that. Spiritia was not in the original deck of cards that Kawamori dealt us in SDFM. But somewhere in the 90's he decided to add it to his fictional universe; as the overall creator, that's his right. Now there's nothing directly contradicting it in the original series either, so it's inclusion in later plot elements is ok. You may not like it, it may not fit your definition of Macross. Hey, that's your prerogative. All fiction, especially scifi, requires a suspension of disbelief; we all have individual tolerances for this. For you, it seems spiritia and the way it's been presented in Macross since M7 has gone too far. As the consumer of a creative work, it's fine to say "I don't like where the story's going." As a personal example: I loved the original Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card, then I thought Speaker for the Dead was pretty interesting, but by the time I got through Xenocide, I hated where things were headed. I tried to read the 4th book, but just didn't care anymore. But I'll still reread the first one. Similarly, many cried foul when Lucas brought in the midichlorians in Episode I and it "ruined their childhood." Yeah, he retconned it. Did it contradict the originals? Not explicitly. Could it have been handled better? Oh yeah! So Kawamori gave us spiritia. Could it have been explained better and represented better? Definitely. I think that M0 could have been an excellent canvas to show us more about this aspect of the PC in a more realistic setting than M7. But it could have been handled better, yes. I'd love for a lot of anime to give a more direct explanation of events; but it rarely seems to be the case. So I've learned to infer a lot when watching anime to fill in those blanks. Doing so, I see a lot of info in Sara's dialog that, though it may not definitively ANSWER many questions about M0, it shows that the writers did put some thought into it. Other people may interpret these things differently, and that's fine because that's what makes the story work for them, and then we can discuss it here. Macross is ultimately Kawamori's baby, and he has the right to take it in any direction he wants. As the viewer, you have the right to say "I love how it started, but this is crap." Like the Matrix I didn't know how to take it the first time I saw M0. I had only seen SDFM, DYRL, & M+ at that point, so it came out of left field. After watching M7, it made more sense. I'm OK with spiritia, but I'd like to see it better handled. It's a safe bet that it will come into play in Frontier; so we'll see what they do with it then.

I'm in the camp that looks at the "magic" of M0 under the umbrella of Robert L Forward: Any sufficiently advanced technology will appear indistinguishable from magic. As VFTF1 has most recently stated, song energy/spiritia is now an established fact in the Macrossverse. It was being used by the PC tens to hundreds of thousands of years ago. It simply wasn't unraveled by UNS scientists in the first 50 years of the established timeline - had Aries not been killed, it might have shown up sooner in UNS technology. We see in M7 that song energy has the capacity to heal, to make plants move, and communicate across vast distances. (I think it was even present in M+, when Myung somehow snaps Isamu out of hypnosis before he crashes in Macross City.) I believe that through the use of spiritia, Sara and Mao were able to communicate with Shin, make flowers bloom, and encourage the growth of insects. I think that through their pure PC bloodline, along with the training they likely received from birth attuned them to harness the power of spiritia. As for the floating rocks, and the absence of machinery to interpret the use of spiritia; who's to say that the technology isn't there? Those rocks may well have been fragments of preexisting machines. Really, it comes together when you consider that Mayan may very well be the actual equivalent of the Altlita protoculture city from DYRL. Think about it: according to legend, the birdman dropped a turtle shell for Roy Kaanu to live on, but the shell broke and formed Mayan and the surrounding islands. In the shallow waters around the main island, Mao takes shin down amond some interesting tower-like formations, and shows him the head of the birdman, which is obviously plugged in to something and being powered. On the island itself, the topography consists of many tightly packed tower-like mountains, criscrossed by deep chasms and caves. I'd be hardpressed to think of a natural process by which these formations would come about. Also, somehow the islanders were able to evacuate their village quickly into a high mountain to watch the events of the first UN/AUN battle over the island. Thus, I'm of the opinion that the entire island was a protoculture city, that has existed for over 10,000 years. It has deteriorated, eroded and been claimed by forests and reefs, but still retains some of its original functionality. As a result, the equivalent of the sound energy collectors (remember, those were actually located on Battle7) still function somewhere under the city, perhaps as part of the birdman's maintenance systems. This begins to explain the supernatural abilities of the Nome sisters, and the flashy effects are exactly what we saw in M7 - visual representations of spiritia at work. When you consider the background information and read between the lines of dialog (particularly Sara's) there's a lot of information about the protoculture in M0. Now as for the ending of episode 5 where Shin's VF-0 folds out among spectral feathers, I'm still thrown by that one...

3. From the tactical display, it looked like SRM#2 also made it to the Frontier, just further back, possibly on Island 2. 4. I bet we'll have to wait for a few more songs to go on there. 5. Someone redrew it in Illustrator, Graham put it on the Frontier images page.

Well, as clunky of an acronym it may be, I guess it's no worse than GERWALK.

Pinpoint barrier roundhouse kick! Wait... has that been done already?

Something I've always wondered: Are the names of the UC mobile suits supposed to mean anything in any language? I know the ones from 0083 did, but those seem to be the exception. I mean really: Gundam Dopp Dom Gelgoog Gouf Acguy Bound Doc etc... OK, Guncannon and Guntank make sense too; but are these strange names supposed to acronyms or something?

Whew, thought for a minute that you were dissing the F-4U. It would have been on. Personally, I voted for the 11. As I've mentioned before, I like it's utilitarian look. The asteroid scene in M+ was one of the best action scenes in all of Macross, but oh, too short... Finally, it was the first true successor to the VF-1 I ever saw. For the longest time, I couldn't figure how they went from the VF-1 to the Logan... Then I wised up upon seeing MII. The VF-2SS is pretty cool, and I always liked the almost Zentraedi look to the fast packs (or whatever they're called). But then I happened upon M+ at the video store and saw the prodigal VF-11. In love ever since, desperately yearning for a 1/72 Hasegawa or 1/60 Yamato... sigh.

Heehee, and you can still turn a phrase! After all, what would the UNG/NUNS have to protect without this necessary activity? Really though - for the sake of restoring the population, Dr. Strangelove had it right... General "Buck" Turgidson: Doctor, you mentioned the ratio of ten women to each man. Now, wouldn't that necessitate the abandonment of the so-called monogamous sexual relationship, I mean, as far as men were concerned? Dr. Strangelove: Regrettably, yes. But it is, you know, a sacrifice required for the future of the human race. I hasten to add that since each man will be required to do prodigious... service along these lines, the women will have to be selected for their sexual characteristics which will have to be of a highly... stimulating... nature. *quote from IMDB

OK, Mr Red Bug, stand here... And, Mrs Red Bug, you sit here. Now put your arm around her. No the other arm. No the other arm. No the other arm. Alright, now look down, your nose is casting too much shadow. And, now wait for it... Say squeeze! Seriously, though... There were 2 red bugs in the attack group, but it looked like they headed off in different directions of the colony ship. Therefore, in order to blow all of them, you'd have to take out the entire Island 1. Besides, being as quick as they were, there never looked like there was a moment where they were all packed together. The only way to get them all with one hit would have been when they launched. Even then, you don't want to go shooting reaction weapons at every unidentified ship that folds in...

Traveling ship-to-ship would've seemed reasonable if they'd used shuttles. Just the notion of flying your car over (or your moped ) across space was what pushed it over the edge. 'Course the name just hurt my head.

Another thing that has me wondering is after the alert at SMS HQ, Ozma says: "Lanka, they're finally here"* [sic]. He definitely seems to know a little more about the bugs than the others. Coupled with the red bug's interest upon spotting Ranka, it makes me wonder what ties she may have to them. And who's Mr Habler? Aside from being simply badass, the pilot episode here has laid the groundwork for many interesting plot threads. Hopefully they won't be casually glossed over like in M7. *Shinsen subs

I was just watching the show again, and I just had a new take on Alto's "angsty" scene before the concert. It seems like most of us have been looking at this scene as though he's continuing the complaint of the sky being to low in the colony, and he feels trapped. This time around, it seemed like it was more specific to the moment: He crumples the paper plane that had soared before and says "I don't want to be here, in a place where I can barely breathe."* ie: I don't want to do this job; they're canceling my maneuvers and I have to fly around in an enclosed building. It almost looked like he wasn't going to the concert at all, but for Ranka showing up. He guides her there, playing it cool, but he actually likes her, so decides to go ahead with the job (queue fountain and commercial break). Then during the job, he is little impressed with Sheryl, but seeks out Ranka in the very large crowd. Maybe I'm a little behind the curve and this is how you all read the scene before; but IMO, taking it this way makes Alto a little more likeable. *Shinsen subs

Perhaps the Ghosts were simply set to level 1 protection or something, so were more susceptible. This is another good use of the Ghosts, to get a little test of the enemy's abilities before sending in your pilots. If Level 7 protection did have some sort of negative effect, it may explain the poor performance of the NUNS fighters. Speaking of that scene, I like what they've done with the flight suits. They look very Macrossy, unlike those ridiculous things from M7. I really wish they'd gone back to Isamu's flight suit though, the transparent visor was a great idea;maintaining a full field of view while still hearkening back to SDFM.

In contrast, this is what I like most about the 11 and the 21. The face looks purely utilitarian, even intimidating on the 21. It kind of sells the design as though looking cool has absolutely nothing to do with its performance, as long as it gets the job done. Now I also like the other style of faces, especially on the 0S and the 17, but I think it looks wholly out of place on the VF-22. I'll meet you partway, though - I don't like how the 0A looks. Although I am interested to see if there'll be a 25"A" variant.

I, for one, can't wait for Nifty Show Time!

That's an idea. Shinsei decides to cut out the middle man and use it's own fighters directly. Come to think of it, their jackets are red & black, and the stripes on the YF-19 prototype were red & black...

I am envious of his skills and apparent time management. Even before I got married, I barely had the motivation to model, even though I love models. I think I'm just intimidated by the "blank canvas effect" of a new model. What color should I paint it? Should I mod it? Do I know how to mod it? Airbrush or hand brush? Oh, what? I've had this VF-1A for two years now? Where did the time go?