I suppose I need to preface this by saying that I have been an avid Macross fan since the old Robotech days, which were only a year or two behind the original Japanese release of the series, and which allows me to feel as a part of it as I could possibly be having grown up in North America prior to the mainstream success of anime. I had to watch a fourth generation VHS of Love, Do You Remember unsubtitled, the image so bad I could not make out what was going on so I just kind of soaked in the colors and the music. I have followed all of the films and series that have come since, Macross II, Macross Plus, Macross 7 and Macross Zero. I have a small collection of the toy Valkyries and a Lynn Minmei model kit that I bought at Anime Expo 98 that I have yet to put together and paint. Now I am not recounting all of these tiresome things because I am trying to prove my street cred. I am not assuming that Macross is anything that my readers would be vaguely interested in.
It's just that Macross makes me feel young like few things do. It makes me feel young in a very sweet naieve way. It reminds me of winter and snow and the smell of model glue and my buddy Rich giving me grief for painting my Valkyrie gloss yellow [which only goes to show that even at a young age I was a visionary - refer to Basara's valkyrie from Macross 7 - gloss red.]
I have loved the sequels in an almost unconditional manner. But Macross Frontier, it really deserves unconditional love, it is perfect. As a twenty-fifth anniversary celebration it often does shot for shot recreations of key scenes from the original program but then pulls the rug out and changes everything around. It references all of the prior series [except for Macross II which has never really been included in the official canon] expands them, twists them up and puts them back down faster and flashier than ever.
The show once again deals with how basic misunderstanding can become tragic on both a personal level as well as a cosmic one but how the yearning for culture can overcome everything.It is truly beautiful.
I was in tears by the final episode.
-Kurt Weller
