Annie picked a bad day to join Rook’s old biker gang.
Robotech: The New Generation #14
Comico The Comic Company (March, 1987)
“Annie’s Wedding”
ADAPTATION: Jack Herman
PENCILER: Reggie Byers
INKER: Rich Rankin
COLORIST: Kurt Mausert
LETTERER: Ed King
EDITOR: Diana Schutz
Scott comes up with the idea of using the river to sneak their mecha past an Invid base without tapping their limited protoculture supplies. While goofing off…I mean being the lookout man, Lancer is knocked out by one of the local natives, a young man looking to become an official man of the tribe by finding a wife. The others are captured by other warriors of the tribe, who blame them for their river god leaving…in other words they don’t know how to work the dam controls. Scott and Lunk take care of that and the group is welcomed as friends of the tribe. Learning his mistake the boy, Macgruder, runs off but Annie’s attempt to comfort him is interrupted when an Invid scouting party shows up. Our heroes plan to use the dam to get rid of the Invid but to help Macgruder, Annie steals Rand’s Cyclone so they can act as bait. With the Invid dealt with, Macgruder is accepted as a man, and Annie as his wife. As the others move on they spot a new Invid type, the Enforcer.
What they got right: On the surface it’s a fun jungle type adventure, and could show just how far civilization has fallen. We get a new type of Invid, and if this were Annie’s final episode (why have an early teen girl on a war mission) it wouldn’t be a bad good-bye. She gets to finally be a bride.
What they got wrong: This is not her final appearance. In fact she’s back the next episode/issue and I’ll get into that when we get there. Also, as insulting as it would be for this to be a Native American tribe it would still make more sense for them to have river gods and what not. By “more sense”, I mean what do Japanese know about Native Americans? Instead it appears to be all white guys (remember, Reflex Point is supposed to be somewhere in the upper mid-west) who somehow fell into tribalism when there is no such evidence from any other humans we meet. Even bush people would be insulted but again, given where this came from it would make more sense as someone already cut off from civilization and “off the grid”. So in not being insulting it still end up being stupid. Choose your trade-off I guess.
What I think overall: Illogic aside it’s not a bad story and could have been a good send-off for Annie, but given how she returns I’m not sure why they bothered.
BW Media Spotlight 