BW Media Spotlight

By now we know the history. Super Dimension Fortress Macross was chosen by Harmony Gold to be dubbed and edited for Western television, but it had too many episodes for a weekend run and too few for a weekday run. So two other shows were chosen, they licensed the name “Robotech” from Revell, who was making Macross model kits under that name in the US, and a series was born. The second war comes from the unconnected Super Dimension Calvary Southern Cross, which became known as Robotech Masters in the recent remaster (where all the nudity and blood were put back in but otherwise uses the same audio from the original show with a new intro that uses the same theme song) because that’s what Comico named that series. But why were all three wars given different names?

In total 85 episodes of Robotech came from the three wars (Genesis Climber Mospedia became the third Robotech War/Robotech: The New Generation). Comico The Comic Company (the publisher’s full name at the time, like “Marvel Comics Group”) published their comics either monthly or bimonthly. Already the comic lasted on shelves longer than the show aired on television by splitting the three wars into their own series. Imagine how long it would have taken to publish an 85 issue series on a monthly basis. This was actually a good idea on Comico’s part. However it led to a problem.

The first episode of the Masters saga is “Dana’s Story”, a clip show meant to bridge the gap between the first and second war, and allows Dana to tell her parents backstory. Dana Sterling is of course the daughter of Max and Miriya Sterling, but since the two shows are separate from each other this connection was one of the ways show creator Carl Macek tried to turn three disconnected shows into one complete story. The problem is that this episode basically spoils the wedding of a human and Zentraedi long before either character showed up in the comics. So the first issue of Robotech Masters is the second episode of the show. This kind of works as “Dana’s Story” doesn’t have a counterpart in Southern Cross. It was culled together from clips of the both shows to form an original introduction mainly of Dana and her best friend Bowie Grant, the two most important characters in this part of the story. So after the Masters comic ended this comic was produced to complete the collection and give us not only a proper adaptation of “Dana’s Story”, but as the writer would do with his run on the Robotech comics attempt to build on the episode and flesh things out. When it comes to this adaptation there are some minor changes but there are plenty of additions.

Robotech Special

Comico The Comic Company (May, 1998)

“Dana’s Story”

ADAPTATION: Markālan Joplin

ARTISTS: Thomas A. Tenney & Mike Chen

COLORIST: Tom Reilly

COVER: Ken Steacy (with thanks to Vic and Barb–the full cover shows more of the room and indicates this could be Dana’s room or just a really huge Robotech fan)

LETTERER: Bob Pinaha

EDITORS: Maggie Brenner & Diana Schutz

Continue reading →