Macross Frontier Movies

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Destiny_Gundam
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

He got cut off but I think it was pretty obvious what he said.

Even though the triangle did resolve it did seem like an after thought. Sure we see the girls get closer to Alto, but he never shows a preference for either of them. There's no real hinting as to who he had romantic feelings for so at the end he could have chosen either girl and it would have made just as much sense.
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

Destiny_Gundam wrote:
Spoiler
Sheyrl wakes up at the end of the movie and Alto is just chillin' with the Vajra somewhere. That they'll be reunited is pretty much a given.
Open ended, sure, but hardly inconclusive.
Spoiler
I never saw anything about her waking up, unless you mean that little scene where she opens her mouth a little bit but doesn't actually wake up. And while that is the most logical conclusion about Alto, if it's true why don't they bring him back? The good guys know the Vajra aren't the enemy any more; sending one Vajra to take the guy who saved them back to his people is hardly much to ask for.
In the end, Alto and Sheryl are no more reunited (or their own fates any more known) than Shinn and Sara in Macross Zero, who we have absolutely no idea what happened to.
It's very inconclusive; open-ended is something like the end to the Ranma 1/2 manga,
Spoiler
where we don't see them get married or anything, but they're off holding hands.
Here, for all we know Sheryl dies in her medical tube and Alto never comes back.
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

She didn't just open her mouth, she was singing along with the song.
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Ocho
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

Destiny_Gundam wrote:He got cut off but I think it was pretty obvious what he said.

Even though the triangle did resolve it did seem like an after thought. Sure we see the girls get closer to Alto, but he never shows a preference for either of them. There's no real hinting as to who he had romantic feelings for so at the end he could have chosen either girl and it would have made just as much sense.
I think it's pretty clear Alto get really close with
Spoiler
Brera
. There was superfluous amount of clues pointing in that direction from Alto love of wearing dresses to the
Spoiler
homoerotic
tension in their encounters. They even ended up together in the end.
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Destiny_Gundam
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

You might be joking but you're right: I wouldn't have questioned it if Alto said he was in love with Brera. That would be the ultimate in trolling :lol:
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

Destiny_Gundam wrote:She didn't just open her mouth, she was singing along with the song.
It's not a big difference since she still didn't wake up. ^^b
Destiny_Gundam wrote:You might be joking but you're right: I wouldn't have questioned it if Alto said he was in love with Brera. That would be the ultimate in trolling :lol:
*Brightslaps Destiny and Ocho*
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

Shinji103 wrote:It's not a big difference since she still didn't wake up. ^^b
Do you know people who sing while in a coma?

Just because her eyes stayed closed doesn't mean she was sleeping.

I heard word of an interview with Kawamori who says that Alto is alive and Sheyrl wakes up, but you know what a lot of these 'creator interviews' turn out to be.
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

Destiny_Gundam wrote:Do you know people who sing while in a coma?
You missed my point a little. Singing in a coma is a sign she's waking up, absolutely. Does she wake up? No. Does Alto, or a shadowy figure similar to Alto, appear? No. ^^b
I heard word of an interview with Kawamori who says that Alto is alive and Sheyrl wakes up, but you know what a lot of these 'creator interviews' turn out to be.
Yeah, pretty much. ^^b
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

Shinji103 wrote:You missed my point a little. Singing in a coma is a sign she's waking up, absolutely. Does she wake up?
The thing with open endings is that it trusts the viewers to connect the dots and draw their own conclusion. Hinting that Sheyrl is waking up is enough to tell us that she's going to wake up. It's not necessary to witness it for ourselves.

Good open endings have set ups like that. There are bad open endings when things are too far up in the air due to lack of hints and I'll conceed that Alto's situation is like that. Still, it's not too bad since we see him fold away with the Vajra, as opposed to the Macross Cannon barrage hitting first and it disappearing in the explosion.
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

Destiny_Gundam wrote:The thing with open endings is that it trusts the viewers to connect the dots and draw their own conclusion. Hinting that Sheyrl is waking up is enough to tell us that she's going to wake up. It's not necessary to witness it for ourselves.
Yet, it makes a better ending; if they're suggesting it so strongly, why not actually show it happen? There's no sense in hiding it like that. It's like holding up a question card to quiz somebody and then whispering the answer in the person's ear.
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

I'm not Kawamori but maybe he thinks his audience is intelligent enough and he doesn't have to hold their hand and walk them through everything. Also, the tiniest of hints can inoke the biggest emotional reactions.

One examples of this is the anime Sola. The hero and heroine had been drinking some obscure drink through the entire series. Both of them die (on screen too) at the end and the epilouge shows the secondary characters living their lives after the fact. The final scene at the very end was a shot of two empty cans of said obscure drink on a picnic table. When I saw that my reaction was, verbatum, "HOLY zoinks!!!"

So yeah, ambiguity can be very effective.
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

Destiny_Gundam wrote:I'm not Kawamori but maybe he thinks his audience is intelligent enough and he doesn't have to hold their hand and walk them through everything. also, the tiniest of hints can inoke the biggest emotional reactions.
It's not about holding the viewers' hands though the ending, it's about giving the viewers an ending. Viewers could come up with a dozen different ways how Sheryl turns out, but actually seeing it gives a better sense of satisfaction.
The same reasoning is behind why people love to see their favorite novels and manga animated; it's much more easy to connect with and emotional when you're seeing it happen, as opposed to coming up with an image in your head.
One examples of this is the anime Sola. The hero and heroine had been drinking some obscure drink through the entire series. Both of them die (on screen too) at the end and the epilouge shows the secondary characters living their lives after the fact. The final scene at the very end was a shot of two empty cans of said obscure drink on a picnic table. When I saw that my reaction was, verbatum "HOLY zoinks!!!"
I get that (I've seen that series too; I'm a sucker for that kind of show) and I had the same reaction, though I'd say this situation is different; whereas the soda cans were a direct suggestion, for all we know Sheryl was just doing some involuntary reaction. It's not like she was actually making sound; all we see is her reacting to a song, which makes sense since she had a deep, emotional connection to singing. But nothing actually suggests that she'll recover in a way like the soda cans signified in Sola.
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

Shinji103 wrote:It's not about holding the viewers' hands though the ending, it's about giving the viewers an ending. Viewers could come up with a dozen different ways how Sheryl turns out, but actually seeing it gives a better sense of satisfaction.
The same reasoning is behind why people love to see their favorite novels and manga animated; it's much more easy to connect with and emotional when you're seeing it happen, as opposed to coming up with an image in your head.
And it was an ending. It ended the movie. What happens afterwards isn't necessary to the story being told. It's was never about holding the viewer's hand or letting the viewer come up with their own story about what happens afterwards. The ending just ends to story that the movie was telling. That's it. This is how Kawamori works. He may come back to the characters at some later time or he may not, or he may come up with a new story with those characters, or he may not. But that ending ends the story he's telling.
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

azrael wrote:And it was an ending. It ended the movie. What happens afterwards isn't necessary to the story being told. It's was never about holding the viewer's hand or letting the viewer come up with their own story about what happens afterwards. The ending just ends to story that the movie was telling. That's it. This is how Kawamori works. He may come back to the characters at some later time or he may not, or he may come up with a new story with those characters, or he may not. But that ending ends the story he's telling.
And like I said, a story is about more than just the story, it's about the characters too. It's always nice to know what happens to the characters; as I've already pointed out as well, viewers aren't particularly satisfied when an ending doesn't elect to tell the fates/after-stories of characters like in Eureka 7 for one. (the lack of showing what happened with Holland and Talho)
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

While it is nice, at the same time the storytellers are under no obligation to do those things.
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

Destiny_Gundam wrote:While it is nice, at the same time the storytellers are under no obligation to do those things.
They aren't obligated to do a lot of things like give us that much information on the fact that Ranka and Brera were siblings, but they still do them.

It still shows that Kawamori has a bit of a habit of not letting his characters actually get together; Macross Frontier was one of the more happier examples (slightly), but there's still Aquarion, Macross Zero, and what happened after Macross Flashback 2012. (not sure if this one was his decision, but still) And although he wasn't the director, it's an interesting coincidence that Macross 7 ended with a non-get-together with Kawamori on the staff. ^^b

I just hope he doesn't do the same thing again with the upcoming Aquarion Evol.
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

Shinji103 wrote:And like I said, a story is about more than just the story, it's about the characters too. It's always nice to know what happens to the characters; as I've already pointed out as well, viewers aren't particularly satisfied when an ending doesn't elect to tell the fates/after-stories of characters like in Eureka 7 for one. (the lack of showing what happened with Holland and Talho)
And the characters got an ending. They got their development and they got their ending. Characters don't have to die or grow old to get an ending. There's no rule book that says they have to show what happens after the series ends or that they have to do this or that. That's up to the storyteller. We've all seen stories that end without seeing the aftermath. In MSG, Amuro floats out into space and meets up with the White Base crew and the show ends. They never showed what happened afterwards. Tomino didn't need to cuz that's the story he wanted to tell. It wasn't until later that brought back practically the entire gang from the original series. Hell, The Sopranos ends with a cut to black. How is Macross Frontier any different from any other story?
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

azrael wrote:And the characters got an ending. They got their development and they got their ending. Characters don't have to die or grow old to get an ending. There's no rule book that says they have to show what happens after the series ends or that they have to do this or that. That's up to the storyteller. We've all seen stories that end without seeing the aftermath. In MSG, Amuro floats out into space and meets up with the White Base crew and the show ends. They never showed what happened afterwards. Tomino didn't need to cuz that's the story he wanted to tell. It wasn't until later that brought back practically the entire gang from the original series. Hell, The Sopranos ends with a cut to black. How is Macross Frontier any different from any other story?
You're putting a bit of a twist on my point, though I'll admit that I did get a bit off my own original point as well. My original point being, Kawamori has a habit for making inconclusive endings; characters going missing and such. Here, Alto is missing, his whereabouts unknown, and Sheryl is lying in a coma. My intended point preceeds whether we see characters grow old and whatnot.

Still, just because they don't have to do something, doesn't mean they shouldn't. As I said to Destiny, storytellers don't have to do a lot of things, yet they do anyway. And there's certainly nothing that says they can't show us the characters after the series either. And in all honesty, the "they don't have to" reasoning is rather lame, no offense. ^^b Lots of people, not just storytellers, don't have to do lots of things, but they do them anyway.
To be clear, I''m not saying a show is bad if it doesn't tell us what happens to the characters after the series. (though as I pointed out before, lots of people do find dissatisfaction in it) My original point is about how we don't even have a fully conclusive ending at all (Alto missing and Sheryl in a coma) and how Kawamori has a bit of a habit for this kind of ending.

On a last note, remember that the original MSG was being cancelled, so naturally Tomino didn't exactly have time to put in anything saying what happened to everybody after the war. Second, original MSG is a bad comparison. As I re-highlighted above, I'm talking about Macross Frontier having an inconclusive ending; Alto being missing and Sheryl lying in a coma. As you said yourself, we saw Amuro alive and well, meeting up with his friends.
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

Shinji103 wrote:Still, just because they don't have to do something, doesn't mean they shouldn't. As I said to Destiny, storytellers don't have to do a lot of things, yet they do anyway. And there's certainly nothing that says they can't show us the characters after the series either. And in all honesty, the "they don't have to" reasoning is rather lame, no offense. ^^b
And you're still throwing a rule book as to what an story ending is. As I said, Kawamori may go back to those characters, or he may not. He's leaving that option open to himself to write more stories. He didn't have to leave it all open, but he did because that's his story.
Lots of people, not just storytellers, don't have to do lots of things, but they do them anyway.
And Kawamori gave us an open ending to the story. He didn't have to, but he did. Boo hoo.
My original point is about how we don't even have a fully conclusive ending at all (Alto missing and Sheryl in a coma) and how Kawamori has a bit of a habit for this kind of ending.
But that's an ending to the story, isn't it?
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Re: Macross Frontier Movies

It's an ending to be sure, but is it a good one? That's a matter of opinion, of course.
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