>Mike the Astrodroid... I was thinking "Where have I seen that before?"
>when he was described, and then I realised that I was thinking of the
>robot from the ancient, Westernised "Battle of the Planets". Was I on
>the right lines with that?

Sort of. Mike Sounders XIII is one of the AI robots from King of Braves Gaogaigar - his original "cosmo robo" form is clearly inspired by Sci-Fi Cute Robots like 7-Zark-7 and his ilk, and his "boom robo" form is more your classic Takara Transforming Robot.

>Finally, one thing I just didn't understand, and would like some
>enlightenment. "She looked as if she'd just pulled an all-nighter in a
>19th Century shirt factory." Um? All I'm getting is entertaining
>images of Jessica Alba as a result. Not complaining about that, but I
>don't understand the reference.

The garment factories of the 19th and early 20th centuries are where we get the term "sweatshop" from - they were basically huge rooms packed full of industrial sewing machines and immigrant women who worked for an inordinate number of hours per day for not very much money doing the dull and repetitive task of making shirts, trousers, and so forth. The conditions were hot, unsafe, and generally miserable. That kind of thing isn't seen often in the industrialized West any more - it's been largely stamped out by modern labor laws - but it still crops up pretty often in the less developed world. (One often finds left-wing activist types refusing to wear particular brands of shoes and whatnot on the grounds that they're made in sweatshops somewhere on the Pacific Rim.)

Anyway, 19th-century shirt factories were hot, dirty, dangerous places where underpaid women did drudgerous work for too many hours per day, so the effect I was shooting for was basically "sweaty and exhausted, and not in the good way".

--G.
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Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Admin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.