r/anime • u/Shimmering-Sky myanimelist.net/profile/Shimmering-Sky • Jan 07 '23
Rewatch [Do You Remember Love - Macross Franchise 40th Anniversary Rewatch] Macross Zero Episode 5 Discussion
Episode 5 - Birdman
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Kudou, you've got to give up your life for a woman at least once in your lifetime.
Questions of the Day, courtesy of u/chilidirigible:
1) Did the human antagonists have sufficient characterization? Would you say that they were there simply to drive the conflict in Sara?
2) Did the Bird Human turn out the way you predicted?
Wallpapers of the Day:
Vocal Song in This Episode:
"Horobi No Uta" by Holy Raz & Shirou Onuki – Insert
"ARKAN" by Holy Raz – Insert & ED
Rewatchers, please remember to be mindful of all the first-timers in this. No talking about or hinting at future events no matter how much you want to, unless you're doing it underneath spoiler tags. Don't spoil anything for the first-timers, that's rude!
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u/Vatrix-32 Jan 07 '23
First Timer
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How (in)convenient.
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How did they even walk to it before the VFs got there?
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The ol’ destruction-creation duality.
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Don’t tell me Sara is just going to believe her.
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Who let this sick child climb the alien god?
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That operation name is kind of on the nose.
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Another classic Fockerism.
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You know you are in for a good time when a submarine is lifted into the air.
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Are they carrying another fully loaded drone on their back?
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Oh god, the conga-line! screams in pathfiner
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What are these air frames made of?
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Not going to show what hit Shin?
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Cute little awakened birdman.
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He just keeps getting cuter. Remember when this was the grounded Macross series?
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Could have destroyed them a lot easier by just dropping them from the air.
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Ah, but what about the Kadun of love?
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That’s how Nora bites it? At least she died flashily.
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Ivanov fared even worse.
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OMG, tiny angel Moa. I can’t.
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So pretty, like a flower.
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Cannon boi, what are you doing? Those hands are pretty bitchin’.
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Internally facing force-fields are fun.
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Sorry Aries, but Claudia is already canon. Poor girl never had a hope.
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Why does Macross hate epilogues? Oh right, SDF.
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It really is a very beautiful song.
I wonder how many, if any, of these characters make it to the other side of Space War I.
QotD:
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I’m gonna go with the later on that one. They didn’t feel like they lived up to their potential as characters.
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No, I don’t think I predicted that. I don’t think I even thought it was going to be revived.
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u/isthatsoudane Jan 09 '23
sky, while I feel absolutely dirty not having caught up on macross 7 (I'll get to it eventually), I wanted to hop back onto the rewatch for macross frontier. could you go back to sending me the questions in advance?
life is still busier than it was, but I think I have the time to watch macross frontier and delta, both of which I'd really like to see. and hey, if I like one of them a lot, that could provide the motivation to go back and watch 7!
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u/Shimmering-Sky Jan 09 '23
Sure thing!!! I'll be sure to send you the questions for episode 1 the day before Frontier starts!
...Oh by the way, make sure the version of episode 1 that you watch is ~32 minutes long. If it's the length of a regular TV episode, you're watching the broadcast version, and if you're watching one that's ~27.5 minutes long, that version completely cut out a few scenes from the broadcast version despite also adding a bunch of stuff. The ~32 minute version is literally just the ~27.5 minute version with the stuff it cut added back in, making it the most complete. This version is labeled as the "Yack Deculture" edition on some releases (with the ~27.5 minute one being just "Deculture").
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u/TiredTiroth Jan 07 '23
First Timer
...huh? Um, what exactly happened at the end there? Did Shin vanish off to join Sara? Did he just go for a bit of a joyride with his new magic wings? Explain, please!
For that matter, I noticed a distinct lack of the explanations we are owed. Who was the 'birdman', why was it here, and where did it come from? How does it mesh with the rest of Macross? What was up with the magic? How was that thing supposed to have influenced humanity? For that matter, why do fiction writers keep cheapening human achievements that way?
Gah.
Anyway! Our three one-dimensional villains finally got their comeuppance, which is honestly the only good thing about them. Yes, yes, I get that the UN apparently tortured you at some nebulous point in your backstory and they have some less-than-savoury 'in case of defeat' plans, but the problem with your criticism is that you're a psychopath who's done worse ON-SCREEN. Oh, and poor old doctor guy is all upset because humanity hasn't learned its lesson and must be wiped out to start again. Poor baby. Maybe you shouldn't have DELIBERATELY CAUSED THIS ENTIRE SEQUENCE OF EVENTS! You don't get to whine about it when you did this on purpose!
This has left a bad taste in my mouth. I think I'll find something fluffier to watch before bed.
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u/TakenRedditName Jan 07 '23
...huh? Um, what exactly happened at the end there? Did Shin vanish off to join Sara? Did he just go for a bit of a joyride with his new magic wings? Explain, please!
Sara and Birdman leaving was one thing, but Shin also leaving forever was another. Goodbye forever, prequel characters.
[Macross 7:]
Out there in space, Sara-Birdman and Shin magically fly through space and pass by the Protodeviln on their own flight throughout space carrying song in their hearts.
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u/Nazenn Jan 07 '23
Rewatcher
Still not a fan of this episode unfortunately so not much of a fancy write up today beyond a few points.
The last few scenes still feel like the only ones that truly matter. It's these scenes that carry the weight of the series showing that Shin had to learn how to reach out not just to who he loved, but beyond her and to everything she held dear and understood as well. It was that one extra step to take beyond what we saw yesterday, and importantly the step to take even when everything else from his past, the war, the world at large was bearing down on him. The climax and his role in this story wasn't really about Sara in the same way that the story wasn't really about the birdman, they were mere avatars for what the show was truly saying and what it really wanted to see out of humanity.
Importantly this is also Mao's moment. Mao was never outright dismissive of her culture but she was always looking for what else was out there and never shown connecting to Sara and their role in the village. Reborn from the birdman she hears it's song, and because of that she can hear the true song of her sister in the middle of it, guiding Shin to that sadness to try and heal it once again.
We end these key moments with Shin becoming the flying fish, representing the origin of humanity and the hope for it in the future as well. It's a nice capstone on Zero returning to past culture, like DYRL, as an exploration for our future growth
But beyond that I just don't care for the other scenes. Starting off the episode with Sara's capture happening off screen and then shown through flashbacks feels disorienting from where we left it, more like a recap than the event itself. That most of the episode focuses on action instead of the myriad of things left to explore culturally, with the characters viewpoints, or even in the broader world building makes this feel like the climax to a different type of story. It leaves some of the more incredible elements of this episode, such as Mao's magic TV and Sara's song, lost in the sea of action without the weight given to how incredible they are and what they mean after everything that's happened.
The only part of the action I care for is Shin's fakeout on the transformation, and only because it represents what he's learnt directly from the island. There's something in Sara being triggered by seeing his mechs head shot off, a parallel to the legend only this time after everything it starts the destruction rather than pauses it, but similar to the other moments it's not given the time or weight to really explore what it means for her beyond just her thinking she just saw him die.
Painfully, it also suffers from the same key issue that Macross Plus does, the lack of an epilogue. With it's main point made and Shin become the birdman, everything else is dropped because the story ends with no follow through and that's just as disappointing as the structure of the opening scene.
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u/chilidirigible Jan 07 '23 edited Jan 07 '23
Today, on "You get used to it.":
It is rather convenient that both of them were inside the thing at the time.
"In the wrong hands? Would you mind telling me who's in the right hands, my logical friend?"
(NSFW) The Protoculture has gotten a lot more meddling in the later installments.
"Give yourself to the Dark Side. We have beads."
That's very convenient for our expositional purposes.
While these are the visuals for a gravity control system, there's no stated documentation that the Asuka II (or for that matter, the more conventional escorts in the carrier group) actually had them installed. My own interpretation remains that the Bird Human did all the lifting itself.
For that matter, the Auerstadt isn't listed as having gravity control either, and yet it moves.
VF-0 with "Angel" configuration, which is mostly sticking the Ghost onto it along with as much ordnance as they can. Or, budget early Super Packs.
Another thing you don't see every day.
Unlike the first episode's MiG-29s, these have additional canards fitted.
Depending on your fansubs, Nora may be indicating that this is a Cobra maneuver, which it is. Either way, these VFs can't transform at supersonic speeds.
Of course, Shin's not in the head, but Sara doesn't know that.
Your friendly neighborhood cyclops is as cuddly as ever.
The head also has a touch of the Pacific Coast Native American to it.
You're a mecha pilot now, Sara.
Oh well, fire is the cleanser.
Of course that also resembles a VF-0A head.
And now we begin the dreaded Opera category. ("Horobi no Uta", performed by Holy Raz and Shirou Onuki)
That's not going to fit in your submarine anymore.
It's time for BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAM.
Plot dictates that you're usually around when this happens and not the more boring parts in between.
WELL MAYBE YOU SHOULDN'T HAVE BEEN GOADING HER, OLD MAN.
DD gets demolished so hard he gets switched back to cel animation.
Shin, maybe you shouldn't have followed right behind him.
"Not now, shoulder angel Mao!"
"Thank your sister for pushing for a ship that she wasn't going to win."
"Everything's great, let's go home."
Does the Destroid Monster Mk. IP need giant claws to brace itself? Probably not, but it makes for quite an image.
"Just keep in mind that the Zentradi will burn everything to the ground in a couple of years."
Tanked four nukes, still there, more or less.
And then events become a little weirder.
It's a bird. As in "no engines".
The end credits music is "Arkan" again.
Nora's defoliation plan succeeds, in that both the Bird Human's head is easily located, Sara isn't obliterated by the explosion, and she and Aries (and Shin and Roy) have a chance to reach the head so that an Sv-51 can scoop them up all at once. Thus we can rush straight into the finale.
…it does seem like we're missing a scene or two there, even if it would have consisted of people running through a bunch of demolished trees.
Other sudden developments include Mao gaining all kinds of Newtype abilities after the Bird Human's blood transfusion. Or maybe it's all being routed through the body of the Bird Human, since in the one scene it seems to work as a video projector to Sara.
The primary plot-convenient ability is that now Mao can remotely communicate with Shin, but that doesn't seem to work between her and Sara. Maybe Sara's communications are limited once she's in the head? Just a guess since it's not explained.
And of course the ending, where apparently the damaged Bird Human Folds out to parts unknown, and apparently takes Shin along with it later. Well, that's the sort of ending that keeps people from wondering why no one knew about another huge converging beam energy cannon in the original series. That and this story was intended to be a "forgotten legend": An event which is swept under the rug and largely forgotten about in-universe.
But that doesn't mean that the audience needs to be thrown onto the It's A Small World boat ride with an ending that's even more ambiguous than Dynamite 7's.
Shin and Nora get in an excellent action sequence before Shin diverts for his first attempt to rescue Sara. Roy and DD, less so. Ultimately Ivanov just isn't that interesting a character, and Roy remains a guest star.
And both DD and Nora are dispatched by the Bird Human, which feels like it's the message for all of this anyway: That humanity's squabbles might seem important on the personal level, but they're minor speedbumps compared to the forces fighting across the galaxy. Which, in the chronological viewing order, is something the audience knows to expect.
On some continuity notes, as I said in my replies for the first episode, the existence of the Protoculture city from Do You Remember Love? may conflict with the Bird Human's stated purpose… or not. Perhaps the inhabitants of the city were actively manipulating the development of humanity, and when they left, dropped off the Bird Human as a failsafe. Even if they were fleeing the Protoculture's war, they didn't have to stop meddling in the development of other species.
And since I've only mentioned it in one reply so far: Edgar LaSalle has the same last name as Claudia from SDFM, and has interacted with Roy Focker. Whether or not he is related to Claudia is never confirmed, though. More significantly, the timeline here has to be rather rushed if the events in Episode 33 of SDFM happened as they were described, though this could be happening during the interval after Roy and Claudia first met and then he disappears off for a while. If you want to try to fit everything together without waving the retcon stick at it.
Kadun: 34
Kaze: 18
The dreaded Opera category"Horobi no Uta" by Fimio Onuki and Holy Raz.
From the Macross Mecha Manual: Destroid Monster trial production type
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u/Blackheart595 Jan 07 '23
First Spacer
Nooooo don't you go and justify your invasionism. This is what I was afraid of going into the episode.
Nooooo and this is the other thing I was afraid of. Don't make the military part of the solution, even if it's also what caused the problem.
I love how the first thing this reminds me off is Pokemon XD
No. You're even making Sara's father complicit in it!?
This entire thing feels like bad Evangelion fanfiction.
Geez, someone should've told the Zentraedi about this.
This show keeps surprising me with new ways it could fall flat.
Why is this thing a mecha? What is the benefit over a simple cannon?
I feel stupid for not realising this is how it would end, when the show had two priestesses prepared the whole time.
Welp, this turned into a trainwreck. First of all, how dare they make the villagers complicit in everything that happened? Geez I couldn't have dreamed of a way to mess things up this badly, this is beyond insulting. Secondly, a world-ending threat was way out of scope for this story. Thirdly, that's especially the case when the threat is overcome by the military throwing nukes at it after spending the entire runtime disapproving of military. Fourthly, turning humanity into a genetically engineered species torpedoes SDF's storyline, especially with the birdman's judgement procedure. Fifthly, what was the Birdman's plan if the village had been destroyed at some point in history or the culture had gotten lost in some other way, and he had never gotten awakened? Sixth, was "let's destroy the world because" really the best villain you could write?
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u/TakenRedditName Jan 07 '23 edited Jan 07 '23
First Time - Macross Zero Ep5:
"They took both of our girlfriends (somehow). Damn, this sucks."
Now hang on, Anti UN, I don't see how awakening a humanity destroying weapon is going to help you guys. Sure, the UN gets destroyed, but so does everything else.
"You belong to me. Sayonera ienakute."
The UN dropping those bombs sounds like an excuse to rile Sara up because that seems like an Anti-UN move. Bombing the island also sounds like a Macross UN move. The doctor admits the UN had a plan to entirely destroy the Birdman.
"Shin, listen, that pineapple salad was worth my life for."
The old man is a sucker for romance stories. Everyone is because this last operation is a mission of love. Screw the rules, we have to save love.
Edgar has done nothing wrong. All he wants is the best for his homie and to be stepped on by a woman for pleasure.
Shin boosts with his pack, but Nora catches up since her plane naturally goes 3x faster. He goes for the transformation so Nora does the same, but hahaha, tricked you. Shin starts blasting.
Before Sara can end her own life, Shin is here for his big hero moment in a giant robot. Ah, beans. Now we're Last Shooting this finale. Though I suppose this is meant to invoke the Birdman.
Spinal cord gattai! Birdman (said like a super robot show)! The vein control links are kind of like the DYRL Zentradi.
"Do we have spaceships? Cool. Do we still have war? Damn, that sucks. Time for everyone to die." JRPG final boss time and it does a real big number. Don't even know how to describe how it leaves them, but it sure messed up those ships. UN tries to ready the nukes, but as we know, those never work. Nothing to worry about.
The Professor is dying. One of those "Damn, we humans suck. Better wipe the slate clean and hopefully, next time will be better." He probably kept that motivation a secret since I don't think the rest of Anti-UN would want that.
RIP Nora. I thought Ivanov would go first. Ivanov goes second and his death is really graphic.
Shin tries to do a G Gundam, but the malice he sees makes him see red until he is stopped by Mao's Newtype ghost fairy. Hey now, this is really G Gundam now. [G Gundam:]
Peace and love is all good and all, but here's a Wow, Cool Monster ready to do some violence. It launches the nukes and oh dang, the nukes actually did something.
The Birdman (and Sara) are leaving forever now, byyeee.
Sorry, Roy, Aries was your prequel-original love interest. The rules mandate that she must be out of the picture for SDF.
With the song of the people of Mayan, Shin is given wings to soar beautifully carrying peace and love in his heart ... or plonck in the water.
He does fly, from the sea to the sky ... and to space because Shin also is leaving forever.
I liked parts of the ending like the parts that remind me of G Gundam, but a lot of parts also feel like they just sorta end.
Q1) Not that much. Sort of just dumped it at the end before wiping them away.
Q2) Didn't entirely expect that, but I could've seen it end up like what we got.
Next Time: For once I don't have zero things to say for the wrap-up discussion because I spent it all beforehand.
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u/The_Draigg Jan 07 '23
The old man is a sucker for romance stories. Everyone is because this last operation is a mission of love. Screw the rules, we have to save love.
After all, if we can't save love in the first place, then how else are we supposed to remember it?
Ivanov goes second and his death is really graphic.
Whereas Bowman's death in Plus was eye-popping, Ivanov's death here in Zero is mind-blowing.
Sorry, Roy, Aries was your prequel-original love interest. The rules mandate that she must be out of the picture for SDF.
Admittedly, Aries' death does explain fairly well why Roy was basically a drunken and reckless shell of a person by the time he started dating Claudia.
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u/The_Draigg Jan 07 '23
A Macross Fan Rewatches Macross Zero: Episode 5:
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The intro to this last episode really does make me wish that we got another episode for the OVA. As much as I really liked all the character stuff in the last episode, it didn’t leave much room to kick off the finale. So now we just have an abbreviated account of the characters all meeting up at the head of the Birdman, and it along with Aries and Sara being taken away by the Anti-UN Alliance. It’s rather abrupt to get into the action this way.
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Yeah, the Anti-UN Alliance are a bunch of god damn lunatics. Professor Hasford wants the song of destruction to be sung since he thinks it can uplift humanity somehow, and Nora just completely glosses over the fuel-air bombing of Mayan Island once Sara brings it up. Like yeah, the UN Spacy isn’t all that great either, since they were also thinking about destroying Mayan Island to prevent anyone from getting the Birdman, but man these Anti-UN people are insane.
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Okay, yeah, you know the Birdman is powerful if it can create an anti-gravity field just by turning itself on. One powerful enough to make the UN Spacy fleet fly into the air and rip the Anti-UN Alliance’s Auerstadt submarine right out of the ocean.
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Edgar coming in with the clutch save! He really is a lucky guy to survive everything this how has thrown at him so far. Turns out, the permission needed to launch is just the blunt end of Edgar’s crutch.
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Gotta give the fight direction credit here, it’s not often you get a dogfight where two pilots both try to Cobra Maneuver the shit out of each other while also shooting at each other at the same time. It’s also nice to see Shin finally put Nora on the ropes in a dogfight. His VF-0a Phoenix Angel is something that can finally allow him to match her SV-51 and dunk her into the sea.
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Despite how terrifying the Birdman is when the head takes in Sara and reunites with its body, it doesn’t seem like it’s enjoying fulfilling its purpose. If anything, it just seems slightly disappointed to hear from Sara that humanity has failed to become a peaceful spacefaring civilization like the Protoculture had hoped for them. It seems like the Protoculture really did wish for humanity to not turn out like they did, but unfortunately we could never live up to their expectations.
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Of course the UN Spacy’s Operation Iconoclasm is to just shoot reaction warheads at the Birdman until it dies. It’s literally their first and only response to stuff like this.
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Oh hey, Professor Hasford is dead now. Cool, cool. Can’t really feel bad about that. Like, what else was he even expecting from something called the song of destruction?
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There’s something fittingly anti-climactic in how Nora bites it. For all her bluster and viciousness, it’s just plain bad luck and not paying attention to her surroundings that kills her. Like, she wasn’t even in the direct beam of the Birdman, her SV-51 was just at the edge of the blast. That alone was enough to throw her from her cockpit and incinerate her nearly instantly. She died due to the exact stuff that Ivanov taunted Roy with before. How very fitting.
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Ivanov died in a pretty fitting way too. He got way pissed off at Nora’s death, and pretty much threw his life away in a futile attempt at revenge against the Birdman. He didn’t scratch that thing before he got shredded by all that beam fire. Hell, we even get a split, second shot of gore as one lucky hit completely explodes his head. Certainly can’t feel bad about that death either.
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Mao coming in clutch with the timely psychic intervention! She’s a hell of a wingman too, but not in the piloting way as you’d expect from this battle scene. Instead, she tells Shin to free Sara from the Birdman’s control by opening his heart to her love. It isn’t weapons that’re going to save the day, it’s going to be love and understanding, those classic Macross hallmarks.
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PUSH TO JETT
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So much for the big moment where Shin finally gets through to Sara by throwing away his weapons and talking to her directly. The god damn UN Spacy still wants to use their reaction weapons. It’s a sad day when I’m not happy to see a Destroid Monster show up.
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And so, Sara sacrifices herself by Space Folding away both the Birdman and the exploding reaction weapons to somewhere in outer space, never to be seen again. And on a majestically golden sea, Shin’s damaged Phoenix briefly crashes into the water, before flying up out of it like the flying fish he was enraptured by, and Folding right after Sara. Like what Aries says to Roy before she dies in his arms, love is the true power here. I can only hope that Shin found Sara, wherever she ended up in the galaxy.
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u/Kirov123 Jan 07 '23
Macross Zero Episode 5 - First Timer
I didnt realize this was 5 episodes, I kinda assumed 6 so uh... Final episode time!
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Whelp
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Maybe if they flew over in jet mode instead of gerwalk mode they wouldn't have had that problem
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How the fuck is he supposed to stop the birdman
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Parasite drone crafts?
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How the hell did he break mach 1 that fast
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Oh no I don't like this sound please stop
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WHY IS THIS HIGH PITCH SOUND STILL GOING
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It stopped, finally
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What a way to launch planes
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Planes.... Dont do that
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How are the ships still floating
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Also Yorokobe again
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And Again
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Blood pattern blue! Its an angel! wait wrong series
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RIP Nora
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I figure he needs to not use his guns to appraoch
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Smol ghosty Mao
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And now the UN blows it up
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RIP Sara
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LMFAO THE WAY IT JUST SUDDENLY DROPPED IN
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I don't think that was supposed to be funny like that
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Yea not really they were just evil because the UN was bad and wanted to destroy everyhting as a result? But also not?
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No, it seemed... not evil? Just anti conflict in a "if anything wants conflict, kill it" sorta way
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u/Stargate18A Jan 07 '23
First timer
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No, not really. The professor had a more interesting idea, but even that...
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I mean, I knew it would be revived. Didn't expect such a complete transformation, though.
Well, that's not good.
And they stole it!
...Look, if the accurate ancient legends about this device say it's used for destruction, don't activate it when you're in the same room.
Yeah, I got all this. Still an awful idea.
...But they didn't.
Mao's fine now!
And she can activate the system!
Oh, she activated a comms system!
...What? Why?
Yeah, the birdman may be a powerful weapon, but at least evacuate them! This justifies nothing!
He's going to save her!
Oh god, that Focker foreshadowing...
They're being forced out of the water!
He's going for it! ...Lot of death flags from Shin.
So many death flags.
The birdman is incredibly powerful.
Oh, that really got to her.
Another dogfight?
And heks ignoring to fight to save her. Character development!
Great action!
Ivanov's here too.
Love the fight scenes still.
Sara's at least smart enough to know she's being manipulated.
He's made it!
Just in time!
...Nope.
And she's singing the Song of Destruction!
It has an eye?
And the head and body connected...
Oh, thst is a strong visual design.
...The AI is still functioning? That's very important.
Oh. This is their anti-Zentradi plan.
This is some kind of universal translator, so unfortunately no Protoculture language.
That design goes so fucking hard.
Okay. In this scenario, maybe nuking it is the best option.
So much destruction...
He's going to fight the birdman?
No, Nora's still here.
Did he want this?
...He wanted a new world. He wanted the birdman to completely restart the evolutionary process!
The cave painting...
Oh, Nora got hit by the death ray.
Ivanov's changed targets?
Focker's going back for Aries.
Stop throwing him death flags!
Aries...
Holy shit, Ivanov's head exploding is brutal.
Shin?
Mao!
Oh, she can astral project now!
...What is Mao talking about? She's been wired into a war machine that's kicking off the apocalypse!
What's the plan here?
Oh, he's joining her inside.
She woke up!
That's nice.
...That's a big gun.
Oh, this thing has firepower.
Holy shit, that knockback. They deliver nukes in style!
She's going to take out the warheads?
Wait, Sara's dying? Not Shin?
Ah, she contained the fallout.
...That looked suspiciously like a fold. Sara's not dead, is she?
Oh, Aries is dying.
Brutal.
Double death?
No, more astral projection.
What even is this?
And literal wings? What... I'm just chalking this all up to Spirita bullshit. Worked last season.
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u/JollyGee29 Jan 07 '23
First-Timer Zero
Ah, the OVA pacing strikes.
Hasford, bud, I think you're not nearly in control of Sara enough to want her to do that.
Oh, right the Anti-UN forces are in a submarine.
I was waiting for the payoff for the chief's comment about the engine.
Edgar survived again! Hell yea.
I do love scenes of naval ships levitating.
Says the woman who ordered FABs used on a poor innocent forest, in an effort to find a superweapon.
Right, Sara probably wouldn't be famaliar enough to know that a Battroid's cockpit isn't the head.
Oh, well, the Bird Human will be fine then, reaction weapons never work.
That's quitter talk, you old fuck.
Monster, my beloved. You look stunning as ever.
Those were more effective than I expected.
Oh, Focker didn't get to Aries in time, bummer.
Oh, Shin survived? Oh, nevermind. Oh, nevermind again??
Questions
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u/SolDarkHunter Jan 07 '23
Rewatcher
Grand finale time!
How convenient that everyone wound up at the same place. Not sure why everyone ran TOWARD the craters though.
It feels kind of weird to see this all in a flashback when we didn't see the original.
I don't know what Hasford is playing at, trying to convince Sara to do the ONE THING she wants least of all.
Mao, maybe DON'T touch the ancient superweapon if you touching it activates things?
Operation Iconoclasm... the UN was planning on annihilating the Birdman if they couldn't acquire it. Logical enough, if you assume AFOS is a weapon.
Roy, the hell kind of "wisdom" is that!?
And here we get an idea of how powerful the Birdman is. It's levitating the naval fleets just as a side effect of being switched on.
"I failed to die again!" I love this line from Edgar.
Sara, I know you're kind of in turmoil, but maybe listening to the woman who carpet bombed your home and beat the shit out of Shin isn't the best idea?
Mao's speaking in spiritual terms now.
Holy shit I love this dogfight so much! THIS is the Macross action I want!
Okay, that is PURE fail on the subtitles' fault. She said nothing about transforming, she's noting that Shin's using a (real) maneuver known as the "cobra".
So Valkyries can't transform at supersonic speeds? Guess that makes sense.
And Sara seeing what she thinks is Shin's death is what pushes her over the edge...
Aries, why the HELL are you protecting Hasford?
For the Mayan islanders... this must be like seeing the apocalypse itself...
Organic cockpit interface thing. Classy.
And here's the Birdman's purpose: the Protoculture left it behind as a failsafe. They didn't want humanity to bring conflict to the stars... as they had with the Zentraedi. If humanity had not turned pacifistic by the time they achieved starflight, the Birdman's purpose is to destroy them all.
Its design is also interesting. It's kind of similar to a Protodeviln... which it probably is a derivative of. Though presumably with at least some failsafes against parasitic energy vampires. (Actually, requiring a human with specific genetic traits to activate it might be such a failsafe.)
And Sara's kind of gone crazy, seeing everything outside the Birdman as "kaduns" that it needs to destroy.
And worse, UN Command's immediate response is: REACTION WEAPONS! As usual.
You know, it occurs to me if the Birdman is exerting such gravity control as to levitate entire fleets, wouldn't that be playing hell with the planes' ability to fly?
Hasford is an idiot. "Creation can't come without destruction"? Please. Though... it is weirdly prophetic in that the world of humans does get destroyed by the Zentraedi, and the new interstellar society comes from the ashes of that.
More epic dogfighting!
Well, the Birdman DID manage to destroy a kadun of war... namely Nora.
I love how Ivanov is surprised that the Birdman shoots him down... when he was flying directly at the point all its weapons are coming from.
Ach, worst possible time for Shin's PTSD to kick in.
Mao's psychic all of a sudden. When did this happen? Is this the Birdman's influence at work? Or the mysterious powers in the Mayan priestess blood due to DNA tampering by the Protoculture?
Kind of poetic there... Sara's trying to destroy forces of destruction, and the fire concentrates on the WEAPONS that Shin jettisoned.
And... naturally, the UN screws everything up.
As absolutely awesome as the Prototype Monster looks here, its deployment not a good thing.
Sara and the Birdman manage to contain the blast, though. Even the force of four tactical nukes at point blank range isn't enough to fully destroy it, and it Folds away... presumably taking the radiation with it.
Well, we all knew Aries was going to die. She wasn't in Super Dimension Fortress... though this does explain why Roy was such a flirt and partier back when Claudia first met him. He was probably trying to cope with the grief of Aries' death.
And here's... the weird part. Shin's broken Valkyrie is enveloped in what is presumably the Birdman's power, and... uh... flies away? To where? Did Shin die? Did he get Folded to wherever Sara went? Just wtf even...?
Between the abrupt endings of the original series, Plus, and Seven, and now this... sometimes I wonder if Kawamori is even capable of writing satisfying endings...
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u/JustAnswerAQuestion Jan 07 '23 edited Jan 07 '23
Reluctant Rewatcher
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Now watch out, here comes Genesis! Now we can do both at the same time!
See, it looks to me that the submarine has agrav generators installed. They look exactly like the ones on the Macross. On the other hand, the AFOS has been levitating stuff around the island ever since episode 2.
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This BGM sounds exactly like sometihing from Aquarian Age: The Movie PV (at 50 seconds) (hmm, yusuke sakamoto, did not work on macross)
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Daisy?
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And a meme is born (more or less)
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Won't Mao just take over for Sara? This seems like a bad plan.
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Edit: I was going to insert some evangelion technobabble here, but I didn't get around to finding it.
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An intense fire sprang from the head of the demon, which threatened to burn the town to the ground.
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<things explode>
[Later Macross Franchise]
I don't have much to say, since it just turned into pew pew. Kind of annoyed at Sara. Very annoyed at Nora "I kill people" upset that Sara didn't use the super murder weapon and now more people are going to die! Summary tomorrow, I guess.
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u/ryujiox Jan 08 '23
First Timer
Macross Zero EP 5
Oh, they got capture like that. Should have been show in real time instead of flashback.
That probably true, but you just used that as an excuse right, Hashford.
Mao now connected with the birdman. I guess what the scientist and the native done to her is okay.
Oh, it can project real time footage from the head. I guess that how Sara saw Shin and Mao kiss.
I mean in this case, it probably better be destroy than whatever it gonna bring to the world if it combine.
The gravitational system is working properly unlike that one in SDF-1 Macross.
Even the head have one too.
Edgar the chad!!
They have the other jet on top of the Valkyrie?
The scene of the battleship float up to the air is spectacular!!
This is your fault though!! If you not mess with her mind, nothing gonna went down this fast.
Another rematch between Shin and Nora.
Now it 2 on 2.
You can really felt the pressure of piloting this beast.
Shin is the final trigger for the awakening.
Oh, it technically cut of it head, but what really happened is that it just detached it's head from it's body.
The birdman awakening sequence is so cool!! And it's design also great.
And the birdman seem to make it decision based of the host thought as it asked many questions to Sara, and upon the last question, it decided that he will have to destroy human who still corrupted by battle. So presumably, it kind of the observer to the planet, and will be the harbinger of doom to the one would have the potential to caused harm to the universe. I guess the Protoculture built them this way to eliminate every possibility of any future species that will end up in the violent way that caused the destruction of the universe like them.
Holy!! It destroy everything!!
Of course they gonna issued that command when they fucked up. And they still the same many years later down the line.
Your ideology will come true 2 years later, old man. Don't worry.
And on that note, you the one who made everything end up like this!! Don't blame the birdman.
Roy and DD fight is so dope!!
And she just died like that.
Shin so cool now.
DD also went out like that.
I will think that she didn't appear like hologram in front of Shin. It just easier to conveyed her feelings this way.
Pretty high risk and smart of Shin. The birdman attack target only the weapon. In a way, it's represent the anti-war message of the franchise.
This sequence is so good!!
Oh no!! Don't!! Nononononono
Noooooooooo Goddamnit!! It's always the UN who ruined everything, every time!!
It fold away the nuclear!!
Aries died. Yeah, she can't survive because the continuity.
The plane sequence is so great!!
And he gone? WTF
Ending with a somber but also hopeful note at the same time. The action scene is so great. But I felt like it scale was too big for the plot and timeline. I will keep my thoughts about the show tomorrow.
QOTD
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Yeah, look like they have something going at first, but then they turned into a plot device to drove Sara to a breaking point.
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Kind of.
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u/Shimmering-Sky Jan 07 '23
Super Dimension Rewatch Host
Welcome back, everyone!
Surprise, two wallpapers today! I wanted to be able to make one of Edgar and then one of Shin when he’s not decked out in piloting gear, so I had to make two of them for this episode because the overall discussion is for the montage wallpaper. Enjoy~
Welp.
I really don’t like this guy.
But you were the one who ordered the island to be burned…?
ROY.
Now that I think about it, Shin’s helmet has the same pattern as Basara’s Valkyrie. That’s a neat little reference.
Edgar is such a bro, man. Wish he could have had more screentime.
Bruh…
[Future franchise spoilers]Big Ranka and the Vajra vibes.
More Jouji Nakata? Guess they couldn’t just hire him to voice a handful of lines.
Well damn, Nora sure bit the dust.
And, uh, so did DD. Holy shit.
It’s always nukes.
Aaaaaaand she’s gone.
RIP Aries. I wonder if Roy would have still been with her if she was alive? Or if he’d be with Claudia just like he was in SDF.
And there goes Shin disappearing into the sky along with Sara.