Home Entertainment It's time to enroll in ROBOTECH ACADEMY!

It's time to enroll in ROBOTECH ACADEMY!

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While anime purists might turn up their noses at its copycat nature, for many young kids in the 80’s, both locally and abroad, Robotech was their very first exposure to Japanese anime and will always occupy a special place in the memories. Plus, DAT THEME SONG! Produced by the late Carl Macek (who passed away in 2010) for Harmony Gold, what we as kids knew as the 3 original seasons of Robotech was actually the edited together footage and plot-lines from 3 separate anime series: The Super Dimension Fortress MacrossSuper Dimension Cavalry Southern Cross and Genesis Climber MOSPEADA.

But we were kids and all we cared about were the badass transforming Veritech Fighters, the heroes like Rick Hunter and Scott Bernard, those super cool swarming missile attacks and the giant Zentradi aliens with their weird looking spaceships (Not Min-Mei though. Nobody cared about Min-Mei). And that popularity saw the show become a massive success in the West, where it spawned several spinoffs, novels, comics, toys and even really tasty chips. The franchise last saw a proper entry in 2006 with the animated movie Robotech: Shadow Chronicles though, with a new series, Robotech 3000, previously being cancelled, a follow-up animated movie being indefinitely delayed and a live-action feature film adaptation being produced by Toby “Spider-Man” Maguire being in development for ages now already – although it finally saw some movement recently when it found a director.

But now Harmony Gold are looking to revive the franchise’s animated roots again, and want you to be a part of it. They’ve unveiled the Kickstarter campaign for Robotech: Academy, a planned new series based off of Macek’s future vision for the franchise, which will follow the children of the original cast on a new adventure, but also finally address the mystery of The Sentinels (which would have happened in a second series in 1987 but which was unfortunately cancelled).

Harmony Gold are looking to raise $500 000, which will enable them to produce a 24-minute pilot episode with all the 3D modelling bells and whistles, which – if well received – will set them up for a whole new series. The kicker (pardon the pun) is that, as one of the rewards, backers of the Kickstarter campaign can actually end up being literally in the new show.

Even before this Kickstarter got off the ground though, Harmony Gold had already turned to the fans, as alongside Tommy Yune and Ford Riley, the respective director and writer of Robotech: Shadow Chronicles, as well as host of industry veterans, they’ve also brought in members of Creavision, the the team behind the really cool Argentinian fan film Robotech Valkyrie Project.

At the time of writing, the Kickstarter had achieved just shy of $50 000 of its intended goal, and as a massive Robotech fanboy I’m definitely going to add my paltry contribution (damn this exchange rate!) to try and make this a success. Who knows, maybe I win the Lotto and next thing you know, my face is on the show. I mean, I already look and sound like a Zentradi.

Last Updated: July 7, 2014

10 Comments

  1. Watched it all. Still could not get into it. Guess I prefer Gundam over Robotech.

    Reply

    • Kervyn Cloete

      July 7, 2014 at 11:17

      We’re officially not friends anymore.

      Reply

      • Kromas

        July 7, 2014 at 11:21

        Never said I hated it at least. Then again I am pretty meh about Neon Genesis. Want a good mecha? Go check out Full Metal Panic!.

        Reply

        • Kervyn Cloete

          July 7, 2014 at 12:01

          Neon Genesis as well? You’re definitely off my Christmas list now.

          Reply

          • Kromas

            July 7, 2014 at 12:05

            I just don’t get the hype. I mean it was good but I can honestly say I have only watched it twice and only because it was very confusing (still is). Suppose Mecha is not really my genre. Comedy Fantasy now that I can relate to. Gimme Slayers any day of the week.

            DRAGON SLAVE!

          • Kervyn Cloete

            July 7, 2014 at 12:10

            Yeah as much as I’m busting your balls, Neon Genesis is not an easy thing to get into. To truly understand the story, you need to read up on and be familiar with a whole crap load of esoteric beliefs that are just barely hinted at in the anime. Because I was quite obsessive about it at the time, I went and did just that, which increased my appreciation for the show’s genius tenfold.

          • Kromas

            July 7, 2014 at 12:14

            Pretty much like how you can truly understand the philosophies in GiTS if you have knowledge of Nietzche and his work on existentialism.

  2. Lardus-Resident Perve

    July 7, 2014 at 11:05

    Moar ROBOTECH!!

    Reply

  3. Brady miaau

    July 7, 2014 at 16:40

    “Not Min-Mei though. Nobody cared about Min-Mei”

    Hell yeah, thanks for remembering AND reminding me, too.

    Watched the whole series with a buddy (ok, GF – (future wife)) about ten years ago, was awesome. On fastoforward, when you, know, the singy lady came on.

    Reply

  4. cookiemonster

    July 7, 2014 at 16:52

    Remember “Yellow Dancer” was a guy in drag ……talk about pushing the boundaries in Apartheid RSA!

    Reply

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