Macross Delta - Episode 18 Discussion / Poll

[Kazu-kun]

Damn, Junna is so awesome. That solo at the end was so cool, and the ED song was great too. I can't wait for the full version.

[Thess]

I want that JUNNA solo too. It was fantastic.

Originally Posted by Triple_R

- Hayate/Freyja synchronicity becoming so good it's bad. I won't fault HayaMira shippers for taking hold of this, but here's what I think/hope is going on: This is being done for 2 or 3 reasons. Firstly, this is to offer one more good challenge for HayaFrey to overcome. Secondly, I hope this is to force Hayate to become a great pilot by his own power - He will still love Freyja, but he won't be powered up by her anymore, he will have to defeat The White Knight by his own skill and tenacity! Thirdly, this might be leading into some sort of plot twist, but I have no concrete ideas of what it could be right now.

It had nothing to do with them in particular but rather the system that Roid activated which super-amplified fold waves and zombied Freyja to generate far more fold output that Hayate could keep up, IMO. Hence why Kaname stopped her after Makina and Reina told her she had raised her fold waves to abnormal levels. Cue to the ED foreshadowing? They unsubtly had the screen error in Hayate's VF of that ending when Heinz began to sing and activate this and they were even singing the ED song to make it even more obvious. I think the solution is for them to train this stuff, or stay away from those ruins. It's not really about Hayate's skills or Freyja's, they need to train their fold receptors or whatever to deal with Roid's newest toy. I don't see why must be made about romance, though. It's simply going to make them both become better. Hayate might have been overloaded, but he was in control of his actions, while Freyja was able to raise her fold waves but she wasn't in control of hers (she was an unresponsive and robotic). The two of them have training to do, IMO. Specially since nobody else can keep up this except Mikumo (and we don't know what she'll do now).

I think a similar thing happened with the Aerial Knights who got overloaded by Heinz' singing. Only Keith managed to stabilize himself after a while. It was because of whatever Roid activated (the protoculture system?).

If previews do not deceive us, it's possible that Epsilon were the one who hired Chaos. Mining companies would be after Windermere fold quartz, hmm?

[Father Hentai]

Originally Posted by Thess

I want that JUNNA solo too. It was fantastic.



It had nothing to do with them in particular but rather the system that Roid activated which super-amplified fold waves and zombied Freyja to generate far more fold output that Hayate could keep up, IMO. Hence why Kaname stopped her after Makina and Reina told her she had raised her fold waves to abnormal levels. Cue to the ED foreshadowing? They unsubtly had the screen error in Hayate's VF of that ending when Heinz began to sing and activate this and they were even singing the ED song to make it even more obvious. I think the solution is for them to train this stuff, or stay away from those ruins. It's not really about Hayate's skills or Freyja's, they need to train their fold receptors or whatever to deal with Roid's newest toy. I don't see why must be made about romance, though. It's simply going to make them both become better. Hayate might have been overloaded, but he was in control of his actions, while Freyja was able to raise her fold waves but she wasn't in control of hers (she was an unresponsive and robotic). The two of them have training to do, IMO. Specially since nobody else can keep up this except Mikumo (and we don't know what she'll do now).

I think a similar thing happened with the Aerial Knights who got overloaded by Heinz' singing. Only Keith managed to stabilize himself after a while. It was because of whatever Roid activated (the protoculture system?).

If previews do not deceive us, it's possible that Epsilon were the one who hired Chaos. Mining companies would be after Windermere fold quartz, hmm?

You cannot train someone to love you. This is growing with relationship.

[Thess]

Originally Posted by Father Hentai

You cannot train someone to love you. This is growing with relationship.

So Keith is in love with his younger brother? It's... good to know. I have no idea how can you correlate biological fold waves input and output with romantic feelings! Specially when they are artificially generated and amplified thanks to Roid's system.

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by Thess

It's not really about Hayate's skills or Freyja's, they need to train their fold receptors or whatever to deal with Roid's newest toy. I don't see why must be made about romance, though. It's simply going to make them both become better. Hayate might have been overloaded, but he was in control of his actions, while Freyja was able to raise her fold waves but she wasn't in control of hers (she was an unresponsive and robotic). The two of them have training to do, IMO. Specially since nobody else can keep up this except Mikumo (and we don't know what she'll do now).

Well, Thess, this is now 3 episodes in a row where Hayate felt overwhelmed by some sort of signal he's getting from Freyja. This wasn't a problem in the show's first half, so what happened? It's strongly implied that Hayate and Freyja fell in love with each other in Episode 16. Do you think this is just a coincidence? In a franchise famous for its love triangles?

I don't doubt that Roid's machinations and Heinz's singing, and maybe even Mikumo's singing, are somehow amplifying the issue. But it really does seem like Hayate is struggling to handle Freyja's love for him. It seems like her heart and mind are so strongly focused on him now that when she sings, he just gets overwhelmed by rune waves coming from her.

So in a round-about way, you could still be right. Maybe Freyja and Hayate need training. Maybe Freyja will need to somehow lower the intensity of her emotions while she sings.

Or maybe Windermereans have something like the pon farr of Star Trek's Vulcans, and Freyja is going through that right now...

[Father Hentai]

Originally Posted by Thess

So Keith is in love with his younger brother? It's... good to know. I have no idea how can you correlate biological fold waves input and output with romantic feelings! Specially when they are artificially generated and amplified thanks to Roid's system.

You are comparing windermere apple with ragna jellyfishes.

Keith has his rune and has another sense for foldwave. Hayate has not that rune so he is limited by his own feelings and that of his Walküre partner.

The point is that Hayate is being overloaded with an additional emotion what has not been very present to Haya/Freyja relationship. Have you ever thought what feelings made them possible to sync? It''s their feeling to protect the other. In the last episodes it was getting more obvious that Freyja feels more than the need to protect Hayate. She is in love with him. this part is so strong that it imbalance the synchronisation. While it increases the partner sense for the wind, it puts Hayate into the state as if being var infected.

At this point. If Hayate wants to be in sync again either Freyja supresses her love or Hayate starts to love Freyja as she loves him. This is currently their limiter.

[Thess]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

Well, Thess, this is now 3 episodes in a row where Hayate felt overwhelmed by some sort of signal he's getting from Freyja. This wasn't a problem in the show's first half, so what happened? It's strongly implied that Hayate and Freyja fell in love with each other in Episode 16. Do you think this is just a coincidence? In a franchise famous for its love triangles?

I frankly don't see the co-relation between feelings in general and fold-waves, except perhaps when depression and uncertainty affected people's actions and "resolve" trigger. Then again, I absolutely loathe the romantic stuff side of Delta, so I'm fairly biased admittedly.

Secondly, the sync was fine, according to Reina, Makina, etc until Roid activated his system which struck Freyja and she started to produce abnormal levels of fold waves. That's in the show, on Makina's and Reina's screen.

Originally Posted by Triple_R

I don't doubt that Roid's machinations and Heinz's singing, and maybe even Mikumo's singing, are somehow amplifying the issue. But it really does seem like Hayate is struggling to handle Freyja's love for him. It seems like her heart and mind are so strongly focused on him now that when she sings, he just gets overwhelmed by rune waves coming from her.

Uh? The first time Hayate felt, as you put it, "overwhelmed", was when she was thinking about Windermere and the war. Episode 16. Not about Hayate. He wasn't even in her head. Sorry but I don't feel like putting every instance of the show development as individuals on a half-baked 'romance'.

Originally Posted by Triple_R

So in a round-about way, you could still be right. Maybe Freyja and Hayate need training. Maybe Freyja will need to somehow lower the intensity of her emotions while she sings.

I don't feel she was emotional when she sang in that scene, instead she was downright robotic. Plus, they parallel what happened to Hayate and Freyja to the robotic Voldor population and how Heinz messed up the Aerial Knights because of the same system. They couldn't handle his romantic feelings for them too? It's just blatantly ridiculous to make everything about the show about a pairing.

Originally Posted by Father Hentai

You are comparing windermere apple with ragna jellyfishes.

Keith has his rune and has another sense for foldwave. Hayate has not that rune so he is limited by his own feelings and that of his Walküre partner.

Hayate has fold receptors and a fold quartz pendant. What makes Freyja and Hayate sync are their fold waves imput and output, not some magical love feeling they have (when they resonated for the first time - there was no romantic feeling. Freyja wanted to help to freed Voldor people, y'all). Roid's system screws up their 'wind' and affected Freyja's fold output thus affected Hayate in turn. They were fine and resonating well on screen before this happened - fact.

The same system had Heinz' fold waves which in turn buff his Knights, specially Keith occasionally (we saw them in episode 15, for example), harming them. But I don't see anyone speculation how they must open their hearts to receive little Heinz' deep dark homosexual love to withstand it.

Stop trying to turn everything about romance.

[ReddyRedWolf]

As Reina would say "It's not Magic, it's Science.".

http://monkeybacon.mywebcommunity.or...-SpaceFold.php

Caption: In the higher dimension that's referred to as Fold Space, the ethereal body, which is considered to be the "spirit", and the flesh and blood body separate.

Extra Report: Fold Waves And Songs
Fold Waves, which are like waves generated by the higher dimensional space, are said to be deeply linked to Space Fold Navigation. It's thought that Song Energy, which was discovered in 2045, is a kind of Fold Wave, and research is being carried out on them even now.

http://monkeybacon.mywebcommunity.or...SongEnergy.php

Extra Report: The Protodevilun And Song Energy
Even though the Protodevilun, who treated Spiritia as "food", ought to have liked Song Energy because the origin of both Song Energy and Spiritia is the Sub-Universe, they suffered damage from the songs of Nekki Basara. This is because the Protodevilun absorbed "negative" spiritia that was amplified by fear, and couldn't receive the "positive" of Basara's songs.

http://monkeybacon.mywebcommunity.or...-SpaceFold.php

Related Matter: Anima Spiritia
The sub-universe is close to completely filled with spiritia to the degree that it can be called a "Sea Of Spiritia", and it's said that there is a part that connects the "Sea Of Spiritia" with the life that inhabits our universe. For that reason, there is a hypothesis that everyone has spiritia. Those that are referred to as Anima Spiritia seem to be able to supply vast amounts of spiritia, which has a purity higher than that of an ordinary person, because the efficiency of the avenue that connects them to the "Sea Of Spiritia" is high.

Roid is messing with stuff he shouldn't have with the appearance of those Mega Fold Gates.

http://monkeybacon.mywebcommunity.or...meline1945.php

497,132 BCE (PC 2,868)

The existence of a Sub-Universe is confirmed on that scientifically advanced planet. According to survey results, this Sub-Universe abounds with super high levels of extra-dimensional energy, and this energy is discovered to have the potential for application (in our universe). The trial production of Super Dimensional Energy Gates -which can supply energy from the Sub-Universe- begins, and genetically engineered biological Super Dimensional Organs are developed. These biological Super Dimensional Organs are extremely compact, and they are expected to supply enormous amounts of energy. The internal conflicts within the Stellar Republic revives the development of the "Ehvil Series", and their trial production begins implementing the technology from the terminated "Ehvil Series." No problems are uncovered in simulations.

[Thess]

Well...I don't doubt this could bring 'romantic drama' (but I could be surprised again, considering the way the lifespan and dad thing was handled - zero romantic stuff and was thanks to Cassim! Bless him). But yeah, the issue happened when Roid activated his system which also affected the way the Aerial Knights received Heinz' singing. This will also mean that as long Roid's system is active, they cannot sync or they'll have to find a way to sync again even under that pressure. I think latter is likely to happen because Roid wouldn't just stop using it.

So maybe Hayate has to learn to produce his fold waves without Freyja's stimulation. Until now he could only use his thanks to her (they never activated alone, while Freyja can use hers without Hayate without problem). It's less about romance and, IMO, more about Hayate's development which he had to stop relying on Freyja in order to be able to sync with Freyja. He has to learn to produce his fold waves simultaneously to synchronize with Freyja to beat his opponents. From his character POV, most of his victories and even his character arc was prompted by Freyja, so it's time for him to prove he can match her instead of just borrowing her wind (I think Keith realized that the wind stopped when Freyja was knocked out - she's the giver and he's the taker).

I think Keith can match Heinz, not simply use his fold waves selfishly as Hayate does with Freyja. That's why he can fly with the 'wind' even without Heinz. Heinz makes him stronger. That's just my take of all this, also based on the ending theory of an 'error' in the system and there goes Hayate's VF 'lonely journey' to a new harmonization with Freyja (and system is operation and everything is all right in the end). Granted, I'm pretty anti romance, that's why I just see it from another angle which is of character's growth and personal journey.

Freyja obviously needs to be able to withstand whatever mental effects the system produces, because she was an unresponsive and robotic singing machine (perfect weapon).

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by Thess

Uh? The first time Hayate felt, as you put it, "overwhelmed", was when she was thinking about Windermere and the war. Episode 16. Not about Hayate. He wasn't even in her head.

How do you know that? She might have been thinking about him some.

In any event, how do you account for Hayate's trippy experiences in Episodes 16 and 17? Your Roid explanation may well be fine for what happened here in Episode 18, except for the fact that Episode 18 seems to be part of an escalating pattern that initially had nothing to do with Roid.

Just why is Hayate having these trippy experiences? It's clearly of some importance, or they wouldn't be happening three episodes in a row.

So what's your speculation for what's causing Hayate these trippy experiences in Episodes 16 and 17?

The romantic love speculation might not be perfect, but in the absence of a good alternative speculation that can account for all of Hayate's recent trippy experiences...

[CriiGV]

While you may not want to label it as "romantic", there's no denying that Hayate and Freyja's resonance is based on their bond. If it wasn't and it's simply "output and imput of fold waves", why has Hayate never resonated with Mikumo who undoubtedly has higher "potential" than Freyja? Or if you want to say that perhaps he is not on par to be able to resonate with Mikumo, then why has he never resonated with Kaname, Makina or Reina?

The resonance is equal to how emotionally and psychologically in sync they are. During episode 16 their resonance started to become stronger because Hayate and Freyja became closer. Whether you want to think romance is unnecesary is up to you, but it definitely has influenced their resonance because FEELINGS. Episode 16 was just the dam beginning to crack. And now fasforward to episode 18 where Freyja has made up her mind and sworn to sing for "everyone's and Hayate's sake" and Hayate has promised to "Fly to protect Walkure and Freyja", and you have them resonating stronger than ever.

As for Hayate overloading, that was because Roid and the protoculture ruins screwed shit up. Hayate and Freyja were completely Ok until the protoculture ended up taking control over Freyja. After Freyja gets taken over we get a few more shots where Hayate is still taking all that fold boost like a champ and he's still in control. But as she keeps singing harder and harder because she's no longer in control, Hayate begins to lose it as well.

Basically, protoculture fold waves overload screwed things up. IMO the most logical thing would be to have Hayate and Freyja work on this sync, not to mention that we'll have to keep working on that triangle. I believe that Freyja is the stronger factor in this equation simply because she's acknowledged her feelings whereas Hayate is getting there. Perhaps Hayate taking off the fold quartz could provide a bit of help. I doubt that with how much his resonance with Freyja has advanced that he still needs it. A bit of training would be nice. Hayate perfecting his piloting skills and Freyja tunning her fold wave output. They need to train in order to bring out the best in each other without hurting themselves in the process.

We all know how resonance is used in anime. Basically it's synonym for "synchronized feelings" and "becoming one". It's shipping on a whole new level, that's for sure. But yeah anyway, even if you don't want to take it on the romantic side, resonance is still strongly based on the feelings of the two parties involved, whether it be romantic or platonic.

It's the whole "pilot and his singer working together as a team and boosting each other up" concept which was the inspiration for Delta.

[Thess]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

How do you know that? She might have been thinking about him some.

Because she was having a moment with Mikumo and thinking and singing about her nostalgia of home and the war. Why would she even be thinking about Hayate? Freyja is see through. If she were, we would have known. Freyja has a life outside Hayate. Can Hayate say the same, actually? He's not as social as Freyja. Look at this episode, she was chumming with Cassim without a sparing a thought about him while he was frantic about her.

Originally Posted by Triple_R

In any event, how do you account for Hayate's trippy experiences in Episodes 16 and 17? Your Roid explanation may well be fine for what happened here in Episode 18, except for the fact that Episode 18 seems to be part of an escalating pattern that initially had nothing to do with Roid.

Just why is Hayate having these trippy experiences? It's clearly of some importance, or they wouldn't be happening three episodes in a row.

Those experiences were painted in a positive light: Hayate liked them and just portrayed their sync deepening, down to his ability to sense her emotions and nostalgia which helped him to understand her further. Trippy experiences of two people sharing feelings (well just the boy feeling the girl's feelings and stuff like that) has happened before under Kawamori's watch. Oh and fold quartz was involved too.

Again, this is a fact - Synchro was fine on Reina's and Makina's screen until Roid switched his protoculture system on. And a scene before that it has Heinz affecting negatively his own Aerial Knights when that never happened before. What does logic dictates to you? Tell you what, I'll play your shipping game (sic). Hayate and Freyja were in cloud 9 to a perfect harmonization where Hayate could feel the real sky and sense her feelings, now Roid severed it to put a wrench on that. It has nothing to do with Freyja's feelings for him when it happened after Roid put that system on. And when her "feelings" were stronger by episode 13 which caused the opposite effect. Because there's a simple formula here in Macross:

Emotions such as love and affection= positive anima spiritia.
Fear, sorrow and that = negative anima spiritia.

Pure love would never overwhelm negatively anyone in Macross universe. Fear does, or other negative emotions (Ranka in episode 20 anyone?). At the time that Freyja was singing. Was she feeling love? She seemed robotic and hollow to me. You can have a shipping speculation there, thinking, I don't know, would their relationship survive without a sync? Would they be able to relate each other? Is this another test to their bond? But I exposed my thoughts here which has less to do about romance and more about Hayate needing to stand on his two feet to be Freyja's equal in the bond (not necessarily a romantic bond, mind you - Keith and Heinz got one and they aren't in love).

[Triple_R]

Ok, Thess, good post. I honestly hope you're right.

I rewatched the Episode 16 and 17 trippy scenes, and it's possible that you're right. Maybe they're meant to be positive. They certainly don't seem to have scared Hayate away from Freyja, so there is that.

And yes, you're right on the timing of things here in Episode 18. Maybe the problem here in this episode really is Roid. On a related note, Roid does seem to be developing into the show's main antagonist/villain. He came across as pretty shady, smug, and manipulative in this episode.

[Thess]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

Ok, Thess, good post. I honestly hope you're right.

I rewatched the Episode 16 and 17 trippy scenes, and it's possible that you're right. Maybe they're meant to be positive. They certainly don't seem to have scared Hayate away from Freyja, so there is that.

I don't know or care if Freyja and Hayate will end up together, but the way episode 18 played is all foreshadowed in the ED. For the reasons we listed. Heck, the ending was playing when it happened. There's no subtlety at all that the end game is Hayate and Freyja reworking their bond and harmonization, IMO (this doesn't mean they'll hook up. Just like I said, Heinz and Keith aren't lovers and they seem they can sync). On top the series focus is cooperation and teamwork between Delta and Walkure.

How they do it - I'll be honest and prefer it has zero to do with powah of lurv. But that's just me.

Originally Posted by Triple_R

And yes, you're right on the timing of things here in Episode 18. Maybe the problem here in this episode really is Roid. On a related note, Roid does seem to be developing into the show's main antagonist/villain. He came across as pretty shady, smug, and manipulative in this episode.

Perhaps. It's the stereotypical path with Keith killing Roid (this episode set up the growing distrust between them), but he's revealing his cards far too early and he's half comic relief with those glasses collection for me to take him very seriously to be honest.

[CriiGV]

I wouldn't put Keith and Heinz syncing on the same page as Hayate and Freyja's sync. They're brothers, that's a bond. Plus you also have to take into account that they're both Windies. And Windermerean are known and specialized in fold waves and reading the wind. It's in their anatomy. Following this logic as long as you're a Windermerean in tune with your wind and your rune works, you should be able to sync with Heinz' song (also because he's a wind singer so there's that too).

Anyway. Sunday can't come fast enough. I can't believe it's barely Monday night. Feels like ages ago when my heart got shattered by episode 18

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by Thess

Perhaps. It's the stereotypical path with Keith killing Roid (this episode set up the growing distrust between them), but he's revealing his cards far too early and he's half comic relief with those glasses collection for me to take him very seriously to be honest.

I have a speculation here, and it involves a Frontier comparison.

Spoiler for Macross Frontier comparison:

Maybe Roid is to Windermere what Leon was to Frontier (not the show, but the actual space colony fleet). In other words, Roid is playing/manipulating his people much like how Leon played/manipulated the people of Frontier.

Somebody or something else could be the Grace of this show...

[magnuskn]

Eh, I am pretty sure that the two episodes of dizzyness Hayate experienced in eps 16 and 17 were clearly not meant as positive developments, so, for now at least, I think they and what happened in this episode spell trouble for the relationship between Freyja and Hayate, romantic or platonic.

They were hitting the theme of "you two can't be together" pretty hard in this episode with Cassims speech to the two of them, anyway. Even if Freyja strongly went against what Cassim was saying, he has a point. I'm 41. If I'd be a Windermeran, I would be dead for more or less 10 years. That's a sobering thought.

BTW, I am quite happy that apparently they are keeping Bogue as an insufferable twit, even when he has the hots for a non-Windermeran woman.

[Thess]

Yes, they are putting a hurdle for them to overcome before the finale you mean? Like any good story would do and something they foreshadowed in the ED? Shocking. You're free to interpret those moments as you like, I'm sure there's a purposeful sense of ambiguity just to rile up the shippers. However, the fact is that in this episode, it was only negative after Roid turned that system on which also had Heinz harming his people as well, so it wasn't a Freyja and Hayate only related incident. Not just our impressions or interpretations, but what Reina and Makina had detected on screen which is an objective measure of what was coming on. It was fine until Roid made his move.

I tire of this Freyja/Hayate talk when the most interesting part of the episode (besides Cassim) was Mikumo getting her memories back. What will she do now? And most importantly, why was she scared of the ruins? Who were those people she saw in that operation room (?)? I'm apprehensive about how she'll behave now after that cute special ending montage, honestly.

[magnuskn]

Yeah, well, apparently people also want to discuss things of which you "tire". Gotta deal with it, I guess.

As for Mikumo, we'll have to see. It's still pretty unclear where they will take her for the series finale. I would put her chance of doing a big sacrifice to end the series (or before) at about 70%, since she clearly overshadows Freyja at this point.

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by magnuskn

They were hitting the theme of "you two can't be together" pretty hard in this episode with Cassims speech to the two of them, anyway. Even if Freyja strongly went against what Cassim was saying, he has a point.

It's not just Freyja going strongly against it. Hayate went strongly against it as well.

And I think Hayate realizes the full weight of what he was saying here, especially given how Cassim framed things. It's notable that neither Hayate or Freyja did the shy blushing loud denial thing so common in anime (and I was very thankful for that).

And to fully hammer it home...

Freyja: I'll sing. For our friends, and for you!

Hayate: And I'll fly. To protect Walkure and you!

Now, maybe there's some nuance lost in translation, but going by these subs, there's some strong implications. One is that Freyja views Hayate as more than just a friend. She could have said "For my friends, including you!" Instead she said "For our friends, and for you!". This way of putting it suggests a very tight bond. Hayate's reply is kinda redundant, as Freyja is in Walkure. So him signaling Freyja out here is also suggestive.