After decades of legal tussles- that prevented huge swathes of the series from seeing official Western releases were finally resolved last year, it's now possible to sit down on Disney Plus and watch some Macross. And there's no better place to start than Macross Plus.
Update 7:45pm: While I'm in Australia and the series is available on regular Disney Plus here, I've since been told that in the US you need a Hulu subscription to watch it on Disney's service, which sounds unnecessarily complicated to me!
OK that's not quite true. I think to get the absolute MOST out of it you should have seen the original Macross Saga (or at least its Western adaptation as the first season of Robotech, which is on Crunchyroll) first. It's a classic in its own right, and some of Macross Plus--especially its finale--will hit a little harder if you know the series' history.
But it's not necessary, because Macross Plus also works just fine as a standalone experience. First released in 1995, just over a decade after the original Macross series had wound up, it tells the story of three childhood friends from the colony world of Eden--Isamu, Guld and Myung--who, having travelled the galaxy, are reunited on their home planet as adults, years after a mysterious tragedy tore them apart. Isamu and Guld, both pilots in the military, are now rivals in a government project pitting two experimental transforming fighters against one another, while Myung works as the producer for Sharon Apple, a popstar who also just happens to be an AI construct.
This isn't a review; you don't need me to tell you this is good, since Macross Plus is comfortably regarded as one of the all-time greats. It's an expertly-told tale of love, friendship and loyalty, the soundtrack is extraordinary and the animation is at times simply breath-taking. Just look at this! This is 1995!
Macross Plus was a must-watch at the time, and has remained so throughout the decades to pass. I've owned it on VHS, I've owned it on DVD and I've had it on...other formats during the years it was harder to watch. If you've seen it during any point in its existence, that's awesome, because any time is a good time to watch some classic anime!
But sitting down with it in 2025 sure was an experience, because for the first time I found the reasons I love it have shifted, and was amazed that an anime that's now 30 years old had so much to say about our own present struggles here on Earth.
As a teenager watching this in 1995 I would have described this as anime Top Gun. It was a series about two bros, both manly in very different ways--Isamu is Maverick, an uncontrollable hothead, while Guld is Iceman, a cold-blooded pragmatist--duking it out in the skies. It had cool robots! Space combat! Rad music! I couldn't have asked for anything more.
In 2025 Macross Plus hit me entirely differently, because as an adult living through these times it turns into a series where its most defining trait isn't its combat, but its deeply specific series of warnings about the dangers of AI. What's particularly notable about them is that they're not vague, imprecise threats like Terminator or The Matrix, but two laser-focused instances of AI threatening some of our most human pursuits.
(Spoilers ahead)
Macross Plus builds towards, then culminates in, two struggles against the soullessness and inhumanity of AI. Isamu, Guld (even though he's not technically human) and Myung are all striving to be the very best in their fields, but all seemingly come up short when confronted with the touted superiority of AI.
Once the vocaloid megastar Sharon Apple has an illegal AI chip installed, she severs the connection she once had with Myung--who was secretly providing her voice and emotions--and goes rogue. She has become the perfect pop star, one whose final performance at Macross City is so entrancing that it hypnotises a crowd numbering in the tens of thousands.
And both Isamu and Guld, who for months have been pushing the limits as test pilots, must now face the government's secret AI fighter the Ghost, a terrifying vehicle unhindered by a human's reaction speeds and physical limitations. When these two men--the two best pilots in the galaxy, piloting the two best fighters in the galaxy--confront Ghost above Macross city during the series' conclusion, it seems they don't stand a chance.
The message here is clear: despite laws banning the more powerful forms of AI, men in power have found ways to implement it regardless, convinced of its limitless potential in their never-ending quest to seize or maintain power.
Despite the odds being stacked against them, our heroes prevail. Sharon isn't perfect at all; as an AI she grossly misunderstands what Myung's love for Isamu actually means, which ultimately leads to her demise. And the Ghost fighter fails on multiple fronts; not only was it susceptible to being hacked by Sharon and sent into combat against Isamu and Guld, but it had no answer to Guld's final sacrifice when he flies his YF-21 directly into the AI craft's face.
Where the AI is painted as seemingly perfect, an evolutionary final step, Macross Plus' human (and Zentraedi) stars are anything but. Isamu is an impulsive, aggressive, misogynistic hothead. Guld is a murderous psychopath who, as we learn at the end of the series, has committed a serious sexual assault. And Myung is--with all acknowledgement of the trauma she has suffered--a complete mess of a person.
Our heroes are deeply flawed in ways we don't often see from the leads in a series, but that's the point! None of us are perfect, we all make mistakes, and while those can have repercussions big and small, they're what define us. We may be imperfect, but as a result so too is the world we've built around us, and Macross Plus' is as full of subterfuge, corruption, love and hope as our own.
Injecting AI into that world is as repulsive to many of its inhabitants as it is here. Isamu even says as much earlier on, balking at the idea of listening to a computer sing (remember, Sharon's voice is actually his old friend Myung!), while even the premise of an AI-controlled fighter, in a world where its greatest heroes from the Macross Saga and beyond have been pilots, is an affront not just to the pilots in this series but also us as fans, undermining the very thing that has made Macross so fun over the decades.
Whether it's the original series or Plus or the seemingly countless contemporary continuations, Macross is defined by two things: fighters and music. Macross Plus showing us a glimpse of a world where those two things have been handed off to computers is gross, and its story being about humanity's ultimate triumph against AI's horrors is a welcome one 30 years later, exactly when it's needed most.
