>>13710866
One of the girls actually disappears, leaving only one remaining love interest.

One of the guys in Plus dies.

The "triangle" in 7 is really flimsy because the only one who really cares is Gamlin.

In Zero, there's no real triangle. It was pretty clearly just Shin/Sara with Mao just kind of being there.

In Frontier, Ranka never really felt like a real love interest. More like a little sister figure.

>>13710866
It was grounded. All three of them seemed like real people.

Ichijo started out a dweeby kid, Minmay started out a slightly air-headed girl dreaming of being an idol, Misa was a sad woman who didn't hope for much more than doing her job well. Nobody started out as a larger-than-life celebrity, if we're sticking to the series. The closest is Ichijo, who can come across as a child prodigy in the first episode, having the balls to do that flyby near Focker.

Their relationships rise and fall for stupid reasons. Minmay just forgets that intense growing-closer she and Ichijo have once they reunite with the other castaways. Ichijo's disappointment in that relationship pushes him into the military, but later, his success helps motivate Minmay to do her best in the idol business.

Their relationship helped them both grow, and then that growth was what split them apart; the military world and the idol world were just too alien from each other. One of my favorite scenes is when Ichijo calls Minmay after Kashikazi dies. Minmay, oblivious to what Ichijo just went through, starts talking about her exhaustion from work, and Ichijo just stands there, then hangs up without saying anything.

So he pursues a relationship with someone who can understand him better, Misa. Until it turns out that idol music and military strategy go hand-in-hand, and everyone is forced to remember what they tried to leave behind. It's not enough to bring anyone back together, but it's enough to make Ichijo remember Minmay years later, holding on to that photo album.

In defense of later series, most of the time they didn't try to duplicate the SDF triangle. Only Frontier tried to do so, and that's debatable. The Basara-Mylene-Gamlin triangle wasn't trying to copy SDF at all, yet the Mylene-Gamlin aspect did have a similar charm.

Why does Kawamori insert love triangles into every work he does, anyway?

Not only macross, even Aquarion, Escaflowne, Basquash, almost everything he produces has love triangles featuring the main character. Does AKB0048 have love triangles as well?

>>13710937
>Does AKB0048 have love triangles as well?
No, actually.

If memory serves, 0048 only had one romantic relationship at all. It didn't involve the main characters, and was, surprisingly enough, handled rather tastefully.

>>13710937
Why does Tomino insert love triangles into all his works?

>>13710881

Is 7 even a Triangle? Isn't more like an...L

Plus is strange

there is the guld, isamu, myung triangle and the isamu, myung, sharon triangle. Guld was the rapist but was really in denial about it. Sharon wanted to kill Isamu as her way of showing him how much she loved him.

>>13711040
In tomino's case, one corner of the triangle will always die.

>>13711042
It's a triangle because Gamlin wants to have sex with Mylene while listening to Basara's songs.

>>13710866
There's a clear best girl, and even though she's the underdog, she wins in the end.

>>13711089
That is why Macross is the best as the best girl always win such as the mountain in Macross 7.

that was compelling?