Macross Frontier

I quite like Mechas because yes, they are cool and the feeling of watching two or more big robots fighting is fantastic. The human itself always dreams about how far it can go with technology and that’s the reason I always get hyped up with Mechas : the personification of the madness and imaginary of the human brain.

Macross is a very famous name in Japan because it was born as the “Gundam opponent” in 1982 and, even if it’s not really famous in the west, this anime was able to face Gundam and, somehow, survive and become something.

As I said Macross was born with the intention of Gundam but with something more appealing and unique. The peculiarity of Macross indeed is only one really unique thing : music. They mixed Mechas and music in such a beautiful way that’s really something out of the chart.

Then let me present to you my personal favorite title from this series: Macross Frontier.

Macross Frontier is the 4th big name from this franchise and, after many years of shame because of Macross 7, they wanted to bring back what SDF Macross left, a real epic legacy, and it was able to do it.

The story starts after Macross Dynamite 7, an OVA of Macross 7 as a sequel, and tells us the story of Saotome Alto, a young guy with no dreams and Ranka Lee, a little girl who’s affected by amnesia; they meet randomly as they were going to the same event : the Sheryl Nome’s live. Who’s Sheryl Nome? A rising singer who’s famous all around the galaxy and she’s indeed the third main protagonist of this anime. It’s a pretty interesting plot so far : one guy with no dream, a girl who’s living her dream and an another girl who cannot have a dream for the moment; but is the dream real or just a “real dream”? I’ll let you find out because I don’t want to spoil anything. Going back to the story, in this anime humanity now is all around the universe as they are looking for a new home and they are all divided in various fleets and our main protagonist of today is the colony of the Battle Frontier which is comprised of six ships: two stealth medium space carriers (which function as the arms in attack mode), one Combat Command Carrier (“central block”), two medium assault battleships (functioning as the leg “engine blocks””) and one heavy bombardment warship (“Gunship”). When separated, each ship is fold capable, combat capable and otherwise possesses all capabilities of a battleship.

This colony is actually trying to escape and avoid an alien form of existence called “Vajra”, a weird thing which is attacking every ship causing deaths and destruction.

As the danger shows up the military do it too and the “Skull Team” shows what it’s capable of. Alto is amazed by them and by their jets, the VF-25, and how they fight and so his very first desire is born :

I want to fly

The first attack from the Vajras is during Sheryl’s live and there was Ranka there and by watching her and listening to her beautiful songs her very first dream is here :

I want to sing

Two dreams are born but one is in danger, Sheryl’s dream is in danger now thanks to the enemy.

From now on the story takes three very different but yet so similar routes because Alto will try his best to join the Skull Team and make his dream a reality but at the same time he has to face Ranka’s problems and he cannot escape from the beautiful Sheryl, who wants to discover what’s the life she always missed thanks to her being a singer.

Macross Frontier has one of the very best love triangles you can find anywhere

and thanks to that the plot goes better and better as the story goes on until very end, one of the craziest I’ve ever witnessed. A fantastic and dramatic story ended with a crazy yet so beautiful ending, what a fantastic thing to see.

Talking about its “power spot”, the music

Macross never missed in finding some real hidden gems in the music industry and I can just name JUNNA, who’s now an incredible singer, but here we have two of the biggest voices I could listen to : Mei Nakabayashi (May’n) as Sheryl Nome and Megumi Nakajima as Ranka Lee. On one hand we have a true singer whose voice is something not human as she can handle every type of song in human’s history and on the other hand we have one of the most brilliant voices out here, a really shiny and colorful voice.

Seikan Hikou from Megumi Nakajima

Iteza Gogo Kuji Don’t be late by May’n

The animations are off the chart for the year

As Macross Frontier came out in 2008 it didn’t let down ANYTHING talking about animations. The CGI of that year is something absolutely crazy and I felt like I was watching something from 2013 instead. We have some high quality stuff

quite a spoiler

The drama is fantastic

And when I say fantastic I really mean fantastic, you can feel what the characters are feeling and the emotions, the scenes, the pain for losing the loved one or the pain of being close to losing someone you love is really powerful. The tears, the ghosts from the past haunting you, the truth you don’t want to know, the mental breakdowns; all of that you can feel it. Sheryl is the peak in this show for this topic, she’s the girl you would never expect to be.

To sum up everything

Macross Frontier is one of those anime that I love with all of my heart for being such a unique experience. I literally got every single thing I was looking for and I was completely amazed by such an execution; drama, action, romance, comedy and epic moments, you can have everything you want.