It’s amazing how quickly my recent burning adoration for Macross Frontier turned to utter hatred in the space of one episode… or at least, utter hatred of some of the characters lol.
To backtrack a little bit, This past week I took advantage of my Soul Eater – Code Geass break to start marathoning Macross Frontier like mad. The story and the Macross universe had me hooked. And as much as the love triangle between Saotome Alto, Ranka Lee, and Sheryl Nome kills me, I also adored watching their relationships played out bit by bit. I also liked how EVEN this triangle was, at least up to episode 22. Not to say I don’t have my preferences… Ranka Lee totally rocks my socks! Curious to find out if there was a clear favorite between the two female protagonists among the series’ fans, I’ve trolled the internets a bit and thought the word on the blogs looked fairly even. As a female viewer, the decision for me pretty much came down to how much I identified with the characters – which definitely fell to Ranka because of her shyness; I will also say I utterly detest spoiled princess-diva types and Sheryl definitely fell into that camp. Despite of all the recent developments with Sheryl falling out of public favor and discovering that she still has the mysterious Vajra-related and (thus far) terminal illness, which made me feel somewhat sorry for her, I still can’t shake my very “meh” first impression of her.
Given how much I like Ranka, if you’ve seen episode 22 you can imagine my utter feelings of hatred towards both Sheryl AND Alto by the end of this episode. I mean, the minute Ranka’s out of the picture the scale immediately tips overwhelmingly in Sheryl’s favor?! Even though Alto just discovered that Sheryl has a terminal illness, did it really warrant the hug and horribly suggestive panning out after the kiss?? I’m annoyed at how quickly Ranka fell out of favor and how friends like Klan just started pushing Alto towards Sheryl. To be fair I guess they’re still under the impression that Ranka betrayed them for the Vajra, but still. If I could bitch-slap Alto a few times I would. As a Ranka fan this episode managed to successfully draw out all the irrational rantings in me xD All in all I wholeheartedly agree with Ozma Lee’s parting words: “Aren’t you the one who’s just flowing along? On circumstances! On those momentary emotions!” Seriously, Saotome Alto needs to MAN UP (and pick Ranka instead of Sheryl ; D;)
To me, Ranka’s always been the underdog in this love triangle… just look at episode 11, when Alto was offered three present-choices on his birthday – to go back home to his father, from his older brother; to wait for her on the hill where they first met, from Ranka; to fly in a boundless sky, from Sheryl. The minute I saw that bit I just groaned and thought, “That’s totally unfair!” Given that Alto can be the bonehead that he is sometimes, it’s not that hard to guess which one he picked D:
I was happy to see Ranka pick up her stride in later episodes popularity-wise if not quite love-wise, but… GRRR. I guess this is a good opportunity though for me to distract myself with Soul Eater / Code Geass until I finish fuming about the recent state of affairs in Macross Frontier ; x;
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