The Super Dimension Fortress Macross
|
|
The Super Dimension Fortress Macross (超時空要塞マクロス Chō Jikū Yōsai Makurosu) is an anime television series. Most of its animation (with edited content and revised dialogue) was adapted outside Japan for the first saga of Robotech.
Macross is widely regarded as a classic of the genre, combining the tropes of giant transforming robots, apocalyptic battles, wartime romance, and victory through the use of a number of means, one of them being bubblegum pop music. It featured mechanical designs by story creator Shoji Kawamori of Studio Nue and Kazutaka Miyatake and character designs by Haruhiko Mikimoto. In addition, Macross created one of the first anime idol Lynn Minmay, turning her voice actress Mari Iijima into a celebrity.
The story concerns a city-sized alien spacecraft that crashes on Earth in 1999. Humans rebuild the spacecraft just before a fleet of alien warships arrive (Zentradi), on the hunt for this ship that belonged to their enemy, the Supervision Army. Meanwhile, a young pilot comes of age and struggles with a love triangle between an upcoming pop singer and a dedicated bridge officer.
The name of the series is same as the name with which the feature spacecraft was given, though the name of the spacecraft is typically shortened to SDF-1 Macross, since it was Earth's first Super Dimension Fortress. The word Macross comes from a wordplay combination of the prefix Macro in reference to its relatively massive size (though when compared with the alien ships in the series it is only a relatively small gun destroyer).
During the war that ensues, the human crew operating this untested alien ship find themselves alone in fending off the invaders. Due to inexperience operating the ship, they end up stranded on the edge of the solar system, with the city that grew around the restored space craft as refugees within the ship. Because the "fold system" allowing rapid space travel stopped working, it took the crew about a year to return to Earth using conventional engines.
The original name for the Macross project created by Studio Nue and Artland was Battle City Mega(l/r)oad. The Japanese consonant that can be translated into Roman letters as either L or R gave the title a double meaning in reference to the story line (Megaload referring to the spacecraft containing an entire city of people and Megaroad referring to the long journey through space back to Earth). However, one of the sponsors of the project was a fan of Shakespeare and wanted the series and the spacecraft to be named Macbeth (マクベス Makubesu). A compromise was made with the title Macross (マクロス Makurosu) due to its similar pronunciation to Macbeth in Japanese and because it still contained connotations to the original title.
A feature film, subtitled Do You Remember Love? (愛・おぼえていますか Ai Oboete Imasu ka?), was released in 1984, with a condensed version of the storyline and cutting-edge animation. (A shortened, English-dubbed version of the feature was also released to video as Clash of the Bionoids, though this is largely lambasted.)
The primary characters of this series are:
Several sequel series and one prequel have followed, with most using a chronology created by the Studio Nue creators (while the rest followed their own storylines). The main Studio Nue chronology consists of (in chronological order):
| Story Time | Title | Production Year |
|---|---|---|
| 1999-2012 | The Super Dimension Fortress Macross | 1982-1983 |
| 2008 | Macross Zero | 2002-2004 |
| 2012 | The Super Dimension Fortress Macross: Flash Back 2012 | 1987 |
| 2031 | The Super Dimension Fortress Macross: Do You Remember Love?
| 1984 |
| 2040 | Macross Plus | 1994-1995 |
| 2045-46 | Macross 7 | 1994-1996 |
| 2047 | Macross Dynamite 7 | 1997 |
| Parallel World | The Super Dimension Fortress Macross II: Lovers, Again | 1992 |
The Macross movie was later described as a "historical" movie within the Macross universe. In Macross Plus and Macross 7, it is revealed that there was a movie produced after Space War I (the original Earth-Zentradi conflict). Macross II was declared a parallel world story.
See also
- Super Dimension Fortress - a UNIX shell access provider named after Super Dimension Fortress Macross
- Itano Circus
- VF-1 Valkyrie
- Variable fighter
External links
Official Sites:
- Macross Official Web Site (Japanese) (http://www.macross.co.jp/)
- Macross Compendium (http://www.anime.net/macross/)
Fan Sites:
- MAHQ (http://www.mahq.net/)
- Macross World (http://www.macrossworld.com/)
Template:Macross seriesfr:Super Dimension Fortress Macross ja:超時空要塞マクロス zh:超时空要塞