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Frontier Love Triangle


Getsuga Tenshou

Who do you think Alto ends up with?  

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  1. 1. Who do you think Alto ends up with?



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Hey guys. I've just finished watching the Frontier series for the first time. And I apologize if this topic has already been discussed before. I just want to get your opinions because the people in this forum seem to be smarter than the average fans(fanatic?) in other anime sites. I would really appreciate it if you would state your reasons for choosing one over the other or if you dont care haha. Ill start with mine, and I think Alto ends up with Sheryl for the following reasons:

1. Ranka has so many similarities with MynMei from the original Macross. She's Chinese, works in a Chinese Restaurant, and she becomes a singing sensation starting from scratch. Sheryl also has similarities to Misa in a sense that she is stubborn, and her relationship with the main character starts out rough, but during the course of the series, she mellows down and falls in love with Alto. Well, we all know who Hikaru ended up in SDF macross right? :-)

2. In Episode 24 before the final battle with the Vajra, Alto goes to Sheryl's room and he says that he's coming back after the battle because he finally realized that living alone is not how humans should live or something of that sort(need to rewatch again this part). I think he was also going to say that he loves Sheryl but was stopped by Sheryl herself before he could.

3. Alto's time with Sheryl is more intimate compared to Ranka's. The Star Date episode, their Dinner Date. Basically, they seem to connect more with each other.

4. I like Sheryl better than Ranka.

I guess reason #4 kinda invalidates the rest because it shows my bias hahaha. What about you guys?

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Well her last name is "Lee" so I guess that makes her Chinese :p

Yeah really sorry bout that. I guess I wasn't active during the time this debate was still in the hot seat. I would have loved to take part in that.

Off topic for a moment here, but I like the way they kept referencing the older macross series. One episode was even dedicated to the legend of macross zero. It gives the newer fans who doesn't know anything about the previous macross generation some history which in turn will make the newer fans interested in watching the older macross series.

Ranka's Chinese? How do you figure?

Anyway, yeah...it's all been discussed many, many, MANY times. I guess we'll find out in a week and a half or so, eh?

(And for the record, I don't really care who ends up with Alto.)

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But "Lee" is Ozma's surname, and he adopted Ranka...so it's not her real name.

Technically that'd make Ozuma's family either Korean, or Hebrew. If it was Chinese, it would've been Li. :p

Edited by sketchley
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Ah, but the "Dragon" has a way.... with words. B)) And he will enter the.... OK, I'll stop there.

Not the Pinyin transliteration of 李.

Anyhow, with a bit more research, Lee would be someone from Hong Kong, Taiwan, Korea, Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore or as a Hebrew name. Ergo, not automatically Chinese.

Edited by sketchley
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Like M7, it will be unresolved hehehe.... Onward to the next Series. Maybe in the 2060's or 2070's? :)

According to the liner notes for Re-Fire, the Fire Bomber reunion album, that one did get defacto resolved since Basara never went back to the Macross 7 fleet, if I remember right.

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Either way, the triangle got resolved. :p

I have the M7 series and OVAs/Movies since around 3 years ago. But because of the bad feedbacks by the Macross community, I haven't started watching any of it yet. Guess the time is now hehe.

Sheryl is ahead of Ranka by a wide margin in the poll. But many people voted for the I don't care opion. Sigh ... I guess most of those who voted for the I don't care option are those who are too tired of discussing the topic already. Again, sorry for that.

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Sheryl is ahead of Ranka by a wide margin in the poll. But many people voted for the I don't care opion. Sigh ... I guess most of those who voted for the I don't care option are those who are too tired of discussing the topic already. Again, sorry for that.

Not necessarily... I never really cared who ended up with Alto, since he never struck me as much of a "prize."

If the question were "Who do you like better, Sheryl or Ranka?" it'd be a different story.

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According to the liner notes for Re-Fire, the Fire Bomber reunion album, that one did get defacto resolved since Basara never went back to the Macross 7 fleet, if I remember right.

Did he get lost in deep space forever? This would make my day.

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Not necessarily... I never really cared who ended up with Alto, since he never struck me as much of a "prize."

If the question were "Who do you like better, Sheryl or Ranka?" it'd be a different story.

Yeah. Alto is a lot like Hikaru in this respect...

Pete

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Not the Pinyin transliteration of 李.

Anyhow, with a bit more research, Lee would be someone from Hong Kong, Taiwan, Korea, Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore or as a Hebrew name. Ergo, not automatically Chinese.

Well, if we're opening that can of worms labeled "migration", then no-one on Frontier is Chinese because not only are they all mostly citizens of the autonomous Frontier fleet with its own president and government, but China on Earth itself has long ceased to exist by that point in time.

Either way, the triangle got resolved. :p

More like "dissolved". :p

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Well, if we're opening that can of worms labeled "migration", then no-one on Frontier is Chinese because not only are they all mostly citizens of the autonomous Frontier fleet with its own president and government, but China on Earth itself has long ceased to exist by that point in time.

clapplz.gif

(Agreed)

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Just to add a bit more to romanization, in actuality I feel that it has only been somewhat recently that Western governments have adopted a more formalized system presumably based on Pinyin to translate family names.

As a personal example, mine is 岑 (observed with higher frequency in Guanzhou & HK), which like most things is pronounced differently in "native" Cantonese vs the official Mandarin. In Canto, it is pronounced something akin to Shum, whereas in Mandarin it's more like Cen. (Not using formal pinyin here, apologies) There is only a very subtle phonetic difference with 陈, a popular last name, which is often romanized as Chen. So when my dad migrated to the US in the early 90's we used Chen, and the name stuck, and that is what I go by today. But my dad's relatives, who came almost 2 decades earlier go by Shum as their official English last name.

As another example, the name for Bruce Lee's teacher, Ip Man (叶问), is pronounced Ye Wen in Mandarin, but he is of course better known as the Cantonese pronunciation of his name (granted he never immigrated out of HK).

In conclusion... an English last name of a certain spelling or pronounciation predisposition is only weakly correlated to an actual Chinese last name.

Edited by Ghost Train
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I have the M7 series and OVAs/Movies since around 3 years ago. But because of the bad feedbacks by the Macross community, I haven't started watching any of it yet. Guess the time is now hehe.

Sheryl is ahead of Ranka by a wide margin in the poll. But many people voted for the I don't care opion. Sigh ... I guess most of those who voted for the I don't care option are those who are too tired of discussing the topic already. Again, sorry for that.

It's not so much being tired of the topic but I don't like Alto very much so I'm fairly indifferent about who he ends up with. I hope that the triangle wont overshadow the events of the second movie as I hope to see more of the events surrounding the Macross Galaxy and aftermath of the war.

For the triangle resolution I don't see a SDFM like situation happening where Hikaru made a choice between the two girls. My guess is a choice by default like Alto staying on the Varija homeworld and either Sheryl having to return to Macross Galaxy or Ranka leaving for a galactic music tour. Especially Sheryl is quite a popular character based on character rankings so I doubt the producers want to risk fan backlash by any too serious a relationship.

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Well, if we're opening that can of worms labeled "migration", then no-one on Frontier is Chinese because not only are they all mostly citizens of the autonomous Frontier fleet with its own president and government, but China on Earth itself has long ceased to exist by that point in time.

I would argue that it all depends on what he identifies himself as, in that case. For instance, I know several Germans from the eastern part of the country who still identify themselves as Prussian, despite the country not existing for nearly a century. If anything, I'd say that because the countries are no longer there politically there (in terms of borders, government, etc), cultural aspect becomes much more important. Take a Han Chinese person as an example. In this example, let's say his grandparents were born in China and survived the war. He's never been there, but would you say he isn't Chinese? Or a German, or a Pole, or an Indian (South Asian one, I mean), or a Peruvian?

It's all in the self-identity.

Noon rant complete, time for lunch. :lol:

More like "dissolved". :p

Semantics! :p But I do agree completely.

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Sheryl wins everytime with her more mature attitude and kinky wardrobe. Sheryl is a woman, Ranka is a child.

Still since Alto is such a pleb then i cant say i want to see him with Sheryl but if he has a choice then he should definitly go with Sheryl.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Well I just hope he ends up with SOMEONE!

The ambiguous ending for Mac 7 really didn't work that well, when you compare how satisfying it was to see Hikaru finally pick someone by the end of SDFM.

Fans need closure otherwise you just annoy them...;)

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Well I just hope he ends up with SOMEONE!

The ambiguous ending for Mac 7 really didn't work that well, when you compare how satisfying it was to see Hikaru finally pick someone by the end of SDFM.

Fans need closure otherwise you just annoy them...;)

I actually prefer the open-endedness of Macross 7 & Frontier rather than the cliche of seeing the hero end up with the girl.

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Also Chinese then:

General Robert E. Lee

robert-e-lee-sm.jpg

Long live teh confederathh!

SCORE!

That said, I chose "I don't care". I side with Nicaragua's last post about open endedness, and why everyone has to have everything tied up in a neat little package in order for the ending to be "good". I actually LOVED how the TV series ended. It was fantastically in character for Alto, especially after the whole situation practically crammed sympathy to Sheryl down his and everyone elses' throat. Even he got mildly disgusted by it at her lowest point and was moved to outrage at the Quarter's departure. Throughout the entire series, Alto never came off as the type looking for a girlfriend. He was oblivious or too focused on his own issues. Sure, he cares about both girls, but it never seems so romantically. Alto was always about playing the part. He would look for his part in a situation, and run with it. It was the acting in his blood that he hated so much. With Ranka, it was always the rivalry with Brera over protecting her. With Sheryl, he was very much her lap dog and then a rock of support and protector once she got sick. Why is he flying? What is he trying to protect? Alto is always about the part he feels he needs to play. He runs away from becoming an actor, when he tends to give grandiose performances as "the tough jet jockey". So I can't see either girl with him, no matter which I prefer. It's all Alto. He cares about the girls. He wants to support them when they need it, but not because of love or romance, but because he feels that it's the thing to do, and in turn, they became both his wings. The sky of freedom he sought. Though fans do need "closure" as banal as "I love Ranka/Sheryl" which is probably why there are hundreds of "SherylxAlto/AltoxRanka" fanfics all over the web. Funny thing is, there still would be even if he had picked her (or vice-versa). Fans are fickle things, and most seem to think the average Japanese ending sucks. ;)

As for the movie, it really depends on how they change this interaction. Ranka's now a childhood friend, which removes a lot of the separation issues the TV had (entire groups declaring victory for Sheryl based solely on screen time, possible rightly so, as it allows more lopsided development). So already Alto's position has changed. I haven't seen the movie subbed yet, but I do think the opening setups are stronger. Ranka's a friend, and he saved Sheryl. I said when the films were being made that the triangle would need serious reworking in order to justify a choice. Fortunately, we're getting them. There are those that care not for spoilers that already know the choice made. I'd have to get to know movie Sheryl, Ranka and Alto a bit better to say who I'd want to "win".

Personal feelings aside, it's such a misshapen matchup of "hot aggressive girl" vs "cute shy girl" over "blind idiot" that it pans out to whomever gets her claws into him the most, hampered by a character design that has most audience members seeing it as a battle between a woman and a child even before they react to personality, that it's no wonder I dropped the romantic aspect of the triangle as a point of interest ages ago and mostly assumed a Sheryl end no matter how poor the fit. :rolleyes: It's still an interesting relationship triangle, just not a good romantic one. I'm even beginning to echo the one member that questioned why people got so worked up over it in the first place.

So yeah, the triangle itself committed suicide in the TV series so "I didn't care". Yet amazingly it ended correctly. That's a television miracle, as I was firmly expected a forced ending of him to embrace the dying Sheryl as she's cured by Ranka, who becomes the bigger woman and "let's him go so he can be happy" like I've seen in just about everything. Yet it didn't, and that is awesome.

Movie wise, I'm still curious, but haven't decided, and refuse to choose on type simply because Sheryl is older and "looks" more the part entirely thanks to character design. So once again, at the moment, "I don't care".

Though I care enough that I responded to this thread. After the series, I was so burned out by the shippers that I practically tore down a redundant "Sheryl vs. Ranka" thread (that includes perhaps one of Gubaba's finest posts ever) with my bare hands. So I've obviously mellowed. Still, ain't there more to this show anymore than "who fracking?" :p

Might I add that I find it amusing that I recognize more of my fellow oldtimers names under "I don't care" than either option. :lol:

Ah, nothing like a cold-addled mind to whip up a late night ramble about anime shipping. Pardon. :ph34r:

Edited by Mercurial Morpheus
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