Judged as a complete entity, most of the narrative mis-steps can be forgiven as the show is quick to find its feet again when it flails. The show begins in fine fashion with the first volume, and although it slips a little during volume 2, with several middling (ha!) episodes that fall victim to a tired repetition, the third volume finishes things of appropriately and sets up the next part of the saga - `Robotech: The Masters`. Action-packed and fluid, the show`s greatest asset is the epic vision it creates within a mere few episodes. Although it`s fairly benign, something the hardcore crowd who bless themselves with the term `Otaku` may object to, the show has an aura of grandness that makes it easy to appreciate this was a landmark show for young Western audiences, who`d never seen anything like it on television. Originally released as three individual volumes, the entire "Remastered Extended Edition" of `Robotech: The Macross Saga` is out now as a modestly-priced box-set from Manga Entertainment.Ĭonclusion While it`s hard to make a direct comparison between `Robotech: The Marcross Saga` and `Super Dimension Fortress Macross` without having seen a whole lot of material from the latter, `Robotech: The Macross Saga` is a fun space opera, a notch or two above similar material from the era and producer Macek`s love for the medium is clearly characterised by a valuable integrity to the spirit of Japanese anime of the day. Mankind unites, sets aside their differences and combine their efforts to use the technology on this ship to advance the human race (aBut this new gadgetry is put to use straight away, along with the now repaired SDF-1, in defending the planet from the invading Zentraedi, a race of aliens who want the technology on board the fortress, as well as other secrets the vessel is hiding, for themselves. Originally broadcast in 1985, this first-third of a giant space-opera begins when an alien battle fortress crashes through Earth`s atmosphere and into a Pacific island of Macross. Pah! Anyway, what we have here is the first 36 episodes of the `Robotech` story, titled `The Macross Saga`. See? Of course if you don`t watch cult TV shows, the scenario is probably lost on you, along with several sentences of crafty reviewer logic. Get it yet? No? Right, well, to elaborate (and not to mention exercise a little imagination), if the shoe was on the other foot and a Japanese TV company bought `Buffy The Vampire Slayer`, `Charmed` and `Firefly`, once the shows were re-written and dubbed into a multi-generational saga for the Japanese, the Charmed sisters could be the kids of Anya and Xander, and Mal Reynolds could be Buffy`s great, great, great, grandson, running away from vampires (what were once reavers) in space. Because they were similar in style and content, with some crafty re-writing, editing, and dubbing, these series were turned into the second and third generations of the story that started with Macross, and Harmony Gold had an 85 part "space saga" on their hands. In this case, Harmony Gold bought the rights to two completely unrelated mecha shows, `Super Dimension Cavalry Southern Cross` and `Genesis Climber Mospeada`. Oh no! How do you solve a problem like Macross? Well, like most problems, wallets were opened and the problems went away. `Super Dimensional Fortress` Macross was 36 episodes long. The problem was, syndication rules (syndication being the practice of production companies selling mass packages of episodes to individual stations as opposed or after network broadcast) of the time dictated that a syndication package must be no less that 65 episodes. In the mid-eighties, Harmony Gold and producer Carl Macek had plans to bring the popular `Super Dimension Fortress Macross` mecha anime series from Japan to America, re-named `Robotech`, dubbed and rejigged a little, and marketed as a worthy tea-time toon for US audiences. Introduction Hold onto your hats, anime fans - you`re about to receive a history lesson.
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