Macross F

This won't be a masterpiece of a review, but this was definitely a masterpiece of an anime.

Story: This is a continuation of the themes from previous Macross's. As before, the story revolves around a space struggle for the future of the human race against an alien "aggressor," but as usual, there is a deeper plot occuring than anyone originally understands. Like previous Macross installations, this anime also revolves largely around music. The story is deep and complex, but still easily understandable. The anime does not run out of plot at any point in time, and does not go ... bat-#$&* insane in the last quarter of the anime to make up for having no story left like many others, especially in the sci-fi genre.

Art: The visuals were stunning on a level I don't recall ever seeing in an anime before. They were both beautiful and incredibly high quality.

Sound: This being Macross, the story in a large part revolves around singing as a means for peace. As you might expect in such a situation, the music is incredible and is used throughout the anime, both as background material and as the primary focus of some scenes. Macross is as much a musical as a sci-fi series...and its great!

Character: Without spoiling things too much, the characters are perfect. They act as they should, with the evil characters being manipulative and conniving, adroitly attempting to bring their ends to fruition without the usual stupid and illogical failings that you find in many other animes. The protagonists fight for their principles, and Macross does a great job of making you feel what they feel, from the relationships between them to the sorrow when one is lost.

Enjoyment: Macross will grab you at the start, keep you up all night watching, then leave you feeling great after it's over. It's simple...Macross kicks ass.

~My second review~

Hello, everyone! Today I am going to throw out the review on Macross Frontier!

This anime from the get-go brings much nostalgia from (Original) Macross, Macross Zero and Macross 7.

If you question the validity of this review you are welcome to do so. I have NOT watched the Macross (original series) but I have watched the movie. I HAVE watched all of the Robotech series and the Macross (Do you remember love Movie)
So on that context, let me start my review.

As I stated earlier, there are many points that I found from both the Macross movie and Macross 7. I personally enjoy all of ... Macross becuase it centers around culture and music.

The story from the beginning is powerful and runs along with the memories and traditions of what makes Macross great.

The art is definately first rate along with the much flashes and absoultely wonderful aircraft flight/fight scenes.

The sound. Oh my. Just like my previous review on Hikaru No Go, the music in this anime just drew me in instantly when I heard it. Again, this is another anime that just speaks volumes of "right music at the right time." The entire soundtrack absolutely flows. (Not to mention how traditonal it is having music from previous Macross series.) Of course w/ Yoko Kanno at the helm of the soundtrack, it is absolutely grand.

Character development is on one hand interesting and on the other hand inspiring. In these 25 episodes of Macross Frontier they definately try to fart out as much to get you feeling personally with each of these characters and want to hold onto their struggles. And in additon ask why things are going the way they are.

Enjoyment: It was a great series if you like seeing things blow up, and want to reminisce about Macross. It's quality is top notch and it is definitely an anime that I think is worth watching more than once.

Overall:
With great plot, story, character development and an overall wonderful feeling behind it, this anime is for you. If you dislike aircraft, a little bit of drama, and a anime that has a wonderful sense of purpose this anime is most likely not for you.

Thanks for reading this review, this was really hard to write w/out spoiling anything.

This series is one of the very few shows that I have watched again and again just for the sheer enjoyment of it.

It's set in the Macross universe somewhere between Macross 7 and Macross Plus. The premise is that humans have just recently survived their first contact with alien life forms and to avoid detailing the events of the original Macross saga, we'll just say that humanity was brought to the edge of extinction. To ensure the survival of the species, humans have left earth in giant self-sustaining city convoy ships with the goal of colonizing other planets. However, there is another ... species that is threatening the existence of the human race. Frontier is one of the massive convoy fleets and the setting for this show.

The alien species that humanity now faces is very much like Blizzard's Zerg and they plague Frontier and other convoys. The show revolves around several characters as they struggle to survive and find their paths.

This is the 25th anniversary series of the Macross saga and Macross Frontier is essentially a 'tip of the hat' to all of the other Macross shows and movies. That being said, the story is an excellent stand-alone salute. The viewer need have no prior knowledge of the original series, but it does add an extra level of enjoyment. It's a mecha anime in the same way that an old western is a horse movie. Unlike some other mecha shows, the Valkyrie and other machines are presented as nothing more than flashy tools that are used to overcome some trial rather than being part of the cast. The story is a simple one and doesn't bog the viewer down with complex terms, sub-plots and sub-sub-plots, or massive loads of tech jargon that nobody cares about. For this reason, it's very easy to pick up and fall in love with. It also helps that the first three episodes are absolutely incredible and will have you glued to the screen.

The characters follow a similar pattern to the original Macross saga. The protagonist is the stereotypical hot-head pilot who doesn't know what to do with himself, the older mentor, the bossy lieutenant, the grizzled veteran captain, the bridge-bunnies, and the protagonists two love interests (it wouldn't be Macross without a love triangle - it's even celebrated as the opening theme song, Triangular). The show has a huge cast and is remarkably able to pull it off, letting you get to know each one and their motivations through the course of the show without doing massive shonen-style info dumps.

The artwork is fantastic and carries through from the intense combat scenes to the more simple, daily life shots. The animation is very fluid through most of the show and the use of CG animation for the mecha is well done and rarely offends the eyes. There are a couple of action scenes where the level of detail and animation drops, almost as if those scenes were forgotten and added in after the fact.

The sound... this is where the Macross series always shines and Frontier is no exception. May'n and Nakajima Megumi perform most of the vocals (as well as voicing Sheryl Nome and Ranka Lee) and the rest is made up orchestral score and other instrumentals. This is one of very few series for which I purchased the soundtracks. Macross saga has always been heavily grounded in music and it shows through in Frontier.

If you haven't already figured it out, I very much enjoyed this show and I highly recommend it. I would almost recommend this show as a primer to the rest of the Macross series as there are so many little bits and pieces of all of the Macross titles that preceded it sprinkled in.

THIS ANIME IS THE GREATEST i most say i was jus blown away by the characters nd the over all plot of this anime it was all emotional nd it jus captured my heart...wen it was all done my breath was jus taken away i WAS speechless literally.. u gotta watch it nd c it for urself =).i had my doubts bout it but there is none now im listening to the sound track atm nd wow i gotta say the songs of this anime is the best i have ever heard.the the ROMANCE is absolutely superb i jus love it. THIS ANIME HAD ... ME AT THE EDGE OF MY SEAT i THINK I HELD MY BREATH AT THE LAST EPISODE cuz i had no idea how everything would turn out. but it all worked out nd im so HAPPY THAT MY FREND RECOMMEND THIS ANIME TO ME nd i KNO that all will love it....ITS ABSOLUTELY GREAT nd u gotta watch it all the way thru to feel the true intensity of it i was jus WOWED by this anime..i gotta say its a must watch ^^

This is a series where I did not feel the story/plot would have carried the show, but the character development certainly did.

The story itself is mediocre-fair. Half way in, if someone asked me what the plot was, I would not have been able to give a coherent, comprehensive, and accurate answer. Today, if someone asked me, I'd be able to only give a vague 1 sentence answer.

So why the hell did I keep on watching?

The characters! You have Alto, Sheryl, and Ranka - a student who loves the skies but was born to a kabuki family, an established galactic idol, and a flegling singer who ... wants to become like Sheryl. The first is stuck in a complex where people call him "Princess", as if he's not masculine enough. He's also trying to become something his family opposes. The second is a confident, independent character seemingly overflowing with success in the entertainment industry. The third..is your typical shoujo girly girl, more or less. This is how they start out.

As I watched the show, every episode focuses on these three characters in a way that shows the audience how they grow and change in reaction to the circumstances around them. It made them feel real, like people you could care about. They had realistic and in depth character issues that made me want to keep watching them to see how they resolved it.

Artwork wise, this show delivered well, especially for its time being produced in 2008 or so. It's artwork still surpasses even some modern anime.

Soundtrack for this series is excellent. It has some of the most emotional pieces (melody and lyrics wise) that I have seen in anime. It also has some catchy pieces that I can listen to even now in 2017. May'n did a wonderful job performing the vocals for Sheryl. Ranka's songs are a bit typical of the anisong genre but Aimo is still a very nice tune. It was also nice to hear Maaya Sakamoto in OP1.

Overall this was a very enjoyable experience. The characters are what carried the show and they are very well balanced too in that they helped one another grow.

I like the characters.
There are ones you'll like in an instant, but also ones that you'll hate once they say/do something annoying.
Unfortunately, that's what happened the first time I watched the first episode.
One character that completely made me hate her just by saying one line. Yes, well, I guess it can't be helped, it can really get to me seeing that kind of attitude and all.
But anyways, as the story progressed I actually came to...HATE her more. Unfortunately.
But, as I've found out about the things that have happened and are still happening to her, I've come to feel sympathy for her.
Well, I was just ... talking about one character...anyways...
This anime is definitely worth the watch!
It may be mecha, but it sure isn't as boring as it may seem. I'm not a big fan of mecha, but anything that can pique my interest certainly lasts. The story of this anime is just wonderful. Complicated at times, sad at times, breathtaking even, and it gets really exciting to the point that you jump on your seat when something terrible or super amusing comes in. Well, maybe that's just me...xD
It has great music too! Better not forget about that! Hehe.

I've fallen in love with Ranka (even though I'm a girl). Haha!
She's the cutest! x'3
Some of you might find her annoying but she's not to me. If I found her annoying, it's like I'm criticizing myself now. xD (I don't hate myself when I'm annoying..wait, am I even annoying?)
ANYWAYS!
You should all watch this anime!
Really awesome and exciting! The romance isn't all that super bubbly, but you'll prolly feel your mushy-juices bubbling once they ever come out! :'D
I know, it has happen! Hehe x']

İT İS ONE OF THE GREATEST SPACE ANİME İ HAVE EVER SEEN.

Macross Frontier is the story of a human space colony fleet trying to find a habitable planet near the center of the Milky Way Galaxy. The story focuses on three young adults and the events that occur around them as the fleet faces a crisis of alien origin

During a mission to an unexplored asteroid belt a reconnaissance New U.N. Spacy (N.U.N.S.) VF-171 is destroyed by extremely powerful and fast insectoid biomechanical alien mecha known as the "Vajra" which immediately begin their attack on the rest of the fleet. Unable to stop the new ... enemy threat, the N.U.N.S. Colonial Defense Forces authorize the deployment of a Civilian Military Provider organization called S.M.S. (Strategic Military Services) which utilizes the new VF-25 Messiah variable fighter to combat the alien menace.

STORY: GREAT 10
ART: SUPER 10
SOUND: AWESOME 10
ENJOYMENT: 10
OVERALL: 10

To this day, I have not written any reviews so far, but I do not regret writing one for Macross Frontier, which was so far the most memorable series that I've watched.

I am not a fan of sci-fic anime, and I could describe it as a genre that I avoid the most. However, Macross Frontier most certainly distinguishes itself from all other.

The story was very well written and I felt the series has alot more meaning to it than what it appears to be. It seems to convey a deep message about the real world, and I think that these sort of shows are the ... most meaningful to watch.

The artwork was quite impressive. However, at times it feels that the colors were a bit over done. But overall I was satisfied by the effort that was put in in terms of art.

Sound effects were nicely done. I just hook up my surround sound speakers and it feels like I am in the middle of a space war. But it is still excellent without the speakers. The music in my perspective was absolutely flawless and all of the songs fits the show quite well.

Character design was quite excellent. I have become immensly attracted to Ranka Lee right after her first appearance in the series. Character developemnt of all other characters were also nicely done.

And of course, I totally enjoyed myself while watching this series. I find myself craving for more after each and every episode and it was quite sad for me to see it all end.

I've rarely given any show, let alone sci-fic show much praise in the past. But Macross Frontier definitely deserve my praise. Overall a 10/10 from me for this series.

fluid dog-fight is the reason i got attracted to this anime, but while watching i sucked into it's atmosphere of tense of triangle love, and the song, i like the song, they have good songs almost as always



but i really don't like ecchi, but this feature will give this more score for certain viewer i think, think of it, a good CG model and animation, good story, good music, damn that's totally overkill, plus ecchi for certain viewer? any anime lover shouldn't missed this one, but i can't watch it without worry while my parents are with me

because of this anime, sometime ... i sing "lion", and "diamond crevasse" on college, and i'm a dude hahaha

TL;DR: Cut out the ending and its a masterpiece. Otherwise 8/10.

Few people may read this review as it's almost literally at the bottom of the heap of reviews written for this series. But I have to get my opinion out there. this anime is way too overhyped.

It does a lot of good things. It's strong points include the overall story, the character development, the (very) atmospheric music, the artwork and the design of the world. In fact, up until episode 20 or so I really thought I had come across a masterpiece worthy of a 10/10 rating. I even considered going and downgrading some ... of my other anime because this one raised the bar for me.

-- SPOILERS BEGIN -- Warning: Rant mode = ON

And then the anime brought out all its negatives. The series conclusion is stale, generic and a cliche of mecha anime that really has no place in a project of this ambition, that is otherwise quite unique and well-thought out. The ending is lazy writing at best; uninspired insipid plagiarism at its worst. The villain was well-thought out and her defeat is due to several deus-ex machinae that really frustrated me. I marathoned this anime and expected a good conclusion because the beginning was good and the story progression was stellar. For the anime to let me down at the 20 episode mark was horribly disheartening.

I was even a bit impressed by how the MC had managed to choose between the two girls who vie for his attention. Right at the end I'm given a cliched harem rom-com situation that I never expected. Why? Just why?

The music which usually fit the mood of each episode really deteriorated towards the ending as well. All in all, the ending threw off the anime from a masterpiece to a cringe-fest.

--End of SPOILERS --

This was a good anime and is worth watching but the ending is aggravatingly mediocre.

(Warning: contains spoilers)

Macross F (or Frontier) is extremely impressive, because I never thought an anime about idols singing teaming up with giant robots in space to save the world together could be THIS dull. It also puzzles me how people sing this so much praise, claiming it's the best Macross installment. Let me just make it clear that this is the first Macross I have watched; and yet, it was so bad it almost killed any desire I had of checking out the rest of the franchise.

I'll try my best to keep it short, but let me break down what I think are some of ... the most critical points that made F a bad anime.

The story starts following Alto Saotome, a pilot trainee, as he crosses paths with Sheryl Nome, a famous idol, and Ranka Lee, a regular girl who dreams of becoming one; all while bug-like aliens known as the Vajra invade the Frontier. Alto is then scouted into the Military, getting caught up between his battle duty and his relationship with Sheryl and Ranka, who increasingly get more and more involved with the intergalactic battles as well. Sounds interesting, right? Well, keep yourself seated. From then on, things start to get complicated; characters are introduced left and right. Political conflict, cyborgs, biological diseases, tragic backstories and copious amounts of romance are thrown into the mix. Everything quickly becomes extremely convoluted: they are unable to properly develop and explain everything they want to show us. Thus, Macross F suffers with HUGE issues in pacing and tone, especially pacing - there were some occasions where I kept asking myself if I missed out on something, because things happened so quickly I couldn't keep up.

When your main plot (and 60 subplots branching from it) is going this fast, of course it will crash. Things happened extremely suddenly, and with no foreshadowing whatesoever; we're just supposed to take at face value that Grace is the main antagonist, in a sudden reveal that makes it hard to take it seriously when nothing in the episodes leading up to this hinted on it. You're just supposed to accept that Mikhail's sister is dead, and that Sheryl was found rummaging through garbage and parentless (a huge plot inconsistency), and that Luca has a crush on Nanase. The reveal of the motive for Grace and the Vajra is so stupid I couldn't contain my laughter. And with all that, the big, emotional moments such as character deaths and tearful goodbyes are extremely hard to care about. Why should I when you squashed your reasons into a single one minute long scene instead of developing the characters properly throughout the show? And there is also the big bad of the entire thing: the love triangle, and the other smaller romances. A love triangle between Alto, Sheryl and Ranka was EXTREMELY unnecessary. I cannot stress enough how unnecessary it was, and how much it empoverished the show. There's no need to measure words: it was garbage. Alto treated both girls really badly (I'll expand on this later) and the girls would often commit acts of love for him, and feel motivated to do things for him, when not a single reason is given for them to feel and act this way. Not to mention that, in the end, after all that kissing and crying and touching, Alto doesn't even end up with either one. If you're going to write in a shitty love triangle into your setting about giant robots, at least compromise and give it a proper resolution instead of this cowardly, open ending bullshit. There's also a lot of dumb ass things that made no sense I could point out (like Ranka becoming famous overnight on the same beat as Sheryl falls out of stardom to the point people wouldn't recognize her on the street), but if I were to list them all I'd be here all week - there were just too many. To finalize, the battle scenes, which should be the highest point of F, put me to sleep. They are messy, full of the characters spouting bullshit technical terms and plot exposition that often made little sense, and I found myself completely uninterested in anything going on, even visually.

But well, as if all of this wasn't enough, the characters were even worse. Yes, I am sorry to say, they were so poorly written it was horrifying. Starting with Alto, our protagonist: I don't know what went so wrong here. Maybe they were aiming to make him a tsundere or just broody, but what they came out with was an asshole. Don't be fooled by descriptions saying Alto is "a normal high schooler" or "just a little broody". Alto is unlikeable from the get-go: he's always disproportionately angry at any and everything for absolutely no reason. He is always yelling at his own friends. And he is always treating the two girls who are in love with him like hot garbage - ESPECIALLY Ranka. It was painful and infuriating to see him make disgusted faces at Ranka and ignore her texts and calls, acting like she was a hassle but still leading her on while she was clearly in love with him. He was also overly aggressive with Sheryl, going as far as screaming at her about her lack of professionalism because she got sick while the girl is bedridden, so ill that she can't get up or move. Then he had random moments of tenderness where he acted nice to them, even though minutes prior he was being the biggest prick in the world, only to return to his default asshole state later. That's because his personality is about as consistent as a pile of diarrhea. He undergoes no real character development, which, well, guess it's fair since his entire character is so intolerable and inconsistent to begin with that I don't see any salvation. He had an interesting background as a Kabuki actor, but they barely explored it - and when they did, it was in the dumbest ways you can imagine, namely jokes about him being a "princess" and his brother trying to convince him to quit battling and go back to acting AS THE PLANET WAS ON THE VERGE OF BEING DESTROYED. Oh yeah, they also tried to explain the fact that he acts like a wolf with rabies with him having a dead mom. When this is the main character of your story, you're already starting off on the wrong footing.

The other two main characters are Sheryl and Ranka, who, like beaming hope at the end of a tunnel, are surprisingly both likeable and reasonably consistent. Ranka gets more relevance and a bigger role in the story; she is a bright, cheerful and kind young girl with a love of singing and a dream of becoming an idol, who later uses her voice to help fighting off the Vajra. Her lighthearted optimism sometimes almost made me forget how annoying everything else was. But unfortunately, Ranka gets treated horribly by her own narrative; between her family trauma, Alto being an absolute bitch, both the heroes and the villains using her for her magic voice, and even brainwashing, she doesn't seem to catch a break. Most of her motivation centers around Alto as well, which is absolute bonkers when she has two older brothers and friends who both care for and encourage her more than Alto ever did in his entire sorry life; ultimately, Ranka also gets very little development, only becoming very slightly less childish by the end. Sheryl, on the other hand, is headstrong, confident and a little arrogant, if anything - not without reason - with a friendlier side to her. She's extremely fun to watch and she owns the show whenever she's on the screen. But, once again, unfortunately, her character development is poorly handled. Instead of teaching her how to be more humble and caring of others, the narrative punishes her for her confidence with a terminal illness. The idea is that she is at her best when she's depressed and dying, rather than thriving on her career and aware of her own talent and presence. And again, the love triangle butts in to make things worse, where Sheryl acts oddly ooc when she's around Alto. Sheryl and Ranka's friendship has so much lost potential, too. The very few scenes they have together are very sweet, but they all end with Alto showing up to ruin everything. Sometimes they were weirdly, vaguely hostile to each other, because I guess they absolutely have to since they like the same guy. Go figure.

The rest of the cast... I don't even know if I should expand on them and make this review even longer than it already is. Let me just say they are bad, cookie cutter archetypes, and that I wish writers knew that they don't HAVE to pair up every single character with each other in forced, nonsense, dogshit romances. Every time Mikhail and Klan were onscreen with their bullshit I felt like barfing. Desk Man, Sugita Man, whatever is his name because I quite frankly don't remember or care, was the most boring villain I've ever seen and so ugly he hurt my eyes. Brera and Ozma were alright, as they at least they were consistent and nice to Ranka unlike everyone else in this show. In short, all you need to know is that none of them are particularly remarkable. Or interesting. Or well written. Or even good looking (Mikhail is really ugly, sorry to note. Who designed this?). What is with mecha anime with school settings and adding dozens of uninteresting, underdeveloped, stereotyped characters and expecting us to care about them all? I've sat through this with Valvrave and Code Geass and it's disappointing to see the pattern repeated in Frontier.

At least I can say ONE nice thing about all this, which is: the music is certainly amazing. I'm listening to Diamond Cravasse while I write this review, and Sheryl's vocals are like velvet - whereas Ranka's silky voice works perfectly on their duets, so props for that. I really wish the music was more important than the strange science and spaceships in the plot itself, but it's more of a decoration/thematic background. As for its visuals, maybe they were impressive back in 2008, but it just didn't age too well. The art looks pretty off and there's a bunch of animation blunders. And like I mentioned before, save for a select few, the character designs were offensive to the eye; Klan literally looks like she walked out of porn (what was with her wide eyed blushing every other minute), Cathy and her friends look really boring, Luca has nothing of note besides looking 10 years old and Mikhail is just God's mistake.

Summarizing all of it, Macross F maybe even had potential. A lot of its ideas were interesting and could have been amazing if properly developed and expanded on. But instead they went on the bland romance, misplaced fanservice and trainwreck route. That's a crying shame. I'll just move on to Macross Plus now and try to forget I ever watched this.

I’ve been watching every macross these past weeks, and this one is definitely the worst entry of the franchise. The music is amazing, the rest not so much. In every series i watched, i found the cast to be more or less really good, some characters i disliked strongly but not enough to trash the whole show; macross F manages to have the WORST cast out of every macross. Sheryl and Ranka are the saving grace of it, and Brera is also a good character, everyone else was either a blatant carbon copy of a past character (Cathy is obviously inspired by Misa and so ... on) or straight up unlikable. Alto is the worst macross protagonist ive met, his looks and background are so good but his personality? not so much. It’s obvious from the very beginning of the series that he prefers Sheryl, and yet he keeps on being uncertain and misleading Ranka, who ends up with a broken heart each time. The treatment of female characters in this show is absolutely terrible, from Ranka and Sheryl who are used for the worst love triangle i’ve ever seen, to girls like Cathy, Nanase, Klan, who did absolutely nothing except being used for fanservice and add to the amount of couples this show has. Klan was especially bad, the whole mess of having a different body when being micronized was absolutely disgusting, every other micronized zentradi is normal and then you have this girl who has either huge boobs or a childlike body depending on her size. Disgusting. Her romance with Michael was terrible as well, Michael always treated her like garbage and now before dying he confesses? Give me a break.
The enemies weren’t good either, Grace was the pinnacle of unlikable, the other guy was so irrelevant i dont even remember his name; all he did in this show is have sex with Cathy in one of the first episodes and thats about it.
Long story short: this show is shit. The music is fantastic but you can listen to it without watching this crappy anime.

The story was best so far its like chrome shelled regios...or gundam 00


if only alto chose sheryl i woul've voted 20/10 hehe it would've been perfect
i think that its the perfect match for them and i love them both to be together so the story could be more interesting..

i hope i could find another one like this with more stable romance ^_^

I've like or loved everything Macross/Robotech. I grew up in the early mid 80s watching the Robotech series. I've seen all the Macross series from the original to Macross II, Macross Plus and Macross 7. So I had pretty high expectations going in. On some parts my expectations were met, but on others they weren't.

The story was very good. Taking place after the war with the Zentradi who they now coexist with. The plot started off really good with the appearance of a mysterious race called the Vajra. Sadly though the story/plot slowly goes down hill ... from there. The problem could be there weren't really interesting characters, but I'll get that in a moment. The climax story was a total mess and didn't make any sense. The Vajra turned out to be almost pointless to the story. The ending was just a plan let down.

The characters were the worst part of the series. You or at least for me won't care for almost any of the characters. Alto was decent, but he came off as boring, he just had no back story or charisma. Ranka for some reason just got on my nerves. She wasn't much of a lead character. There were only a few I liked. Sheryl who was great character with a real story shouldn't have wasted her time on Alto. Also Michael who seemed to be the only real man in this anime. He had a great ending which I loved.

The animation by Satelight was brilliant. One of the best things about the anime. The way the animated everything from the characters to the battles were great.

The music as usual for a Robotech/Macross series was amazing. I even downloaded the soundtrack.

Sadly this series just didn't live up to my expectations. Was it still a good series.. yes just not on the level of Robotech, Macross, Macross Plus or Macross II.

Alritey

Story: Love triangle between two adults and one ugly kid and aliens.




Art: Fantastic, the op and ed art are prob one of a kind


...
Sound: this anime has some of the greatest insert songs ive ever heard; ranka has a great voice for such a ugly kid. SHeyrl ofc has great voice.



Character: Alto: ok.. Sheyrl: good Ranka:eh ok Ranks real brother: why must they include him after 1x eps..



Enjoyment: there are a few boreing episodes, but overall its very enjoyable


Overall: 9/10 it coulda been hella lot better but it just misses the spark that macross zero had

One of my favorite mecha. The animation art is fantastic. The mechas are really cool, and so are the battles.
A bit too cute, but thats part of the macross charm. If you liked the old maross, you will not be disappointed by this one.
The story grips you, and you have to keep watching to find out the plot.
Thumbs up !

Story: Passing over the ending, this was a cute story without being too silly or irrelevant feeling. The backdrop of space travel and war, kept the character drama from getting over the top, so it was enjoyable rather than too trite, though it was not spectacularly original. It was interesting to see music wedded to science fiction in this way. I was not pleased with the ending, though I will not spoil it. Endings tend to color my view of a story quite a lot, but, I tried not to let it interfere too much since I was eager to watch this story unfold.

Art: The ... art was pretty good. I don't have anything specific to say about it really, but, its not like it wasn't enjoyable.

Sound: Music was a large part of this show which was very nice, though as the two of the main characters are pop stars if you hate pop it might be harder to enjoy the sound of this show. I absolutely love "Aimo" and enjoyed the different singers and their tunes changing things up.

Characters: The characters were not extraordinarily developed, but sufficiently so to understand them (with the exception of Grace). I did not enjoy the main characters as much as the supporting characters, though, Sheryl did grow on me slightly toward the end. There was fair amount of Ranka hatred on veoh, which, I can't say I really understood, but, I do think she has the potential to annoy people who dislike naive, innocent, sensitive and defenseless characters. But that put them off her, not the show. Just as Sheryl's initial appearance put me off her, not the show.

Enjoyment: I enjoyed this show enough to be impatient for the next episode, though not as much as I was for the next code geass. I was very interested to see this show unfold on the both the personal level (yay love triangles) and the larger level (good old fate of the human race).

Overall: Its hard to make an overall comment because that includes the ending, which I found dreadfully unsatisfying. Still, I do not regret watching the show and enjoyed it along the way. But, if you are looking for mecha battles and sci-fi with music and some good old fashioned teenage drama, this show certainly delivers.

I'm very new to the Macross World, but I thought I'd give it a go. Kawamori's strangely loose canonical lineage seemed like it would be a fun area to watch unfold in canon and fanon.

Sound: It's Macross. Music is going to be there and it's going to be important. I really enjoyed the soundtrack. The vocals and songs (pretty much all dealing with romantic metaphors and analogies) are really well placed, well sung, and beautifully crafted. To me, nothing ever seemed overly repetitive despite using the same material often. The in and out music during mecha battles was fun and really enhanced the scenes.

Art: ... It was a pretty wonderfully done anime series. There were occasionally oddly shaped hands and feet and clumsy panning out work, but the visuals I was in it for (the planet environments and the space battles) were gorgeous and amazing.

Characters: Most people know that the anime involves a Love Triangle before going into it. It was well done. Both heroines were likeable (maybe even more than the hero) and any shipping factions that are and were slinging mud at one another sadly miss out on a chance to see interesting characters. The 'side characters' are awesome. Omza Lee, Michael, Klan Klang, pretty much any SMS character stole the spotlight as many do in anime series. The motives, the backgrounds, some of it wasn't on par with the other positives of the series, but nothing was so bad. Fanservice, of course.

Story: Macross Mecha meets Ender's Game extraterrestrials. If you like either, the 'shounen' part of the series will appeal to you. Again, the love triangle is handled well. Looking (but not having watched) the first Macross, it seems to follow some of the archetypes and vibes that specific Macross held. Since it's a continuity of the Macross world, knowledge of past series will make this one very enjoyable with all the nods given to Macross history. The story had its ups and downs for me. To keep rounded interest, many story lines have in and out sequencing-we'll get something with Ranka's life, pause it, go to Sheryl's, pause it, go to a battle, etc. It kept everything flowing well, but also highlighted which storylines I cared little for (there were around 3 or 4 minor ones). Some very poignant and hard-hitting lines, a few close calls where you think they did, but 'yes!' they didn't-it definitely makes for an enjoyable anime experience. I also cried once and thought quite a few parts were full of total badassery.

-That covers the anime generally, this part is more of a specific experience analysis; deals with shipping...you've been warned-

Enjoyment: This is the sort of funny part. My first encounter with Macross Frontier came from an avid fan who happened to obsessively love AltoxRanka and at one point declared that ship to be canonically proven as true. Not ever having touched the story myself I thought it a pretty interesting thing to see what happens to a person as their ship goes from fanon to confirmed. I came into Macross expecting Alto and Ranka to have a confirmed ending relationship. I fell for Ranka and Shirley. Both are awesome (so are many of the other females in the series). And whatever you ship more power to you. Obviously I didn't get the ending I expected, but I definitely got an awesome experience. Watching my expectations axis tilt was something I've really never felt before. I wasn't actively for or against either pairing in the canon, but the romance was done elegantly. And not just with the main triangle. Well, there were a few bumps but I have sort of low expectations for romance in shounen that I happen to enjoy.

Definitely worth watching, especially for the music and mecha explosion porn.

*2nd review I have done, still going to be terrible, I am here to say this though, the character review and most of this review will be opinion based*


Story 6: Its a fair story, 1 man 2 girls... excuse me, but I have nothing to say for this.

Art 7: The art wasn't bad at all. How they designed the ships and the fighter jet things were nice, if your one of the people who count this as the animation, it's fair game to me, both were good.

Characters 4-6: The reasoning I have this is because of Ranka and her brother being one of ... my two most favorite characters.

All the S.M.S members were fine.

Nome, Sheryl: This is to easy, a piece of shit character who has nothing to include or put into the story. Just there to make an idiotic love triangle and piss others off.

Overall: I enjoyed it, although the last few episodes were confusing. I got depressed over him...

[Notice how Alto isn't in the review, reminds me of the guy from School Days, so yea, I'm not going to say anything over that]

“Macross Frontier” is a mecha sci-fi series meant to celebrate 25 years of “Macross” anime and bring all the different “Macross” series together.

As such all of the typical Macross elements are present, veritech fighters (transforming from airplane to robot form and back), giant spaceships and space battles, young men dreaming of soaring the skies, the many faces of being a popular songstress, from being discovered to becoming the people's idol and even saviour.
As a celebratory series that aims to bring all the previous series together “Macross Frontier” is rife with references to the other series, with explicit plot references, obvious links or Easter eggs. While ... viewers who have seen the other “Macross” series will be able to enjoy all these references and possibly gain a better understanding, anyone without prior knowledge about the other “Macross” series will be able to follow and enjoy “Macross Frontier”. The key plot elements necessary to follow the series and its premise are sufficiently explained so no one is lost as to what is happening.


The characters in “Macross Frontier” were quite good, most were sufficiently three dimensional and not merely generic characters. Next to the man characters Alto, Ranka and Sheryl who were all complex enough, a good ensemble of their supporting cast were fleshed out well enough to become quite interesting as well, especially Michael, Klan and Luca. Other characters like Nanase, Brera and Ozma were alas more typical characters.

As the first opening song's title “Triangular” suggests, “Macross Frontier” features a love triangle between the main characters Alto, Ranka and Sheryl. It is done quite well and brought on screen during the entire series' run. While there are hints of a lot of possible drama and suffering that comes with such a situation, the final episode leaves things more open on a positive note. While it's a nice ending, the chance to conclude with some really gripping dramatic storytelling is missed, and seeing the painful elements of their love triangle are often brought forth throughout the series, this is a shame. Nonetheless, the final episode definitely has its charm and hits the mark.

Having two songstresses with Sheryl -the established and widely popular artist- and Ranka -the new upcoming refreshingly innocent starlet- leads to a unique dynamic that allows for many poignant scenes and plot possibilities which the series makes good use of. Add to that each has their own distinct personality and troublesome past they must discover and overcome, they prove to be entertaining characters.
Alto may seem to be a more common male lead, he's often hot headed and seems to fail making any progress in his relationships with Sheryl or Ranka, but the manner in which his motivations and goals are ultimately portrayed make him less generic after all. As for him not making a definite choice between Sheryl or Ranka, while it's implied he may have deeper feelings for both, his goal was always to live his own life so he foregoes any decision even if that has others accuse him of just acting and trying to please everyone. Aiming to not hurt either since he holds them both dear, both Sheryl and Ranka are important people to him who motivated him and helped him get to his goal. So paradoxically Alto ends up holding both Sheryl and Ranka close to him, while at the same time keeping them at a distance.


“Macross Frontier” squeezes enough other (sub)plots in, from the battle of survival against the Vajra, the relationship between humans and Zentraedi, the different evolutions people must make, experiencing and overcoming loss, political intrigue,... most are handled well, be they small or spanning multiple episodes.
Towards the end of the latter half of the series, the pace picks up and the atmosphere slightly darkens, themes such as survival, genocide, the pain of loving and losing are brought in a manner that's quite surprising and gives the series a more serious tone up until the final episodes. Especially when one of the more important characters dies, the sense of loss this means to the other characters and how it affects them is brought forth. This was however necessary as in the episodes before, the Macross inhabitants have already suffered serious losses and damage to their habitat ships but as none of the main cast were directly affected, it would feel distant to most viewers. Having a significant character disappear has a definite impact to illustrate the grave situation the cast find themselves in.

The final action packed episode brings nearly everything to a satisfactory conclusion. Seeing the celebratory character of “Macross Frontier” and the message of wanting to live on that permeates throughout the series, the end is very fitting.


Animation in “Macross Frontier” alas suffered from being quite inconsistent, there could be a visible difference in animation quality between episodes or even between scenes. This was quite apparent due to the fact many scenes or full episodes have truly sublime animation, with gorgeously animated fast-paced action scenes and incredibly detailed characters with great shading and colouring. So when the animation level drops it often stuck out like a sore thumb. I doubt it would ruin the viewing experience for anyone, though most people will pick up on it and notice it.
Regardless of the animation quality drops here and there, “Macross Frontier” boasts some of the most intricate, flashy and lusciously animated mecha and space combat action scenes seen these recent years, for fans of that genre certainly not to miss.


“Macross” has always had music as a theme or plot device, accordingly the music in “Macross Frontier” is quite frankly fantastic, Yoko Kanno produces an awesome soundtrack filled with different styles, a real musical centipede with tracks that perfectly accentuate the events on screen. The opening, closing and insert songs are all good tunes and nearly all other known songs from previous “Macross” series are sung throughout the series. From the original opening songs “Triangular”, “Lion” , catchy pop/rock tunes full of energy to “Diamond Crevasse”, “What 'bout my star” and even the classic "Ai Oboete Imasu ka“ and "Watashi no Kare ha Pilot” from earlier “Macross” series, all excellent music that adds to the series atmosphere and enjoyment.
For those interested in soundtracks, the “Macross Frontier” original soundtrack is definitely worth it and quite pleasant to listen to by itself as well.


Any “Macross” fan should check out this series but if you like mecha, action or space adventure, then you will surely enjoy “Macross frontier”, it's no doubt one of the best series of the spring/summer 2008 season.