The 1980s were interesting years for anime. They were the height of the real robot era in which we saw serious sci-fi shows with mecha being used for war and general transport. One of the most successful was Super Dimension Fortress Macross, a 1982 TV show from Studio Nue, Tatsunoko and Artland which was later imported by Harmony Gold to the U.S. and rewritten as the initial story of the Robotech series. The premise focused on a group of people trapped on a battleship attempting to fight off a race of giants from space known as The Zentradi by using “culture shock” as a weapon, which came from a singing star’s music. Since the giants had no concept joy or peace in their society (as they were a race bred for war), they were distracted and could be potentially be defeated in battle.
Amidst this backdrop was a young girl named Lynn Minmay who evolves into a major singing star and becomes involved with the show’s lead character Hikaru Ichijoe, a pilot who rescues her during the initial episodes. He in turn eventually becomes involved with one of his commanding officers, Misa Hayase. The series combined the better elements of romantic triangles, pop music, mecha and galactic warfare, and started a very profitable franchise of music, models, toys and art books among other things.
This led to a theatrical film being released in 1984 entitled Super Dimension Fortress Macross: Do You Remember Love. Director Noboru Ishiguro utilized the best people from his staff on the Macross TV series, including mecha designer-turned-animator Shoji Kawamori and character designer Haruhiko Mikimoto to create an equally successful movie re-imagining some aspects of the TV series’ story but with higher quality animation and detail. The concepts of romance mixed with the power of music set against a backdrop of intergalactic war got people to hit the theaters and buy the art books and posters and paraphernalia. This film was also brought to the U.S. both unedited and in its severely re-cut incarnation, Clash of the Bionoids.
Another interesting 80s trend was the development of the OAV (Original Animated Video) format in which titles were released directly to home video. While these were primarily full fictional works, there were also music video collections that would come out taking vocal songs (openings, closings, background music) and put them to scenes from a given TV show. Often there would be new footage highlighting the context of the music videos, with a new extended ending for the characters involved. One example would be Genesis Climber Mospeada: Love Live Alive. This collection depicted the show’s singing character Yellow Belmont (known to Robotech: The New Generation fans as Lancer) giving a concert while telling an author about his adventures with his friends after saving the Earth from giant crab creatures known as The Invid.
Similar to this format, the producers of Macross released a 30-minute collection entitled Macross: Flashback 2012, in which Lynn Minmay gives a farewell concert. The videos were made with footage from both the TV series and the theatrical film, as well as bits of live footage of city scenery. The songs were the same ones performed by Minmay seiyuu and singer Mari Iijima. After the opening concert scene, the retrospective starts with “Sunset Beach”, a pop-styled vocal with elements of Hawaiian luau music. The next ones, “Zero G Love,” and “Shao Pai Lon” (Small White Dragon) bounce out short dance pieces while “Silver Moon, Red Moon” plays like a light evening semi-jazz styled piece you might hear at a local restaurant. This set of videos centers around Hikaru, Minmay and Misa’s times together.
Following a small interlude, we come to the next video which always gets me, entitled “Ai Wa Nagerwu” or “Love Drifts Away.” Initially the focus is on Hikaru’s tragic ‘big brother’ Roy Fokker but shifts to the lives of soldiers heading into battle, as anime footage is intercut with clips of live military forces further illustrating this song’s martial focus. It’s a song designed to fighters a bit. The series episode where this song was first heard (which also shares the same name) depicts a climatic battle showing the Zentradi wiping out Earth’s population, while what remains of humanity on the Macross leads a desperate battle to defeat the superior invading forces. (Robotech fans will likely recognize this episode as the epic “Force of Arms.”)
After an acapella interlude entitled “Cinderella,” we come to the title song of the theatrical feature “Do You Remember Love.” For the film’s iteration, this is the song Minmay sings to confuse and ultimately help the humans defeat The Zentradi. It’s a slow piece with balanced pacing, described in the story as one the giants’ and humanity’s creators (known as the Protoculture) enjoyed thousands of years back, helping to establish Macross’s theme of the power of culture over the power of war. In essence, a powerful invading fleet is defeated by “a love song.”
The final video is the highlight of the collection and is the only one to feature brand new animation. Flashback 2012 was promoted as the final farewell to Lynn Minmay and the show’s other original characters. The segment, directed by Shoji Kawamori this time, is broken up into two parts with Minmay singing “Tenshi No Enogu” (An Angel’s Paint), the majestic mid-tempo closing theme from the theatrical film. The collection opens with her already performing the concert for her fans in front of the resting Macross. The second part concludes Flashback with a fleshed out (yet unspoken) story.
Taking place a couple years after the TV series, Minmay walks quietly through an empty concert arena, reflecting on past performances and better times before Hikaru and Misa appear and offer her a place aboard a new battle fortress called the Megaroad-01, departing for space alongside a Zentradi fleet. We get to experience a myriad of her remembrances while Misa commands the cruiser and Hikaru flies a new Valkyrie fighter, the VF-4. The animation quality is the same level as the theatrical film, right down to the heavy amount of detail in the artwork and very busy backgrounds. This is the last glimpse we get of Minmay as she bows before the audience and the closing credits play with an alternate version of “Runner,” the TV series slow-paced outro as performed by Ms. Ijima and Fujiwara Makoto.
This was the last impression fans had of Macross for five years as people were hearing rumors of a new sequel but with little of the veteran staff returning. In ’92, the 6-part OAV series entitled Macross II: Lovers Again was released, occurring 80 years after the original show. Only character designer Haruhiko Mikimoto returned for this project, which was released in Japan and in America by U.S. Renditions soon after. Although none of the original characters returned, the themes of space warfare and the power of music continued to be present.
In ’94, Shoji Kawamori and Studio Nue teamed with Triangle Staff to continue the franchise in Macross Plus, a highly regarded 4-part OAV series combining computer and cel-based animation techniques. The first volume contained the short retrospective piece “A Future Chronicle,” which detailed the franchise timeline up to this point. It declared the TV series and Flashback actually had taken place and that the theatrical film was made by the characters to tell their story to future generations. While Macross Plus and its contemporary TV series Macross 7 were said to be direct sequels, Macross II was placed outside the official continuity from that point. However, the “Future Chronicle” short was removed from Manga Entertainment’s U.S. release of Macross Plus.
Sequels Macross 7 and Macross Frontier have expanded the franchise with stories of how humanity and the Zentradi have established space colonies while encountering new races and other threats, which may be affected by music and culture in various (sometimes extreme) ways. Often in these shows, there’s new music, new mecha and a romantic triangle in the story. In the background though, you can still hear references to Lynn Minmay’s music, as the universe continues to grow after jumping off with Flashback 2012.
Director Shoji Kawamori has claimed stewardship of the Macross franchise as he’s been in control of most of the sequels including the current Macross Delta, and the prequel show Macross Zero. Haruhiko Mikimoto went on to work as character designer on Macross 7 and for works such as Aim For The Top Gunbuster, Salamander, and Aquarian Age. After a distinguished career, Noboru Ishiguro went on to direct the epically-long series Legend of the Galactic Heroes as well as Tytania before his passing in March 2012. Mari Ijima continued her recording career releasing albums in Japan and the United States, where she can be seen as a guest at various anime conventions.
The trend of music video collections continued after Flashback 2012’s release. Sonic Soldier Borgman, Bubblegum Crisis, Superbeast God Dancougar, and more recently Gurren Lagann and Macross Frontier all had collections lasting about 30 minutes with new footage included. Meanwhile, Flashback 2012 was never released in the United States. Due to many licensing entanglements encompassing much of the Macross franchise, neither it nor any of the sequels are likely to be translated and officially released here any time soon, if ever. However, Japan and the U.S. are in the same region code for blu-ray media, so if people were to find it in that format, they could easily enjoy this small but very integral piece of the Macross story.
Thanks to Dave Merrill for helping to edit this piece.
