More Screencaps from Macross Frontier 21
Picking up from last week's episode, the humans are still valiantly trying to repel the Vajra attack. Leon and his harem march into the command center of Battle Frontier where he tells the Brigadier-General in charge that President Glass was killed by the Vajra and as the next higher in rank, he is taking command over the entire fleet. He then proceeds to order the Battle Frontier to move out.
Meanwhile, Alto, Ranka and Luca hurry towards the headquarters of the LAI, Luca's family company, while an enraged Klan cover for them with a Valkyrie-type canon. Once the three reach their destination, Luca reveals his plan of luring the Vajra into a single area and using his company's special fold bomb to wipe them all out. However, once Alto realizes that the plan necessarily involves using Ranka as bait, he initially refuses and even gets into a heated argument with Luca until Ranka herself offers herself as bait. The whole thing has become a battle for survival between humans and Vajra.
Back in Battle Frontier, Leon receives word from Luca about the fold bomb. In response, he orders the entire Island-3, which is used as a leisure area for the Zentradi, isolated. Brera later appears and tells Ranka that she does not have to sing. His concern for her is her undoing but even with tears in her eyes, she tells him that she's fine.
Ranka's song reaches out not only to the Vajra but to the entire fleet as well. As they swarm towards Island-3, Leon seals off the island and cuts it out from the rest of the fleet. Alto then extracts Ranka out of there just as the fold bomb explodes and wipes out the entire island. Ranka feels an unspeakable pain while Grace watches it all inside her mind, silently pleased with her "little queen."
It is a hollow victory for the humans. In the aftermath, grief takes over.
Leon, with Ranka, holds a commemorative funeral for the fleet's fallen heroes. He tells Ranka that her brother is also sadly missing and now asks her for one more song to lift the people's hearts. But Ranka only apologizes to the crowd and declares that she is never going to sing again. The news shocks both Alto and Sheryl.
Later, Ranka discovers Ai-kun safe and sound and apparently pleased to her. But then Ai-kun transforms into a second-stage Vajra right before her eyes.
That evening, Alto meets up with Ranka at their usual place where he teaches her how to fold a paper airplane. They talk and Alto tells her that his mother, who has always been frail, wanted to see a "real" sky. This is the reason why he wants to become a pilot.
Ranka tosses into the air her first paper airplane and as she watches it fly away, she starts to tell Alto the real reason why she called him there. But they are interrupted by Ai-kun. Alto immediately pulls out his gun, hating the Vajra so much for killing Mikhail and many more of his comrades. Desperately trying to protect Ai-kun, Ranka explains that this one only just transformed and therefore had nothing to do with the deaths. Despite this, Alto still refuses to listen, until Brera arrives and knocks him to the ground. Ranka then adds that she has been remembering more and more of her past and that she wants to find out more about it and herself. As soon as she says this, Brera summons his Valkyrie and takes Ranka with him out into space.
COMMENTS:
After the very powerful emotional outburst of Episode 20, this one feels like a denouement of sorts. It's only fitting, considering the emotions that come with the aftermath of any war.
Everybody hates the Vajra now. When you have lost too many of your friends and lovers to a war, it's hard not to hate the enemy. I can't imagine Ranka's situation: it must be a different kind of personal betrayal to hate the enemy for killing your friends and at the same time feel sympathy for them because you are connected to them on some deeper, instinctive level. But her leaving is not escapism, a way for her to forget her situation and forge on. Rather, it's a showing of inner strength, her desire to seek the truth about herself. A weaker person would be too afraid to take on that challenge. Not Ranka Lee.
I'm so glad that this episode chose to lay out Ranka's true character. In the previous episode, she failed not only the people around her but also herself. Now, she's been given a chance to redeem herself and redeems herself she does, picking herself up from the ground and standing tall...singing even when it hurts (Sherly's Awesome Words of Wisdom (TM) went through) and never looking back even when the whole fabric of her being wants her to.
Her relationship with Alto is also more defined. With the much more alluring Sheryl out of the picture (god I hope not, she's awesome!), the two of them can talk with each other freely. Theirs may not be as electrifying as the other pairing or as dangerously exciting but it is most definitely gentler.
I do still want Alto and Sheryl to end up together, but with the way Ranka's character development is progressing, I won't mind him ending up with Ranka instead. Hmm, maybe Sheryl should just end up with Klan Klan because hell yeah, YURI! But Ozma and Cathy....I WANT HAWT SXE NOW! These two's participation and their knowledge of what really happened to President Glass are so going to be material in the next episodes to come. I can hardly wait!
Posts
0 comments:
Post a Comment