Robotech Heading to Big Screen, Starring Toby Maguire

dominique_cimafranca writes "Classic anime cult favorite "Robotech" may be next for the big screen live action treatment, if recent news from SciFi.com's SCI FI Wire is to be believed. Tobey Maguire will produce and may star in the film. The article says 'Warner Brothers Pictures picked up the rights to Robotech, which features giant robots known as mechas. Maguire is producing through his Maguire Entertainment banner and is eyeing the lead role in what the studio plans as an SF franchise a la Paramount's hit Transformers.'" I wonder if they'll go back to the Macross source material when plotting the movie... there's a lot more good substance there then in our version.

Comments

I don't think it'll be the original version.

[Spy der Mann]

The version we got in the US is much more "Hollywood-like": It has romance, a love circle, heroes fighting to save the country/planet/whatever, and nearly-stereotypical villains.

Re:I don't think it'll be the original version.

[TomHandy]

To be fair, the original Japanese version of Macross has that too - that isn't specifically the difference between Robotech and the original source material.

As big an RT fan as I am...

[Chas]

Part of me is going:

  OOOH! AHHG! YES!

But another part of me is wondering how well this is going to translate into live action. And whether or not it's going to wind up stepping all over the beloved (though flawed) series that introduced so many people to anime.

Re:As big an RT fan as I am...

[Ms.Otaku]

Just as long as they improve the music, oh please let them improve the music. Even as a kid the english version concert episodes made me want to clap my hands to my ears and roll on the floor in agony.

Re:As big an RT fan as I am...

[certron]

What I am perhaps most worried about is that they will try to cram the three chapters/ages of what we know as Robotech in the US into one movie. This would be a mistake, I feel. However, I would also hope they would take enough time for some character development. Roy Fokker plays a huge role in the first chapter, even if he is... otherwise indisposed. Will I care, at that point in the film, that he is making an exit? Will the characters of Claudia and Rick, believably?

One thing that they absolutely need: an orchestra.
One thing they can do without in a movie, but which was crucial to the series: a narrator.

I almost want to say the first arc could be made into a trilogy by itself. The discovery, development, training, the first fold, being lost, death, first contact(s), spies, micronization, destruction, reconstruction, more destruction, etc are going to be hard to squeeze into a single movie, even if it turns into "Dances with Bretai" and is 3 hours long. The main problem I had with The Sentinels was that we were introduced to a whole new alien race, find out they are bad, and see them defeated in the span of 90 minutes. While I'm sure part of it is latent Comic Book Guy "It was better when I was 8 years old" feelings, I'm pretty sure they would have taken 5 episodes of introduction and explanation for me to care that anything happened to them.

For some reason, when thinking about the Mospedia chapter, I keep thinking of the danger room from X-Men III. Mostly, the scrapyards.

This is heresy!

[Channard]

Clearly, nothing can beat the stop motion awesomeness that was Robot Jox.

plural

[J05H]

"Mecha" not "mechas". The same way that "deers" or "mooses" are incorrect. One mecha or many mecha, there is no S at the end.

Besides that, a Robotech live-action with today's 3D animation will absolutely rock! It'd be hard to pack into 2 hours, but I'd like to see some of the 2nd and 3rd Robotech series (and/or Macross Plus) mecha involved, since they look so cool.

The Source Material

[TomHandy]

It is very unlikely they'll be going back to the "source material" on this one, as there are still a lot of disputes between Harmony Gold and Tatsunoko and Big West. At the very least, they aren't likely to be able to use things like the original Macross Valkyrie (aka Veritech) designs, and they may not even have the rights to redo the original story.

Of course, with Warner Bros. in the fray now, they might actually work out the IP rights, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

Yeah, honestly.

[Valdrax]

Anyone who thinks that a Hollywood, live-action movie remake of an extremely long running cartoon show is somehow going to be more true to the original story than the American cartoon has never, ever, in their entire life watched any American movie based on a cartoon or video game.

Ever.

Posing the question is tantamount to trolling on the front page.

Macross source

[zakezuke]

While I and most enjoyed Macross over Robotech. The big difference I can remember was Macross dealt with the idea of proculture, as in culture before the giant aliens became genetically modified, where Robotech strung on two unrelated anime fighting over a mythical engery source known as proculture. Such a big difference in story lines would make it difficult to integrate actual Macross sequels and prequils. Near as I'm aware the only sequel, Macross Plus, was released in English though away from the Harmony Gold treatment.

A number of "Robotech" movies were planned, all canceled. This is one of those cases where I feel the fans suffered by a company holding onto to their intellectual property far too long without actually using it.

Interviewing Harmony Gold rep tonight

[Robotech_Master]

I will be interviewing Harmony Gold representative Kevin McKeever at 7:00 Eastern tonight about this and other new Robotech developments on my live talk podcast Space Station Liberty. Please call in with your questions!

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Tread carefully...

[zelik]

Robotech, or the Japanese original Macross, is a very very sacred franchise... Just go look up the Robotech wikipedia and you'll learn that this thing is just as big if not bigger than the whole Gundam series which is still on going and is like the Apple ipod of Anime mecha series. My opinion? Don't mess around with this unless you've got your head screwed on real tight. This to the anime aficionados is like Star Wars. There is much at stake. If you've seen the Macross movie you'll understand why. So touching, so well done. The American version is really........a joke. I'm sorry, the songs "Star light, star bright" really didn't do the originals justice. The original franchise could have been grandiose if the corporations didn't get involved and muck it all up. (again, read wikipedia for more info). Sorry, ranting while inebriated. I just really hope that Mr. Toby doesn't think that he can cash in on transformers and screw around with this one. I for one, do not wish to see screwed up versions of my childhood toys/robots. Have you seen the transformers toys that are being sold now a days? I mean, honestly, are kids nowadays that retarded? I have nephews and the optimus prime they are playing with is a lot more simplified and retarded than what I had as a kid. Shoot, I would think we progress as the generations roll forward, not backwards. With brilliance in kids such as Geohot who can crack the iphone while still in high school I feel the marketing depts. in big corporate really need to be fired for taking two steps backwards. Anyways, enough of rant, I just realllllllly hope they do this movie justice. No, Robotech was a joke and melding 3 different animations was a stupid stupid AOL/time-warner merger style move. Just keep it simple and close to what the original storyline held and you'll win the love of fans/fanatics and newbies alike. Think Lord of The Rings and you'll win in Spades. And god, please don't dumb down the toys or change the valkyre.

Overfiend coming to live action...

[xero314]

Maybe they can follow this up with a live action Urotsukidoji. I mean if they were able to bring The Story of Riki to the big screen live action style, I can't see why they can't do the same for tentacled demonic sex.