Robotech over the years has gotten about equal amounts support and derision from anime fans. It introduced viewers to permanent character deaths and a dramatic serial space opera, but also obscured parts of the message of the original Macross and had a few edits here and there, though not nearly as much as what had come before it.
One of the bigger criticisms of the whole franchise is that in order for it to remain cohesive it requires a “god of the gaps,” or something to explain why these disparate parts of the story and universe actually fit together. I’ve made fun of Robotech for that reason before as well. But then I thought about this idea of just filling in blank after blank with whatever you could find, and it reminded me a whole lot of another giant robot franchise: Gundam.
Question: Have you ever heard of Johnny Ridden?
If your answer is “no,” that is perfectly normal. But if your answer is “yes,” then you are a fairly hardcore Gundam fan, or you’ve just seen the name appear on Gundam models and scratched your head wondering just who this person is.
To make a long story short, Johnny Ridden is a character who, like Char Aznable, was a Zeon ace in the original Mobile Suit Gundam. He got his own custom colors, his own nickname (Crimson Lightning), and he fought at many crucial points in the war. The only thing is, he never appears on-screen in any of the episodes or movies. You are just supposed to assume he’s around. Also, he loves Kycilia Zabi. I don’t think even her own father can say that!
Basically Johnny Ridden was designed after the series was over to help promote the line of Mobile Suit Variations, or robot designs which take existing models and recolor them in order to sell them off as “new.” If you’re into video games, it’s pretty much the same thing as a “palette swap.” It’s just like how a Wizard is stronger than a Magician in Dragon Warrior because it’s yellow. And the big thing is, Mobile Suit Variations worked. They sold, they made Bandai money. And now? Johnny Ridden makes appearances in games and has comics in which he actually appears, and it all has to do with how much people want to explore the gaps in the world of Gundam and how easy it was for Bandai to make this all possible.
When you look at what Robotech did, it almost pales in comparison.
OGIUE MANIAX 
I have heard of Johnny Ridden, though I scratched my head a lot not knowing what to think of him.
I think making fun of Robotech for the reasons you shared above is quite alright. However, you can also go all the way and have real fun with how far Robotech went.
I’m talking about the Sentinels and End of the Circle novels by Jack McKinney. These works are sooooo far out, they aren’t even recognized as canon anymore.
Shame, it’s because I love these books — almost in a fanfic kind of way.
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Johnny Ridden is a character dear to me because he has traits that Char doesn’t (i.e. loyalty, chivalry).
One problem I have with UC Gundam and this gap-exploring, however, is that it all but focuses on the OYW-CCA era. I’m very fond of the F91 and Victory timelines, but they never get much love, in terms of quantity of stories and actual merchandise.
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All I know about Johnny Ridden is he exists because people such as myself wanted an actual RED Zaku, and not a pink one like what Char uses.
I think the key difference between the Johnny Ridden sort of thing and Robotech is that you don’t need to use Johnny Ridden as a pulled-from-thin-air explanation for how something in the Gundam anime itself went down. It’s not like there’s some sort of indiscrepancy that one needs to use Johnny Ridden to resolve. As such, I would say the presence of the Johnny Ridden/Shin Matsunaga “palette swaps” isn’t a “gap filler” at all. It’s more akin to all that Extended Universe tripe in Star Wars, most of which does the impossible and manages to be even worse than the prequel films.
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Man don’t get me started on the Star Wars Extended Universe.
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Let’s take it back to ‘first cause’.
As we all know from history, Gundam did poorly during it’s original run on TV, so much so that it was canceled early. Bandai’s first kits for the show were crude, more toy than the highly detailed scale model we know today, and they didn’t do well either.
Sunrise decided to copy the success of Space Battleship Yamato and re-cut, with increasing amounts of new animation, the Gundam TV series into three movies. Coming out at the very height of twin ‘booms’ (Yamato fever was at it’s peak, and Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back was keeping Star Wars mania alive) the Gundam movies succeeded where the TV series failed.
As part of this, Bandai came up with a way to move deadstock model kits by sponsoring a contest (I think it was in co-operation with Asahi Sonorama, Tokuma Shoten and Fuji Film) called ‘Mobile Suit Variation’. The winning entry (or entries) would win the ultimate prize, having their kit-bashed modified model kit turned into an actual, commercially available model kit! Pictures of Okawara’s model sheets showing ‘variants’ such as the Zaku Minelayer were published to start the ball rolling. I believe this contest was also the inspiration for the ‘Plamo Kyoshiro’ manga, about kids building models and ‘fighting’ them at the local hobby shop in a hi-tech VR envrionment. Think Pokemon with plastic model kits.
Anyway, the contest was a big hit, Bandai sold a shitload of models, the MSV kits released sold at decent levels (in some cases more than expected, as at the time if you wanted a GOOD model of the RX-78 Gundam the kit of choice was the 1/100 scale ‘Perfect’ Gundam, as the core Gundam in the kit was a vastly superior model compared to the existing 1/100 scale ‘standalone’ kit, and the same for the Zaku Minelayer) and the success of the MSV kit line directly lead to the production of Zeta Gundam. Note that the ‘High Mobility’ Zaku II (Johnny Ridden) is the obvious model for Zeta’s ‘Hi-Zack’.
And that is your ‘Anime Connections’ lecture for today.
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I don’t know thing one about Gundam, but that’s very interesting.
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I’ve actually gained some respect over the years for Robotech’s story. Sure, it’s flawed, but when you consider that the producers took three unrelated shows and somehow made them fit together, it’s pretty impressive.
Was that ever done before Robotech? Or since?
Now, will someone out there hear this call and dub Mospeada for us?! :)
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Robotech takes a Japanese persons work and calls it their own without permission! Robotech isn’t Japanese anime! Its sequels are made in America animated in Korea! Its now just a cartoon! Carl Macek is just a no talent hack compaired to lord Shoji Kawamori!All hail lord Shoji Kawamori! Long live Macross! Death to Harmony Gold! Robotech fans should kill themselves for the love of lord Shoji Kawamori!
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