Sundown

Wait, isn't this the one story that differs from all the other examples, where the main character does die?

You missed the obvious. Or if Will Smith is in it. I believe I. Robot did okay as well, and it was at least based on a hard sci-fi premise. But apparently "Oh, hell no." makes such a thing watchable.

Ah right, oops. I don't know what I was thinking. I think in the instance of the A-10, the pilot trimmed all the way and held her steady, and the F-15 has an FCS, not a FBW system, which while it assists controllability (in ways I don't fully understand) isn't the same thing as FBW.

Haven't there been cases where planes like the A-10 and F-15 have flown home and landed without most of their wing? I know we're talking about weight here, but would a FBW system capable of keeping these examples airloft also be able to account for significant weight imbalances?

Ooo. Macrossnexus is pretty snazzy, Hurin. My only comment would be that watching the right hand menu flash and refresh everytime I click to expand a link is a little bit of an eyestrain. Anyway to fix that using frames or something?

I really wonder sometimes what the point is to "shaking up the universe", when it usually means a new arraingment that works less well than the older did, because characters were written with the original order of things in mind. Especially when they'll just undo all their changes a few years down the line. Other than as a gimmick to sell books, I mean.

*cheers* 379244[/snapback] Yay. Because disparaging comments eagerly made on wrong assumptions are something we can all really get behind. Yay!

Ah, thanks Duke.

It's the head of a Tomahawk Destroid that's seen better days... somehow the pilot managed to get shot through the visor in addition to runing most of the destroid. It's from that scene where Minmei and Kaifun have a spat... the destroid looms the background, leaning on a building.

Thanks Az. Wasn't sure where it was supposed to go. A little embarassed.

Has anyone read Miller's Batman: The Dark Knight Strikes Again? I know it wasn't well received, especially since folks were expecting something more along the lines of Dark Knight Returns, but not expecting much, I actually enjoyed the read. The art's just kind of... out there... the earlier pages look really rough and lazy, and the coloring's experimental, and, well, pretty bad... but both seem to tighten up towards the end of the book. There were a few pages that were so good they almost seemed out of place, and I felt like I was reading DKR again. It was as if DKSA could have been awesome if Miller wanted it awesome. But instead he wanted to screw around and could, because well, he's Frank Miller, and Lynn Varley could tinker with photoshop, because she's his wife. Sure, the story wasn't as deep and complex as Dark Knight Returns, but it was still a pretty great read with some big surprises and some pretty memorable moments, especially at the end. And for once, instead of Miller portraying Superman as dumb dumb, he's just only kinda sorta dumb, and kind of gets a clue at the end. I know I wasn't supposed to, but I liked it!

I miss Hurin and his unabashedly contrarian common sense around here. Outside of his one post I saw in the feedback section, where's he been? Speaking of which, A1's been AWOL too. Are they off on some father-son bonding trip? Or he's eaten Hurin? One of the two.

Sigh. We're discussing the relevence of Super Hero stories in a modern world and whether that sort of entertainment still "works". Much of what's written today isn't for children-- it's written for and panders specifically to adolesents. And then there are the few stories that go a bit further because the authors wrote them as adults and wrote into them themes and complexities they care about as adults. Yes, they're silly. Yes, they're fanciful. But in the best of comics, the authors still say poignant, relevant things and say them very powerfully-- albiet using the colorful characters we fell in love with as youths.

Err. Just for clarification, I was talking about when I was 10 in 1980-something. And here I thought we were expressing a childhood disappointment 20 years later, not one we currently have. There was a point a few years later in my adolescence where it occured to me the powerful fantasy I had as a child wouldn't happen, and I probably wouldn't even want it to happen. A wistful sigh, a shrug, a realization that I'd been silly as a kid, and I moved on. Let's not read too much into things on some less-geeky-than-thou witchhunt, eh? As for ComicKaze, and how seriously he hoped for his Macross fantasy to happen, to what age, and to what degree, he can probably answer for himself... But can't say I was expecting someone to pee on our little walk down nostalgia lane.

Ha. If anyone, the RIAA are the last folks I listen to. I have a blog entry to prove it. Maybe not, but going digital does has made piracy somewhat more covenient. And I'd think it'd definitely increase piracy as far as comics are concerned. Right now, if I want to read the latest issue of whatever, I'd have to go down to the store and grab it. If I could bittorrent it, along with whatever backissue interests me, I know that would be a pretty huge temptation.

You mean I wasn't the only one? It disturbs me now that I'd hoped for something that I knew would lead to the near end of the world. But hey! I get to fly a fricking cool jet-robot!

Wouldn't this actually increase the piracy? You know, like everything else digital that's ever been released?

Which I believe happens to get addressed in DC's 9/11 tribute, and in Alex Ross's Peace on Earth and Kingdom Come. One of Ross's (and Millers') recurring themes is that heroes aren't meant to solve man's problems, and can't even if they tried. They're meant to serve as examples and inspire people to do their share. Of course not every writer gets this and it turns into a pandering display of colors, powers, and gratuitous anatomy. It really depends on the writer and artist. Not everyone handles the meshing of real world with spandex well. There's a fine balance realism and fanciful that has to be struck for a comic to work, and comic heroes of course fail when viewed from an unflinching and critical eye for realism. But that's true for more than just comics. That's true for fantasy, for most sci-fi, and especially true for Japanese animations featuring giant transformable robots who battle giant human aliens and narrowly win only by the power of song and music.

Probably because there's no such thing as international copyright? Copyrights aren't enforceable in a foreign country unless that country agrees to a copyright treaty with the US. That's not likely to happen with your cold-war superpower enemy. You know, all that 80's stuff where we thought we were all going to get nuked.

Wow, being able to bow out graciously... there's hope for the boy yet. As someone who's also enamoured with what he thinks of the world, I know what it's like to encounter people who have totally different tastes and opinions. It's mindboggling. People can like Valks with faces? People can actually think the Star Wars Prequels rival the originals? People still find MTV watchable? What the?!1111!one1!! Unfortunately, yes. And no matter how finely tuned I think my tastes are (because I'm that vain ) , it doesn't prevent other people from totally disagreeing. I suppose now I'm vaguely curious...

This thread is fun like a trainwreck is fun. You keep lookin' but feel horrible for it. The original poster seems to have a hard time understanding how it's possible that his opinion and sense of style isn't one that everyone else shares, especially when what he feels and sees is so obvious to him. If I understand it correctly, he doesn't want a VF-1 redesign per se. He wants one that he actually likes, and to him it's probably baffling how someone can redesign the VF-1 multiple times and not get it exactly like how he pictures it in his mind.

Man, I just reread this. The VF-0 doesn't stop being a redesign of the VF-1 just because you don't like it. What you hate about the VF-0 is precisely because it is a redesign, one that happens to retain the things about the original you hate, instead of retaining the things you like. And I don't know what you dig so much about the VF-1SOL that makes you at the same time hate the VF-0, since they both look extremely similar, especially in technological style. Yes some of the porportions are different, yes, it's a tiny bit more aggressive, and yes, the SOL has four lasers instead of two. But it looks more like a 0 than not. Except it's again, uglier, and seems to have junk stuck on it for the sake of looking "more advanced". Sigh. So after 12 pages, here are our conclusions: 1. You hate the VF-1. 2. We don't. 3. None of Kawamori's actual redesigns satisfy you, because he didn't do them in the precise manner you would have liked. 4. You think the VF-1 is Kawamori's worst design, while some of us think its in fact the best, while the rest pale in comparison. 5. You want a redesign, even if there won't be an upcoming animation that uses it, and then a new model kit of it. That's not how Studio Nue or Kawamori works. 6. You're going to have to design this VF-1 that you like, because it's not going to come from Kawamori. 7. And even if you do, many here won't be very receptive of it, because we simply share different tastes and aesthetics. Unless, maybe this is what you want: http://www.mahq.net/mecha/macross/advvalk/vf-3000.htm

Sigh. Do you realize whether something is "ugly" or not is an opinion, and that your personal opinion might not be usually universally shared, as shocking as that might be? You do realize that there are folks out there that have vastly different tastes than you do, and that just because something is obvious to you, others might not see the same thing-- and you might even be in the extreme minority? The only thing that we know for sure is that most everyone here disagrees with you. Yes, the VF-1 looks a little dated. But it's the most beautiful, proportionate, and elegant of Kawamori's designs in both simplicity and form. This might shock you, but I feel actually feel that Kawamori's sense of style has degraded through the years, and his designs have looked worse and worse compared to the original VF-1 that I fell in love with at first sight. His designs have gotten more complex and refined, yes, but few of his recent designs have captured the feel the original did. In my opinion of course. And to me, the VF-19, VF-11, and the battroid mode of the VF-17 and VA-3 are his "run of the mill" designs that I would give a big Meehh to. And yes, this might shock you, but if anything, that VF-1SOL is ugly. Especially its head. The VF-1S's head doesn't need modernizing... seeing as there are no real world robot heads we can use to determine whether the 1S is outdated or not. If anything, its head's what looks perfectly fine, and sticking a bunch of crap on it and making it more "extreme" isn't making it more modern. It's making it look crummy. And of the things I dislike most about the VF-0, it's its head, as Kawamori just slapped a bunch of extra junk on it that it didn't need, which only obscured its original form and elegance. Of course, again, opinion. Express them? Fine. Shoving them down folks throats as facts? Not fine.

So you want a "redesigned VF-1" that's more extreme in bits, but in other ways retains some VF-1 features that the VF-0 doesn't. And it looks like you don't like Kawamori's new design aesthetics. If you wan't him to redesign the VF-1, you're going to get a VF-0, or something like it, or he might just stare at you flabberghasted and say, "I thought I just did." Pretty much whatever it is you want, you'll have to do it yourself.

Unless your salad dressing is made of people... "Soylen dressing is PEOPLE!!!" Man, I am so retarded. *Cackles inanely* I actually appreciated that.