Don't get me wrong, having James Wan do Fast and Furious 7 was genius. I mean former Director Justin Lin almost walked off the set on Tokyo Drift when the goons over at Universal told him they had to use an Indian girl to play the main cast rather than Japanese. Justin Lin told the studios that Fast & Furious was born on the premise of engineering and love for Japan. He knows this because Justin, like myself, grew up in the Import Racing world. We didn't follow Hollywood. They saw us, and they copied us. That's the truth.
If you ever see the making of Fast & Furious, you'll notice that actors and movie directors went to the races at midnight to see what all the fuss was all about in Import Racing. And the rest? Well it's history. Especially in the tuning scene and the police force!
James Wan is a bit more international. His tributes to directors are probably much more vast than Justin Lin's. That's because James Wan isn't American. He's Chinese. The fact that he is able to rise to the top is amazing in the world of white-washed Hollywood. I mean all the execs care about is the American audience and pays very very little homage to Japan.
In the past, I frowned when Memoirs of Geisha didn't break new ground. They used proven international stars from Hong Kong, Taiwan, and added Ken Watanabe as the main character. The problem? It's about Geisha? Where was the honesty in that film? Is that what you call a tribute to the Samurai? To Kyoto? To Shintoism? Is that even a tribute to Akira Kurosawa? The man who influenced and gave birth to those of Steven Spielberg and George Lucas? (True story).
The joke is that American Robotech fans will hope for the watered down cast. The fact that Rick Hunter had to be an American character was due to the fact that the execs forced it upon Carl Macek. Macek knew Japan. Trust me, I was in a conference room with him once. I remember him vividly talking about the past and how it worked at Harmony Gold.
He knew that America wasn't ready for hardcore Anime. He knew that George Lucas heavily watched Anime growing up. He eventually admitted that he wasn't a fan of the original Shoji Kawamori story plot. What most of us Macross fans know today is that the Japanese version is just much better?
The idea of "song" integrated in the Zentradi race as a memory of the founders or "Proto-culture" saves the human race. Well at least Macross city and SDF-1. We later find that the Earth was decimated by the Supervision Army leaving Macross as the last of mankind.
James Wan doesn't have to be Macross fan. He doesn't even need to be a Robotech watcher. What he needs to do is study Shoji Kawamori. He'll quickly learn that Shoji designed the G1 Transformers Optimus Prime. He designed and made every Veritech fighter known to man. And he designed and wrote the fight scenes that look more like a scene from Top Gun than a GI Joe cartoon.
And most of all? Shoji Kawamori is now considered a director that of the likes of Hayao Miyazaki. There are plenty of tributes to go around with the series, but in Japan, Shoji Kawamori is seen as the most respected animator in the fanboy and mecha kingdom.
For most of you, you may not tie Shoji Kawamori to Transformers, but make no mistake, Transformers was like Robotech. They took existing Shoji Kawamori designs and integrated them into the Marvel Universe. They seized an opportunity by using Japanese robots.
James Wan must have grown up watching the Macross series and the continuation with Macross Zero and Frontier. All of which was under Shoji Kawamori's studio. And sure, there's a huge dispute among the three studios, Harmony Gold, Tatsunoko Pro, and Big West, but that never swayed Shoji Kawamori from continuing his life business.
James Wan can easily study the life of Kawamori to see just how much he struggled to bring Macross to the big screen and to the globe. There was some ups and down at the studio, but in the end, none of this could ever have happened without his art. Some people will compare Macross to Pacific Rim, but I compare Macross to Lord of the Rings, Twilight, Divergent, and Hunger Games.
In the end, it's that good. And it's historical in the nature of Anime. Sure, the Robotech version exists in the United States. And professionals are talking about making this a Transformers type movie, but in the end, it's just so much more.
Forget the explosions for a minute. Just focus on the love story and the enemy. It's hard to hate the Zentradi as well because they are giant clones bred for war. They have never experienced love, happiness, and just live their lives to kill.
Well that integration of love story is all due to Mr. Kawamori.
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