Denver Comic Con

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Robotech Memories: Robotech Returns!

February 1986

-take note that most of the accounts below are that from a perspective of a 13 year old boy from 1986. 25 years have past and much as been learned. Yet, this is what I thought back then. Stay with me and I'll show you how it changed my life...

Or it could have been early March 1986. It was still a very important time. My seventh grade year was coming to an end. The long months of Fall 1985 and Early 1986 with no Robotech was nearly over. In the months prior to March, I had learned to live without Robotech. These were the years before On-Demand or Hulu. Christmas 1985 had delivered us with our first VCR. Unfortunately, Robotech wasn't out on VHS. At least not anywhere I knew. But it wouldn't matter.

While watching a typical afternoon lineup of cartoons, most likely Voltron or Thundercats, there was a fast station commercial and an advertisement for Robotech airing Monday at 4:00 pm. My heart stopped. Not more than a few milliseconds or I would have found myself unconscious on the floor, mind you.

At last, Robotech had Returned!

Things were back to being a great time. I remember talking to Chris Lester in Mrs. Field's English class about the latest episodes. I doodled battles of Hovertanks and Bioroids. All the while it never dawned on me to use the fancy new VCR to record the episodes until one day I was going to miss one due to a school activity. I set the VCR to tape and it hit me like a sock full of pennies. I could tape it every afternoon and watch it whenever and as often as I wanted. The first episode taped: Robotech, Second Generation, episode 10 (46) Stardust. It was then that I started working on my own home video library of Robotech. Everyday I was at the VCR at 4:45 (remember it started an hour later in the Roswell area - LA was an hour behind us) waiting to punch the record button. I remember Gumby was on before it (and I had to watch the claymation while I waited) and Thudercats would start immediately after just as I hit stop on the VCR. Allowance went to blank VHS tapes.

I was so angry at myself that I hadn't started taping it before. I prayed that KTTV would rerun the show at least one more time so I could catch all the episodes I missed (Ep #1 Booby Trap through Ep #45 Metal Fire ). I was so focused on recording the show, I even remember running (literally running) from my mother's work (Chewning Footwear) to our house in under 20 minutes. Not bad for the 2 or so miles. I don't remember all the details but somehow I recall my grandmother was suppose to pick me up around 4 pm and take me home. When 4:30 had rolled around and still no ride, I told my mother, I going to run home. She was so shocked that I literally took off running, she didn't stop me. I remember opening the door with 5 minutes to spare. I loaded the tape and hit record.

I would continue to record and watch all the episodes right up to episode 60 (the 24th episode of Robotech Masters). Then, horror struck. KTTV had canceled broadcast of Robotech. We didn't' even get a full run of the show. My hopes of seeing New Generation to completion had been robbed from me again! I waited thinking it had to be a mistake. Yet, when 1 week turned into 6 weeks and no Robotech had returned to TV, I knew I had to live without Robotech once more. But I wasn't going to like it nor sit quietly. It was this time that I started writing not only KTTV in Los Angeles but my local cable provider requesting, no demanding, the return of Robotech. I told my friends to write. I'm not sure how I got the information (remember the internet wouldn't be invented for another 10 years) but I had heard rumors KTTV had been pressured to remove Robotech from the afternoon lineup due to the realistic violence in the show. Here was a show that taught us that war meant people died. Not everyone safely escaped an exploding Rattler or Skystriker with a pearly white parachute. It was a show that had real emotions, character growth and development and kick-ass robots! I don't have copies of the letters I sent, but I know I sent more than a few. And when all hope was gone, the day came. Robotech would return once again!

By late June 1986, KTTV had won the battles with the Robotech Fans and the mothers that hated it. I even remember the ad stating "returning due to popular demand." Yes, Robotech was back on the air starting July 1986. KTTV had picked the show up right where it had left off with episode #61 The Invid Invasion. Life was good again. Then, I was told I had to go to my grandmother's in Alamogordo. You know, the grandmother that had no cable. So, I asked a friend, Rob, to record the show while I was gone. I gave him a couple tapes and left from grandma's house. When I returned, I quickly took up the duties of recording the show every afternoon. I finally got to see how New Generation ended and a part of my life had been filled. I can still feel the excitement of the last episode when the narrator said, "join us where it all began. Reacquaint yourself with Rick Hunter, Lisa Hayes and Lynn Minmei." I bought a new tape and was ready to start recording the First Generation of Robotech. Soon I would have a near complete run of the show. Yet, Robotech disappeared from the lineup once again. Without warning it was gone. Not sure why. But it would not air again on KTTV nor any other channel until the early 1990s (when the Sci-fi Channel aired it).

-The dark times of no Robotech would haunt me once again. But during that time I had something just as good. The only difference was, I had to read it instead of watch it...