#160: Otogi Zoshi (2004)

 

Director: Mizuho Nishikubo

Screenplay: Yoshiki Sakurai

Voice Cast: Fumie Mizusawa as Minamoto no Hikaru; Kan Tokumaru as Abe no Seimei; Kenta Miyake as Watanabe no Tsuna; Shinichiro Miki as Mansairaku; Kumi Sakuma as Urabe no Suetake; Ooki Sugiyama as Usui no Sadamitsu; Shinichiro Miki as Minamoto no Raikou; Wasabi Mizuta as Kintarou

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

 

[Major Plot Spoilers Throughout]

Otogi Zoshi is of note, for me personally, as this is from a period where Manga Entertainment, still going strong in their home country in British even into the 2010s from the nineties, changed as an anime distributer considerably in the early-to-mid 2000s. Just purchasing the rights to multiple animated series is a change as, beforehand, they rarely did baring the curious decision to buy Virus Buster Serge (1997), a very unpopular Masami Ōbari helmed show, and focused on OVAs and films instead in their initial heyday in the nineties. This period Otogi comes from has, up to the 2020s, never been fully re-released from those original Manga Entertainment ones, probably with the huge technical issue that, tragically, most anime by this time for television was not made in high definition or on film, in the transition era of digital drawn animation from handdrawn. This means that a lot if in Standard Definition that, unless piled onto Blu Rays as the American company Discotek is want of doing, leaves them ostracised in the world of high definition even over the quality of the work on the discs.

Baring Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex (2002-5), a very popular show spun off from an original 1995 film, this has left a lost sector of the company's slow and eventual change to a changing audience fading into the past. Imagine picking up Neo Magazine, which started in Britain as a publication in 2004 and devoted itself (alongside other Asian culture) to anime and manga, and seeing the titles the company once behind Ninja Scroll (1993) and Urotsukidôji: The Legend of the Overfiend (1989) had now acquired - She, The Ultimate Weapon (2002) (an odd mix of body horror, war and tragic romance with an abrupt finale), Tetsujin 28-go (2004) (a 2000s reboot of the 1960s series which Discotek did release as a Standard Definition on Blu-Ray set¹), or Heat Guy J (2002-3) (a hyped series which instead became a running gag by accounts on the defunct podcast ANNCast). And also among these is Otohi Zoshi, a period chambara action drama on the surface which does throw back to the older titles Manga Entertainment had released. Still action based, also by Production I.G., a big gun in anime as a studio because they worked on Ghost in the Shell. This period was, in hindsight, a tentative step still with the action and science fiction of yore, but eventually as the market changed and the audience, edging close to one day into the 2010s titles and genres they released would dynamically change.

Ironically, Otogi is a very idiosyncratic creation, because it is literally two very different thirteen episodes shows which just happen to share the same characters and plot. The first half is how I knew of the show and the only way people likely knew of Otogi Zoshi in promotion. In the Heian period, the sister of (real life figure) Minamoto no Raikō, Minamoto no Hikaru, has to pose as him for a mission, accompanied by her aide and samurai Watanabe no Tsuna, in a quest to protect the capital of Kyoto by acquiring magical objects, five magatama that represent the five elements (Metal, Wood, Water, Fire and Earth) scattered across the country. It becomes clear that she is in a plot of greater machinations, on her quest and acquiring other allies, based on real figures or folklore ones - Usui Sadamitsu (a noble ladies man samurai), Urabe no Suetake (gender swapped into a mysterious woman sent with them they are initially distrustful of), and Kintarō (a super strong boy they abruptly meet who is obsessed with food, based a folklore hero). The first half of Otogi Zoshi is very narratively straightforward as there are three magatama left to collect the series, with the only other details being a growing bond between Hikaru and Mansairaku, an acclaimed performer travelling the country too, and that everything is under suspicion the more they travel, and the more people they encounter in their quest to acquire the magatama back whose perceptions cloud her initial one.

It is for the most part grounded within the logic of a materialist world, at least in mind of a super strong young boy in the cast based on Japanese folktales. When one character abruptly turns into a demon in a fight, it does set up how, eventually, the show will fully embrace the supernatural. In terms of the look of the show, it is very realistic with the character designs defined as such, alongside the aesthetic naturally befitting a period chambara tale with extensive research involved by the production. Learning that the figures in the show are based on real people for the most part from this era, who became folktale figures with various interpretations, provides the series with a greater weight to where it virtues will eventually lay. Personally, for me though, it is difficult to talk about Otogi Zoshi without spoiling it immediately, as this show only can be explained with what its structure is meant to be and what the goal of the project was. Narratively the first thirteen episodes charge through this samurai narrative very quickly. It is engaging when watched, but in all honestly, if it had been all there was, Otogi Zoshi would have be immediately forgotten.

Normally when you have twenty six episodes, the thirteenth is the time of the second act, plot twists changing the show considerably if they had not already. Well, Otogi Zoshi takes the biscuit as by them most of the cast is killed off and the capital is left a burning wreck by conflict. What happens is that in the next episode preview, you the viewer are informed that next story is set in modern day Japan, with reincarnation meaning the cast all returns in the shadow of their past lives. By itself, the first half of this show would have been a frankly generic show for me. Where things get potentially controversial, but interesting for me, is that the second half is now an entirely different genre and tone, as the cast have to deal with the results of centuries before for karma's sake.

A breezy modern day aesthetic, even Hideki Taniuchi as the main composer replaced by the legendary Kenji Kawai, brining in New Age influenced smooth jazz, and an episodic structure of Hikaru, with her friends, now a teen landlady who helps investigate supernatural phenomena around Tokyo whilst looking for her missing brother. Arguably one factor in my preference for this, honestly, is that one of my favourite types of plot structures are supernatural/horror ones involving figures investigating weird incidents and folklore over episodic tales, building sometimes to a main narrative. The show completed changes tone from it action heavy tale of sword fighting and intrigue, with an energised opening song changing to another over real footage of Tokyo street life, rotoscoped, whilst the cast are animated mouthing the lyrics to a lighter hearted song. The only real detraction, by accident, to this change is that Hikaru arguably is a less proactive figure as a result. Forced to be her brother in the Heian period, handy with an archer's bow and having to fight, you can make the argument she is a weaker figure in the second act, the one major flaw which personally could have been written better.

It does feel more interesting however as a series through the modern Tokyo setting as, for all the research, the first act charged on so quickly with the plot you do not have time to really absorb the world. Here, every episode is named after an environmental location or landmark in Tokyo. Real ones, turning this show into a geographical tour as one episode can actually be about Kourakuen Hall, the famous arena, where a character comes across the ghost of his late boxer father, or at Shibuya, a district where a giant ghost dog is wandering about disrupting ATMs and cash machines in lieu to the folk believe of wolf figures representing good luck in economy. This becomes, if all real folk and anecdotal tales, an actual snapshot of Tokyo painstakingly researched and drawn onscreen. If some of them are spiced up, they do not feel contrived and out of place. As the characters' past literally haunts the modern day, the ghosts and supernatural realms can be found even in the underpass of the Tokyo railway, or how, near the iconic Tokyo Tower, the urban legend of white noise on television showing the dead is explored in one episode, entirely in lieu to the tower being just above a cemetery and caused by disgruntled ghosts.

It as a turn offers a problem mind in how to sell the show as, not able to spoil such a major direction in the whole narrative, it also means Otogi Zoshi is no longer an action samurai show with a steady pace, but becoming a different genre with a sedate and even playful tone. I half wonder how viewers reacted to this, especially as these were the days every anime distributor, in the United States and Britain, followed an insane distribution method of releasing individual discs with a handful of episodes on them separately rather than whole series (or a couple) of box sets. Imagine those who were buying each DVD release for this, full price per disc, and I wonder how many liked this change or not. Otogi Zoshi by accident also feels like a symbolic eye at how Manga Entertainment was at a cross roads. Perversely its first half is like those older titles they licensed, the second like the titles they would be more open minded to as the market place changed. In fact, the later half feels closers to something the late ADV Vision would have licensed, or frankly MVM Entertainment, one of those titles they might release, having survived into the modern day, alongside the type of titles which would become popular in the 2010s.

Just the show itself, without any other context, is imperfect but I liked quite a bit. Not the best of the genres it is tackling, but this type of story by the second act is that I gain great pleasure from. As a structurally risky work, it also does deserve praise for the experiment, especially as it embraces by the final act when a supernatural train that floats in the sky needs to be ridden, a reminder in itself that now I have least seen the 1985 animated adaptation of Kenji Miyazawa's Night of the Galactic Railroad, I would not be surprised if I keep falling over explicit references to it over these reviews and even anime I grew up with. It even negates a need for a villain as, in a poignant touch, said villain of the first half now returns in the second as a changed man, wishing to alter a history caused by him to protect Tokyo.

In fact, the second act is only eleven episodes. The last two are bonus episodes, one of Urabe, now a fortune teller who gets to do more here, before reencountering the group in a story of a haunted hospital and a cat. The last is a self reflective and philosophical tale of the former villain encountering an old man with greater wisdom then many of the nature of time and how Tokyo has existed as an entity almost immortal over centuries. A befittingly obscure conclusion to a surprisingly unique television series, worthy of rediscovery as a fascinating curiosity just for the tonal shift and how that changes the work.

 

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1) Sadly, a concept not brought over to British anime distribution. As always, we get barely a lot of titles over here as a result, which is a pain.

#159: Sekkō Boys (2016)

 

Director: Seiki Takuno

Screenplay: Michiko Yokote

Voice Cast: Shiho Kokido as Miki Ishimoto; Yui Makino as Mira Hanayashiki; Tomokazu Sugita as Saint Giorgio (聖ジョルジョ, Sei Jorujo); Shinnosuke Tachibana as Medici (メディチ, Medichi); Jun Fukuyama as Hermes (ヘルメス, Herumesu); Daisuke Ono as Mars (マルス, Marusu); Takaya Kuroda  as Hanzō Horibe (堀部 半蔵, Horibe Hanzō); Rena Maeda  as Kinue Yamashita (山下 絹枝, Yamashita Kinue); Takahiro Sakurai  as Hironori Yanagisawa (柳沢 宏典, Yanagisawa Hironori)

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

 

Another micro series, and like many of them, this is slight but there is a pleasure in experiencing them, to watch (no matter how long it takes to view all the episodes) and experience their jokes and moments of playfulness. Especially when, at seven minutes per twelve episodes, Sekkō Boys is running with a strange premise it milks a lot of great content from to a virtue.

Namely the tale of a young female art student Miki Ishimoto, disillusioned with her previous aspirations due to being sick of drawing sculptures, getting the chance in a lifetime to manage an up-and-coming male boy band. Aside from the fact, however, the titular Sekkō Boys are four living statues, and not just plaster busts of anyone. They are of actual stone, as Miki got the job partially because the other staff have back injuries due to carrying them around, and are personifications of actual historical and mythological figures. Mars, the Roman God of War; Hermes, a Greek God; Saint George, as Saint Giorgio here, a real life figure accepted as a saint in Christianity and Islam famous for fighting a dragon in lore, and is the older leader of the group; and (Giuliano di Lorenzo de') Medici, an Italian nobleman and ruler of Florence, who is the youngest and the heartthrob.

Half the humour and why Sekkō Boys worked is that the humour, and the various strains of it, all play off enticing ideas such as these being living figures or mythological deities who just happen to be statues. Sometimes their limitations are enforced, as baring Hermes with his spare body they do not even have anything under the top of the shoulders, the reason why most of Miki's work is as much to carry them about or drive them. Other times a lack of logic is part of the joke. Sometimes there is, like one of the members being posted as a delivery to travel around secretly, but they can apparently drink and even beat each other up off-screen among other scenes witnesses. The lines are blurred whether they are viewed as just statues, and thus dismissed, but also celebrities. One gets a cameo in a popular crime show as a murder weapon, and that is not even the best part of the joke.

And the show plays to their cultural histories, exemplified by the fact they idolise a two men group who are also stone busts, not obvious figures either but Roman general Marcus Junius Brutus, and French playwright and poet Molière. Likewise, here the Gods will be the most recognisable figures but the jokes play with probably more knowledge of who they all are then even I picked up. Yes, there is a scene of Athena, calling to let one of the members know how embarrassed they and Zeus are when he looks terrible on a TV show interview. Yes, Hermes, considering he was a trickster God, is discovered heading a sneaky snake oil scheme. And, as a stoic saintly warrior of yore, Giorgio is the stick in the mud in the group with a habit of terrible Dad level puns, proof that the concept is a universal one that exists in both British and Japanese culture even if puns are a fine art, especially in anime scripts, for the bad ones as much as the funniest. He does however manage to trend online and in general in popularity for "Giorgio-ing" which helps the saint's confidence immensely.

Most of the show is episodic, as with most of these micro series, but like the best, even if the shows are slight their characters are memorable, which is clearly their goal in that, if they stick, these figures in any scenario if there were more than one season would be fun to imagine in. Even side characters are memorable here in the little we get, like a female idol singer Mira Hanayashiki who is significantly more popular than the Sekkō Boys but both likes them, developing friendships with the band, and also (in her costume inspired by a moth) really likes insects, leading to a scandal when one of the boys is caught at her apartment even if she is just showing him her favourite live beetle. That this is still a show about a male idol group trying to success is inherently interesting as, if any of it is accurate to the truth, it could have been made into a great drama show just from all the stress and anxiety.  

Even in this absurd comedic form, many of the jokes are not the band as statues but the strain of trying to succeed. Having to dodge around interviews, making sure they are not destroyed by an interviewer notorious for her ability to crush interviewees with her questions, or getting enough time to perform on a big TV variety show because another group, a whole squadron of golden Buddhist statues, has to have introductions for them all. Even a very dark joke which could be seen as problematic, that of one of the Sekkō Boys having to sleep with someone to help to band, has the added absurdity to soften the touch of, well, being a stone bust without even arms.

Honestly, the only real disappointment with this show is that it had to end - after only twelve episodes, the joke could have been taken further or a better ending was found. Especially for a micro series, the final episode is of importance for me, and this one, of Medici vanishing, does not really stand out. More so as the dynamic and emotional turn, of Miki quitting her job, was played out an episode or so before and a more appropriate ending.

The one detail worth covering, enough to create a more elaborate review, was that I stumbled across Sekkō Boys due to its mention on a list online for the weirdest anime. Sekkō Boys to an outsider would be bizarre, and the premise is, but it is a noted detail of anime that many strange premises have passed my eyes, and for anime fans able to watch even more than I have, but do not cause us to bat our eyelids. Especially with comedy, unless they are very strange, humour softens the premise when you know it is not meant to be taken seriously, and the tone here is more conventional than something truly weird would be. What instead stands out instead is that, whilst not the most distinct micro series I have encountered, it does enforce how this type of show really develops talent. For once, rather than a group of actresses, this show is about a quad of male voice actors being allowed to show their talent, especially with the added difficulty that they are voicing statues who never emote or animated, petrified stone statues with one facial expression throughout. In itself, this is the real virtue to take away from Sekkō Boys alongside how, with a nice and pleasing aesthetic with a distinct strange touch, the show won me over.

#158: Amagami SS Plus (2012)

 

Director: Tomoki Kobayashi

Screenplay: Noboru Kimura

Based on the Visual Novel by Enterbrain

Voice Cast: Hiromi Konno as Sae Nakata; Kaori Nazuka as Tsukasa Ayatsuji; Rina Satou as Kaoru Tanamachi; Ryoko Shintani as Rihoko Sakurai; Shizuka Itou as Haruka Morishima; Tomoaki Maeno as Jun'ichi Tachibana; Yukana as Ai Nanasaki; Hitomi Harada as Manaka Hiba; Izumi Satou as Ruriko Yuzuki; Kana Asumi as Miya Tachibana; Mai Kadowaki as Keiko Tanaka/Risa Kamizaki

Let's start the meat bun convention!

Following on from Amagami SS (2010), this sequel series does feel like a bonus rather than a proper continuation. The original Amagami took a novel approach to its origins, as a visual novel romance story with multiple paths and multiple possible female love interests, by imagining six alternative stories where our lead, Junichi Tachibana, goes down the route of a romance between one of six possible women each time in his high school. This is not as extreme as, say, if it had fully embraced a sci-fi/metaphorical fantasy, as it never played to this reputation beyond an occasionally wink. Neither did it turn into School Days (2007), another visual novel adaption where it got around its multiple path format but taking the nastiest and more gruesome for a compelling and agonising trip that ripped the clichés of the genre to shreds. Instead, this franchise's first season was sweet, bearing in mind the potential issues at hand with its underlying tone of the ultimate fantasy girlfriend scenario it was trying to dodge, working as a one-off series with a fascinating form. Amagami Plus as a follow-on as instead two episode narratives for each female character than the original four for each, following the period after those narratives or at least their actual endings, as some did end with an epilogue set further in the future beyond high school.

These arches here are slight, and this definitely is a case where you need the original series to fully flesh them out in context, existing within the time where the romances were already kindled between Junichi and the characters. They being - Tsukasa Ayatsuji (deceptively layered, even ominous) taking part in an election for school representative; Rihoko Sakurai (a childhood friend) still trying to get Junichi to know she likes him; Kaoru Tanamachi (another close friend and a tomboy) and Junichi going on a bus trip vacation which goes south when the bus vanishes; Ai Nanasaki (first year and friend of his sister Miya), finding herself isolated when Junichi is stuck in a cramming class over even Christmas Eve which comes off as a secret cabal who kidnap failing students; Sae Nakata (another of Miya's friends, extremely shy) having developed more confidence but facing a bigger hurdle now she is head of running the Christmas fair; and Haruka Morishima (an eccentric but popular British-Japanese third year) in a melodrama around her possibly setting sail to Britain, with her English cousin Jessica introduced, her identical double with blonde hair.

Out of all of them, Rihoko's does have dramatic heft, as her arch originally ended with unrequited love, only for this to escalate when in this season's story she is invited over to cook dinner. My personal favourite is Kaoru's as, as a two episode comedy of a squabbling couple who clearly like each other, it plays as a farce with a dynamic change of locations, even involving a sinister looking inn in the middle of nowhere where the neighbouring monkeys will steal your underwear as you bath in the bathing pool. They are all interesting stories in a sense, honestly, I have a fondness for these characters after all the investment I have put in, but this is definitely a case of a show which is spinning on its wheels.

Here, the potential issue I raised last time, the hetero-fantasy at play in multiple love interests played at once, is here and an issue for other reasons. One of the show's best parts here is that, even in another girl's chapter, every female character gets scenes in the others, and even as archetypes, they are interesting. Even a figure like Jessica, a broad character who speaks perfect Japanese but with an accented form to it, is interesting that even a broad stereotype, once fleshed out, gains a personality. It helped considerably here still that Junichi is a much likable male protagonist; still shy and with sex on the brain, but someone who is kind and does his best to help people.

The sense of ill-ease comes from the fact that, whilst these characters are lovable, the production itself is stuck unable to really progress beyond its original structure, and that leads to these interesting stock figures being stuck in a really generic form of romance which plays to gendered stereotypes. Most of this is the issue that, for the idealised romantic interests to stay idealised, this show now cannot go anywhere unless they gain more personality and drastically change, which is where for these female characters, as for another here and there, after high school at a young age it is marriage and likely kids with no sense of their own personal growth awaiting them as characters beholden to their creator Gods.  

This is probably why a figure like Tsukasa now stands out more, frankly manipulative and with darkness to her personality in the first season and here, even when a female rival in the elections tries to get to her through Junichi, a potentially crass twist of her creating a fake seduction sense of campus romantic confession, only for Tsukasa not to bat an eyelid and only reprimand Junichi for falling into such a obvious trap. She grows more interesting as a result as, even if her arch in the first season did involve marriage and a daughter, she clearly wore the trousers in the relationship, their dynamic marriage life as an anime in itself would have been great, even as an entirely separate tale that could have woven their narrative between these two seasons in there.

The problem for a lot of female characters in anime is that, if the characterisation is good or they are given independence, even a character drawn for male fan service (insanely busty figures, even unnaturally proportioned, and skimpy costumes) can gain worth, and female fans who would even cosplay as her and find something to admire, but it takes the writing of the stories to trap them in prisons of generic male-centric narratives, as idealised images, to prevent this from happening. If the character is merely to be a fantasy of romance, then this prison is even more of an issue. Harem shows, not including the reverse ones of a male harem and one female suitor, are a subject I have yet to fully understand but in even that choice of sub-genre name - based on originally the separate part of a Muslim household reserved for wives, concubines, and female servants, but slanted towards the idea of the wives (or concubines) of a polygamous man that is a male sexual fantasy in the modern day - is problematic, alongside the issue of the women, despite always usually being far more interesting than the male leads, being merely in the shadow of the male protagonist, the stand in for a target viewer usually meant to be male, in examples I know of.  

Once established, the problem is worst when the characters cannot develop their own independent personalities. In the first series of Amagami, the arches were the attempts at romance when Junichi first met these women, and their personalities grew as he has to learn to know them. That made sense and less of an issue. Here, by now, not much progress transpires and you cannot say anyone in the female cast is helped by this. Haruka is particular, in the last arch, unfortunately even gets the soppy melodramatic ending where Junichi professes his love for her the third year graduation ceremony; at the time, I was engaged in the moment as drama, but now the eccentric figure who was far interesting in her flighty nature and that she had a really close relationship with her female best friend, which felt far more romantic in between the lines, is now less interesting as a character. There is also the sense, whilst not increased in amount from the first series, that the fan service becomes more pronounced, including for the sister Miya. It is never incestuous thankfully, but now the little sister who was fixated on meat buns is far more interested with her best friend Sae's pronouncedly large breasts, which goes beyond horseplay at points. Especially as the final episode, her own, is centred around a hot spring, including a pool designed to help increase bust size, one wonders if Japanese women actually are obsesses with bust size, as this is common in a lot of anime, or if this is a trope Japanese male anime writers came up with. Hell, in an alternative world, is Miya's horseplay with Sae able to be read with a gay reading, as she did in a bonus OVA in the first episode declined dating a boy who asked her out, or more likely just an excuse to tease male viewers with female on female fondling?

The final episode as mentioned is a fan service one, but ironically, I find virtue it is as it actually cuts Junichi out of the plot, of a new hot spring resort offering a free day for women only, by having the female cast by themselves interact and be themselves. It is all meant as an episode of pure cheesecake fan service, merely teased with no actual nudity or anything raunchy, but jokes and moments actually make it one of the best episodes, like the ramen pool or Tsukasa and Kaoru, in the pool for bust size, deciding (in a love-hate moment of bonding) to challenge each other to stay in the pool even the heat nearly knocks them both unconscious. There is actual characterisation of interest, even if it is not the most feminist of narratives where the cast could have had a lot more personality if their archetypes were allowed to be flexible even in bonding and conversing. It also has one final joke with Junichi, when he does have a moment in the episode, involving a bath powder that inadvertently encourages abstinence, which did end the show on a high.

Truthfully, in knowledge the original show was one that for anyone with a greater knowledge of visual novel and high school romance anime might have found more derivative than I did new to these tropes, this is a case of diminishing returns. It is, already mentioned, bonus material to a show that was inherently six feature length stories that were based on six possible relationships blossoming which could have existed by themselves, here with the exception of one only additional material that never raises the stakes or really pushes to new dynamically rich hijinks. Only a drastic tonal and/or structure shift would really take this show further, but as it was always at the back of my mind, the sense of the undercurrent of gender politics which I could get past in the first series became more apparent when characters here are stuck in the same patterns in the sequel. This was the time for a tale, in each time line, of the six relationships after high school or even older - what becomes the stagnant tone here unfortunately was the selling point in the first place and now it was the premise's biggest hindrance.

#157: Macross Plus (1994-5)

 

Including Macross Plus: The Movie Version

Directors: Shoji Kawamori and Shinichiro Watanabe

Screenplay: Keiko Nobumoto

Voice Cast: Rica Fukami/Riva Spier as Myung Fang Lone; Takumi Yamazaki/Bryan Cranston as Isamu Alva Dyson; Unshō Ishizuka/Richard Epcar as Guld Goa Bowman; Mako Hyoudou/Melora Harte as Sharon Apple; Banjou Ginga/Bob Papenbrook as Raymond Marley; Kenji Utsumi/Beau Billingslea as Col. Millard Johnson; Kōichi Kitamura/Richard Barnes as General Gomez; Megumi Hayashibara/Bambi Darro as Lucy Macmillan; Sho Hayami/Steven Blum as Marge Gueldoa; Tomohiro Nishimura/Dan Woren as Yang Neumann

Viewed in English Dub (OVA) and in Japanese with English Subtitles (Movie Version)

 

One of anime's biggest franchises, one that is not based on a pre-existing source thus adding a greater weight to its longevity, is the Macross series, started in 1982 as a TV series Super Dimension Fortress Macross where, in a sci-fi future, humankind fought a war-like alien race, the power of music becoming a key aspect to the franchise onwards. Tragically, it is a franchise that is not easily available to see in the West, as it will continue to into in the 2020s, all entirely due to the muddy history of its licensing by an American company named Harmony Gold USA.

Harmony Gold USA, whilst also becoming involved in real estate, bought the rights to the original series and, even if using other shows in the sequel series, created from it the Robotech franchise, an Americanised version which became an eighties pop culture item of peoples' childhoods. Enough for one film, Robotech: The Shadow Chronicles (2006) to be made in the 2000s, but yet to follow the route of Transformers and successfully adapt to live action or another series, though a live action theatrical film is clearly the end goal desired. The problem stems that they acquired said rights, and gained them back again in 2019 from Tatsunoko, the legendary Japanese company who co-produced the original franchise, and they can hypothetically prevent anyone realising any part of the original series into the West without their backing, worse depending if they presume Robotech is still a commodity of greater value than Macross. What definitely had not helped, before the requirement of the franchise, was that Harmony Gold USA and Tatsunoko and Studio Nue and Big West, the latter two involved in the creation of the original series, was a series of lawsuits over the years including Harmony Gold USA instigating that they owned the international rights to the entire franchise¹, a tangle web of cease-and-desist letters, issues of who actually owned what, and law cases that helped prevent any Macross titles being available in the West. It entirely depends on whether they would deliberately prevent anyone from ever realising Super Dimension Fortress Macross or the numerous follow on work which have continued into the modern day now that Harmony Gold USA managed to reacquire the license; whatever the case, whilst the franchise in Japan is now an institution, little of this successful franchise has been made available in the West.

Exceptions snuck through. ‎Macross: Do You Remember Love? (1984), the bombastic theatrical conclusion to the original series, had an English language release called Clash of the Bionoids, a drastically edited version by by Celebrity Home Entertainment's "Just for Kids" label in the late 1980s. Two exceptions which were bigger, and were released in Britain too, also snuck through. One is Super Dimensional Fortress Macross II: Lovers Again (1992), which is not very well regarded; Macross throughout its history is intertwined with Shōji Kawamori, its creator, whilst this was a sequel title for the OVA market which he and others were not involved in, a sequel project created anyway regardless of that fact. The other, which he had involvement with and has a greater legacy, is Macross Plus, an OVA story which Manga Entertainment distributed and kept the rights too well into the middle of the 2000s in the DVD era, and is held as one of Macross' best moments completely.

It is a release that Manga Entertainment could be proud of, from their period where they were notorious for work like Urotsukidôji, because both a) it is a story that can be sold without any other context of the franchise, and b) has such importance too that its both considered a major part of the franchise, and that it includes a couple of big names early in their careers, thus having a historical importance. One is Yoko Kanno as the composer, a female singer and musician very early in her anime soundtrack scoring who would gain importance onwards. The other is that, whilst Kawamori is the chief director, he co-directed with Shinichiro Watanabe, who would go on to director Cowboy Bebop (1998) and become a huge figure himself.

Macross Plus itself is fascinating, as set in a sci-fi future world named Eden and going back to Earth for the finale, it is set three decades after the original Macross narrative but exists as its own tale, one that is essentially a romantic melodrama fused around a sci-fi action plot. It is a story about adults, surrounding a romantic triangle. It involves Myung Fang Lone, a girl in high school who was obsessed with singing, now an adult who abandoned the career and became the manager of Sharon Apple, an artificial musical idol she secretly acts as the voice and soul of. Her disillusionment is connected to the friction between her two childhood male friends, Isamu Alva Dyson and Guld Goa Bowman. Dyson is a hot headed pilot, who in the OVA version has been far too much a pain that he is shipped off to Eden to become a test pilot where Bowman already is. Bowman is half- Zentradi, the original war-like aliens from the first Macross series who eventually humankind could come to peace with. Bowman believed Dyson was the one who destroyed their relationship with Myung and is antagonistic as a result as they are rivals in test planes. Dyson's is a regular transforming plane, one of the series' trademarks being fighter planes which turn can turn into bipedal mecha, whilst Bowman's is powered by his mind. When Myung appears on Eden, returning home as part of Sharon Apple's intergalactic music tour, their emotions are brought to the surface.

What is amazing about Macross Plus is that it is still the best of sci-fi animation when scrutanised, as an OVA in the hand drawn era for the well held franchise created with a great deal of care, but is also focused on a drama which fascinates as a genre hybrid. At this point, it is worth now bringing up the OVA and the Movie version, the first still less than three hours, the later just two, compare as this was originally meant to be a feature film but was first the four part OVA series. When it comes to reinterpreting part four of the OVA series, the Movie is rewarding, but baring a couple of new scenes the Movie version's greatest flaw is that it has to condense the first three episodes over the first hour, losing a great amount of weight and characterisation. Written by Keiko Nobumoto, it is a drama in its heart, though the plot does take on the fact that, looking like the sister of HAL 9000 from 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), Sharon Apple is going to have an important part of the tale that has to be resolved with action. Even her plot, to malfunction at some point, is influenced by the drama as, alongside an illegal bio-chip allowing self consciousness, Myung's own regrets play an important part. Whilst a lot of anime mixes genres and adds a lot of drama to them, it is distinct how this title treats the material with a greater sense of weight.

As science fiction, the quality of the production is still a high quality. It is not a surprise that, after the first sequel was created despite him not being there, Shōji Kawamori was going to rectify this with what he would have felt was a proper sequel. Shōji Kawamori's reputation as an anime creator and producer, screenwriter, visual artist, and mecha designer is that he can demonstrate and build his own designs, including the transforming planes of this franchise, from Lego to show how his work is put together. The quality here is exceptional, back up by the fact that both the action scenes are incredibly rendered but the dramatic scenes have the necessary power to them. It reminds you too that whilst Ichiro Itano is notorious as a director, he who helmed the Evil Town episode of Violence Jack (1988) that put people like me off its uncut version, Itano as the Action Choreographer here is of such a high talent he earned the trademark, from Macross and such titles, of the "Itano Circus", as seen here in a painstaking animation touch of multiple missiles being fired at once being drawn going in their own trajectories.

In general, just under theatrical animation, the quality here is found everywhere including in the world building, the world of Eden a lavish one between the sprawling metropolis, where even a karaoke bar looks like a funhouse, and the natural landscape is full of wind farms and prehistoric dinosaur birds. Helping the drama considerably, including the little we see of Earth, this feels like a full fleshed out world without any further content of the Macross lore baring some references to the fact this is a while after the original series was resolved. Even, if it does show datedness in the additional material in the Movie version, the CGi sequences has aged considerably well as they was used with a distinctive touch, an aesthetic which is distinct rather than obsolete.

Ironically, some of the most vibrant animation in this action story comes from Sharon Apple, particularly the concert scenes of hers where, designed to literally (and dangerously) enter the audiences' minds, some of the most vivid imagery comes in. Hitting a prescient note of virtual idols, not to mention holograms of passed musicians on tour, the Apple music sequences, which take on ominous menace when she gains awareness and brainwashes whole masses with hallucinations, are still striking especially as they do play a huge part in the narrative, an added and intentional double edge sword of a figure whose music switches between sultry ballads and J-pop but can eventually hijack any technology with her form.

Speaking of this music, the Macross series holds its music as a huge part of its trademark. It could be silly or sweetly naive that Macross: Do You Believe in Love? is meant to end with a love song ending the intergalactic war, or that the follow -up to Macross Plus, the TV series Macross 7 (1994-5), had a fictional band Fire Bomber created and music literally used as a weapon, but here it makes a potentially awkward mix work perfectly. One of the key reasons is that the music was created by Yoko Kanno. Kanno, as mentioned, became a major figure in anime music for the quality of her music and here, helped by the by members of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra for most of the score, the music is exceptional and also immensely varied. Voices, Myung's main song, has the dynamic nature it requires, and I like the English language version as much. After, in the Dark / Torch Song, the end credit song sadly lost in the Movie version when the OVA uses it as the last minute stinger before the credits, is evocative. Even the Movie version, in one of the best moments, has a distinct a cappella piece over a montage condensing the original plot, an insanely distinctive piece, and the orchestral pieces over the flight scenes are as good too. It is, without a doubt, one of the best soundtracks I have covered and Kanno's reputation means there are a lot of huge and iconic soundtracks she has created that will challenge this one, including her collaboration on Shinichiro Watanabe's Cowboy Bebop.

Even the dubbing is of note as, as someone who usually listens to the Japanese dub when possible, controversially I think I prefer the English dub. This has been complicated as the fourth and final episode was redubbed with different actors, but the English dub for the OVA series, with a few flaws, is still something to admire. It is helped that two of the leads for the original dub are great - for Bowman they had Richard Epcar, who would become a veteran in voice acting and directing voice dubs, whilst Dyson is played by an obscure American actor named Bryan Cranston, who worked in animation dubs in the mid nineties until I first discovered him, among his career in small film roles and television, in Malcolm in the Middle (2000-6) which I grew up with. Yes, that Bryan Cranston, who would then one day shave his head and lead Breaking Bad (2008-13), a huge American television, in an example of how some actors have to work for a long time before they find success; and Cranston's voice performance for me here is a bar few could touch in terms of a great anime English dub performance.  

One of the best aspects of title, more so the OVA which is the superior version baring one detail, is the emotional depth to the material. I will argue that Macross Plus itself, without any other context, is still a unique title for how well it managed to get the genre juxtaposition right, especially as it manages, through its plot, to make its separate pieces make sense and have a sense of dramatic power as a result. These characters are actual adults, and the drama between the lead three leads which leads to the story is rich. It makes sense, in one of the most rewarding sequences, that after trying to shoot each other down, and even after a friendly fire sequence in an earlier episode with live ammo, that a dogfight between Dyson and Bowman first devolves into petty arguments from their youth and eventually reconciliation through laughter and floating in the clothes, all because the story writing was fleshed out fully.

Sadly, the Movie version condenses too much for this to work. Where it has some interest, and arguably the best version could be created, is that it reworks the final episode drastically, alongside a couple of new scenes for side characters especially Lucy Macmillan, a female crew member at the test flights who has a romance with Dyson. The biggest thing for me, which is more meaningful than even the more elaborate Sharon Apple scenes, is that of a huge tragedy which is elaborated on the Movie version. [Major Spoiler Alert] It is the death of Bowman, which re-animated and retold is given more sad weight alongside the fact that, much more explicit and horrifying to witness, his final conflict with a self piloted super plane could have been even more powerful if a cut of that final act was added to the first three episodes of the OVA. [Major spoilers end]. As it exists though, it says so much that the original OVA as it was, without the new material, still ends perfectly.

Macross Plus altogether is one of the best examples of the medium from the nineties, the last period before OVAs started to fade away in the 2000s. Sadly, whilst the license Manga Entertainment has is said to be untouched, Harmony Gold USA still having the license and wishing to keep Robotech alive into the 2020s is tragic unless they make the noble act to let that and the Macross franchise co-exist in the West onwards. I say this with mind that I am happy to explore the Robotech franchise, as it was arguably a key title as a gateway to anime, but Macross is such a huge franchise in the medium, leaving as a result that emotional that a potential handicap that prevents it from being seen easily is going to be a nightmare to negotiate. It sucks more as Macross Plus, even without that context and having found it into my early interest in anime, returning to it for this review after a long time, is still so good, better and more meaningful than pure nostalgia could ever be.

 

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1) https://kotaku.com/why-you-havent-seen-any-new-macross-in-the-west-for-nea-5990702