I first saw the show on the local UHF station that in a year or so would become home to an experimental new network: Fox. They showed it at like 6am or so, which was about the only good thing about having to get up early for the bus to school.
The interesting thing about the series is it was actually 3 Japanese series that American producers redubbed and strung together into an epic saga.
The first part was called Super Dimensional Fortress Macross in Japan. The second part was called Southern Cross or something. And the third part was called Genesis Climber Mospeada.
While I watched the show when I was a kid, it was reading the books in the 90s that really rekindled my interest in it. The books, originally published by Del Rey starting in the late 80s, aren't written all that great but when you're 14-15 that doesn't really matter all that much.
The good things about the books are first they can fill in gaps in the TV series. Since it was spliced from 3 different shows the transitions aren't all that smooth. The books help to knit everything together and to add some shading to what is on the screen. A whole series of books (The Sentinels) was supposed to be a follow-up TV show but was never made so the books (and maybe comics) are the only way you can experience those. Since the shows were dubbed from the Japanese versions, the dialogue in the books can sound a little more natural than it does on the screen where sometimes the delivery might sound too fast or slow or forced to replace the Japanese words.
So a lot of what I'm going to talk about in the A to Z entries comes from the books, not the TV shows.
Since you haven't read those books or probably watched the TV shows in a long time, if ever, let me start by breaking down the basic story line for you.
First Generation (Super Dimensional Fortress Macross) Books 1-6, 19:
The Masters used Protoculture for the creation of ships and battle machines (mecha) operated by an army of giant clones called the Zentraedi. They conquered a bunch of planets and were seemingly unbeatable.
Except the residents of the planet where Zor discovered Protoculture--slug-like creatures called the Invid--didn't take kindly to having their planet exploited. They raised their own fleet and army of mecha to fight the Zentraedi.
Aghast at what he'd wrought, Zor loaded the one-of-a-kind Protoculture matrix on his super-dimensional fortress. Guided by a vision, he sent the ship to a placid blue planet: Earth.
In the year 1999, Earth was in a constant state of war. It was called the Global Civil War, though basically it was World War III. Things were pretty bleak, with nuclear war seeming inevitable. Then the giant spaceship crashes on a tiny Pacific island called Macross.
A team explores the ship to find the corpses of giant aliens and a warning about them and the Invid. So Earth unites under a new world government and begins refurbishing the ship. Earth scientists also start building new mecha to fight the alien menace.
But no aliens show up for 10 years. On the day the fortress, christened Super Dimensional Fortress 1 (SDF-1), is ready to go online, the Zentraedi war fleet arrives near the moon. They begin sending down forces to capture the SDF-1. There's a battle and the captain of the SDF-1 decides to "fold" away from Earth.
The fold goes wrong and the ship jumps all the way to Pluto, which was a planet at the time of the show and books. The ship begins making its way back to Earth but it doesn't take the Zentraedi long to catch up and attack them.
With millions of ships the Zentraedi could easily overwhelm the humans but they want the ship intact so they don't press the advantage. There are a few minor engagements before the SDF-1 gets back to Earth. But Earth doesn't want them around since the Zentraedi have no interest in the planet. The SDF-1 goes back into space for a little while, but ultimately they return to Earth and this time land in the ocean.
When the Robotech Masters created the Zentraedi, they made them without a lot of basic emotions like love. The Zentraedi didn't have families or children or any of that. Males and females had little contact with each other. So it turns out humans have a secret weapon: music, movies, and kissing! As the Zentraedi soak in human culture, they start to defect to the SDF-1.
Ultimately the Zentraedi leader, Dolza, decides to bring his massive flagship and war fleet to destroy the Zentraedi who have had contact with humans. Those Zentraedi join with the SDF-1 to fight Dolza. But first, Dolza's fleet razes most of Earth.
With a little trickery, the humans and their Zentraedi allies get into the enemy flagship and blow it up, taking out most of the enemy. Then the badly damaged SDF-1 returns to Earth for good.
Earth is badly scarred from the "Rain of Death" with most major cities being wiped out and crashed Zentraedi ships all over. Besides the humans in the SDF-1, there are also the surviving Zentraedi now living on the planet.
But for most Zentraedi adjusting to a human life is all but impossible since they were bred for war. One of the former Zentraedi leaders, Khyron the Backstabber, recruits disaffected Zentraedi to fight the humans. After his plans are thwarted, Khyron crashes his ship into the SDF-1 and its sister SDF-2, destroying both.
Construction of an SDF-3 soon begins. The ship is to undertake a mission to Tirol to offer an olive branch to the Robotech Masters. But things are still unsettled on Earth. A new, xenophobic government called the Army of the Southern Cross is rising while the Zentraedi launch terrorist attacks on human targets. The Zentraedi are soon put down and the SDF-3 leaves for its mission with pretty much all the main characters from this series to explain why they aren't in the second series.
Second Generation (The Masters Saga): Books 20, 7-9, 21:
With the SDF-3 gone, the Army of the Southern Cross is soon in charge of Earth. About 15 years later, the Robotech Masters show up with ships and mecha of their own to look for the lost Protoculture matrix.
There's fighting in space and on the ground, with things not going great for Earth. But the Masters are running out of Protoculture and getting increasingly desperate. Inside the ruins of the SDF-1, the Protoculture matrix begins letting out spores that start growing into the Flower of Life.
The Masters have lost the Protoculture matrix and soon are all dead. Hooray, right? Nope. The growth of the Flowers calls out to the Invid, drawing them to Earth.
In the meantime, a human ship shows up over Earth claiming to be from the Robotech Expeditionary Force, which was the name for the SDF-3 mission. Dana Sterling and her platoon steal the ship to go to Tirol and find her parents.
The Sentinels: Books 13-17
While Earth is reorganizing under the Army of the Southern Cross, the SDF-3 appears at Tirol 10 years after the Robotech Masters have left for Earth. The SDF-3 is damaged, its fold engines useless to leave the Robotech Expeditionary Force stranded. They set up camp on Tirol to get their bearings after driving off the Invid there. Soon they're hailed by a group of aliens calling itself the Sentinels that are fighting the Invid, who have enslaved their planets.
Some of the REF, led by Admiral Rick Hunter, go to help the Sentinels take back their worlds. The fight goes across four planets before they get to the Invid homeworld of Optera and finally defeat the Invid--or half the Invid.
Third Generation (New Generation): Books 10-12
Meanwhile, having defeated the Invid on the other side of the galaxy, the Robotech Expeditionary Force turns its attention to defeating the Invid on Earth. Scott Bernard is part of the first armada sent to retake the planet. But the invasion is a debacle and Scott finds himself marooned in South America.
Undaunted, he gathers a ragtag group of freedom fighters to head north to "Reflex Point," which is about where Indianapolis used to be. After a long journey, the irregulars make it to Reflex Point about the same time as a second wave of the REF shows up.
The Invid regis is convinced to leave Earth. She gathers up all the Invid in a symphony of light that destroys the REF fleet as it leaves.
At last Earth is free! But there's still one last loose end...
The End of the Circle, Book 18:
The SDF-3 has disappeared! It folded with the rest of the REF fleet but instead of going to Earth it wound up stranded in another dimension. Pretty much all the main characters from all three series are brought together to explore this dimension and find a way out. Which they do with help from the Invid regis and the thought-to-be-lost fold engines of the SDF-1.
The SDF-3 returns to Earth to find the planet healing and having moved on from Protoculture. And so everyone can go on with their lives. Hooray!
The first series is probably the most popular of the three. It's the longest and most iconic in terms of books, comics, video games, and other merchandising. The second series gets kind of short shrift as it has to follow up the iconic first series and set up the third series. A lot of it doesn't make all that much sense on its own, so the Japanese version is probably better. The third series is good in that it doesn't have to insert a bunch of blather about a Protoculture Matrix, so in a way it might be the purest of the three. And except for the beginning and end it's mostly focused on smaller fight scenes, not massive space battles.
The A to Z entries in April will fill in more of the story--mostly the characters and equipment. So strap in and get ready!
2 comments:
I should probably watch this since I don't remember much of it and I never read the books. Lots of cool mecha designs. My biggest aversion to doing much with the series is because of Harmony Gold and how they are total asshats with the property. :(
I’m surprised to realize that I’ve never watched a single episode of this show. So this will be an interesting challenge for me
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