FUNimation Films will treat moviegoers in Ohio to the Midwest premiere of Robotech: The Shadow Chronicles, the new animated feature that continues the saga introduced by the 1980s television series. This special screening will be presented in conjunction with the Ohayocon convention at the Arena Grand Theatre in Columbus on Saturday, Jan. 6 at 11:15 a.m. General admission is $6.50 but attendees of Ohayocon can present their registration badge to receive $1.50 off their ticket.
Picking up where the popular anime TV series left off with a cliffhanger more than 20 years ago, Robotech: The Shadow Chronicles features a cast of returning characters, led by Scott Bernard and Vince Grant, that fights to end a decades-long struggle against an enigmatic alien race known as the Invid. Details surrounding the mysterious disappearance of the legendary Admiral Hunter will be revealed and our young heroes will uncover a treacherous plot that could tear them apart and threaten their survival.
The film is directed by Tommy Yune, who worked on visual effects for the original TV series and produced the video games Robotech: Battlecry, Robotech: The Macross Saga and Robotech: Invasion. Mark Hamill (Star Wars, Batman: Mask of the Phantasm) and Chase Masterson (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Manticore) lend their voices to the production, which incorporates CG elements into the classic anime style.
Produced by Harmony Gold and distributed in North America by FUNimation Ent., Robotech: The Shadow Chronicles took the award for Best Animated Sci-Fi Feature at the 2006 Int’l Horror and Sci-Fi Film Festival and has also screened at Cannes and a host of other fests, including The New York and Los Angeles Korean Film Festivals, the Hawii Int’l Film Festival, The Waterloo Festival for Animated Cinema and the Asian Animation Festival in Chicago.
The movie will also have a three-day engagement at Portland’s Hollywood Theatre starting Jan. 5, where Kevin Mckeever from Harmony Gold will be on hand for a Q&A session after each show. The first 100 attendees to each theater the film will receive a limited edition Robotech mini-poster. Information on each theater can be found at www.arenagrand.com and www.hollywoodtheatre.org.
FUNimation plans to release Robotech: The Shadow Chronicles in additional theaters and on DVD early this year. Fans can watch for updates on www.funimationfilms.com. An exclusive nine-minute excerpt from the Robotech: Birth of a Sequel documentary can be viewed at www.theshadowchronicles.com/trailer.php?id=minidoc1.
