RavenHawk

I disagree. The Toynami Beta is a more than decent product (and is supposedly based on Aoshima's engineering, but made by Toynami, while the Toynami Cyclone is supposed to be a reboxed Beagle with a new head, so not only is it engineered by Beagle, but actually made by them too, so it should have identical quality).

Has anyone received a shipping notification on their Toynami Cyclone? Now that the Beagle MOSPEADA is out and people have it in hand, I hoped that Toynami would be a matter of days later, but I haven't heard anything yet, and Robotech.com still just says "End of January."

Ok, I'm slowly working my way through the comics (with a decided predilection for New Gen). Here's what I've read so far, with some brief comments: - 1996 Calendar: Ok, this is useless pinup art, but what do you expect? - Crystal Dreams: Pretty much useless, but can't expect much from a free convention giveaway. It is interesting, seems like they were working in elements of one of the Macross movies, either Plus or II, I forget. - Invasion: Not much for story at all, decent art though. Interesting to see revision of Academy material here. - Invid War: Really good. Much better than I was expecting, both from an artistic and story point of view. - Invid War - Aftermath: Not to my taste, but still kind of interesting, though it all felt rushed. Definitely faultered at the end, and seemed to have been a non-Robotech story that the author(s) wanted to tell, and just set it in the Robotech world to be able to sell it. Still, not terrible, as long as you think of it as an Elseworlds type of thing. - Robotech The Movie: Pretty bad writing, though the art was ok. Interesting to see just how Carl Macek would have liked to have done the story, if the original animation had allowed for it. - Sourcebook: Not much needs to be said. - Star Runners: Carpenter's Journey: While it's a fun idea to see what went on with this trip, this is terribly written and feels rushed, while also being just a bit silly and cliched. This could have been a nice 4-issue mini. - Robotech Misfits: A very cliched cast here, trying to create a funny dirty dozen I guess, but I could see the concept being very entertaining and interesting in the right author's hands. - New Generation (Comico): Actually much better than I was expecting. Art goes from good to poor, depending on the issue, though the Dorman covers are gorgeous. Would've been amazing interiors. It was nice to see more details from MOSPEADA being in here than made it to the New Gen cartoon and, again, interesting to see some of Macek's ideas here that didn't fit in with the animation. - Robotech II The Sentinels: Cyberpirate: Just terrible. A waste of space, and fell oh so far short of what the author said he was hoping to do with this series. Very immature take on the concepts too. How is this the same author who wrote Invid War??? - Robotech II The Sentinels: Rubicon: The worst of the whole lot here. Artwork with no shading and that makes each character look indistinguishable from another. That, added to the artist doing completely new takes on each character's look keeps you from having any idea what is going on or to whom. The writing is terrible too. Real World type soap dialog, disjointed story... just terrible. - Robotech II The Sentinels: The Malcontent Uprisings: Seemed a bit rushed and to fall far short of its potential, but, despite those failings, and despite my minimal interest in the generations involved in this series, it was pretty good. Decently written, decent art work, pretty well thought out story (again, though a bit rushed), and some nice new mecha to boot.

The Wildstorm stuff was disappointing, but, as I read through the older stuff now... it was still better than SO MUCH of the old stuff. I think my biggest gripe with the Wildstorm stuff was that very little really happened, considering the page count. The old stuff may have had bad art (about half the time, love the Eldred stuff) and bad writing (again, about half the time), but at least a lot typically happened in any given issue, really progressing the story, as opposed to just building page count for future trade paperbacks.

Thanks

Considering what a long series the Sentinels comics were, with the same writers for so much of it, I think it could have been handled like in the books. Let's not even mention how nicely Breetai's/Regent's final battle was handled in the books, versus, what, a single panel in Prelude to the Shadow Chronicles? Well, I guess I did just mention it.

I'll try it, but keep my expectations really really low. Suspect it will turn into one of those things that was great in theory, but disappointing in execution. As for art, I'm really enjoying the art in Invid War, especially the Eldred/Perry work in issue 9. The rest of the Robotech comics that I've skimmed so far... well, I can't understand how someone was actually paid money to draw that. Like I said, looks like 12 year olds (or younger) doodling... while in a hurry.

Guess I'll give it a try and see. Still tough to stomach T.R./B.D. Edwards turning into a giant mutated protoculture monster...

I looked at it (the download of it, that is). First page says it's meant to be a Robotech story, but with the feel of Akira and Megazone combined. Ok, could be interesting... Then I recognize the main character as the cool guy who appeared in Invid War, then died about 2 pages later. Ok, starting to look a little fanboyish, but maybe... I flipped through the rest of the series and it looked like it just gets worse and worse. I was planning on reading it after Invid War and Aftermath. You're saying skip it completely, or just go in with really low expectations?

Tommy Yune is credited with the story, the Waltrips with the scripts. Based on the Wikipedia entry mentioned above, it is a retconning which kept some Sentinels stuff, and forced in other things which only a Yune could love... Seeing as how I thought the story AND the dialog and other visible elements of the script were all just awful, that doesn't make me feel to encouraged about the Waltrips' other writing.

Problem is, I'm really more interested in the New Gen/Invid stuff than the Macross stuff... ... and, though I loved the Sentinels books, if Prelude to Shadow Chronicles is any indication of the Waltrips' writing, then I don't think I could stomach the Sentinels stuff.

It would be nice if you could separately buy a set of the Beagle stuff that is different from the Toynami release... like the head.

Thanks. I'm reading Invid War right now and enjoying it a lot more than I would have expected. Of course, my expectations are based on some of the later issues which I flipped through, which looked like some 12 year old kid drew them... in a hurry.

That's a good thing, right?

I've been downloading some of the old Robotech comics, from all of the various companies. Can anyone recommend a reading order to me? They seem to be very interrelated, but I haven't had any luck finding one online. Thanks.

CollectionDX says Ray comes out in March. http://www.collectiondx.com/node/3046 So, choose who you want to believe.

That's what I thought you were going to say... Thanks. BTW, for anyone who care, I emailed sales and marketing at Toynami about a week or two ago to ask if they would be re-offering the blue MPC Alpha to help us all avoid buying from Aoshima instead... and still no reply.

Not arguing with you at all, just basing my information on BigBadToyStore. If you look up there list of Robotech items there, they have the Scott Beagle listed as Masterpiece #1 (1st quarter 2009), Lancer as #2 (1st quarter 2009), and Rand as #3 (also 1st quarter 2009, though I am almost sure I saw another site listing the 3 dates as January, March, and May).

Yes, that's what I meant. Thanks.

Actually, I think Yellow/Lancer is supposed to be March, and then Ray/Rand in May, though I may not be remembering correctly. I know, seems weird, since Ray and Stig are almost identical molds, so would be easier to follow one up by the other, but they probably figured it would be tougher to get us to buy both, unless they get us to buy another along the way, and then start to feel that we need all variations... which is probably pretty smart.

I kind of doubt it's MEANT to be the same universe as Megazone, but I think it is definitely heavily influenced by it, or maybe carrying over some old ideas from it. Reminds me a bit of Megazone 23 Part III too. Well, I watched episode 2 last night. Still not sure what to think. I think that, especially in this episode, by not speaking Japanese, I'm really missing a ton of the substance of it. All that's left, at that point, is kind of just more maneuver blades chasing bug-like robotic vehicles down strangely empty highways...

How did you get your hands on a blue alpha?

Anything you'd be willing to chat about about in private messages?

I wasn't talking about Robotech doing a disservice to the original animes. That topic is a dead horse, let's just leave it alone. I was referring to talking about which mecha is better, or if Macross mecha would beat Southern Cross mecha or anything like that.

I do get that, and I, for one, was first introduced to all of this by Robotech... read the Robotech books and loved (almost all of) them... but I just don't think it's not a realistic comparison, and does disservice to the original work. Mecha in Southern Cross and MOSPEADA are a lot more fragile and less powerful than in Macross. Not because they're "worse" but because they exist in a different anime version of reality.