Rand and Annie attack an Invid hive on skis.
Scott: "If only they weren't so undependable! I'd know if they were in serious trouble or just goofing around!"
Annie, of her cobalt limpet mine: "Hey, I carried it, I think I should be the one to plant it!'
Annie falls down and needs to be saved by Rand like four times, but she does plant the shit out of that mine. It explodes the brain-sensor thing into a cloud of protoplasm that floats around and then slimes our two heroes.
Rand, upon being released: "I've had it and I'm gonna slaughter those animated trash compactors!"
Marlene screams and whines alot as Rand slaughters the animated trash compactors. She takes Annie's crown as Least Useful Member of the squad. Also, technically, she's younger than Annie.
Nothing really awesome happens in this ep except for some cool dogfighting....until the end, when we have a gratuitous scene of Annie and Rook splashing around in a lake and Marlene stripping nekkid to join them, cause she "doesn't understand human ways." If I had a nickel for every time I've heard that.
ep71: the secret route
OK, this ep is fascinating.
Lancer meets an old flame, and stares deeply into her eyes...while dressed as Yellow Dancer.
We learn the origin of Lancer's cross-dressing, which had something to do with eluding Invid who were coming for wounded male freedom fighters. His old flame came up with the idea of throwing him in the makeup and the dress. How often does THAT happen?
Yellow puts on a really cool Marlene Dietrich-esque outfit and introduces a song as "an old Minmay song," although the song they play is "Look Up The Sky Is Falling." Imagine a fact even LESS cool to know than the fact that one of the songs in "Boogie Nights" is from "Transformers: The Movie." That's what I just wrote.
But the fascinating part is the whole ep concerns a secret route through the mountains which is fraught with much Invid peril...and I like to think, a metaphor for the unparalleled transformation of Lancer to Yellow Dancer and his own "secret passage" towards gender re-identification and his public/secret life as a pop enigma.
Also, they play all 3 big Yellow Dancer songs in this ep. There's a great audio cut to the guitar solo in "Lonely Soldier Boy" as Carla is leaving Yellow, the tranny rock star that she inadvertently created. It's sort of like the "Up Where We Belong" moment from the end of "Officer and a Gentleman," except much, much, much more weirder and Japanese.
Way to go, Yellow. Way to go.
Lancer meets an old flame, and stares deeply into her eyes...while dressed as Yellow Dancer.
We learn the origin of Lancer's cross-dressing, which had something to do with eluding Invid who were coming for wounded male freedom fighters. His old flame came up with the idea of throwing him in the makeup and the dress. How often does THAT happen?
Yellow puts on a really cool Marlene Dietrich-esque outfit and introduces a song as "an old Minmay song," although the song they play is "Look Up The Sky Is Falling." Imagine a fact even LESS cool to know than the fact that one of the songs in "Boogie Nights" is from "Transformers: The Movie." That's what I just wrote.
But the fascinating part is the whole ep concerns a secret route through the mountains which is fraught with much Invid peril...and I like to think, a metaphor for the unparalleled transformation of Lancer to Yellow Dancer and his own "secret passage" towards gender re-identification and his public/secret life as a pop enigma.
Also, they play all 3 big Yellow Dancer songs in this ep. There's a great audio cut to the guitar solo in "Lonely Soldier Boy" as Carla is leaving Yellow, the tranny rock star that she inadvertently created. It's sort of like the "Up Where We Belong" moment from the end of "Officer and a Gentleman," except much, much, much more weirder and Japanese.
Way to go, Yellow. Way to go.
ep70: enter marlene
you darn tootin, she enters.
also on this VHS tape: original TV ads for the action figure series "Rambo: Force of Freedom."
(How did kids play with the Rambo toys? What were his missions? How did he act as a "Force of Freedom?" Did he always start off captured, or on the run from the U.S. Govt? My point here is that Rambo's opponent was everybody, including mostly all military leaders and representatives of all armed forces in every nation he got dropped in. If Rambo saw the G.I. Joe team, he'd probably find a reason to fight them. And I guess that would be awesome.)
Anyway.
Some fanservice (that's the otakus' polite word for Totally Gratuitous T&A) as Marlene enters, of course naked. With big hair covering her parts. Yawn. OK, OK, you guys win. Little boys' imaginations captured everywhere. Sigh.
They also find the BETA FIGHTER! Which, as discussed below, is basically the Alpha Fighter's knobby bitch.
Not really feeling this ep. In kind of a bad mood. Marlene's screaming freakouts ain't helping any. The problem with Marlene is that just as the gang was starting to cohere as a team, here comes the moody alien spy-girl who's gonna be mysterious and awkward and need all the attention, and constantly get it by being naked at inappropriate times. I guess she's a necessary character to give Scott something to do besides launch 196 cluster missiles at everything he sees. I just don't remember liking her.
ep 69: the genesis pit
I just think it's cute that Scott and Rand bring Annie along on this important reconnaissance mission when she honestly can do nothing but scream and hang on to the back of the cycle. I mean what's she gonna do if they fall into a Genesis Pit or something? Start ovulating?
...shouldn't have typed that. Should not have typed that. Never let the monster free....
Speaking of beasts that live in dark pits inside of us, I've never been big into dinosaurs. I don't understand what's so awesome about them, and I question their nerdcore cred. That is, geeks who are really into dinosaurs, and science-fiction that involves dinosaurs, just seems wrong to me. I mean, I understand that they were amazing creatures, but the problem is they really existed. I just can't geek out about that.
...shouldn't have typed that. Should not have typed that. Never let the monster free....
Speaking of beasts that live in dark pits inside of us, I've never been big into dinosaurs. I don't understand what's so awesome about them, and I question their nerdcore cred. That is, geeks who are really into dinosaurs, and science-fiction that involves dinosaurs, just seems wrong to me. I mean, I understand that they were amazing creatures, but the problem is they really existed. I just can't geek out about that.
ep68: eulogy
Colonel Wolff in this one sounds kind of like he's being voiced by Charlton Heston. I know that's not the case, but wouldn't it be great if it was?
ep67: paper hero
RAND: "I hope you know what you're doing, Lunk."
LUNK: "Hey, when did I ever know what I was doing?"
I love the tough-guy talk coming out of the animated non-racially-specific googly-eyed people.
LUNK: "Hey, when did I ever know what I was doing?"
I love the tough-guy talk coming out of the animated non-racially-specific googly-eyed people.
whoops, i have to kiss you now
Another thing about this ep. Rook cons Rand into kissing her, to save face, or for some convoluted reason. Much like the scenes in Macross where Lisa and Rick snogged for "strategical" situations.
What is it with all the fake non-committal kissing? Is it because the original anime didn't want to show "real" kissing? (The actual couples in Robotech, notably, spend much more time staring deeply into each others' eyes [and blowing things up together] then actually kissing.) Or is it just for tease/fanservice, the titillating suggestiveness of kissing someone for pragmatic reasons, when both of you only sorta kinda want to.
Anyway, it's cute.
HILARIOUS RANDOM LINE PROBABLY ADDED TO COVER SOME JAPANESE-ISM THAT DIDN'T TRANSLATE #67.2:
Rand, as he's driving off, to Rook's family: "Get a job!"
What is it with all the fake non-committal kissing? Is it because the original anime didn't want to show "real" kissing? (The actual couples in Robotech, notably, spend much more time staring deeply into each others' eyes [and blowing things up together] then actually kissing.) Or is it just for tease/fanservice, the titillating suggestiveness of kissing someone for pragmatic reasons, when both of you only sorta kinda want to.
Anyway, it's cute.
HILARIOUS RANDOM LINE PROBABLY ADDED TO COVER SOME JAPANESE-ISM THAT DIDN'T TRANSLATE #67.2:
Rand, as he's driving off, to Rook's family: "Get a job!"
ep66: hard times
Oh there is some funny ass shit in this one where Annie's pestering Rook to eat some chicken (in her rapid-fire voice-actor-fitting-long-line-to-short-lip-movements-style): "Hey-Rook-it's-time-to-eat-better-hurry-up-or-there-won't-be-any-left-c'mon-doesn't-this-piece-of-meat-smell-good?" Then Rook swats it out of her hand, and the drumstick falls to the ground, and Annie whines, "Now it's all dirty!"
There's no real reason Annie has to say "Now it's all dirty!" Except to iterate that she never ever never stops talking. Which is hilarious. Great job, voice actor. ROTFLMAO.
Also of note: whenever Lancer takes a shower, his persona is totally feminine, up to and including daring/denying the guys (e.g. Rand, Lunk) to "peek" at him/her naked. Which is, I dunno. Kind of Advanced Topics in Gender Studies, if you know what I mean.
adaptation
So the day after I mused about getting stuck with the Harlequin-romance-novel era of movie adaptations, it comes out that they just gave all 150,000 books in the Sweet Valley High series to Diablo Cody. Ha. I remember the Sweet Valley High books. I wouldn't feel one twinge of anything if they were made into movies. I know a few girls who might.
ALL the American Anime Adaptions are going to fail HUGE. Probably financially, absolutely artistically and conceptually. Only the Japanese should be live-actioning their own anime. "Akira" isn't even a good movie for chrissake, it just looks so cool because it's drawn cool, ya know?
The only one that has a chance is Robotech, because its story has been fine-tuned into the Western soap opera milieu, and still only if they do a few things exactly right, like Max & Miriya, Yellow Dancer, songs by Kelly Clarkson, and making it a two-parter skipping the Southern Cross.
...Don't get me wrong, it would be great to work on....almost any adaptation project...but getting put on "Connect Four" or "Care Bears: The Movie" would be basically like getting the Beta fighter, pictured here. It's great because it's an amazing space fighter that transforms and has like 188 missiles and you can blow things up with it....but it's not the cool jet-looking one that has sleek lines and transforms into the sexy-looking battloid that, let's face it, has even more missiles and takes the point against shock troopers. The Beta fighter is not that thing; it's useful but kind of lumpy.
Re-liveblog on hold because I'm in NYC doing meetings for my screenplay "Look For Water." I really wish, though, that I'd brought the Robotech: Battlecry PS2 game I got for $5 with me, 'cause I'm staying in an apt with a PS2.
(I got exactly the wrong PS3, btw: the one that doesn't play PS2 games, but also is not slimmer and more expensive. FML.)
A confessment: My timeline for becoming successful as a writer-director has never been based on outracing death, but rather on wanting to be in the mix before they stop making the nerd-adaptation-movies and move on to, I dunno, Harlequin romance novels. It'll be a pain seeing the Robotech, JLA, West Coast Avengers films if they come out and are directed by some indifferent yokel, knowing that I didn't do enough to avoid the tragedy. We'll see if in a few years I look back on this post and weep while watching the Mike Bay-directed Robotech, in which the Valkyries have their chest missiles replaced with heaving breasticles, as they swoop in and attack, inexplicably, Miami.
ep65: curtain call
This ep is particularly awesome. I started this liveblog with some idea about reflecting on the big issues via Robotech (e.g. pop culture, Japanese fetishism, war n peace, lost youth, blondes vs. blue-hairs, etc) but now I just sound like a fanboy. I'm cool with it.
Yellow Lancer does a big rock concert to distract the human collaborators while Scott & team sneak into their base and steal some Protoculture, then the requisite fight with Invid Shock Troopers.
The real art of this ep is the soundtracking of the action drama with the pop/rock songs, a skill that I, Kenny Loggins, and perhaps a few other people on the planet really appreciate. The minor-key disco anthem "Look Up The Sky Is Falling" matches Scott & Co.'s underground crisis like a fine wine pairing, while keeping the apocalyptic overtones of the series perfectly in frame. Her next song, the upbeat rocky one, kicks in just as the team escapes the water trap and the good guys officially Start To Win. (For no reason other than my mind being full of crap, I know that that song is called "It Don't Get Any Better.")
Like the guy in "High Fidelity" says, These Things Matter. Yes the songs are stupid. Yes, the whole idea of heroes fighting alien villains is stupid. Yes, I am stupid. Yes, chest missiles are stupid. But you put them all together (for the record: songs, heroes vs. aliens, me, and chest missiles) and you have something really special that will last forever.
P.S. The music in "Tranformers: The Movie", while goofy, helped the story, whereas the music in "Michael Bay's Transformers", while ostensibly hipper, helped you want to kill yourself. Just as an easy illustration of what I'm talking about.
ep63: lonely soldier boy
What else do ya need to say? Best song in the whole series.
Annie: "Whaddya think they do for fun around here?"
Rand: "Probably sit around and watch their floorboards warp."
Yellow Dancer is a kind of flower, I never knew that. I had thought it was just of those Japlish-isms, like "Jello Fighter." Remember the days before search engines when you couldn't instantly look up anything?
Enough beating around the bush. Yellow Dancer is the GREATEST CHARACTER EVER IN A CARTOON IN AMERICA. She's a guy...with purple hair...who dresses in drag...so he can lead an alternate identity as a famous dead-sexy rock star...to support his other life...as a Highly-Trained Guerilla Freedom Fighter. I mean, did you get all that? The Transformers had to go through like five seasons before they even had a female.
This ep also has a good example of the "fire 167 missiles to hit 2 targets" rule of Robotech warfare, which comes up from time to time.
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