Shaka_Z

I actually find it ironic that Sheryl's spotlight is being taken by Ranka - who Sheryl seemed intent on encouraging and molding early on to be her protege... until the two started openly competing for Alto that is.

oh he recognizes brera all right - he's just in denial because he's believed brera dead for the last 12 years.

heh... a few decades you say? the way it works is that from time to time records of sensitive events are reviewed and it is determined whether or not the public is ready/needs to know (in whole or part) the events that transpired. rarely are things like this ever declassified without major omissions and editing. just look at the sheer amount of black-outs in the released documentation of project blue book and you will see my point. about the only people who actually know what went on are those who either lived through the experience or their children (and neither of those parties are likely to seriously counter the 'official' records - people have been known to 'disappear' for less)

ok... there might be something to this connection I've posited... while Ozma (at least in the 2 eps Ive looked at so far) only wears a nondescript earring that may or may not be mayan, he is of a significantly darker skin tone than any other character in the show save for Carnalia and bobby. yeah... I know that is too vague to be considered evidence. I am going to continue this thread of investigation. there is something interesting however concerning gilliam, who died in episode 1 - he had a necklace that is very possibly of south pacific island design, and it was featured rather prominently as one of his belongings when Ozma brought Alto to the SMS hangar for the first time. once again too vague... but.... there is also a couple of pictures of him on the same table, one of which was taken on what appears to be an island somewhere (not on frontier - no ship dome visible) still vague... dammit

yeah... I really think that Sheryl was given the Nome name by grace - it is possible however that Ozma's lineage can be traced back to mayan island - not as a direct relation to mao but as perhaps one of the grandkids of the other villagers who survived. He knows alot more than he is telling... that much is absolutely certain, and some of it - the very fact that he knows of the events on the island way back when - is the kind of thing that is typically passed on from parents to kids. I am gonna have to look back thru the series to see if ozma wears any accessories that might be of mayan origin.

how old is alto's father anyway? mao was right about 50 when the 117th was lost in 2047. Alto would have been 5 or 6, whch puts her at 44-45 when alto was born. even today it is not all that rare for women that age to bear children with proper medical care - provided they have not gone through menopause already. It's even possible that she could have used in-vitro techniques using stored eggs from when she was much younger, and there are a number of examples of THAT happening in real life today - grandmothers acting as surrogates for example. how long has frontier been in active service? it is possible that those flashbacks were from a different colony ship, or from frontier before it was launched. do we even know from where the 117th was launched? as I see it, Mao's research would have been another major problem between her and Ranzo - she wold probably have left to pursue it against his wishes. and there wouldnt have been any need for her to have been on the 117th from the beginning. her relocation may have been deliberate to get away from ranzo, or just make it easier to collaborate with Grace and Ranshe. as for the hairstyle in the flashback - ranzo seems to be the controlling type... he may have frowned upon Mao's open display of her heritage by wearing her hair in her original style as well as her tribal jewelry, especially in public... yet another point of stress in the relationship (many people get into less than ideal relationships for the wrong reasons... Alto's birth itself may have been a result of a one-night stand between mao and ranzo - we just dont know)

that's my feeling as well... given Alto's flashbacks to his own childhood, it is *remotely* possible that Mao is his mother. if this is the case, it may explain many things concerning the Elder Saotome's attitude towards his wayward son. imagine that while she did marry Alto's father and bore him a son, she still harbored something of a torch for shin kudo after all those years, and encouraged Alto's love of flying from early on because of it. if Alto's dad was aware of this on some level, it would have caused a considerable amount of stress in the relationship, possibly leading to an estrangement when Mao left to pursue her research with the 117th fleet. In essence, Alto would have been left behind to be the target for his father's own feelings of inadequacy in comparison to a 'dead' rival he had never met, and Alto's split from the family business to pursue that dream would really piss him off. wow... I can actually see that having happened.

I gotta agree with the weaver above... if alto fails to t*p T**t @$$ he will regret it for the rest of his life...

remember however, that we are relying on what Grace has revealed to us at this point. there is no guarantee whatsoever that she told Sheryl the whole truth - in fact I doubt that the revelation was any more than half-true. Grace is a truly masterful manipulator.

lest we forget to mention the control layout of an appleseed landmate. those mecha are slaved directly to the movements of the operator, with pilot legs in the thighs of the mecha, and an extra smaller set of arms. I imagine the ex-gear of a vf-25 might be a means to apply those techniques to a much larger vehicle

hmmm... damn this ep has got all sorts of things sprouting out of my brain... for instance,

yeah... gotta say it... grace's power level is: OVER 9000!!!

Still..

I think granted that is pure speculation and conjecture on my part. yeah... I am getting a vibe from that too.

I also got a weird vibe the image was rather disturbing...

I could have sworn I swear the more I watch RAWS of anime series, the more I seem to be able to understand. If I am right about the above that is...

indeed... lots of good character development this ep. especially regarding ozma/cathy and even the small bit with michel/klan, although I was quite surprised that sheryl didnt appear until the end - I fully expected her to have had a bout of illness while still on the bridge, landing her in carnalia's care. the fact that she didnt suggest to me that we might be in for a longer run of frontier than originally expected... if they are going to wrap this up in 10 more eps or less, things have *got* to speed up a great deal from here, and I dont see that happening at this point (the next ep preview looks to be paced about the same as this one, with heavy focus on the secondaries and the sheryl (instead of Ranka) side of the triangle. Also, if we get a *true* new OP for 18, it would be indicative of being the actual halfway point, so a run of 36 eps is possible. o yeah... Cathy has it in spades... looks like her engagement isnt gonna last much longer ^^

for the YF-19 all the way. both it and the yf-21 were testbeds for a whole lot of goodies that didnt make it into the production models for some reason or another... most notable for the -19 was the holographic cockpit display, which permitted the pilot to look down at his feet and see what was below the plane, giving a near spherical field of view with very few blind spots. of course we all know what the yf-21 was famous for ^^.

oops ^^ I really should start using vanpanq's avatar image of kaname smacking souseke with the halisen... forgetting which thread I am posting in... sheesh...

Like I said in the ep 15 thread, odds are that in this game of chess, Grace has had a knight in the form of Brera while Bilrer has lacked one up until he realized Alto's characteristics (for lack of a better term - Alto is able to go head to head with Brera, and has deep connections to both of the girls), hence the unusual step of meeting with the newly promoted lieutenant.

so you are thinking that Sheryl was subjected to accelerated aging? some how I doubt that, as she seems to have a pretty good idea of how long she's lived on Galaxy, given that she knows how long she has had the earrings. *unless* her memories of her life on galaxy were implanted. thats a whole lot of 'Ifs', and since scientists in general dont like having too many variables to worry about when conducting experiments, it is most likely that she was allowed to mature at at a natural pace. matter of fact, I would be surprised if her embryonic and infant/toddler stages were not extremely regulated to ensure that her early development was as close to human norms as possible. as an aside, Sheryl takes extreme pride in the fact that aboard galaxy she is one of the *very* few 100% 'natural' humans aboard... hell.. the way she flaunts her cleavage simply screams 'look at THESE... aint NOTHIN fake on me, IN me, or GETTING in me' ^^. though she did in fact fail at preventing grace from slipping her the pills... but then she trusts grace to be looking out for her.

yes the whole fairy-9 reference *is* unnerving. somehow I think that Sheryl is in fact the 9th of her particular 'experiment' - possibly based on Mao's genetic code and the bird human blood... perhaps while she 'failed' to exhibit whatever the people who created her wanted in the lab, she was viable enough to be let out into the 'wild' of Galaxy as a long term study subject (I am assuming the other 8 in the series died due to some kind of genetic defect while in vitro or while still infants). her emergence as a singer of substantial talent probably made her useful to those who knew her true history. Ranka is likely related to Sheryl in the sense that she too is a research subject from a different, but competing project. gotta wonder though what exactly Grace is trying to hide by swapping the blood samples... it cant just be the witchcraft pill or Sheryl's Alpha type. as to Bilrer's taking notice of Alto... I think he has had his eye on both Ranka and Sheryl for some time, and has recognized that Alto might be a means to get them both away from Grace's faction. that or he has become aware of Brera's role as a knight in this game of chess, and has decided that he needs his own. as to the triangle... I think the girls came to an unspoken agreement during that serenade-duet of alto. at some point it felt like it stopped being a competition between them over alto, but rather a cooperative assault on Alto. it was definitely working too. perhaps on some level the girls have realized that they *both* need him, so why not share? the idea was certainly starting to form in his eyes ^^. dammit why cant women in RL be this unambiguous?

think of them as simple avatars in a GiTS-style virtual chatspace. kind of like the episode of GiTS when the Major took part in a 'round table' discussion about the laughing man, but using simple graphics instead of the full virtual bodies to represent the participants. I presume that Grace and her cohorts are capable of the full virtual body simulation, but were not doing so for either lag or security considerations.

like others here I too felt the ep should have been spread out over 2 episodes... it just didnt flow right. at the end of 13 I honestly expected Sheryl and Michael to be sneaking around the MS looking for Ranka - kind of similar to Max's masquerading as a zentran in the original SDFM. of course, that would mean they get first crack at the rescue, but botch it, and end up having to be resued themselves. it would have played into the brera angle quite nicely, as Alto would have been forced to decide wether to pursue Ranka (Brera would still have gotten to her first) or save sheryl and Michael... only for ALL of them to need saving once they get out of the mothership to find themselves in the middle of the big battle (cue episode 2 or the mini-arc). that scenario would have been much better than what we got for both character development AND mecha porn.

I just saw the raw... wtfomfghmocgawddaaaayyyyyyuuuuuuummmmmmmmmmmm no speculation.. I am waiting for the subs - except that