Macross Delta

[Galvatron]

Is anyone else watching this? It's about the power of love and music triumphing over evil once again, but it's full of animated mecha porn. I love the Macross Elysion.

[Vendetta]

I managed to watch the first ~4 episodes before Stellaris and Dark Souls 3 combined to steal my every waking moment.

It's okay. Definitely not as good as Frontier was, but it's certainly moving faster than 7 did. It's an interesting development of the 'verse as well, rather than focusing on a single colony ship it's taken on and developed some stuff seen in Dynamite 7 with other protoculture-fiddled species around the galaxy now starting to become connected through humanity's diaspora enabled by Space War 1.

[Galvatron]

It also looks like the history is still a bit muddled, with Mirage's recollection of her grandparents' meeting more in line with DYRL than the TV series.



It's nice to see that the New UN Spacy keeps the old VF-1 updated and still uses them as trainers:



Also, here's a nice shot of the new VF-31 Siegfried:



And another of the Macross Elysion, because I love it every time it's on screen:

[Parallax]

I watched the first two episodes and it makes me long way too much for Macross Plus style stories instead of this type.

The bands tech is ... magic. It's not tech. It's full out music powered magic. While the Macross universe has a loooong history of employing all manner of cool holographic based tech, lead singer chick is using ... magic ... to shield crowds from blasts, seemingly fly and all sorts of other craziness - including phasing her hand through solid objects.

[Galvatron]

Hey, Macross has always been about the irresistible power of love and music.

[U.P. Cinnabar]

I thought it was about fifty-foot tall aliens and missile spam.

[Parallax]

It's not the focus on the music as such, it's more as how it's increasingly being used as a Deus Ex Machina.

SDFM - Music is a massive culture shock to the enemies. This very briefly paralyses their fighting ability as they can't comprehend this new stimuli.
Macross Plus - Music is used as a means of mass hypnosis by Sharon Apple.
Macross 7 - If anyone can explain this mess, feel free. It seemed to be that giant aliens didn't like Basara's singing. Which is completely understandable.
Macross Frontier - Fold waves accessed via music. How? No idea. Another bunch of giant aliens who don't like some music but like another.
Macross Delta - Music is magic.

The first two examples listed, the use of music is understandable. Since then, however, music has gone from an explainable plot element to what seems like full blown magic.

And Seigfried is a terrible, terrible name for a VF.
Everyone time I see one, all I can think of is Siegfried from Get Smart.
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/23 ... 34867e.jpg

Which is maybe a link back to the name of the good guys organisation. They're called Chaos? Really?
I'm a little concerned about how much military tech private companies seem to have and how superior it seems to be to the UN Spacy. Chaos, which seems to be relatively small, has the cutting edge VF-31s yet we see UN Spacy forces regularly flying what look like VF-17s. Which were decent fighters back in Macross Plus but that's what ... twenty years ago?

OTOH, the blatant colonial themes are a nice touch. Up until this point we had little to no idea just how many species the Protoculture went and messed with. And it seems like it was a LOT. You have ocean people, cat people, dumbass wind worshipping people, humans, zentraedi, etc.
The shots of the Island Class ship descending on planets with waaaaay more primitive civilisations really were reminiscent of British/French/Spanish/whoever colonial fleets landing on 'unexplored' shores in our own history.

But the real questions is. We know that Isamu Dyson is still flying, as seen in a cameo in Frontier ... so why is he not the star of this series?
I'm also curious as to the fates of Max and Mylia. They're mentioned by their granddaughter (who are her parents?) but what was the eventual fates of the Macross 7 fleet? Are they still alive? They hadn't seemed to have aged at all between Macross and Macross 7.

[Vendetta]

Macross Frontier - Fold waves accessed via music. How? No idea.

Symbiotic bacteria which live in the digestive system of the Vajra and form a low level hive mind via foldspace. Post-Frontier they have migrated to (pan)humanity, and are somehow connected to the Var syndrome*. The big plot of Frotntier was attempting to achieve this migration and use the hivemind type properties to control humanity, but without the Vajra queen (they've buggered off now) there's no control, only low level emotional connection which is what allows the Walkure singers to counter Var syndrome.



*Source

[Parallax]

We're up to episode 10 now and I'm torn on this series.

The dogfights are done pretty well. The action pieces really are nice to watch.

The music is generally nice, though there's probably too much of it. And this links back to one of my earlier comments that the original Macross and Macross Plus got that balance of mecha/music just right - the music was there for a reason and didn't feel shoehorned in or a Deus Ex Machina.

The plot is getting a bit repetitive over the last couple of episodes. Evil Wind Guys come in, they fight the Delta Platoon and then are pulled out by Lord Roid for reasons he doesn't really explain. White Knight cackles like an evil douchebag. Rinse. Repeat.
That being said, the death in the last ep was a bit of a shakeup though was telegraphed blatantly.

The fan service and female transformation shots, when Walkure start performing mostly, are waaaaay too Sailor Moon-esque and feel horribly out of place for the Macross franchise. Macross has always had such elements (Minmei's chinese dress thing, Sharon Apple appearing naked half the time, etc) but it's always been more low key than Macross Delta.

So far it's about on par with Macross Frontier, well behind Macross Plus but streets ahead of the generally terrible Macross 7.
Quite watchable but not great.

[Parallax]

Episode 11: Went for the feels ... but missed horribly.
No mecha action and the entire ep stunk of filler.

[U.P. Cinnabar]

But, you have to admit "Giraffe Blues" is kinda catchy. Like clap.

[Enigma]

I barely remember the 80's cartoon when it was called Robotech. I'm way behind what Robotech\Macross was all about.

[mr friendly guy]

I barely remember the 80's cartoon when it was called Robotech. I'm way behind what Robotech\Macross was all about.

They are 2 different shows. Sort of. Basically Robotech took 3 Japanese animes with different continuities and with the magic of English dubbing made them fit into one storyline. Of course to do that some of the things in the story have to be different. Apparently this was a thing back in the 80s, Voltron also had this accounting for the difference between Lion Force and Vehicle force Voltron.

[Parallax]

Episode 12
Definitely better than episode 11 but ... well, one of the areas Macross Plus did well in was world building. The little shots and framing choices, mixed with the scenes detailing how the UN Spacy works, really fleshed things out and made the setting seem real.
That, of course, went to crap with Macross 7 ... only marginally improved with Frontier and Delta is so far on the same level.

What I'm taking the long way around to saying is ... if you're about to launch a really important military operation some basic recon work would probably be a good idea. If you're going to base your narrative around military folk, have them act like military folk and their operations are planned like military operations.
This one failed miserably ... oh, about three seconds after it started.

[Parallax]

Episode 13

The action really went up a few notches, with pretty much the entire episode being one long battle.
And, for the most part, it was pretty solid.

We got a look at NUNS being pricks as well as what a reaction warhead can do.
We saw that the Protoculture could hide freaking huge buildings in subspace.
We saw the Elysion take damage pretty much identical to the original Macross.
We saw that Walkure are pretty much D&D Bards, giving their teammates massive combat bonuses.

OTOH, we saw the good guys make some pretty big tactical mistakes. The Island Ship was evacuating Ragna and seemed to be clear from the combat. We saw the Elysion deliver a pretty nasty blow to the Protoculture ship. We saw the White Knight shitting himself.
At which point the Elysion and attached forces retreat rather than pressing home the advantage they obviously had. The enemy fighters were in disarray, with their leader losing. Their main ship had lost its shields, suffered damage and was vulnerable.
Yet the Elysion retreated. I can't see any justification for such a move.

[Galvatron]

Episode 12 is full of glorious shots of the Macross Elysion both before and after transformation:

















I think it's my new favorite Macross ship. Or it's definitely neck and neck with the original Macross (DYRL version).

[Parallax]

I don't know, it's going to be hard to beat the Macross Quarters surfing down through an atmosphere.

https://youtu.be/uULjjKgHPkE

[Parallax]

Episode 14 AKA GIant Transforming Ship Sex

The civilian Island Ship retreat left said craft in less than ideal shape. Apparently, it'd been sitting there at the Ragna dock for thirty years since it first landed ... and routine maintainence apparently wasn't a top priority anymore. The engines failed once the retreat was over. The docking system was also damaged, presumably by the Windermere folk in their attack.

To get power back to the Island Ship, so the civillians don't freeze and/or aphyxiate, the Macross Elysium has to transform into Robot mode and do an emergency docking procedure - so it's Macross Class Generators can power up both ships.
So you have a giant robot docking with another ship via, and I kid you not, via a protusion in it's groinal area.

Mixed with the innuendo between Hayate and Jenius Girl, I'm thinking that the episodes writer was more than a tad ... frisky.

[Parallax]

A few more episodes down and this series ... is not getting any better. In some ways, it is worse.
The new opening sequence doesn't make any sense - at least the original one communicating SOMETHING about the characters. The new one just seems to be Macross Delta's shameless bid to tap in the Idol Group audience.
And music still seems to be effectively goddamn magic.

Two things really stand out to me at this point:
1) Windermere's plan isn't plausible. They are one not terribly advanced planet. Yet somehow they can produce large numbers of cutting edge VFs. They can somehow man blockades/fleets. They simply shouldn't have the logistics to carry out what they're doing. That and their lifespan - 30 years? How are they so advanced? Wouldn't a shorter lifespan really hinder tech advancement?

2) Hayate's relationship with Freyja. She may very well be 15 (out of 30, being Windermerean) but she looks like she's about *twelve*. This is seriously creepy stuff.

[SAMAS]

You're right, they Don't have the population. Thus the attempts to conquer the galaxy via mind control.

Also why a recent.episode had a blockade force having to redeploy elsewhere.

[Parallax]

Last night I watched episode 22.
And episode 22 was, for the most part, actually pretty good.

A pity that much between when I last posted here and 22 was such ... rubbish. Apparently, according to Middle Eastern Stereotype #4567 and knower of things strange, music is a big power in the Macross-Verse because the Protoculture tampered with the genetics of all the current races so it would be.

So you know how the original Macross was actually a pretty good commentary on how culture can combat violence? Yeah, not so much anymore. Now the Minmay attack worked because of Protoculture magic. *sigh*

The real weakness of the series, however, is the continued focus on the singing group Walkure. The balance between mech action and the music is so incredibly skewed, it's getting in the way of the actual plot making the series feel very padded.