Makina and Reina continue to fascinate me in Macross Delta. They’re such a nice, well balanced couple I dread the day the series will make them into close friends or something similar. So far though Delta has been very good in showing, not telling how close they are, how comfortable they are with each other. They’re also the friendliest of the whole Walkure crew, not afraid to mingle with the support crew or in Makina’s case work on the Valkyries themselves, the ones most active in welcoming Hayate and Freyja to the team.

Meanwhile those two are so in synch the supporting cast is wondering whether they were separated at birth. Again, this is shown as much in their behaviour around each other as in dialogue. It has been that way since the very first episode but it’s still on that cusp between friendship and romance, where it could go either way. In general there seems to be much less drama in Delta‘s love triangles than in previous instalments, but their strong bond leaves the third member of the triangle somewhat out in the cold.

Mirage has been somewhat of a tsundere, slightly hostile to Hayate at first, not unjustified considering how they first met (not to mention him throwing up all over her after his first training flight). It was obvious that her somewhat stiff and by the book attitude was hiding some personal trauma –that’s always the cases with these characters– and we got a hint of it this episode. Last time she’d already mentioned her grandparents, arguably the most famous fighter pilot couple in the Galaxy and their legacy; it’s no surprise she feels the pressure. There were a fair few signs of a blossoming friendship between her and Hayate this episode, but no romance yet.

But perhaps we have been looking in the wrong direction for our love triangle. Perhaps it’s not so much Freyja x Hayate x Mirage as Hayate x Freyja x Mikumo? The latter certainly seems …interested in the new Walkure member more than mere friendship or camaraderie might justify. She’s also a bit more …hands-on with Freyja than with the other Walkure members. Mind, it’s all suggestion and nothing concrete so far, but wouldn’t it be fun if that was the official love triangle?

So far Windermere had been the menace lurking in the shadows, stirring up Var trouble and flying around in unmarked planes without much of a explanation or justification for what they were doing. Not anymore, as last episode ended on a declaration of war, with this one opening with the reasons why Windermere wants it: to liberate themselves and the rest of their globular cluster from the oppressive menance of the New Unified Government. Whether those reasons make any sense to outsiders is another thing entirely, but it shows how Macross never goes for simple black and white conflicts.

Hayate is right: Freyja does have the best creepy smile in all of Macross. She and Hayate make a good team, with Mirage forced in the role of third wheel, her stiff manner and gruff behaviour contrasting with the open warmth of Freyja. Past Macross series tended to be a bit mean towards characters like Mirage, making them the butt monkey — think of Cathy Glass in Frontier e.g. — but here Mirage is left her dignity.

But that doesn’t mean her pomposity doesn’t get punctured. As when she talks about her grandparents, Maximillian “Max” Jenius and Milia Fallyna, the first ever human-Zentradi couple in an attempt to motivate Freyja, but is interrupted by Hayate asking what that has to do with anything. It’s a fun little scene further establishing each of their personalities, especially coming in an episode that’s ninety percent setup. What I like about it especially is that it’s not so much a love triangle as a friendship triangle, where Hayate & Freyja had hit it off almost immediately and so did Freyja and Mirage for all their difference in personality, while Mirage and Hayate keep managing to rub each other the wrong way but don’t necessarily dislike each other… It’s just that his frivolity annoys her, while her pomposity irritates him.

Not that Hayate isn’t free from pomposity himself…