September 9th, 2016 
AstroNerdBoy Macross Delta 23
Macross Δ 23
マクロスΔ 23
SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:
Windermere forces are looking for the members of Walküre and Delta Squad that infiltrated the planet. Mirage, Freyja, and Hayate are in one group on foot. Mikumo, Makina, and Reina are on on two trikes in another group. Kaname and Arad are in the final group. Mikumo’s group is found and she’s captured by Roid as she provides cover for Makina and Reina to escape. He IDs her as the Star Singer. Hayate, Freyja, and Mirage are captured, where Roid and others show them the evidence of Hayate’s father’s atrocities.
Thoughts/Review:
Well, we get another episode to push CD sales, though there’s a side of plot, for what that’s worth.
Singing in a Cave or on a Cliff
Freyja gets the singing duty this episode. We get the illogical moment for her to start singing while they are on the run from Windermere forces. Yeah, that’s what we should do. Let’s sing and let the bad guys know where we are and capture us. Sure, they were in a cavern tunnel through the mountains, but that doesn’t mater.
Then Freyja gets to sing when they are taken to the Karlisle site of the dimensional bomb drop. Obviously, this is supposed to make me feel emotional. I guess it worked since I muted my speakers until the singing stopped. But hey, let’s buy the music CDs!
Lets Have a Picnic in Enemy Territory!
I nearly screamed when Makina and Reina decided they needed to have a picnic and get a character moment with Mikumo. The sheer stupidity of this event makes my head hurt so much. You’re on an enemy planet, hunted by enemy forces, and time is limited. But hey, there’s ALWAYS time for a picnic. 🙄 I’m shocked they didn’t start singing. I guess that was a bridge too far.
Look, I’ve no problem with Makina and Reina wanting to melt that ice wall that Mikumo keeps up. However, this moment could have been held in a manner that shows they have some measure of situational awareness. Clearly, the writers of this episode have no clue what that means.
Dimensional Weapons Conspiracy
Ever since NUNS set off a bomb at the Protoculture ruins on Al Shahal, I’ve suspected that folks at NUNS and King Gramia were working together. To what end, I couldn’t say.
Macross Delta 23 makes me feel that way again. First, we had Kaname and Arad visiting the abandoned NUNS base on Windermere. My first thought when they came here was, “Why isn’t this place secured by Windermere forces?” For that matter, why isn’t Windermere using the facility for their own purposes. Makes no sense to me.
Then there’s King Gramia’s shrine to Wright Immelmann and his VF-22 fighter that dropped the dimensional bomb on the Karlisle region of Windermere. This feels like propaganda, not actual truth.
Finally, there’s Freyja’s reaction to the bombing site. She witnessed the bombing as a child. I figure there’s something else she’s forgotten to explain the truth here. Either way, in the end, Hayate’s dad will be shown to not have committed an atrocity.
Star Singer
Roid continues to follow his own agenda. He uses his magic words to stun Mikumo, then gut punch her to make her his captive. Then he binds her up in one of those Japanese S&M fashions. 🙄 Question is, why isn’t he informing Keith or the others about this?
I can see it now. She’s the Star Singer (whatever that is) reborn. Roid gets her to turn on everyone, causing him to laugh and bukake his massive glasses collection. Then because of the actions of Makina and Reina this episode, combined with the actions of Freyja and Kaname in the past, Mikumo returns to good. She might go insane for a time. At the same time, Keith and company turn on Roid and he has a face melting incident. (Or something like that.)
Love Triangle
Yeah, yeah. The writers have to push this love triangle thing until the bitter end. Freyja and Mirage obviously know that they are in love with Hayate. They also know that they are rivals for love while being companions in the field. However, I’m just tired of it.
I don’t know how things will end, but I guess Mirage and Freyja came to some understanding. I base this on their defense of Hayate before Bogue, Roid, Keith, and the others.
Conclusion
There are three episodes left in this series. Thanks to the poor pacing and an emphasis of advertising the music at the cost of plot, I’ve no idea where any of this will go. I’ve made some predictions (mostly as a joke), but frankly, this series is a mess and it isn’t getting any better.
In the end, Macross Delta 23 failed to impress me. There were some interesting tidbits here and there, but mostly, I was glad when the episode was over.
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It certainly is turning more boring that it was already. And the amount of stupidity a long time ago passed the no return point.
I maintain my ideas of some chapters ago: Roid is the mad scientist arquetipe, just because of reasons, and Mikumo is a plagiary (and inferior of course) version of Leeloo from the fifth element. The NUNS are the cold war CIA, and the nuclear bomb, I mean “dimensional weapon” was deployed by windermere.
I don’t want to think more about this series, I’m just watching it to the end hoping that everybody dies when a zentraedi fleet destroys Windermere….
I mean, if there are a thousand Bodolza class fleets around the galaxy were are they when you need one?
Even my sympathy for Mirage is gone. Messer is the only character that makes the cut just because he died before being ruined by the stupid writing.
Is hard to see, but at least this is not as stupid as Macross 7, even when the antagonists of Delta are more ridiculous.
Also, there is another irrelevant mini special that analyzes the fingernails and lipstick of these “idols”.
Frontier is now a masterpiece compared to this…
I agree. However, there are a lot of folks who really seem to like the series and buy into the music. I may be getting “too old and too crypto-fascist” to receive what Macross Delta is trying to transmit. 😉
Ha!ha! Even though Ernest is Zentradi, he doesn’t come off as such. I actually miss the Zentradi. I think about that every time one of them starts going nuts from Var Syndrome.
The first episode of Macross 7 with the hideous MC screeching, “LISTING TO MY SONG” while piloting a variable fighter made it impossible for me to watch any more episodes.
Ha!ha! That’s saying something. 😀
Wow. This was bit over the top harsh, but i can’t help but agree this wasn’t great episode to a mediocre series. Macross has turned into music selling vehicle vs toy selling vehicle.
Story doesn’t make much sense, for a Macross view. Director was either force to do this way or writers/director was handed the agenda. We like Macross to continue, we need funding do it. We need try somehow lace it with advertising of music.
Frankly, i can see it. Anime industry is bad shape. CD sales to o’takus aren’t going cut the muster i guess. That culture has changed so much in Japan since we were young that anime isn’t big thing anymore with younger set, so industry reliance on die-hards has come to the point it’s not selling anymore.
Macross, arguably one more successful scifi television series is barely able limp along only ones left who like series (production wise) is the guy does Macross 7. You do math how this show was going turn out. It maybe a generation thing, writers may have dumbed downed plot bit to allow for everyone get into it. I get the vibe that military style animes don’t have alot appeal they once had and fan-service is required to lure viewers.
I can’t agree that Frontier was bad series (Macross wise) It was a GOOD series, which had flaws. Least it didn’t have unrealistic ship designs, enemy that was nearly invincible unless you had dedicated house band for the ship to win.
First of all: I liked Frontier. But I don’t consider it on my top50 anime series list.
The funding aspect is the pillar of all the problems. It needs to sell to survive. Frontier did good because it had the nostalgia hype at first and because the show had an excellent production team. Delta is cutting corners everywhere to make profit.
For an example of budget comparison just take the “Rival” franchise: Gundam. Sunrise is very big, and have all the resources and several proper animation teams. It even can have the luxury of making experiments, like Code Geass was at first (and the forgettable Valvrave as a subproduct), and the series planning is an important thing to them. This permits to make now and then some more “serious” iterations of the franchise. But even when there are commercial objectives for the toy models and other merchandising, the pride of Sunrise is to be a “specialist MECHA animation studio”.
Bandai just have the Macross rights and outsources its animation to others studios (satelight this time), and lately it is just for product placement first, and quality second.
One thing that comes to me these days is that story about the original Macross being born just to be a parody of more serious animes like gundam or Yamato: “Let’s make a Space Musical anime with F14s “tomcat” Transformers fighting giant aliens at the compass of some pop girl singing”.
Now Delta is a parody of Macross itself.
Well, the anime industry has always relied on the otaku market. Anime has always been created because sponsors want it. The Japanese have always sold anime videos for outrageous prices. Even though DVDs and now BDs can hold a lot more episodes, the Japanese have always put a limited number to raise the price. (But they thrown in a few DVD/BD exclusive extras, including OVA episodes, whether full, mini, or parody of themselves.)
Traditional ones, maybe. However, there are a lot of military ones filled with cute battle babes that are highly popular. Heck, Kantai Collection glorifies Japanese World War II warships by turning them into hot, anime waifus. 😉
That being said, I think any writing issues can be traced to writers being forced to accommodate whatever the sponsors of the anime want. Or whatever they don’t want.
Astro, i know your going be watching Episode 24 soon. Just so you know, the second Macross Delta Special came out. It has some interesting stuff on the Walküre gear. However it was as funny as the first special.
I’ll have to look for the special. I just watched the regular episode.