Continuing on with Blu-ray news that’s totally blowing my mind, the Japanese arm of Bandai Visual has revealed that they’re planning to unleash a massive Blu-ray boxed set of the original Macross series in honour of its 30th Anniversary (the first episode aired back in October of 1982.) This show, in the guise of the first third of the Robotech saga, as we saw it here in North America back in the ’80s, was instrumental in shaping my love for anime, the giant robot genre and for serial storytelling in general. I don’t think it’s too far fetched to say that some aspect of the story, the design or the legacy of the series is present in my life on an everyday basis (aside from the fact that I’m perpetually gazing at the three large character models I have sitting above my television.) The news that all 36 of the series’ original episodes will be available on Blu-ray this May is throwing me into something of a fit. As I’m sure the obsessive amongst you will understand, I need to own these discs. The problem, however, is twofold – the boxed set is prohibitively expensive and there’s no hint of English on it, either by way of dub or subtitle. What’s a fanboy to do?
Two Macross Blu-ray boxed sets will ship in Japan on May 25th – the regular set priced around $500 USD and the deluxe ‘COMPLETE’ boxed set that includes an additional disc of extras and a bunch of extra printed material, priced at around $600 USD. I’ve detailed the ‘COMPLETE’ set below (via: animenewsnetwork)
SUPER DIMENSION FORTRESS MACROSS: 30TH ANNIVERSARY COMPLETE EDITION BLU-RAY BOX
(May 25, 2012 – MSRP ¥47,250)
Video: 4:3 1080p
Audio: Japanese Linear PCM Monaural (no subtitles)
Special Features:
- All 36 episodes
- a booklet (with staff interviews, pre-production designs from when the creators were working on early series concepts called “Genocidas” and “Megaload/Megaroad”)
- a box illustrated by character designer Haruhiko Mikimoto
- inner jacket covers illustrated by mechanical artist Hidetaka Tenjin
- a music video collection (edited from pachinko and pachi-slo machine footage)
- the 30th anniversary special that ran on the Family Gekijō channel
- promotional videos from the Macross PlayStation 2 game
- the “Macross Special” version of the first two episodes that aired in the original premiere
- the original broadcast version of episode 11
- the credit-less opening and ending animation sequences
- the opening and ending sequences from “Macross Special”
- the super-deformed version of the opening sequence
- commercials of the time
- additional materials
- Replicas of the 1983 tome Macross Perfect Memory, the scenario script for the first episode, storyboards (for the opening sequence, episode 1, and episode 27), and a collection of illustrations (from DVDs, LDs, plastic models packages, and elsewhere)
[...] wildest Blu-ray dreams are coming true all at once!! First the Universal Monsters films, then the Macross anime series and now a good portion of Hammer Films‘ catalogue films have all been announced [...]