Volume 9, No.2
- By Geoff L.
(Edited by Ramón Bannister)
Geoff L., Kena Cubed Contributor
As a child, I enjoyed a good variety of pop culture shows that were indelibly burned into my memory. The one that I cherished the most was the animated TV series, Robotech. Produced by Carl Macek for Harmony Gold, it is perhaps the most richly written story that I remember from that time. Some say that this was the show that popularized Japanese anime into the consciousness of American popular culture. Sure, there was Voltron, but that certainly wasn’t the vast epic drama that Robotech was. With Voltron, it seemed that whatever problem that arose from the beginning of the episode would be resolved in the same tired formulaic approach each time: the good guys defeat the bad guys (until the bad guys are up to their evil ways again in the next episode with little variation to their plans). You could say that Robotech was unique in contrast with other animated series that were on at the time. Nothing else seemed to be written with the same amount of complexity.
You might wonder whether Robotech glorified war. With closer inspection, I’m confident that you’ll see that it’s quite the opposite.
Later on in life, I served in the military after 9/11. You might say that I had an immersive experience in international affairs as well as some of the subtle things of military life. Most recently, I re-watched all of the Robotech episodes on YouTube and began to notice more in the story than I did when I was younger. With this recent viewing, I came to appreciate certain nuances of the story. Whether this was by accident or by special insight on the part of the writers, it’s another dimension that I can take to heart. Many themes were hinted at in the story which I can draw from experience:
- How shared experiences bring about easy camaraderie
- The feeling of being far away from home and commiserating with others who feel the same
- The need to find some semblance of normalcy in an inherently chaotic environment
- The hope that your efforts just might protect someone, even if it just means protecting the person to your left and right
- How when you are under constant alert, you value even a few minutes of free time that you have, even if it means lying in your bunk and staring at the ceiling
- You question if what you are doing is right, searching for some meaning
- How war can be terrifying for a short amount of time, while the majority of it is a long, boring anticipation for something to happen
- Finding some level of comfort knowing that one more day has passed without incident, equating to one more day that you’ll be home
I guess one could say that it’s hard to understand this without living it.
The SDF-1 when it crash landed. Screen shot from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjM8PbTw5tU&feature=sh_e_se&list=SL
So for the uninitiated, what is Robotech about anyway? Well, the story starts with the unexpected crash landing of an alien space cruiser in the South Pacific, beaching itself on a fictional Macronesian island called Macross Island. The arrival of this alien warship occurs while World War III is in full swing. Although the occupants of the ship are deceased, this ship makes the world leaders aware of something: 1) we aren’t alone and 2) they aren’t friendly. Recognizing that humans have a greater threat with which to contend, this one event puts an end to the war as the world’s resources are diverted into studying the alien vessel and developing technologies in the hopes of defending Earth and the human race. This technology is dubbed “Robotechnology.” Subsequently, this event makes “World War III” now retroactively named “The Global Civil War” (much like “The Great War” was called “WWI” with the outbreak of WWII).
The SDF-1 after it had been reconstructed. Screen shot from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjM8PbTw5tU&feature=sh_e_se&list=SL
With the remnant United Nations forming the United Earth Government (with some holdout nations in conflict over this formation), all efforts are pooled into thwarting a possible future alien invasion. For the next decade, the finest minds from all over the world converge on Macross Island to study this strange alien technology and rebuild the alien vessel into the Super Dimension Fortress One (SDF-1). As all of these efforts are being conducted, a small city (Macross City) begins to form around the military base.
It is during the ribbon-cutting ceremony of the SDF-1 that the aliens, the Zentraedi, have returned in force to retrieve the vessel, staging from lunar orbit. However, because much of the SDF-1’s technology is still yet to be understood by the humans, the ship had an unknown fail-safe “boobytrap” built into it by its previous alien owners. It was a trap meant to be enacted by its original occupants while near death against the Zentraedi if they tried to recover the vessel. With the arrival of the Zentraedi in outer Earth orbit, the SDF-1’s main gun activated without warning. As the bridge crew tried in vain to shut down the gun, the powerful weapon automatically fires into space, destroying a section of the alien fleet. This spurs the aliens to attack the island in an attempt to recover the SDF-1, marking the beginning of the 1st Robotech War and the start of the Robotech epic drama.
I feel that the story gives proper respect to members of the military while making its own statement against war and its destructive wake.
Cultural Analysis
Science fiction has a way of speaking about the current human condition. At the time that Robotech was released, the real-life tension of the Cold War was still felt across the globe. Personally, I don’t think it was an accident that the story starts with the alien battle cruiser crashing into earth while the world was at war. It seems to make a statement that mankind can accomplish many things if we can settle some of our differences. Yet sadly it also holds up a mirror to humanity, as if to say that we ourselves are really no different than the aliens who try to conquer Earth. We too have a sordid past replete with conflicts and conquest.
In another allegory, to me the Zentraedi are perhaps representative of some kind of Soviet-style authoritarian type of society. We find later in the saga that the Zentraedi are a bioengineered race of 40-foot humanoids that were meant to be a proxy army for another race, the so-called “Robotech Masters”, the Tirolians. Basically, all the Zentraedi know in their society is war and conquest. They are sustained by chemical protein constituents and have no concept of art, music, or any kind of cultural wonders that we as humans appreciate. However, several of their spies eventually defected to the human Earth society after they experience our culture (music, food, etc.). At this point, I realized that this is somehow a parallel to those who defected from Stalinist nations to the West. Some of the Zentraedi secretly come to find that those “Micronian” humans aren’t quite so bad and they start to envy what they don’t have, especially music.
Captured humans being interrogated by the Zentreadi leader. Screen shot taken from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-BqFr7opSY4&feature=sh_e_se&list=SL
You might wonder whether Robotech glorified war. With closer inspection, I’m confident that you’ll see that it’s quite the opposite. I feel that the story gives proper respect to members of the military while making its own statement against war and its destructive wake. You sense this when certain key characters die and the loss is felt by those that were close to them. For my own military educational development, I read Once an Eagle by Anton Myrer. In a nutshell, it followed the fictional life of a career military officer from when he first enlists, to his exploits in Europe during WWI, to the Army’s reorganization thereafter, to his time in WWII in the Pacific Campaign, and then being recalled to Active Duty in the fictional Southeast Asian country of Khotiane. Though it’s fiction, I feel that it pays proper homage to those in the military who serve with genuine honor (as opposed to Machiavellian careerists) while making a statement against US involvement in Vietnam. In that same spirit, I feel that Robotech accomplishes the same with the Cold War threat of nuclear annihilation, at least indirectly.
It seems to make a statement that mankind can accomplish many things if we can settle some of our differences.
I understand that that the story of Robotech is essentially derived from 3 disparate Japanese animations (Macross, Army of the Southern Cross, and MOSPAEDA) and rewritten to be a coherent story for an American audience. Anime purists have a good case that the American adaptation in some ways “bastardized” the originals. Whether or not you believe that argument, one thing seems clear to me: I don’t think I would be as appreciative of Japanese animation if it weren’t for Robotech. I think others may feel the same.
Robotech is more than just a story about space warfare. It is also a coming-of-age story for the main characters. On another dimension, it is a story of romance and of love lost. In another way, it’s a testament of mankind’s will to survive, even if by sheer determination and morale. Without this complex plot, I firmly believe that Robotech could have easily been a forgettable story. The heavy themes in the story affect the characters, changing them during the long span of the story. The characters have dimension. It provides a certain continuity that is realistic and dynamic. I think this is the heart of what made Robotech special.
