Would Macross be more popular/respected if Robotech did not exist?

[bhayes82]

Honestly, I once liked Robotech. I didn't get into it when it actually aired cause I was too young, I rediscovered it in the '90s when it started airing as re-runs on the Sci-Fi channel. I dug it back then. I liked the deep story combined with the action. Back in those days I didn't know anime the way I do now. I do have a fondness for robotech, I remember when I first saw Robotech II: The Sentinels on VHS and I was intrigued.

I remember when I first 'rented' Macross PLUS on VHS and thought 'oh this is a side story to the Macross Saga of Robotech, very cool' and I didn't like it at first cause of the tone of the story. i wanted more aliens vs robots type story - not a love triangle/soap opera.

it wasn't until later that I realized that robotech was a combo of 3 different unrelated shows, but i 'still' didn't care so much back then. then I happened to catch 'Macross: Do You Remember Love' . it's actually thanks to MAHQ.net's description section on Macross DYRL that i realized 'oh this is the macross story with 'better' animation.

and when I saw it, i was blown away and I began to realize why so many Macross fans hate Harmony Gold. this great franchise has been 'held back' for so long. the tone, and vibe and the intention of SDF Macross is completely removed in Robotech. I feel that the VOICE CAST of Robotech are very talented, but i didn't realize how much they butchered SDF Macross.

thanks to online streaming/pirate sites - i have been able to see the other macross shows too.

I gotta be honest. Macross 7, Delta and Frontier really do come off as 'generic' anime that happened to have the valkirye fighter in them. It doesn't feel 'macross' enough for me.

for me the 'true' Macross stories are SDF Macross, DYRL, Macross PLUS, Macross II: Lovers Again, and Macross Zero

Harmony Gold unfortunately does a horrible job of Managing the robotech brand. Their attempt to 'remaster' Robotech was terrible. the horrid picture quality, those clunky new sound-effects. I actually enjoyed Shadow Chronicles but that came out in 2006. they planned a sequel but they stopped production on that. then they tried to crowd fund another sequel but that didn't work either.

I guess the coronavirus pandemic impacted Harmony Gold in some way cause i find it odd that they now all the sudden will allow Macross Dubs to happen at some point. I'm glad but Macross will forever be confused as robotech to the general public.

with the upcoming Gundam live action movie coming, i see that HG is trying to get a Robotech movie going again - but still - i think Both the Macross brand and the Robotech brand are forever tarnished.

[Seto Kaiba]

Would Macross be more popular/respected if Robotech did not exist?

Would one of the biggest names in mecha anime be more popular if there hadn't been a knockoff brand with zero potential and even less creative integrity deliberately obstructing its overseas licensing and doing everything that its owners could think of - legally and otherwise - to misinform people about it, to dissuade hobbyists from taking an interest in it, and to obstruct those that were interested from actually watching or supporting it in any way?

Yes. Obviously.

I gotta be honest. Macross 7, Delta and Frontier really do come off as 'generic' anime that happened to have the valkirye fighter in them. It doesn't feel 'macross' enough for me.

for me the 'true' Macross stories are SDF Macross, DYRL, Macross PLUS, Macross II: Lovers Again, and Macross Zero

Eh... Macross fans hear this a lot from the Robotech fanbase.

Really, what it is, is that their perceptions of what "Macross" is are horribly skewed by trying to view it through the lens of the mess that is Robotech. Macross is not a war story with a romance subplot. Macross is, and always has been, a character drama and love story with a space war subplot. Its creators have been very very clear about that fact from the outset. As Kawamori describes the franchise, Macross is a love story that's set against a backdrop of space battles.

Because Robotech fans are used to the butchered version that focuses exclusively on war, the love story and character drama that have always been Macross's heart and soul feel like a major change of focus.

It's ironic that three of the five titles you listed are the three worst-performing Macross titles in Japan for the very reason that the love story and character drama was less prominent and the story darker and less upbeat: that would be Macross II, Macross Plus, and Macross Zero. Many Macross fans would point to the Macross 7 series as the ultimate distillation of "Macross-ness" in terms of the show's themes about love, communication, and music. Macross 7, Macross Frontier, and Macross Delta are the three shows in the franchise that did the best in their native market and garnered explosive decades-long popularity.

I actually enjoyed Shadow Chronicles but that came out in 2006. they planned a sequel but they stopped production on that. then they tried to crowd fund another sequel but that didn't work either.

In fact, Harmony Gold didn't stop production on Part II of their planned 4 part "Shadow Saga" OVA. Production was never started, because the OVA was cancelled due to having no budget.

Spoiler

Because Harmony Gold was unable to find anyone willing to invest in a new Robotech development in the wake of the embarrassing failure of Robotech 3000 and bankruptcy of the studio developing it, Harmony Gold's creative staff had to beg their own management for funding for development and production. The funding they got was paltry, and was only secured because the new creative director (Tommy Yune) promised his superiors that this new title was going to sell like mad, that it would reinvent Robotech in a way that would make the franchise popular and relevant for the first time in its existence, and that it would attract investors to fund all of production costs for the OVA's subsequent episodes.

Of course, when all was said and done Robotech: the Shadow Chronicles couldn't get its foot in the door at most of the film festivals it applied to, its only award was won by dint of being the only entrant in its category, it was largely ignored by the hobby press who were long used to Harmony Gold's Mall Santa-like tendency to be all talk and nothing in the sack, near-universally panned by Robotech fans as an atrociously bad fanfic, widely mocked outside the fanbase, laughed out of town on streaming, and it sold terribly even by HG's low standards.

This crash-and-burn failure meant that the Robotech creative staff were not able to fulfill the conditions it had agreed to in order to secure funding, so they were unable to secure any funding to develop or produce their OVA's second episode. The project was cancelled due to lack of funding.

I guess the coronavirus pandemic impacted Harmony Gold in some way cause i find it odd that they now all the sudden will allow Macross Dubs to happen at some point. I'm glad but Macross will forever be confused as robotech to the general public.

No, Harmony Gold's sudden interest in facilitating the release of Macross worldwide has nothing whatsoever to do with COVID-19.

What caused this sudden reversal was an impending court ruling against Harmony Gold in the European Union.

You see, a few years ago Big West (the owners of Macross) finally took notice of the growing interest in the Macross franchise outside Japan despite Harmony Gold's efforts to embargo all things Macross. It was apparently a persuasive-enough picture that Big West launched a series of legal challenges asserting its status as the true and rightful owner of the Macross intellectual property in markets worldwide and filed trademark registrations to challenge and overturn Harmony Gold's trademarks on Macross's title, logos, etc.. HG had been using those trademarks to stop distributors from licensing Macross outside Japan by threatening them with trademark infringement lawsuits. Harmony Gold disputed Big West's trademark filings, and as per protocol the dispute went before the intellectual property courts where Big West won every case. Each dispute ended in Harmony Gold losing its trademarks in the region to Big West.

By the time the initial decision was reached in the European Union, the situation between the two companies had effectively reversed itself completely. Now Big West was armed with the power to shut down Robotech in a majority of the world's markets by threatening to sue for trademark infringement. Instead of Macross being bottled up in Japan, Big West was now in a position to have Robotech bottled up in the United States where is has practically no audience.

So, in the final phase of the appeals process in the European Union and with no hope of a victory, Harmony Gold's only way forward was to seek a negotiated settlement with Big West. The time had come to Bend The Knee. For Harmony Gold to knuckle under. To get down on all fours and really lick boot in the hopes that Big West would be willing to offer permission for Robotech to continue existing in exchange for access to the US. So Harmony Gold gave away control over the Robotech franchise and became little more than an intermediary for Macross releases all in exchange for Big West's promise that it wouldn't block the release of a live action movie if one gets made some day.

Very few people are going to confuse Macross for Robotech. Mostly Robotech fans deliberately trying to muddy those waters, because most people outside the small and shrinking Robotech fanbase don't know Robotech exists. Robotech will never be anything more than a footnote in Macross's history, like the Harmony Gold dub of Dragon Ball where Korrin is called "Whiskers the Wonder Cat".

with the upcoming Gundam live action movie coming, i see that HG is trying to get a Robotech movie going again - but still - i think Both the Macross brand and the Robotech brand are forever tarnished.

Not "again"... still.

Harmony Gold has been trying, continuously and without any success, to get that Robotech live action movie proposal off the ground since 2007. Nobody's interested in making it. The only reason Warner Bros was interested in the license back in '07 was because Robotech was a contemporary of Transformers, which Paramount was and is making bank on. It was the same similar-property effect that saw a run on "true sports story" scripts in 1992 due to the success of The Mighty Ducks.

[bhayes82]

Thank you for the explanation. u seem to be well-versed on this topic.
but yeah, that clears everything up for me. thank you for explaining. I found this round-table video with Tommy Yune and Kevin McKeever...what are your thoughts on it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D8XXr9ounJw

and 'yes' I will admit I'm Robotech influenced. can't help it. for example, DYRL is really good but the 'minmay attack' and the finale felt anti-climatic and just too fluffy and too feminine for me, whereas the entire movie is ACTION and robots vs. aliens with alittle bit of romance and but i still dig the movie very much. but watching it made me see "ah, now I see why Harmony Gold is hated.."

SDF Macross series is good, but for me as it stands now, its just so OLD looking. it doesn't turn me on anymore. i prefer to see DYRL. wow. Macross Plus and Zero bombed in Japan? I didn't know this. i thought they we're beloved. oh well.. i just prever the OAVs and Films moreso than the series' 7, Delta and Frontier just don't do anything for me.

so from the sounds of things. Robotech can finally dissappear and Macross can flourish now. that's good to know.

do you forsee complete redubs of SDF Macross, Macross II and Macross Plus ? and new Dubs of Zero, DYRL, 7, Delta and Frontier ??? or will

[Seto Kaiba]

Thank you for the explanation. u seem to be well-versed on this topic.
but yeah, that clears everything up for me. thank you for explaining. I found this round-table video with Tommy Yune and Kevin McKeever...what are your thoughts on it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D8XXr9ounJw

Why would anyone ask Tommy Yune or Kevin McKeever anything anymore?

Those two have literally never been less relevant to the goings-on in Macross and Robotech than they are now.

Mind you, they weren't relevant before either. Kevin McKeever was near-universally loathed by the Macross and Robotech fandoms even before he agreed to work for peanuts to work as the Robotech franchise's official spin doctor (read: marketing guy). He was completely unqualified for the job, so the only utility he's had has been as a Hate Sink to make Tommy or Steve look more likeable by comparison. Tommy Yune... well... there hasn't been a reason to talk to him about anything since early 2007, since the cancellation of his Robotech: the Shadow Chronicles OVA effectively removed him from proximity to anything remotely resembling a decision in the management of the brand. It's actually kind of bizarre that either of them is still employed at this point. It's not like it's a secret that Harmony Gold had already abandoned animated Robotech years before any of this stuff with Big West.

and 'yes' I will admit I'm Robotech influenced. can't help it. for example, DYRL is really good but the 'minmay attack' and the finale felt anti-climatic and just too fluffy and too feminine for me, whereas the entire movie is ACTION and robots vs. aliens with alittle bit of romance and but i still dig the movie very much. but watching it made me see "ah, now I see why Harmony Gold is hated.."

SDF Macross series is good, but for me as it stands now, its just so OLD looking. it doesn't turn me on anymore. i prefer to see DYRL.

Well, what you're gonna see in the future is more of that stuff... Macross is all about the love stories, music, and character drama. Always has been.

wow. Macross Plus and Zero bombed in Japan? I didn't know this. i thought they we're beloved. oh well..

No Macross series has "bombed" in Japan. Macross II: Lovers Again, Macross Plus, and Macross Zero did get decidedly lukewarm receptions when they debuted, though. All of them failed to strike a chord with Japanese audiences precisely because they were darker stories, with less of Macross's trademark very optimistic outlook, romance focus, and musical emphasis. So it's been kind of an uphill battle to win a greater acceptance of those titles over the years... via some tie-ins and cameos done in later titles like Frontier, Voices Across the Galaxy, and Delta.

so from the sounds of things. Robotech can finally dissappear and Macross can flourish now. that's good to know.

It certainly looks that way... though Harmony Gold is going to cling to Robotech as long as it can, because it can only retain those trademarks that enable its negotiating position with Big West in the US if it's actively selling Macross-based Robotech merch. They'll continue re-releasing Robotech on print-on-demand DVD and now Blu-ray, and flog the series through the usual cycle of streaming services, but it's unlikely that there will ever be any new Robotech development. Even most of their merchandising partners have abandoned them due to slipping sales.

do you forsee complete redubs of SDF Macross, Macross II and Macross Plus ? and new Dubs of Zero, DYRL, 7, Delta and Frontier ??? or will

My expectation is we'll see subs-only releases to streaming services in the coming year, followed by eventual dubs and home video releases. I'd suspect that they'll continue to use the old dubs of II and Plus as well, as there's a surprising following for those in some corners. Enough so that the Japanese home market release of the Macross Plus OVA included the "international edition" English dub from the 90's.

[bhayes82]

yup. u are correct. thanks for the explanation. but yeah...Robotech needs to dissappear..at this point.i think it will dissappear too. it will be a SLOW process, but i think it will happen. u are right its no secret that HG has abandoned the Robotech animation. and yes, they are flogging those crappy 'remastered editions' on streaming and blu ray. that's what made me turn against Harmony Gold, those crappy so called 'remastered versions' of robotech and the cancelled sequels,

my hope is that we'll get COMPLETE re-dubs of everything Macross at some point. SDF Macross series, Plus/Plus movie edition, and II: Lovers Again and New dubs for everything else. the dub for Macross II is downright awful and hard on the ears. they gotta redo that one. its terrible!!

also what I think would 'really' help Macross to be understood by Mainstream audeiences is if they do high quality 'English language' covers of all the songs and intro songs for each series/OVA/films. I think if they get the funimation team to do ALL the voice dubbing and if they spend the money needed to get the licensing and hire the best singing talent available to do english language covers of ALL of the songs and intro songs , i think that people in general and newcomers in general would go "oh wow, this is NOT robotech..this is something better and the music is pretty good too" Macross PLUS wouldn't need covers cause the songs in that were English. but if they did that, i think the 'romance' aspect and that aspect of 'music' and 'love' being used as the weapon to end the war and make peace - i think it would resonate more with American/English speaking audiences. honestly, the j-pop love ballads in japanese language can be jarring and off putting when mixed in with the robots vs aliens mecha aspect.

if the dub became a 'dub with amazing music' that would be cool. Funimation is pretty good with doing english covers.

Macross 7 'could' be interesitng if it had a high quality dub and english covers of the songs, but watching it, i just go 'huh?..who is this Basara guy and why should i care about him?'

if the songs were in English in high quality..i think it would resonate better and even robotech fans would become lovers of Macross..

.honestly..as a former fan of robotech..i will say this...if the remastering of Robotech had been an authentic 'remaster' - meaning, if they 1) did an authentic remaster/cleaning up the original source video for Macross, Southern Cross, Mospeada, 2) contacted the original voice cast and the robotech narrator to do improvements in the old Robotech dub and added back in violence and other things that was edited out in the old TV dub 3) avoided adding clunky new sound effects and kept the orignal sound effects we grew up hearing 4) avoided re-cutting the intros/outros 5) kept the original fonts/coloring style for the opening and episode titles and just cleaned them up instead of using something 'new' that doesn't fit.

this is what made me turn on Harmony Gold. An obvious 'lack' of resources (meaning money) and lack of effort.

remember that funny Conan O'brien bit for Pierre Benards recliner of rage rant Robotech? when those B.S. remasters came out, i felt his rage.

instead they got 'partially' remastered video and edited this partially remastered footage down to fit the old Robotech TV dub, while adding in new age CLUNKY sounding special effects that are terrible and don't fit the series at all. i mean the series was made in the '80s but they've added loud over the top new age sound effects? it didn't fit. and if its animated sequels had moved forward i would support the brand. but HG just does NOT have the resources, money, to manage the brand properly in a respectable way. they keep failing and letting the fans down. and embarassing themselves.

around the time of the reslease of those Robotech remasters, that was the time i had re-discovered DYRL and then i began to 'undertand' why fans hate Harmony Gold. Macross Do You Remember Love is a 'CLASSIC' and an 'epic' piece of anime that no one has ever seen. its truely a crime

I actually bought and read the Shadow Chronicles prequel comics. they were interesting. shadow chronicles the film was decent and interesting but the Shadow Chronicles sequel failed to get made, the crowd funding they attempted for 'another' sequel post shadow chronicles also failed. they keep failing..and keep trying to make Robotech seem more popular than it really is.

so yeah.. lets wait and see what happens now. they're trying to do a movie... if they pull it off. fine.

but we need Macross dubbing/re-dubbing to happen and i think new dubs/redubs with English covers of ALL the songs/intro songs will help the macross brand in America, in my view.

[MythSearcher]

I gotta be honest. Macross 7, Delta and Frontier really do come off as 'generic' anime that happened to have the valkirye fighter in them. It doesn't feel 'macross' enough for me.

for me the 'true' Macross stories are SDF Macross, DYRL, Macross PLUS, Macross II: Lovers Again, and Macross Zero

Eh... Macross fans hear this a lot from the Robotech fanbase.

Really, what it is, is that their perceptions of what "Macross" is are horribly skewed by trying to view it through the lens of the mess that is Robotech. Macross is not a war story with a romance subplot. Macross is, and always has been, a character drama and love story with a space war subplot. Its creators have been very very clear about that fact from the outset. As Kawamori describes the franchise, Macross is a love story that's set against a backdrop of space battles.

Because Robotech fans are used to the butchered version that focuses exclusively on war, the love story and character drama that have always been Macross's heart and soul feel like a major change of focus.

It's ironic that three of the five titles you listed are the three worst-performing Macross titles in Japan for the very reason that the love story and character drama was less prominent and the story darker and less upbeat: that would be Macross II, Macross Plus, and Macross Zero. Many Macross fans would point to the Macross 7 series as the ultimate distillation of "Macross-ness" in terms of the show's themes about love, communication, and music. Macross 7, Macross Frontier, and Macross Delta are the three shows in the franchise that did the best in their native market and garnered explosive decades-long popularity.

3rd side view of this, as a generic anime watcher from outside of Japan and NA.

I have never watched Robotech and only heard of it.
Not really a big fan of Macross, never watched the original TV series and only watched DYRL, Plus, Zero and F.

Watched some 7 episodes, played the PSP game of the compilation of the series(based on the Gundam Battle series engine) and they just don't amuse me as much. Granted, I don't even like plus, but I don't understand how 7 keeps setting up the "don't want to fight but let's sing in the middle of the battlefield." thing. A friend of mine, while is very annoyingly hating anything but the original, DYRL and II(Understandably, he also only liked FG and hated anything onwards from Zeta) who also never watched Robotech, likened Basara to Doraemon's Gian, who just forced people to listen to his horrible songs, and I kinda have to agree because his song styles really aren't appealing to me. I also don't like the mouth on his VF-19. Yes, I can kinda guess 7 is likely one of the most popular titles in Macross because of I can't explain why it got 5 anime and 2 manga, I am not going to say 7 is bad because I never actually watched it, but it just doesn't attract me to do so.

I liked DYRL and F the best in the series because of the songs the heroins sang during the final battle are just that much related to the story, you really feel sad for them. Minmay just got dumped and DYRL lyrics talks about how "Don't have to be alone anymore", Sheryl is dying from the Vajra toxins and the lyrics sangs "(I) want to live".

[Seto Kaiba]

yup. u are correct. thanks for the explanation. but yeah...Robotech needs to dissappear..at this point.i think it will dissappear too. it will be a SLOW process, but i think it will happen.

It's been an inevitability for a while now... especially once Harmony Gold soured relations with Tatsunoko Pro, who owns the animation they license for the series, a few years back. They're going to hang on as long as they can but it's not going to be for that much longer.

u are right its no secret that HG has abandoned the Robotech animation. and yes, they are flogging those crappy 'remastered editions' on streaming and blu ray. that's what made me turn against Harmony Gold, those crappy so called 'remastered versions' of robotech and the cancelled sequels,

That was hardly even their fault. The series performed poorly on broadcast, so when the time came to take it to home video they couldn't attract a decent licensee and the licensee they got was an amateur outfit that did poor quality work with the limited tools available. The original master tapes and edit lists were damaged beyond any recovery in a flood in the early 90's, so all they had to work with when they tried to re-release the series on DVD were those low-quality VHS tapes that'd suffered age-related deterioration so it looked like arse. The reason the Remastered Edition exists is because they were able to partially reconstruct the missing materials using archival tapes discovered in 2002 and tried to work around the missing edit lists by commissioning a new edit.

They tried to make the best of a bad situation... even if they were still trying to essentially claim credit for work that wasn't their own the whole way through.

also what I think would 'really' help Macross to be understood by Mainstream audeiences is if they do high quality 'English language' covers of all the songs and intro songs for each series/OVA/films.

Proper English dubs are more or less a given, esp. if the series is going to be broadcast at any point.

That said, producing English versions of the songs is all but completely guaranteed to not be happening.

We're a good 20 years past the point where the anime distribution industry in the west considered that necessary to release a series. Like the Robotech-style rewrites that died with the 1980's, re-recording songs is a very expensive undertaking that's not worth the effort because the result is practically never well-received. Hiring a songwriter to rewrite even one or two songs with English lyrics and a vocalist or voice actress to perform them is an unpleasantly large additional expense for an industry that operates on razor-thin margins. In the late 90's and early 2000's it was done for a few shows that were going directly to broadcast but that was about the only way to justify the costs.

For a series as dependent on music as Macross, that would be an apocalyptically expensive endeavor that'd be practically guaranteed to get the studio verbally crucified for sh*tting on the work of several legendary j-pop and j-rock artists.

It's just not necessary anymore either. Audiences have demonstrated on no uncertain terms they're fine leaving Japanese vocals as-is even for broadcast airings.

.honestly..as a former fan of robotech..i will say this...if the remastering of Robotech had been an authentic 'remaster' - meaning, if they 1) did an authentic remaster/cleaning up the original source video for Macross, Southern Cross, Mospeada, 2) contacted the original voice cast and the robotech narrator to do improvements in the old Robotech dub and added back in violence and other things that was edited out in the old TV dub 3) avoided adding clunky new sound effects and kept the orignal sound effects we grew up hearing 4) avoided re-cutting the intros/outros 5) kept the original fonts/coloring style for the opening and episode titles and just cleaned them up instead of using something 'new' that doesn't fit.

this is what made me turn on Harmony Gold. An obvious 'lack' of resources (meaning money) and lack of effort.

Not just money, as described in one of my previous paragraphs... it would've been basically impossible due to the destruction of the original master tapes and edit decision lists in a warehouse flood in the 90's.

Some of the rest would've been undesirable since Robotech Remastered was also an attempt to clean up the Robotech series and reinvent it as a credible contender in the mecha anime genre in tandem with their work on what became Robotech: the Shadow Chronicles. They were trying to make it more presentable to a new audience, and looking and sounding like 30 year old leftover arse wouldn't exactly help in that.

Bringing back the original voice cast and narrator to re-record dialog would've also made it extremely expensive and probably impossible for Harmony Gold to afford since most of the Robotech voice cast are members of the Screen Actors Guild now and would have to be paid guild scale. That is also why Harmony Gold restricted its cast for Shadow Chronicles to the bare minimum number of returning characters... it's just too expensive.

they keep failing..and keep trying to make Robotech seem more popular than it really is.

That's been the reality of Robotech since Day One. Even the "original" TV series was nowhere near as well-received as Harmony Gold likes to claim, having been a middle-of-the-pack performer at best and having had an extremely unsuccessful toy line.

Watched some 7 episodes, played the PSP game of the compilation of the series(based on the Gundam Battle series engine) and they just don't amuse me as much. Granted, I don't even like plus, but I don't understand how 7 keeps setting up the "don't want to fight but let's sing in the middle of the battlefield." thing.

It's... complicated. Like Gundam's Newtypes, it's one of those things that makes perfect sense in context but if you try to explain it it sounds like it should come with a corkboard wall full of red string and polaroids and one seriously strung-out looking narrator with untidy hair. Basically, Bardic Inspiration is a real psychic power thanks to human minds being connected to higher dimensions and emotions existing as a form of higher-dimensional energy.

The PSP games are definitely no ambassador, though. They're not meant to be. They're a "For Fans" sort of thing that more or less plays like a barely-in-context "greatest hits" collection of moments from disparate TV series and OVAs.

A friend of mine, while is very annoyingly hating anything but the original, DYRL and II(Understandably, he also only liked FG and hated anything onwards from Zeta) who also never watched Robotech, likened Basara to Doraemon's Gian, who just forced people to listen to his horrible songs, and I kinda have to agree because his song styles really aren't appealing to me.

Ironically, that's exactly how the series presents him for maybe the first 1/3 of the story.

[MythSearcher]

yup. u are correct. thanks for the explanation. but yeah...Robotech needs to dissappear..at this point.i think it will dissappear too. it will be a SLOW process, but i think it will happen.

It's been an inevitability for a while now... especially once Harmony Gold soured relations with Tatsunoko Pro, who owns the animation they license for the series, a few years back. They're going to hang on as long as they can but it's not going to be for that much longer.

u are right its no secret that HG has abandoned the Robotech animation. and yes, they are flogging those crappy 'remastered editions' on streaming and blu ray. that's what made me turn against Harmony Gold, those crappy so called 'remastered versions' of robotech and the cancelled sequels,

That was hardly even their fault. The series performed poorly on broadcast, so when the time came to take it to home video they couldn't attract a decent licensee and the licensee they got was an amateur outfit that did poor quality work with the limited tools available. The original master tapes and edit lists were damaged beyond any recovery in a flood in the early 90's, so all they had to work with when they tried to re-release the series on DVD were those low-quality VHS tapes that'd suffered age-related deterioration so it looked like arse. The reason the Remastered Edition exists is because they were able to partially reconstruct the missing materials using archival tapes discovered in 2002 and tried to work around the missing edit lists by commissioning a new edit.

They tried to make the best of a bad situation... even if they were still trying to essentially claim credit for work that wasn't their own the whole way through.

It might get hard because from the licensing company's point of view, getting the Robotech license is much easier and cheaper than the Macross license, and because they bought the rights to do that, it is impossible to stop it now.
So if you want to use the image of VF-1, SDF-01, or the characters of the original Macross show(or the other two shows involved in Robotech), all you need to do is obtain the much cheaper license of Robotech instead of Macross, given that you tag the label to be Robotech instead of Macross. They may not produce new shows, but that license is going to be a good credit card to cash as long as the Macross franchise is around and people will still want merchandise from the original series.

[Mafty]

Macross's main point being the love and music honestly explains a lot, particularly in its international reception. Really most of Kawamori's work in the mecha genre tends toward a focus upon anything else but the actual mecha.

The other Macross series (Plus, 7, and Delta) all downplay mecha in terms of other facets of the story; Plus had a dramatic Love Triangle between three troubled people, an AI being developed to replicate humans, and a government conspiracy. By contrast there are really only 2 mech battles in the entire OVA, and more time is spent on corporate feuding and flight tests than on the actual mechs in combat. 7 was a over the top Super Robot show where the characters literally fought with music above all other weaponry, and Delta spent more time on the Idol side of things , then on the (admittedly confusing) main plot.

The same is true for most of Kawamori's other mecha works. Aquarion follows Macross with a love triangle, which is actually used to power the robots. Escaflowne was able to flesh out its world and characters, and mix several genres together, Even Unit Pandora ended up being mismarketed by Netflix as a mech action show, when it was really more character driven.

That's at least one (but not the only thing) that would divide Gundam and Macross. Gundam does have a great story and interesting characters, but the mech are always at the forefront as well, to the point many of the Gundam series are named after the main Gundam, while most Macross series are not. In fact the Valkyries seem to get little attention in merchandising compared to the Gundams and other suits (to the point that Windemere has a grand total of three Mechs in Delta).

Honestly as someone who loves mech I prefer Gundams way of mixing two together, over Macross which downplays the mechs(Not that Macross is bad by any means, but some of their stories can get kind weird).

So this might be the reason for the sequels varying reception ; if someone goes into the series expecting a lot of mech action, they'll probably be disappointed.

[Seto Kaiba]

It might get hard because from the licensing company's point of view, getting the Robotech license is much easier and cheaper than the Macross license, and because they bought the rights to do that, it is impossible to stop it now.

It's all subject to Big West's approval now anyways... so I'm not sure it's really an issue. Harmony Gold has milked its Macross license so hard the cow turned to dust, and now they can barely manage to sell a few hundred units of anything worldwide.

Macross's main point being the love and music honestly explains a lot, particularly in its international reception. Really most of Kawamori's work in the mecha genre tends toward a focus upon anything else but the actual mecha.

The other Macross series (Plus, 7, and Delta) all downplay mecha in terms of other facets of the story; Plus had a dramatic Love Triangle between three troubled people, an AI being developed to replicate humans, and a government conspiracy. By contrast there are really only 2 mech battles in the entire OVA, and more time is spent on corporate feuding and flight tests than on the actual mechs in combat.

Macross Plus is somewhat unusual in terms of its story in no small part because the OVA wasn't conceived as a Macross story. It was originally developed as an unrelated original work back in the mid-80's after DYRL?, and ended up on indefinite hiatus when its sponsor bailed. Kawamori revived it and superficially reworked it to fit into the Macross setting when Big West offered him production resources for a TV series and an OVA to make more Macross sequels.

That's at least one (but not the only thing) that would divide Gundam and Macross. Gundam does have a great story and interesting characters, but the mech are always at the forefront as well, to the point many of the Gundam series are named after the main Gundam, while most Macross series are not. In fact the Valkyries seem to get little attention in merchandising compared to the Gundams and other suits (to the point that Windemere has a grand total of three Mechs in Delta).

These days, it's mainly a product of their different approaches to merchandising.

In spite of Yoshiyuki Tomino's desire for realism, Gundam's merchandising empire is built on the back of the franchise's plamodel lines. The original Gundam series was forced into a "villain of the week" sort of setup similar to super robot shows due to its low ratings, and that ultimately became the backbone of its merchandise strategy. Merchandising dollars wrote the sequels, so Gundam was forced to adopt an unrealistic setting in which there's very little standardization and new models and variants are introduced constantly to justify having the largest possible number of new plamodels for each series... often to the extent that each character has their own unique mecha.

For Macross, the Valkyries were a big draw but the music at the core of its original story dominated its own merchandising lines. So merchandising focused on the music and Macross got a lot of albums and character goods instead. This took a lot of the pressure off the mecha plamodels and toys, allowing the setting to have far more standardization in the military and the writers to focus much more on the actual characters and story than they would if they had to introduce a new mecha every two or three episodes.

IMO, Macross's way makes for better storytelling... Gundam has, of late, become too overtly driven by its plamodel merchandising to the extent that it has multiple entire shows that no longer attempt to hide the fact that they're plamodel adverts thinly disguised as entertainment.

[bhayes82]

Honestly, I feel that Robotech has damaged the preception of what Macross 'really' is in the eyes of Americans and English speakers and generic cartoon watchers. Only true anime nerds know the difference.

to fix that a total a complete reintroduction of Macross and what it is - i feel is required.

i STILL feel the only way to bring Macross to some kind of respectability in the U.S. is with a NEW dubs for each film/series/OVA and with high quality english language covers for ALL the Japanese language J-Pop music songs and intro songs used in each series. licenseing the music will likely cost an arm & a leg but that's what it will take to get this franchise to be understood and respected by general audiences.

for example a english cover of the Macross theme for the old series along with a 'new' dub would rock. why not hire an male opera singer to sing the Macross theme in English to make it catchy and a talented american singer to do english covers of the Minmay songs. why not hire a talented male singer to redo the theme 'seventh moon' in english language.

a simple 'DUB' is not enough cause..hearing Japanese language J-Pop mixed in the the Action & story is too Jarring and off-putting for the average viewer in my view. thankfully for Macross PLUS - 90% of the music was sung in English.

[Henyo]

stuff

in the age of the weaboos and idols being among the top money making stuff? i seriously doubt anime fans would be oft put by hearing Japanese songs in what supposed to be an english speakings etting. Actually, dubbed songs might do the reverse. it's gonna make fans NOT want to commit to the macross franchise. And with how some companies go about their dub process(looking at ya funimation) a macross dub would be the option for the minority. those who like to try something different and those who are already. mecha fans. and do remember that the most common anime fan gravitate towards seasonal stuff. and regards to genre, you got the aforementioned isekais, idol shows, shonen. mecha, yuri and the like are the outliers.

@seto Kaiba: this is something i never thought about before. DId robotech not have sales that match with the veavy hitters of the time? like TF, TMNT, GI Joe. from what i can recall of the robotech videos i watched, its credited as one of the shows that showed cartoon's potential as a serious story telling medium and that it paved way for peeps to get into anime. wasnt there also some other english adaptations of animes during robotech's time?

[Chris]

Honestly, I feel that Robotech has damaged the preception of what Macross 'really' is in the eyes of Americans and English speakers and generic cartoon watchers. Only true anime nerds know the difference.

to fix that a total a complete reintroduction of Macross and what it is - i feel is required.

To a certain extent, yes, but only among older people in fandom. Echoing what Seto said earlier, Robotech fans think that Macross is supposed to be a jingoistic war story, rather than a love story set against a war background. However, there are newer generations of anime fans who have never heard of Robotech and wouldn't care what it was. Time has made this a moot point. Also, it seems like Big West wants to do a "complete reintroduction of Macross" in the West, so this is already happening.

i STILL feel the only way to bring Macross to some kind of respectability in the U.S. is with a NEW dubs for each film/series/OVA and with high quality english language covers for ALL the Japanese language J-Pop music songs and intro songs used in each series. licenseing the music will likely cost an arm & a leg but that's what it will take to get this franchise to be understood and respected by general audiences.

for example a english cover of the Macross theme for the old series along with a 'new' dub would rock. why not hire an male opera singer to sing the Macross theme in English to make it catchy and a talented american singer to do english covers of the Minmay songs. why not hire a talented male singer to redo the theme 'seventh moon' in english language.

a simple 'DUB' is not enough cause..hearing Japanese language J-Pop mixed in the the Action & story is too Jarring and off-putting for the average viewer in my view. thankfully for Macross PLUS - 90% of the music was sung in English.

No, dubbing songs is completely unnecessary and would probably be repellant to lots of fans. It's been decades - people are used to English dubs mixed with Japanese songs. People who are bothered by such a thing are a minority and irrelevant to the franchise's success.

[Seto Kaiba]

Honestly, I feel that Robotech has damaged the preception of what Macross 'really' is in the eyes of Americans and English speakers and generic cartoon watchers.

Well, perhaps in the eyes of a few of the people who actually remember it... but the majority have shown no such issue even before Harmony Gold was finally forced to bend the knee. Robotech fans have been abandoning it for Macross and "getting it" just fine since at least 1992. In my experience, it only seems to really be an issue with hidebound old Robotech fans who can't let the series go and accept the originals as their own thing.

i STILL feel the only way to bring Macross to some kind of respectability in the U.S. is with a NEW dubs for each film/series/OVA and with high quality english language covers for ALL the Japanese language J-Pop music songs and intro songs used in each series. licenseing the music will likely cost an arm & a leg but that's what it will take to get this franchise to be understood and respected by general audiences.

That's your opinion and you're entitled to it... but the realities of the industry are rather different.

To be frank, the anime distribution industry in the Americas and Western Europe has changed a lot since the rise of the (legal) simulcast streaming services like Crunchyroll in the mid-2000s. Dubs were an absolute necessity for the anime industry of the 1980s because the market was tiny and having a dub was the only hope of getting a series to a wider audience through a broadcast or cable network. Developments in the late 80's and 90's proved that anime hobbyist audiences were in fact quite keen to see anime in as close to its unaltered state as possible and saw a lot of growth in the market for subs-only releases for the small but growing audience that demanded an experience as close to the Japanese home market audience's as possible. The "Subs vs. Dubs" argument has been tipping towards "Subs" at a pretty consistent pace over the years. Thanks to the rise of the simulcasts on streaming services, we've hit a point where you could seriously argue that subs is becoming the norm for new anime viewing with dubs being a convenience feature for those who still want that kind of thing. Dubbing songs has been a near-dead practice in the industry for decades because the results are almost invariably poorly received, and in Macross would be considered something very much like sacrilege given how important music is to the franchise.

The reality is that Big West could very likely release Macross without any dub at all and encounter no issues with general audiences... and a dub with song rewrites would almost certainly garner negative results.

a simple 'DUB' is not enough cause..hearing Japanese language J-Pop mixed in the the Action & story is too Jarring and off-putting for the average viewer in my view. thankfully for Macross PLUS - 90% of the music was sung in English.

... no it wasn't.

"Voices" is in Japanese.
"Idol Talk" is in French.
"After, in the dark", "Santi-u", "A sai en", and "Wanna be an angel" are written in freaking Zentradi.
Most of the rest are just weird acapella sound-making.

Only "Pulse", "Borderline", and "Information High" have English lyrics and the former two only barely have lyrics and "Information High" is the only one used prominently in the OVA.