by the fans for the fans

If you were part of the creative team of 'Macross Saga' what would you leave the way it is and what would you decide to change?

Of course, you can look at it from different perspectives:
- as part of the team that work on the Japanese orginal

- as part of the HG-team that edited it for American television

- as part of the team that is rebooting the series

- as someone who has read a synopsis of the series but has not yet watched the episodes - and thus is free to use his/her own imagination

NB In theory, we could start six topices: one for Robotech in general, three for the thee subsagas and two for the sequels (Sentinels and Shadow Chronicles). But that depends on how many people who visit this site are willing to join in.

I would change Episode #36 so that everyone on the bridge survived. Not only were their deaths pointless and stupid, the animation doesn't even support it. Here you can see the bridge is completely intact:



Khyron's collision took off an arm.

I think I would've had Gloval and the others survive as well. What was the point in killing them off?

I third that. No need to kill them of. Perhaps Gloval, to prevent Lisa from keeping on leaning on him the way Rick did on Roy. But even he could better not have been killed: he would have been the officer in high command that not only lobbied for the REF-mission, but also would have suggested dr. Lang, Lisa and Rick leading it.

Another reason not to kill Claudia: I believe it would have been better if she had been the mother of Bowie, instead of creating two different characters especially for Sentinels to be his parents. That would have been another tie between Macross and the Masters Saga (of course, Vince would not have been her brother).

Killing them of might have made sense if HG had not intended to continue the series after #36 - instead, they did away with some of the more obvious connections between the first and the second series.

Another thing I would change: Rick and the others would operate more as part of a squad/unit than as individuals.

Seeing Sentinels before Macross, I expected the characters to have gotten to know each other as members of the same military outfit. I knew, because of an online description, that Rick was a civilian pilot who joined the airforce and clashed with Lisa, who was higher in rank.

Anyone ever noticed Rick is never shown interacting with his peers? Roy outranks and outages his him, Max and Ben were his subordinates. Are soldiers not supposed to interact with their equal rank comrades?

Rick being one of a few rookies within the skull squadron would mean he would also be at odds with fellow soldiers telling him he should get in line (not just Lisa). But it would also give more room to actually demonstrate his talents as a soldier, a pilot and a commander. Imagine a situation were he and a few others were cut off from the rest of the squadron, no higher officer around and Rick then instinctively telling the others what to do.
That would be a better explanation for his rapid rise in the ranks than just saving Lisa.

In the series as we know it, it's not sure if Rick really was that good or if he had just been favoured by Roy. With more focus on Rick interacting with fellow soldiers, that would have been less of a problem.

In addition,Lisa would not be sitting high and dry on the bridge: she would be part of that unit as well. That way, they would meet and argue more often, but also had more opportunity to start respecting each other despite differences. In real life, a young officer who stayed at the base barking orders to those who actually got under fire would soon lose authority among the troops.

Both Lisa and Rick would become more convincing as talented soldiers and officers this way. And their eventually falling in love would also have been more realistic - less depending on them getting stuck in the same places for a few hours.

The Fifteenth Squadron in 'The Masters' are more teenagers breaking rules than soldiers, but in that one way they are more realistic than Macross: they operate together and are also together on the base. The army is a group thing.

Even Rick doubted his own skill, claiming in one episode that he was "getting shot down all the time".

I think there were far better pilots than Rick, but to his credit he had an emerging leadership personality, which the talented pilots would come to rally behind.

I'm not shure if Rick's self-doupt gives any indication of his talents. Lots of talented people in various areas keep doupting themselves (a befriended psychologist called it the 'impostor syndrome'. Talented people not always believe in themselves, they think they just got lucky so far and any moment other people will realize they're really not that good at all).

Self-confidence is no indication either: Ben Dixon...

Peter Young wrote: I'm not shure if Rick's self-doupt gives any indication of his talents. Lots of talented people in various areas keep doupting themselves (a befriended psychologist called it the 'impostor syndrome'. Talented people not always believe in themselves, they think they just got lucky so far and any moment other people will realize they're really not that good at all).

Self-confidence is no indication either: Ben Dixon...

Ben's death was a tragic accident, and in no way indicative of his skill, or lack thereof. The fact that he survived as long as he did, and as Rick's wingman, no less, would indicate that he did have a certain amount of skill. One time Max said he shot down 9 enemies that time, and Ben said he only got maybe 4? I don't remember exactly, but if he's even HALF as good as Max, that's still pretty impressive. And one battle isn't necessarily indicative of total skill level. He could have been having an off day. I've spent a good 15 minutes trying to Google this and I can't find it anywhere. I don't even know which episode it was.

I did find some interesting discussions on the topic though, this one in particular ranking pilots on a scale of 1-10, taken from this page :

Dairugger XV wrote: Ben: 6, He doesn't get shot down as much as Rick (it took an exploding shield to take him down), but he doesn't have the flying finesse of Max or Rick.

And since we just love non-canon sources here on these forums:

Colonel Wolfe wrote: After Re-reading the Ben Dixon entry in RDF Manuel... his a Better Pilot then both Rick and Roy.... W/ his PP of 22 he's as Quick as Max.. had he only lived thorugh the series... Skull Squadron might have had Mr. Dixon as its Ace pilot.

Ben Dixon: 9- Talent Equal to Max, and no Blue hair... so What if he Died... He didnt fall inlove with anyone and make me Waste 23minutes of my life watching a wedding episode.. or listening to him complaining about Kissing cousins....

I'm sure he does overstate himself, but that's just how he copes with the stress of being a giant flying transforming death machine.

Alpha Bravo wrote:

Peter Young wrote: I'm not shure if Rick's self-doupt gives any indication of his talents. Lots of talented people in various areas keep doupting themselves (a befriended psychologist called it the 'impostor syndrome'. Talented people not always believe in themselves, they think they just got lucky so far and any moment other people will realize they're really not that good at all).

Self-confidence is no indication either: Ben Dixon...

Ben's death was a tragic accident, and in no way indicative of his skill, or lack thereof. The fact that he survived as long as he did, and as Rick's wingman, no less, would indicate that he did have a certain amount of skill. One time Max said he shot down 9 enemies that time, and Ben said he only got maybe 4? I don't remember exactly, but if he's even HALF as good as Max, that's still pretty impressive. And one battle isn't necessarily indicative of total skill level. He could have been having an off day. I've spent a good 15 minutes trying to Google this and I can't find it anywhere. I don't even know which episode it was.

I did find some interesting discussions on the topic though, this one in particular ranking pilots on a scale of 1-10, taken from this page :

Dairugger XV wrote: Ben: 6, He doesn't get shot down as much as Rick (it took an exploding shield to take him down), but he doesn't have the flying finesse of Max or Rick.

And since we just love non-canon sources here on these forums:

Colonel Wolfe wrote: After Re-reading the Ben Dixon entry in RDF Manuel... his a Better Pilot then both Rick and Roy.... W/ his PP of 22 he's as Quick as Max.. had he only lived thorugh the series... Skull Squadron might have had Mr. Dixon as its Ace pilot.

Ben Dixon: 9- Talent Equal to Max, and no Blue hair... so What if he Died... He didnt fall inlove with anyone and make me Waste 23minutes of my life watching a wedding episode.. or listening to him complaining about Kissing cousins....

I'm sure he does overstate himself, but that's just how he copes with the stress of being a giant flying transforming death machine.

Ben was a total bawss tbh. It's a shame he was killed off. What a waste of a great character

LadyGrimes wrote: Ben was a total bawss tbh. It's a shame he was killed off. What a waste of a great character

And can you believe that smug superiority displayed by Max as he gloated over him? I bet the reason Ben was upset was because Max was stealing his kills