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| Yellow Belmont gives an emotional performance in concert. |
Original Release Date - Mospeada: Sept. 1985. Running Time: 49 minutes. Written by: Sukehiro Tomita. Directed by: Katsuhisa Yamada. Produced by: Akira Inoue, Hiroshi Iwata, Kenji Yoshida.
Original Release Date - Robotech: July 23, 2013. Running Time: 89 minutes. Screenplay by: Gregory Snegoff. Story by: Carl Macek, Tommy Yune. Directed by: Gregory Snegoff. Produced by: Frank Agrama, Carl Macek, Tommy Yune.
PLOT - MOSPEADA:
The war with the Inbit is over, and Earth is again at peace. Yellow Belmont has continued his music career, now without the need to cross-dress to hide from the enemy, and he is playing to a massive crowd. In between sets, he gives an interview in which he recalls the comrades he fought with during the alien occupation. He continues recalling their adventures as he performs on stage, giving his all in an intensely emotional performance.
PLOT - ROBOTECH:
The war with the Invid is over, and Earth is again at peace. Lancer, aka "Yellow Dancer," has continued his music career, now without the need to cross-dress to hide from the enemy. Just before a concert in which he'll play to a massive crowd, he gives an interview recalling the fight against the alien occupation. He recaps events from his first meeting with Scott Bernard all the way to the final confrontation with the Invid Regess, while doing his best to hide a secret of his own...
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| Yellow, alone with his thoughts after the concert. |
CHARACTERS:
Either version of Love Live Alive focuses on Yellow/Lancer. He is the only character to receive any substantial new footage, and the flashbacks to the war are indicated to be his memories - though this is a bit muddy, as both versions show events he wasn't present for.
Mospeada's Yellow was always a bit mercurial. In the interview segments in the original version, much of what he says is banter that seems designed to hide his inner thoughts as much as possible. He teases that he got used to dressing in women's clothes, only to then add that those clothes are too expensive now. This slips only when the interviewer notices the photographs he carries of Stig's team, referring to them as friends. He corrects her, firmly identifying them as "comrades."
Robotech's Lancer is more direct. Given that the Robotech version is a traditional compilation film, he pretty much has to be in order to provide a frame for the flashbacks. He still gets cagey, though, with the interviewer at one point observing that he seems to talk more about the others than about himself. He also affirms his focus as his music, with him declining an invitation to rejoin the military: "I feel I can make more of a difference to people as Yellow Dancer than as a soldier."
Advantage: None.
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| The Invid invasion of Earth. |
NARRATION:
The Mosepada version is mostly a music video. It not only has no narration - outside of the brief interview scenes, it barely has any dialogue. The visuals and music are trusted to create the experience.
Robotech opens with narration that's similar in delivery style to that of the series. A couple of newly animated sequences recap the initial Invid invasion of Earth, including a quick shot of an exhausted Dana Sterling joining a mass evacuation of the planet. After that, the bulk of the running time is made up of scenes from "The New Generation," which are also framed by narration - in this case, in-world narration delivered by Lancer to the interviewer.
While both versions work fine, there's little question that Mospeada's presentation is the more dynamic of the two.
Advantage: Mospeada.
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| Yellow grants an interview while changing between sets. In Robotech, the interview comes before the concert. |
DIFFERENT FILMS WITH DIFFERENT GOALS:
The Mospeada and Robotech versions of Love Live Alive are reasonably similar from a narrative perspective: Yellow/Lancer gives both an interview and a concert while recalling the events of the war. However, they are scripted and edited to achieve entirely different goals.
Mospeada is a musical celebration of a series that had only ended the year before. Save for a few lines here and there, the flashbacks are a series of rapid visuals selected to accompany each song, with each song conveying a different mood: action-heavy with Midnight Rider and Clap!! Clap!! Clap!!, more emotional for Blue Rain or Heart Wave. The music is the throughline, not the story.
Robotech is, as ever, all about the story. This version is a traditional compilation, amounting to a 90-minute recap of "The New Generation." Lancer's interview is far more extensive here than in Mospeada... which becomes a problem, as Robotech has to expand the interview scenes by repeating the same shots over and over again. The musical element is all but eliminated, with only one concert sequence retained.
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| Yellow pauses for a drink in the ruins of a battlefield, in a shot that's only seen in Mospeada. |
CUTS AND ALTERATIONS:
I won't bother enumerating the differences in the flashbacks. However, of the new footage...
Mospeada's Opening Is Moved to the End: Mospeada opens with Yellow riding his motorcycle to the concert as the song, Mind Tree plays. The piece's slow and reflective tone matches well with a moment when he pauses in the ruins of a battlefield. Robotech moves the scene to the end, with Lancer pausing on his trip home. It works in either version: In Mospeada, it puts him in a mood to reminisce; in Robotech, he leaves the battlefield and his past to return to his new life. But I prefer Mospeada, because it sets the mood up-front.
Women and Children Removed: As Yellow reaches the venue, we see the people camped out, waiting for the performance. One shot features a woman applying suntan lotion to another woman's bare back, while another shows a family with children waiting. Both shots are removed from Robotech, with only the first, wide establishing shot retained.
The Invid Invasion: There is a small amount of new animation in Robotech. Most of it comes right at the start. We are shown the three mounds from Southern Cross - the ruins of the SDF-1, where the Invid Flower of Life was set free. Then the Invid arrive on Earth in a beam of light that descends like a storm.
Straight to the Interview: In Mospeada, the first interview scene comes more than 15 minutes in, after Yellow has performed his first set. Robotech moves straight from its opening to the interview.
Lancer Gets Shot Down: As the interview begins, it's now Lancer's turn to narrate the beginning of the war. New footage shows Dana Sterling evacuating just before the first attempt to reclaim Earth. Col. Jonathan Wolfe is briefly featured, and then we see Lancer's squad getting ambushed by the Invid, with Lancer shot down. This moves directly to footage from The Secret Route, with him being rescued by Carla and hiding from the enemy by dressing as a woman.
Yellow Performs Throughout Mospeada: The original version continually back and forth between the flashbacks and Yellow's concert, with interview snippets shown during costume changes between sets. The vast majority of his recollections are purely visual, as he recalls the past while singing.
Lancer Only Sings One Song: There is just a single scene of Lancer performing in Robotech, and it's made up shots taken from all of Mospeada's concert bits. This results in a giant visual continuity gaffe, as Lancer apparently runs through three outfits while singing one song, an abbreviated version of We Will Win.
Scott Invites Lancer to Join His Next Mission: Both versions culminate in a reunion between Yellow/Lancer and his old friends. Mospeada keeps this entirely wordless, with the song, Heart Wave, playing over shots of them gathered together. Robotech eliminates the song. We hear bits of casual conversation, but the scene's focus becomes Scott telling Lancer about his next mission and extending an invitation to join it.
Jim and Mint vs. Lunk and Annie: Yellow leaves the reunion as his friends sleep, smiling at each of the couples: Stig and Aisha, Ray and Houquet, and Jim and Mint. The most "couple-y" shots of Jim and Mint are removed, de-emphasizing the age-inappropriate pairing for Lunk and Annie.
Lancer Doesn't Litter: In Mospeada's opening, Yellow opens a can and drinks while in the ruined battlefield, then tosses the empty can away when he's finished. The sequence has been moved to Robotech's ending - but Harmony Gold apparently didn't want to be accused of encouraging littering, as those specific shots have been removed.
New Animation in the Final Scene: Both versions end with the same scene, basically showing the same ending for Yellow/Lancer. However, Robotech needs to really spell it out with dialogue, and so a tiny amount of additional animation closes out the film. The new shots are slipped into the existing scene - Note that I don't say "seamlessly," as the visual difference between the old and new footage is glaring.
Next Episode: After the end credits, Robotech's announcer teases the "next episode" - The Shadow Chronicles, which was released almost seven years before Robotech's Love Live Alive.
Advantage: Mospeada.
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| Yellow prepares to make his entrance. |
MUSIC:
The 1985 Japanese original is framed entirely around its music. Its soundtrack is outstanding, a mix of new songs and songs from the series. It can legitimately be enjoyed as a concert video, a showcase for the work of the While Rock Band in particular.
Robotech only features one new song, which plays over its end credits... and that may be a mercy, as the new song is worse than any of the ones it re-uses from the series. All other musical cues are just Robotech's standard incidental music - though the opening titles music, an arrangement of old Robotech music, is a vast improvement over the opening titles score for The Shadow Chronicles.
Advantage: Mospeada.
OVERALL ADVANTAGE - MOSPEADA:
The Mospeada OVA is a far more striking work. Not only is it an effective button for Genesis Climber Mospeada, it's also a dynamic viewing experience. The post-series context frames sequences of well-judged, thematically grouped visuals, each of which is backed by excellent music.
The Robotech version is an adequate compilation film - but it's also more ordinary and, at 89 minutes, feels just a little too long for what it is.
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| Yellow rides through the ruins left by the war. |
A LITTLE TOO CHANGED:
To date, Love Live Alive is Robotech's final entry. There's a certain symmetry to this: The first release was Codename: Robotech, a compilation of the first third of "The Macross Saga"; and its last is this, a compilation of "The New Generation." It's also appropriate that this final entry is an Americanized version of a Japanese OVA, effectively returning the series to its roots.
The Robotech version is a radically different entity than the original. Changing it a straightforward retelling of "The New Generation" makes sense. Mospeada's Love Live Alive released the year after the series ended, so it was reasonable to expect viewers to remember it. The Robotech version released in 2013: 28 years after "The New Generation" was broadcast.
Even acknowledging that, however, I think Robotech makes a mistake by all but removing the musical aspect. The more traditional compilation approach would still work if Lancer were to perform sets throughout. The film could even include some of the visual montages from Mospeada, with the interview segments framing a more traditional narrative.
This sort of hybrid approach might have allowed Robotech to channel at least some of the mood of the original. But with the music so de-emphasized, the uniqueness and atmosphere is lost, leaving the Americanized Love Live Alive to play as little more than an overlong clip show.
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| Yellow reunites with his old friends. |
CONTINUITY CONFUSION:
Robotech's Love Live Alive is passable as a compilation film, but there are a few questionable choices. I have no idea why this movie includes Ghost Town, the episode with the old soldiers, it in its recap; it's a fine standalone episode, but it's hardly a core part of the story. Meanwhile, despite devoting precious minutes to this sideline, the film doesn't make time for Ariel's protests to Sera and the Regess - even though it includes the scene in which Sera recalls Ariel's words and acts upon them.
Love Live Alive was released on home video, packaged with a re-release of The Shadow Chronicles. That might lead you to expect that the compilation film would try to smooth away a few of the continuity issues between "The New Generation" and The Shadow Chronicles. It doesn't. Just inserting a clip of the Ariel/Regess scene from the 2006 movie into the recap of Symphony of Light would have lightly massaged the discontinuities - but even something that obvious wasn't done, and all continuity mismatches are retained.
The post-credits "Next Time" blurb makes the timeline even more confusing than it was already. It seems obvious that the frame for Love Live Alive is set some time after The Shadow Chronicles, the first half of which directly overlaps with the events of the final episode. Also: Scott and Ariel are shown as a proper couple here, something that only became true in The Shadow Chronicles; enough time has passed since the series for Lancer to move on in his own life; and there has been enough time to plan and promote a concert with multiple back-up musicians and technical tricks that plays to a huge crowd. Not to mention that Lunk has grown a full beard.
Despite all of the above, the end teaser explicitly posits this as a lead-in to The Shadow Chronicles - something that makes zero sense!
OVERALL:
Both versions of Love Live Alive are perfectly pleasant to watch on their own terms. The continuity of the "official" placement for Robotech makes my head hurt... but if I just decide that the frame story occurs after The Shadow Chronicles (because it pretty much has to), then it's a serviceable enough epilogue to Robotech's "New Generation."
Still, at 89 minutes, the Robotech version overstays its welcome - and beyond that, the Mospeada OVA is a vastly more satisfying overall experience.
Overall Rating - Mospeada: 8/10.
Overall Rating - Robotech: 5/10.
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