Robotech Origins - This Underrated Masterpiece Saturday Morning Cartoon Opened America For Anime
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 30 พ.ค. 2024
- We often have page homage to the ‘80s on this channel, especially when it comes to animated cartoon tv shows of this dynamic decade. People who grew up watching cartoons during this time continue to claim that these were the best cartoons had ever been. Sure, the animation, sound, and other technical aspects might seem not that great in comparison to what we have today 40 years later. However, these cartoons have great stories, amazing character design, and most importantly, a lot of heart.
This video takes a look at one such memorable tv show from the ‘80s, an anime-based cartoon called Robotech that debuted in the year 1985. It was an American Production but with stories and combined footage taken from other previously aired Japanese anime series. Hardcore fans will definitely remember this one and there is also excitement around this series because of an upcoming project. So here is our take on it! - บันเทิง
I can actually say Robotech changed my life as a kid. I had no idea that a "cartoon" could have deep characters, epic storylines, romance, tragedy, AND cool transforming mecha.
I was too young to understand the plot as a 6 years old. I just liked the action.
I made very sure to be home every time it aired. No matter what.
Same.
Same
same
Robotech is the gold standard of anime. Max Sterling’s dogfight with Miriya is still epic.
Miriya was my first Anime crush back in 85 when I was 9. Lol
Hell yeah ,high point of the series.
Absolutely
I love that Khyron was actually talking about Rick Hunter when he told Miriya about the 'unbeatable Micronian pilot' but Miriya found Max instead.
@@Sebastianmorgan76 I was 10 when this came out and loved it 😃
Love this show. Between this, Battle of the Planets, Star Blazers and Voltron...I had the best childhood. 😀
I agree! So did I! 👍
Star Blazers is just a bit better than Macross, and I think the cyclone was my favorite mech.
I concur with the above comment.
Don't forget Transformers and He-Man. Being a kid in the 80's was awesome!
@@jimdigitalvideo He-Man was, and always will be, 2nd rate garbage. The kids that liked him were always the abused ones from broken families.
YES YES YES AND YES AGAIN. This show was my introduction to animated space operas with relatable characters, and that opening score still rocks till this day!!!
This was supposed to happen in original form. However the American censorship cut almost 45 seconds to almost 2 minutes from episode
I'm 55 years old and I still can't get enough of it because it actually had heart where most of the cartoons of today
Mine is Starblazers
God, I woke up at 4:30 or 5 AM as a kid to catch just one episode in the morning before going to school (I eventually VCR'd it). I read the books too! I will always remember the first time RIck Hunter realized that there were giant, living, breathing humanoids inside those battlepods and what it meant to him. Also, come on, Beetai and Exedor... what an amazing experience.
G-Force,Star Blazers,Force Five and Robotech. Anime back in the day!
The original Macross is now coming to the US, and the Japanese company was forced to sue production company Harmony Gold which owns Robotech. Both companies made a deal that both Macross and Robotech can now exist as their own separate entities and one cannot interfere with the other, meaning Macross is now heading to the US after years of lawsuits.
Really? Do you know if it’ll be available for purchase or streaming only?
Dude have you heard of the macrossworld boards? These guys were so heavy in hating robotech and its good to see the robotech nerds can finally get the original unmolested version of Macross without all the weird "protoculture is just an energy source dude" lore tampering that HG did. It was kinda a cool idea to merge all three stories into one big epic story however by doing this it destroyed the original Macross and people to this day are confused between real Macross and Robotech. It is my wish that Robotech keeps going on (as a western science fiction story where Hikaru never disappeared and lives on) and MAcross keeps going on as an anime about the pop stars influencing foreign people to stop killing each other using culture to pacify them. I believe this message is universal and is what makes macross a great story without all the editing that HG did. In the same way we have multiple Transformers universes, we should be able to have multiple universe for the robotech/macross. This way Robotech can be one universe and Macross another one.
@@markus5862 One of the shows that I didn't wanted to get on streaming services.
@@bacd-nn2lg yeah, same. I’d prefer to own it to go along with my robotech Blu-ray’s. Never seen either but I’ve heard such good things about robotech that I figured id give it a shot.I’m an 80s child as well, I just had never seen it
The original Macross was released in the United States in the early 2000s by Animeigo and before that the Robotech Perfect Collection on VHS which had two episodes of Robotech and two episodes of the original corresponding Japanese episodes in the mid 90s. I know as I owned both. Unfortunately the Perfect Collection only made it to 10 tapes per each saga before Streamline video went under.
The recent agreement opens more of the sequels that had difficulties getting across though it wasn't always hampered by HG such as Macross 7. Animeigo had an interest in bringing it over but the price was split between video and music (Victor Entertainment) tracks and it was too expensive causing many anime companies of the time to pass over it.
Bruh, I was there! I remember when Robotech came out, GI Joe was a smash hit and all the other cartoons like Thundercat's, MASK, ETC. They got ROFLstomped when Robotech came out. I stopped watching GI Joe and started watching this because people would actually die when shot at. I remember running home from 3rd or 4th grade school as fast as my little legs could take me so that I wouldn't miss the intro and the next episode in chronological order... It was an amazing time to be alive! Sadly, the second and 3rd season didn't do so well, but I still watched them and bought the DVD collection of all 3 series.
Great memories coming home from school to watch. In a way, Robotech's continuous storyline was like a soap opera for kids.
Heh...as I was fourteen when the adaptation aired, I asserted that "The Macross Saga" was a few IQ points ahead of the live-action soaps of the day
I loved still love Robotech, I'm 54 yrs old. It was awesome
I own Robotech and I'm 41 years old and I still can't get enough of it because it actually had heart where most of the cartoons of today have lost exactly that they have no real substance in them lately sing about Robotech is it's not just about the planes the fighting it's about trying to get people to understand there's other ways that you took with life
47 now and this rocked in the mid eighties. So many fond memories!
I am the same have all the episodes and they are still great to watch
Take a look at Molson new ones they keep copying the same time you take a look at Gundam they keep saying that they want to stop Wars and yet they keep coming up with new weapons Robotech was different it was talking more about love and how to protect it and wishing the world would stop trying to stop Mankind from making the same mistakes as the past that's the difference between Robotech in the cartoons of today the anime of today really has lost what anime was about back then if you take a look at 90% of the cartoons and Anime and that they're all talk about the same thing as they were five years ago and no wonder everybody's trying to say that anime is the problems with the Youth of today I'm starting to think that the way they've turn the anime around in the Last 5 Years from what it was back in the day of Robotech is completely and utterly different
I'm 40 years old and my uncle recorded the entire series on VHS and gave it to me when I was seven. Been watching the series religiously ever since.
I'm 42 and this series had a major impact on me way back in the day. I managed to get the whole collection of the original series...Macross. Released back in 1982 in Japan. If you've never seen it,you really do need to.
Loved Robotech as a kid and still do. It was the first animated series I ever saw that depicted combat fatalities, which made the story so much more believable. And, as you point out, it had a ton of heart. Masterpiece.
I was 26 when this came out. By far the best thing the 1980s put out along with Captain Harlock and the queen of a 1,000 years.
Yes!!!!!!!!
I was 18 in 1885 and I loved Robotech as well.
@@davidmorse2310 I did the math, that makes you 155 years old 🤓
I grew up off Robotech pure nostalgia long live the 80s!
As an 11 year old when Robotech hit TV, I loved it because it treated its viewers with a little more respect than the rest of the cartoons of that era. Characters could actually die, which gave the show suspense and weight.
Robotech had heart, in a way that few shows do. Nothing showed this kind of character development seen here until Avatar: The Last Airbender, two decades later.
Interesting comparison. I love both series, but had never considered comparing them.
The simpsons
It was a awesome series. The art of storytelling has fallen.
Death, war, romance? Not being constantly talked down to, or shielded from reality? In a world where most cartoons were completely sterilized and baby-proofed, younger me was blown away by this series.
Long live the 80s.
Why no one has made the link between higher birth rates and creativity has me still baffled. More people growing to maturity meant much more creativity amongst all this music, media, films, cultural development, when the generation with high birthrates came to maturity 20 years later, eg ppl born in 60s coming to adulthood in the 80s (ofc the boomers aha, but im a millenial) but it still needs to be said, that less people means less creativity, as we can see today
The 80's was a time to live and if anyone finds Robotech action figures will be wealthy 👍💰👍
Robotech was a major factor for the Anime explosion in the 80's. But my first experiences with Anime were Speed Racer, but more importantly StarBlazers. It was StarBlazers that set me up for Robotech and beyond.
No doubt Robotech was only possible because of Speed Racer and StarBazers!
I agree with you on that. I grew up on speed racer, battle of the planets and start blazers great programs
Everyone talks Speed Racer. Not seen anything bout Astro Boy. Granted, artwork not as good. But a good start to anima when you're a little kid. Always thought transformers was sloppy work. Was in my 30's when Robotech came out, was blown away. Taped all of it.
Yes, i watched it when it was first aired in the states. First of its kind and no other matched it for story and characters.. this video said that any one who saw this in the 80s will remember it fondly. No truer statment has ever been uttered.. thank you for making this video and treating its contents with reverence.
wow same for me first it was Star Blazers than Battle of the Planet but Robotech to me was starblazer on steroids.....I later found out the original titles and got deep into anime in the 90's with stuff like Akira Macross Plus/Ninja Scroll etc Gundam series....might be old but still look at an anime series here and there....I always hoped scific channel or netflix would adopt the entire series into a live series. The foundation is there..just need to change a few things for modern times
@@bryantsmith2061 , just wish sci-fi would stop making hokey movies.
Robotech was my gateway drug into a much deeper world. As a kid growing up in New Orleans Louisiana I used to run home from school to watch this show on local TV many of its themes I could not understand at that time all I knew was transformable mech and fighting and space. I was hooked from day 1 I remember asking for the toys and getting a Veritech. It was different from everything that was on TV at the time I can remember it was the first time a animated show made me cry and it wasn't the last time either (see transformers the movie). Love this show own this show they don't make em like this anymore
I used to watch Robotech right before school in the morning during the 80s. It was the GREATEST TIME TO EVER LIVE. I feel sad for the kids who live today and the terrible "content" they must endure.
Such a classic anime. Remember being SUPER excited to watch it.
I watched Robotech when it came out in 1985. I didn't become an anime and manga fan untill a year later when Robotech Art Vol.1 came out. Chapter 5 talked about how the show was made and the anime and manga industry in Japan. Reading that chapter is got me in to Anime and Manga. Still a fan now.
I’m 44 years old, I remember watching this a kid. Freaking love Robotech !!! Never been a better cartoon on tv made .
I'm only 16 but when my father introduced me to robotech, I've been a huge fan. I really enjoy all of robotech and macross. I really REALLY hope we get a remake or a robotech movie
Except it wasn't a Saturday morning cartoon. It was a Monday-to-Friday afternoon cartoon.
This is the whole reason why they had to merge 3 different shows to increase the total number of episodes.
Five episodes per week means that you need 65 episodes in order to fill the minimum duration of 3 months.
In my area, it was a Saturday morning show that aired at 6:30 am.
Yep, 1985-6 Australia, once a week on Saturday morning.
Ours was 3:30 in the afternoon in the summertime we would literally stop playing basketball or football and say hey it's 3:30 we got to go watch robotech see you in a half hour it was awesome being a kid in the '80s.
In Chicago, it was Monday-Friday on Channel 44 at sometime between 6am and 7am.
You all are lucky! it came on at 730 in the morning for me. Luckily I lived a block and a half from school. If I booked it and jumped the back fence I would make it to class on time. Barely..... I missed out on morning recess but OOOHH WELL
I'm 52 now. Robotech didn't just open the door to anime here in America. It blew them wide open ....Especially for me in my youth!!
It was the first cartoon that was released that didnt talk down to us. It was an epic war drama where people died and stayed dead. This was unheard of in American cartoons at the time. It gained our respect because of it. It wasnt like gi joe where everyone makes it to the ejection seat. The animation was great and thw story was real. Not everybody made, main characters and friends. No one was safe. Great time to be alive back then. This was the quality that we wanted in all future stories but very seldom got. God i miss good television
My childhood days isnt complete without that masterpiece,like votoms and gundams so nostalgic to remember those hidden gems i was hoping they got a remake
I remember watching this in the mid 80's when my family was stationed in Sigonella, Sicily. I could not get enough of it.
"Hired Gun" was my first episode. I was 12 maybe. I remember sitting there waiting for Dusty Airs to get back up. He never did. I kept watching and was hooked. Then came the other cartoons where no one ever died. After "Farwell, Big Brother" gi joe and them could not cut it.
And the Team that brought these 3 Japanese shows together and turned them into an epic tale of emotion did an excellent job.
I remember seeing this as a kid. Along with Voltron, these cartoons would change my life. I had no clue about "anime", I was far too young. But anime would go on to be such a huge part of my life. Now at 41, anime is STILL a MAJOR part of my life and I am very thankful for that.
I have THE ORIGINAL DVD-release and remaster that was initially / originally a limited-run by-preorder-only.
Quite a few years later I ran across a new DVD printing that was supposedly also a remaster and was more mass-market focused and I picked that up too (primarily so I could preserve my original disks by not using them much).
And I eventually got myself the first ever DVD release (again, limited-run by-preorder-only) of Super Dimensional Fortress Macross.
And I did all of that from deep, dark (South) Africa during a time when we couldn't just order things from overseas or the like - any imports from elsewhere were treated as full-on IMPORTS with all the difficulties etc. one might expect of that.
All of that because I caught Robotech on television as a kid. And it was / is literally the most memorable and impactful show of my childhood.
I loved this show. I used to draw so many detailed reproductions of the mech and did my best to clean them up the best I could because in my youth all I wanted to be was an inker. Well that never happened but I have so many fond memories of this show. I too had a love triangle at that age so Rich's situations were like reflection of my love life. That was what made this show so great, The relatability of the characters.
Anime got introduced to the mainstream in the mid 1980s but I got into it in 1963 with Astro Boy and then later with Kimba the White Lion, Speed Racer and Star Blazers.
YI got into those same shows in the 1970s, along with Gigantor and the Amazing Three.
Gatchaman/Battle of the Planets
Oh yes that's my generation when I was a child i was ten yrs old at that time robotex my favourite animated cartoon then and now a all time long live the eighties retro a classic cartoon.
This was the first cartoon I saw that actually had real characters and plots rather than just rely on their vehicles and episodes. It was different from the other things we watched in my time. It focused on the characters and their situations, they were flawed but sympathetic, they all changed over time, and it hooked you in. If I ever become a professional writer I will claim this to be an influence, and I wouldn't be surprised if there aren't more - many more - who'd claim the same thing.
I saw this at 10 years old which led me to my love of anime and Gundam gunpla. I had the transformer jetfire and realized that he was a direct design steal from Macross. So many good memories of watching this show after school.
In the 1990s that Jetfire toy went for huge amounts of money on ebay if you owned one due to the drought of any new toys from robotech. If you owned a jetfire you were royalty in toy collector circles for a time. Then a company called Yamato(renamed Arcadia later) made VF-1 macross toys and everyone went insane buying multiple of the toy to compensate for the lack of anything new for decades. And finally Bandai basically muscled in on this market and gave us the Chogokin of today. (this is about when I stopped collecting because it was getting crazy expensive for me) My dream? Get all those Bandai toys to a wider market after the live action movie is made (which I hope isn't bad and doesn't flop) so we can get them at affordable prices!!
@@UToobUsername01 Yes....and yes! My brother bought one of the macross transformable toys and sadly a young niece got ahold of it and it disappeared. I wish I had my old toys still. And I do hope they do the anime justice with the movie.
@@insaneconqueror5421 You can still buy the Bandai Chogokin VF-1 today online but it is quite pricey. At least you can buy them. Just not cheaply. If the movie does well and Bandai start to release old school MAcross toys on the retail shelves in mass prodcution then YES you would be able to get the classic VF-1 from Macross at non-ebay-scalper costs. I am a collector so I have the arcadia toys however still don't own a Bandai Chogokin VF-1 yet. (they are like Arcadia's one but have slight better method of transformation for the arms)
@@UToobUsername01 Sweet! I will be keeping my eyes open for sure.
@@insaneconqueror5421 we all have that one cousin.
There really was something special about Robotech. The cartoon was worlds beyond what cartoons of today are even capable of.
i am 52 years old and i still love it harmony gold struck gold and has been trying to beat the horse to death ever since just give us a cleaned up restored with no changes to music or content and focus on good toys that is all we want stop trying to remake the gold of the past
I grew up watching this as a teenager. I was born in 1973, if that tells you something. Back in the 80's, I found out the series was back on when I got home from school. I couldn't wait to get home from school to rewatch the series over and over again.
I😍the anime series Robotech,an interesting Sci-fi drama adventure series back in the 1980s,it came on every weekdays morning before I head to high school,I always will be a special fan of Robotech,I even had three Robotech Visual Archive books📚I give it ten thumbs up👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍a very classic series😃💗💗💗💗📺
Dude. Are you talking about the books bound in red with their own little folder they fit into???
If so: Do you have ANY idea how rare they are and how hard they are to find!?!??? That you have all 3 is insane and I'm SUPER jelly!!!
In all these years I've managed to only get my hands on number 3.
Watched it syndicated. The first interacial couple a cartoon, I've seen
I'm 44 now and still remember I was 8 years old as a kid when I watched this. It made me more intelligent and made me ask critical questions at school.
This is what I grew up on way before the rise of anime in the US. I still have my RObotech toys and comic books from the 80's-90s. This show was ahead of its time and even had a 'perceived gay character (Lancer). Its still one of my favorite cartoons.
I think he was a cross dresser. But the story in the original japanese one was that he had to disguise himself as a girl to avoid war or something like that. So he became a female popsinger. He wasn't gay or trans just a man who had to look efiminate. Sort of like the character in Turn A Gundam. (there is an episode where he agrees to be a femboy for a time lol Ah japan and its weird sex fetishes...)
I never got to see the shows. I saw the add’s when I’d visit family in the city. I had the novels and a bunch RPG book’s that my friends and I played.
Damn, had forgotten about Lancer.
This is, indeed one of the best animations to date. There was nothing like the 1980's. There won't be another time like it. I was fortunate to be a kid in the 1980's.
I've rewatched the entire series 5 times. I think it's time for number 6 lol
Gotta love the SDF-1 and crew. This anime was so far ahead of its time
Simply put.... one of my all time favorites...... 1980s some of the best years of my life 💯
Macross was one of my early anime shows I've seen with the boom of Japanese tokusatsus shown in Philippines. Last new Macross I've seen was Delta.
First show I ever saw an interracial couple in..this show was so ahead of its time..I loved it..
I am one of those that watched the show back in the 80s. It was one of the shows that introduced me to anime but not the only one. There was also a similar anime that came before it: Starblazers. Also, there was Speed Racer and Battle of the Planets.
I'm 44 now, 20+ years of military service & this is still my fav anime of all time
Starblazers came first and is awesome in the original and remake Space battleship Yamato 2199, Admiral Otika best space captain ever. I watched Robeteck while serving in the Air Force and I loved it as a young adult I found it relatable as many of the main characters were also in military service and I understood things like duty and comradery, as well as the isolation of serving far from home. It may have been sold as a kid's show but it was well beyond that. I even read all the books that came out after the series was on tv. Good memories of a great show and a younger time in my life.
i respect what robotech did (even though im not a fan of harmony gold as a business) and ill always love the original anime shows that it used more (no story/dialogue changes and censoring like in robotech) but i get why its important to people as it had cultural impact back in the day and i don't hate people for liking it
100%
the epics of creation in entertainment seem to have a theme: here on Earth, where chaos and order meet in ways that expand the space they interact in into a kind of light that benefits all that bathe in it . Harmony gold kept it's vision from the corruption that has killed almost every other epic sci-fi franchise....and has kept the baby from being thrown put with the dirty bathwater that is the face of modern western entertainment: the impulse may have seemed selfish but the effect protected the essence of the robotech fandom
How cool was that? The Americans combined 3 unrelated anime from Japan and fused them together to created a unique storyline that streamlined all 3 together. Great stuff to the Agramas and Macek. You guys made my childhood days. Thanks!
Man! I would watch this show all the time and that intro, the music, anyone that watched this show would recognize it immediately 😀, definitely brings back good memories of my childhood. There's good anime nowadays, but the ones we grew up watching are forever treasures of our childhood
The intro gave goosebumps
@@504WildMagnolia it got me all excited anticipating what was coming 😁😁😁
Robotech, Akira, and Ranma 1/2 got me into anime. Still watching anime to this day!
It started with Robotech (i was 5yrs old) then moved to Transformers, Voltron, He man, Thundercats, TMNT, bravstarr, Bionic 6 and more........proud 80s child!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Robotech got me into Japanese animation as a kid…Akira and Appleseed are just two of my favs. Robotech was the first time I ever saw a tv character die on tv as a kid watching this in the 80’s. I was lucky to meet Carl Macek as well as the voice actors for Roy and Rick. I still have fond memories of this show and I actively collect Robotech toys to this day! Robotech made my childhood enjoyable and is quality entertainment. It still holds up to time too!
My dad used to put this on while making me breakfast and I’d watch until I was time for me to go to school. I thank this show for getting me into anime
Yes! Voltron and Robotech my favorite childhood toys and cartoons!!
Robotech the Macross Saga is my childhood favorite! 😎👌👌
Well, i now have all three shows in the original form i will forever be grateful to Carl Macek and the rest of the team for bringing them to the West in there Robtech format. Had a great time in the Netherlands watching supertime on the Superchannel. Still got a little crush on Lisa Hayes. :-)
I’m 48 ., I remember and loved this cartoon as a kid…
Wow, great video. This was the best and my childhood
One of the best Space Opera shows. I was glued to the screen watching this as a kid. I still collect the Macross Saga figures.
Robotech bring to tears and at the end of this show really bring me into tears one of the best 80s shows 😎
I remember it fondly as an 10 year old from South Africa where it was also broadcasted ;)
I still love and always will love this anime. It really kicked my love of anime into full throttle. I would run home from school to watch it when I live in Southern California back in 1985. I would love to get the full DVD set of all three wars into my collection.
My favorite show was Star Blazers (aka Space Battleship Yamato)….until Robotech came around. I was in high school and too old for cartoons, but my little brother convinced me to watch one episode. That’s all it took. We recorded every episode on VHS and watched them until the tape wore out. It’s still good even today.
I was eleven in 85 and watched Robotech then. I still love it!
I was shocked at what I saw, It was so adult in many ways and I was hooked!
Am grow upp with the robotech series.Am was werry happy too see this when Am was a kid a long time ago.Am have all episodes on dvd 📀.
Robotech made me the good person I am today at age 46. I felt like my family never understood me. But the crew of SDF-1 had my back and heart!
Robotech Macross was my favorite anime of all time!
In 1985 I had just returned from being stationed in Germany in the Army. I had a friend in the barracks who introduced me to the Robotech comic books so I started watching the show. This was literally my introduction to anime and I was hooked. After I got out of the service in 1986 I walked into a comic book store and they had a leatherbound copy of the 'Art 1' book in the case. these were limited to 1200 editions and are signed inside the cover by the authors. I bought #921 for $40. My dad thought I was crazy to "waste $40 on that thing". I still have it, in mint condition, still in its sleeve. I have used it as a reference for my hobby (model building) and still like to look through it. I also have several of the comics including the #1 edition of the 3D version of the comic. Robotech was and still is a great influence on me.
Maaaaaan those books are INCREDIBLY rare and hard to find!!!
In all these years I've only managed to get my hands on #3. And that was just a truly lucky find in a garage-sale type of thing!!!
My favorite show growing up as a kid.
Fun fact about Robotech: Predictably, there was a toyline for the series, which released toys of most of the main characters, some vehicles, and a 5 foot long SDF-1 playset (for when you absolutely needed to outdo the rich kid with the GI Joe aircraft carrier at all costs.) But the most iconic vehicle from the series-the VF-1 Valkyrie fighter - wasn't part of the toyline.
Why? Because Bandai owned the Valkyrie toy mould from when they made tie-in toys for Macross in 1980, and they had already licensed its use to Hasbro a few months previously for the Transformers character Jetfire.
Company lawyers engaged in a war that could rival the human - zentradi conflict, and eventually came to a deal: The Robotech toyline wouldn't have a Valkyrie, and Jetfire would be completely redesigned for the Transformers cartoon and comic. And, legal - wise, everyone lived happily ever after until the Mechwarrior game started using designs of Robotech Mecha for some of their battlemechs....
I actually have a “Jetfire” autobot that looks exactly like the Veritech fighter and I could never understand why it didn’t look like Jetfire from the Transformers show. Maybe the comic Jetfire copied the Veritech so much, that lawyer war started smacking them and changed the design for the show to put out? I dunno, was just a kid with no internet to find out these kind of things.
FASA also used designs from other Japanese TV shows, which Harmony Gold claimed as belonging to them. Imagine the surprise of Nippon Sunrise (later named Bandai) to learn that a Hollywood real estate company "created" and "owned" the mechanical designs from Fang of the Sun: Dougram, an anime that Sunrise aired a few years before Farouk Agrama and Harmony Gold even knew that Macross existed.
Great video! Anime, old and mostly new, is made for adult audiences, not for children like American cartoons. Hence, the destruction and onscreen character deaths, which we never saw in American cartoons. Another aspect why 80’s cartoons were the best is because most didn’t have children characters, the main characters were adults which was appealing to us 80’s kids, unlike many animated series today.
My favorite show growing up!
Man, I loved watching this show as a kid. Even with all the licensing issues it was still an interesting project and there isn't really another show like it.
Unless you consider Mobile Suit Gundam and its related series. Not exactly a show like Macross/Robotech, but the basic premise of using robots as tools of warfare amidst a character-driven space opera is very similar.
i love this show, its one of the 3 anime that made me a fan of anime
The books man. You have to read them. They really flesh out and finish the story!
Absolutely! I love how they delve into Khyron and his psyche. The comics are also good. I particularly like Invid War, showing an alternate of what happens after Scott left Earth.
I loved this show; and own all the DVD's. Just one thing we forget when remember how awesome this show was... Minmay episodes.
Facts. Gawd that woman drove me insane - even as young as I was.
as a kid in the 80s watching this cartoon i cant even begin to explain how it awed me to the extent that it did, it was the absolute best thing ever.
People like to rag on it and on Carl Macek, but the amount of effort and production that went into this show was pretty amazing for its time. A lot of anime that was translated just use the same music from the original show but Harmony gold made almost entirely original soundtrack for the show.
The voice actors and actresses were really good too
I’ve always felt this show would be great for remastering with a few story tweaks, with modern animation I think it would look amazing.
When Roy Fokker died, it literally gave my young self nightmares. I didn't see the rest of the series for years because of that.
Great video about my all time favorite cartoon!!!
Just one thing.....
Dude, AIRCRAFTS IS NOT A WORD!!!.........1 AIRCRAFT, OR 50 AIRCRAFT.......🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️
I had the chance to watch it from the very first episode on it's first run. Although the story was great, as a modeler, it was the mecha that really got me. That first Cyclone transformation changed my life... I later became main writer and editor for both PROTOCULTURE ADDICTS and MECHA PRESS magazines. I lived and breathed anime for nearly 20 years. That was a long time ago... But I still remember that saturday morning when I first saw the Cyclone. Sorry, I'm getting misty eyed thinking about the good ol' days! Cheers from an old hand.
In my neighborhood, you would see all the kids running home after school to watch this show. My mom even let me have watch parties at our house. Fantastic memories.
I always wanted to watch this cartoon. I had some of the action figures.
My mum got me the t shirt back in 84, loved it.
Don't waste any time. Watch it soonest.
I saw it when it first appeared on TV. I saw and resaw it, whenever it appeared. For me the most emotional episode was the final battle of SDF-1 Macross, the alien ship that was adopted by mankind taking off once more to defend its adoptive home. Each time I watch this, it constantly brings me to tears.
There is an additional Robotech video that produced, the aftermath of the third part of the series, where there is an interview with Lancer, some limited animation connecting the ending of the second series with the arrival of the Invid into the next season. Sadly, I don't recall what's called.
If you liked that episode you'd love the enitre "SDF MAcross Do you Remember Love" anime which has that in much much higher quality animation with amazing detailed battle scenes. PLus a lot more gore. (I think they tried to censor it in the west so seek out a fansub from pirate sites that got the original cut) Milia and Max fight is awesome and Kakizaki's sudden death is a funny meme in anime circles now because he is laughing and gets owned by milia for mocking female aliens. Seriously if you like the action from the tv show get that movie. You will not regret it. It's a masterpiece film. The way the SDF One gets its main gun blown to pieces is beautiful. The ending is epic and overall feels like a fairytale a little bit. (the idea that the aliens lose to one ship just because they are confused by music which distracts them and lets the hero get close enough to nuke the leader with reaction missiles to win the war. Basically what I mean is Hikaru is the space knight in shining armor coming to rescue pop princess and the bad guy is like the Goliath from the Old Testament bible giant getting its head chopped off by the little guy. That's what I mean by "fairtytale" or "legend" in underlying theme. Whereas the tv show is much slower at telling the main story the movie is done much faster paced but more dramatically with better music)
I just got into the Macross series earlier this year, starting with the OG SDF Macross of course. I thoroughly enjoyed it from start to finish and really hope this will allow people of today to get a good chance to experience this all time classic. I still catch myself humming the opening score of this show all the time.
Robotech was such a fascinating animation. I started watching it in 1986/87 when I was 15. It was on very early on Saturday mornings like at 6a or 6:30a. It then was moved to weekdays at 6:30a. I made sure to record on VHS before I left for school. I still have the VHS tapes with almost all episodes. It was such a accurate depiction on war and death that would be the reason I would think it to air early morning and not afternoon after school was out. Understandably GI Joe was a major hit for young kids, but it was nothing compared to Robotech.
Yup, remember waiting for it and watching it relentlessly in the 80s. Thanks for the memories 👍❤️🇵🇰
I was 12 in 1987. It was aired in Malaysia every Saturday morning at 10am - 10.30am. The space battle was great.. It made me interested in Japanese Amination like Bleach, One Punchman and etc. This video does bring back memories.. Thank you
This, Mobile Suit Gundam and Starblazers were the only thing that came close to a little space opera named Star Wars at the time. Though we had other anime localized like Battle of the Planets and Force Five, it was these three specifically that kept it's drama in the forefront as well as it's amazing action sequences. We saw death (though sometimes ret-conned due to censorship, you can since find restored versions), and the consequences of war that nothing in traditional western animation market ever came near to with children's cartoons. Great video. Though I would have liked a spotlight on characters from all three wars. I love Dana, Bowie, Scott, Rand, Rook and Lancer as much as Rick, Lisa, and Roy.
I really hope somehow, someway, Robotech 2: The Sentinels are completed. The novelizations of this story were nail-bitingly good.
As a younger otaku who first saw the actual SDF Macross in it's subtitled glory before finding out about Robotech, I have only two things to say. One, I'm sorry we never got a straightforward dub because syndication rules were absolutely broken at the time, and two, watching videos like this, I feel like I can get the idea of what it was like to be a kid in the 80s watching this, and feeling the excitement, even though I'll probably never get to watch Robotech anyways.