Macross Frontier

[shinta|hikari]

I will still hold it against Ranka, since she managed to sing just fine after being slapped. Being slapped and lectured is not exactly life changing, which means she could have sung all along, but chose not to because she feels "used" and hurt. It is not as if they are asking her to risk her life at that point. All she had to do was sing to save lives, not go into a robot and battle with monsters. And the reason for her being unable to sing is so lame. So what if she sees Alto embracing Sheryl? What does that even confirm? She simply let her insecurities take over instead of fighting for what she wants.

Yes, she is weak, but not normal teenager weak, but lame-ass weak. Shinji Ikari, who also had issues about abandonment (and younger), had a tougher time but people (and lots of them) held it against him and called him a crybaby and a wuss for being afraid of being torn apart and burned to death inside a gigantic human form (which btw almost happened several times). Ranka is obviously worse.

[David75]

I will still hold it against Ranka, since she managed to sing just fine after being slapped. Being slapped and lectured is not exactly life changing, which means she could have sung all along, but chose not to because she feels "used" and hurt. It is not as if they are asking her to risk her life at that point. All she had to do was sing to save lives, not go into a robot and battle with monsters. And the reason for her being unable to sing is so lame. So what if she sees Alto embracing Sheryl? What does that even confirm? She simply let her insecurities take over instead of fighting for what she wants.

Yes, she is weak, but not normal teenager weak, but lame-ass weak. Shinji Ikari, who also had issues about abandonment (and younger), had a tougher time but people (and lots of them) held it against him and called him a crybaby and a wuss for being afraid of being torn apart and burned to death inside a gigantic human form (which btw almost happened several times). Ranka is obviously worse.

Reasonning and feelings aren't the same.
Being able to take the right decisions and act accordingly is difficult enough for anyone... it becomes utterly difficult when under stress or feeling related state. For a teen it's double worse. It's not the same part of the brain that reacts.
Being able to make the best possible choice with a clear state of mind, while caught in a personnal love quagmire is impossible when it's your first time being in love...

[shinta|hikari]

She clearly said she was fed up. She wasn't confused, or unsure of what to do. She just didn't want to. Two choices, with one being the obvious winner. How hard could it be?

I also know that singing with emotion is difficult if you don't carry that emotion, but whether that will have an effect or not was unknown to Ranka and everyone in that scene, so it is a non-factor. As far as everyone knew, she just had to open her mouth and spout some Ai-mo stuff to have an effect on the vajira.

@Kraco - you are looking at it in retrospect. It doesn't matter what actually happened, since we are talking about Ranka's choice based from what she knows at that time.