Rebooting Robotech for TV - animation or live action, which is better?

I just reread my post... Sorry Darthbill I didn't mean to attack you. Your posts here are always good. I was having a bad day when I responded. So, I will give you my honest opinion about a new Robotech Movie/Television series. I would rather a Trilogy of films based on Macross. The only proble m is that I fear it will suck. In my opinion Transformers was an insult to the original cartoon (which was very flawed to begin with). I don't want another complete rein visioning of the franchise. The basic story is there as are the robot designs and characters. So, there is no need for some Hollywood "intellectual" to go in and start adding his two cents. Just follow the story line from either the television series or better yet follow the books. I wouldn't want a television series because I don't want to see CGI Robotech. Also, CGI people look too fake to my eyes. Or at least to human characters in Transformers Prime looked (to me) terrible. I am also concerned over whether or not it would be Robotech or PC Robotech. I do not- DO NOT- want a PC version of Robotech! I also don't want "cute" irritating kids. Modern cartoons are riddled with irritating characters who are meant to be endearing, but aren't in the slightest! So, I hope you understand the reason for my previous rant. I didn 't mean it to be a personal attack. Sorry.

All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.

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I don't want a reboot. I think it should be left alone. Every Gi Joe series after the original sucked, every Transformers series after Beast Wars sucked, every Voltron series after the original sucked, The new Thundercats sucked, the new He-Man was okay, but for me He-man will always be the first ten min comics. And in all honesty I didn't really like the original He-Man television series to begin with.

I haven't seen most of the other GI Joe animated reboots or the Voltron follow ups or the Transformer follows up beyond Beast Wars & Beast Machines (and I hated BM) so I can't comment on any of those. I only saw bits & pieces of the new Thundercats and from what I understand that series suffered from a lot of executive meddling (who knows, maybe if we ever get another Thundercats reboot we'll have Lion-O as the wise old mentor and Jaga as his young protege). I liked the He-Man reboot, still sad it got axed, and never read the mini-comics so again I can't comment on those.

However, I will admit right now to not being a fan of the Star Trek reboot films, and I'm not even a die hard Star Trek-er fan, I've always been more of a casual fan, so trying to judge those films on their own... there's just something about them that doesn't click with me, even though there were things I liked in them & about them. I liked Chekov being less of an idiot, but didn't care for what they did with Scotty, nor did I like the time travel shenanigans, the presence of Leonard Nimoy despite how awesome he is, I thought Nero was a weak villain in the 09 film and I didn't care for what they did with Khan in Darkness.

Every time some dumb film studio has the "brains" to "reimagine" something they screw it up. Sure they may update the art work or throw some "fancy", but fake looking CGI on it, but they almost always lose the heart soul and essence of what it originally was. Why reimagine it, why mess with it? Why not just rerelease it to the airwaves again? I don't understand this talentless obsession with reimagining prior shows (that were perfectly fine the way that they were) that is going on nowadays. And for the life of me I can not understand why people (like the original poster) are clamoring for more crappy remakes, reimagining's and retellings of things that were fine the way that they were.

I just reread my post... Sorry Darthbill I didn't mean to attack you. Your posts here are always good. I was having a bad day when I responded.

No offense taken, I've been known to behave badly on IMDB forums myself.

Speaking for myself I don't think it's impossible to take an existing property and give it a superior re-imagining. Difficult yes, but not impossible. There's a line in THE AGONY & THE ECSTASY from a scene where Michelangelo is clashing with the priests over his chapel ceiling, they bring up the artwork of the Greeks & ol' Mike starts ranting "Why shouldn't we equal them [the Greeks]? Surpass them if we can?"

I don't mean to discredit Robotech and its appeal as it is or disrespect its long standing fanbase, to which I am still relatively new, but looking at it now there are things that I feel could be done better, characters who could be fleshed out more, plots that could be developed and explored, etc. Miriya Parina (Parino? I can never remember how its spelled), the Zentradie pilot who falls for Max Sterling, is full of story telling potential with the whole "stranger in a strange land" angle, her introduction into human society, her awakening to emotions she never knew she had or could feel - love, grief, guilt, regret, etc. She's from a warrior caste system and undoubtedly helped destroy countless worlds before coming to Earth, how would she cope with the sense of guilt from years of doing bad things once such a concept is introduced to her? How do she and Max play off each other? We see what Max could bring out in her, but what could Miriya potentially bring out of Max himself? What other aspects of Max's character could be brought to the surface from being around someone like Miriya?

And then there's the other things that could be tightened up, such as the far reaching adventures of Rick Hunter and co as they venture out into space to deal with the Robotech Masters while the Southern Cross do their thing on Earth, something that couldn't be done before due to the cut & paste nature of the series conception and other unforeseen events (see the back story of the Robotech Sentinels debacle). Today a modern writing team could split the difference between Rick and the gang's adventures out in space with the antics of Dana Sterling & her pals on Earth as they tangle with Zor Prime and all that (I'm actually rewatching the series right now so please bear with me if my memory is rusty - also I haven't had a chance to read any of the EU novels or comics) split the difference again with the Macross Saga characters trying to get home, the Southern Cross characters fate(s) and the adventures of Scott Bernard and his rag tag team of misfits in the 3rd act.

So, I will give you my honest opinion about a new Robotech Movie/Television series. I would rather a Trilogy of films based on Macross.

I take it you have no interest then in the Masters/Southern Cross and New Generation storylines/characters?

The only problem is that I fear it will suck.

You're no alone in that fear.

In my opinion Transformers was an insult to the original cartoon (which was very flawed to begin with).

The Transformers films are terrible, no argument here on that (still can't bring myself to endure the 3rd one). As a friend of mine once said - the original Transformers show may have been a toy commercial but at least it gave you what you expected to see - big robots hitting each other. You get that with the Bay movies too but you also have to put up with 2 hours of unfunny jokes and unlikable characters. I don't know if that changed with the 4th one or not.

I don't want another complete rein visioning of the franchise. The basic story is there as are the robot designs and characters. So, there is no need for some Hollywood "intellectual" to go in and start adding his two cents. Just follow the story line from either the television series or better yet follow the books. I wouldn't want a television series because I don't want to see CGI Robotech. Also, CGI people look too fake to my eyes. Or at least to human characters in Transformers Prime looked (to me) terrible. I am also concerned over whether or not it would be Robotech or PC Robotech. I do not- DO NOT- want a PC version of Robotech! I also don't want "cute" irritating kids. Modern cartoons are riddled with irritating characters who are meant to be endearing, but aren't in the slightest!

I'm not looking for a wildly off the wall re-envisioning of Robotech so much as I'd like to see a fresh but more tightly plotted & connected version of the story, if that makes sense. As for whether it's "PC" or not, well, I'm more interested in not just rehashing *everything* beat for beat, PC or not makes no real difference to me as long as the writing is good. Yes, certain key story-lines, arcs & themes are necessary but I don't just want complete rehashes of "Broken Heart", "Rainy Night" (you have to admit Rick trash talking Lisa in front of her workers probably wouldn't go over well with today's audiences) and/or "Private Time". I could barely tolerate the suicide inducing levels of angst Rick Hunter put Lisa Hayes through the first time I watched the series (I was like "Okay I get it, love sucks, Rick's a jerk, Minmei's a brat, Lisa's an idiot with bad taste in men, now JUST *beep* END ALREADY!!!") and I'd rather not have to go through it all over again. Maybe it's blasphemy but I didn't like Rick Hunter that much as a protagonist to begin with (I prefer Scott Bernard) and throwing half his character development under a bus just to drag that subplot out probably added to my dislike of him, and there are/were so many more interesting things/characters to focus on than such an unpleasant triangle that had outlived its usefulness (not that it did wonders for Lisa or Minmei). Lord knows a day in the life of Max, Miriya & little Dana would have been more entertaining than the rehashing of Lisa/Rick/Minmei

So... yeah, as I said in the official reboot thread, if we ever do get a reboot, I don't want the Macross saga portion being defined/bogged down with that triangle, not when we could go deeper in exploring/modernizing the friendships between Rick, Max and Ben, the class warfare between the Zentradie, their connection to the Robotech Masters, etc. I could make a short list of other ideas, notes, even possible episode titles/summaries, scenes/character interactions but I'm not if they'd get read either here or in the other thread.

As for "irritating kids" well every decade of shows/movies/literature has those. Annie from New Generation might be seen as irritating by today's standards - even back then she may have been seen as such. What are Spike from Transformers and the Thunderkittens from THUNDERCATS if not irritating kids? ;)

So, I hope you understand the reason for my previous rant. I didn 't mean it to be a personal attack. Sorry.

Again, no offense taken. I'm just as guilty as anyone else of behaving badly on internet forms, be it here or Toonzone or Superhero Hype, etc.

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