[Lynk Former]

Well Macross has never really been all Japanese. We've had character names such as "Roy Focker" and "Maximilian Jenius"... a lot of names in Macross do have a hidden meaning, so it wouldn't surprise me if "Alto" was chosen for the very reasons you mentioned.

In the first episode, Alto reminded me of Hikaru in his cynical phase in SDF Macross...

EDIT: MUST READ THIS EDIT AND CLICK LINK Oh... you guys really need to hear the new version of Ai, Oboete Imasu Ka (Do You Remember Love?), the ending song for Macross Frontier... it's so damn good

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zo7-eTTaw0I

And just so you know, the song is sung by Megumi Nakajima who plays Ranka Lee in Macross Frontier and was the new pop singer chosen specifically for the series... the same way that Minmay came into being...

And for us diehard Macross fans... you know the end of the song where you hear the words "mou hitoribotchi ja nai, anata ga iru kara" being sung?... That's Mari Iijima singing that, the voice of Lynn Minmay. Yes, how FUCKING AWESOME IS THAT! It makes me all misty and brings a tear to my eye... I can't wait to get my hands on the full version of the song, godamn! And then let's not forget the fact that Yoko Kanno is also involved... the awesomeness of it all is just too much for me!

Megumi Nakajima (Ranka Lee) and Mari Iijima (Lynn Minmay)

Even if Macross Frontier ends up being the crappiest Macross series so far... it'll still be worth it just for this one song.

(I don't know why, but Mari makes me melt...)