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Subject: "HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae"     Previous Topic | Next Topic
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"HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae"
 
   LAST EDITED ON Mar-25-07 AT 02:11 PM (EDT)
 
Being a Partial Record of Personages Involved with the Glorious Launching and Maiden Voyage of Her Majesty's Sky-Fortress Macross, July 10, 1890.

Members of the Macross Crew

Captain Genrikh (Henry) J. Gloval, IRN - Russian naval officer, chosen to command HMS Macross on her maiden voyage to the Moon. Gloval is a political appointee, having served as the Tsar's representative on the Grand Alliance Council from the start, and many RN officers resent the fact that a foreigner has been given the high-profile command of the vessel as a political sop to the Russian court (relations of the Queen and all that, you know). Many British officials refer to him only as "that damned Russian" - a title in which Gloval seems to take some perverse pride. By turns strict and fatherly, he is beloved by his crew. Gloval is wary of the Grand Alliance, suspecting that nations with conflicting - or worse, parallel - long-term goals cannot agree to share a power like the Macross indefinitely.

Lieutenant Commander the Honourable Lisa Hayes, RN - Executive officer of HMS Macross. The first woman to achieve so high a rank in the Royal Navy. Lisa is the daughter of Admiral Donald "Dreadnought" Hayes, Baron Barrow, GCB, RN, but she achieved her position more in spite of her father's prominence than because of it. Inspired as a child by the arrival of the Macross, she set out to become, and now is, a respected naval officer, though she still battles the chauvinism of her peers on a daily basis. Cool and poised, she deflects criticism with competence and withering personal disinterest, but at times the loneliness of her position weighs on her. Captain Gloval is one of the few male officers to show her the respect she deserves.

Major Sir Roy Fokker, RAFC - A Batavia-born Dutchman who served as a soldier of fortune before going to work for the British as a test pilot - a term newly coined - in the Armoured Aero-Soldier program. No slouch as an engineer himself, Fokker has developed improvements to the machines. His contributions to the development efforts have been recognized with a knighthood, a commission as major in the newly created Royal Armoured Flying Corps, and appointment as the commander of all the Macross's AAS forces. Fokker and his half-Javanese wife Claudia, who works as a communications engineer on the Macross bridge, welcomed their first child, Anton, not long before the story begins.

Ens. Hikaru Ichijo, IJN - A young Japanese naval officer assigned to the Macross as part of Imperial Japan's small but vocal contribution to the Grand Alliance. In training to be an AAS pilot. Ichijo is a devotee of flight and a great admirer of Fokker and Lilienthal, who he sees as the foremost pioneers of the most significant new frontier in human history - the air. Serious-minded and steeped in the Japanese mode of military thought, with its roots in that country's not-so-distant samurai past, he rarely smiles and never makes a joke, except for his curious habit of sparring verbally with Lisa Hayes on the tele-communicator. He seems to find the idea of a female command officer oddly compelling, rather than laughable as many of his peers do, and has been known to get into fistfights with other pilots and crewmen who make jokes about Hayes behind her back.

2nd Lt. Dennis J. MacCrofton - A young Scottish officer serving in the 2nd Dragoons (Royal Scots Greys), the Royal Army cavalry regiment assigned to operate the non-flying Armoured Soldiers aboard the Macross. MacCrofton commands a troop (1st Troop, B Sqdn.) of five Mark IV Armoured Soldiers, or "tanks" as they are affectionately known by the British troops. Cheerful and confident (and perhaps a bit cocky), he likes to dispute the notion that the Armoured Aero-Soldier units are the top dogs of the Macross's internal military hierarchy, often challenging AAS pilots to various feats of daring or, failing that, just a good fight. Hikaru Ichijo considers him a disruptive flake; he considers Ichijo a dull stick-in-the-mud.

Sgt. Victoria Marks, USA - An American cavalry soldier who commands one of the U.S. Army's non-transforming Model 1888 Knox-class Armored Levi-Craft. The United States has contributed more technically than militarily to the Macross project, and there are few American soldiers aboard the fortress, but Sgt. Marks and the unit she belongs to (the 2nd Maine Volunteer Cavalry Regiment) are proud to be serving in the most advanced and powerful force the United States can field. Marks has a friendly rivalry with Lt. MacCrofton of the Royal Scots Greys. She and her crew will put their "slab" up against one of the British "tin men" any day of the week.

The bridge crew - All young women following in the path broken by pioneers like Lisa Hayes and Claudia Fokker. Another sign, if his critics needed one, of the essential wrong-headedness of "that damned Russian". Sublt. Vanessa Laird, RN is a young Scotswoman who conceals fierce determination and an viper's tongue behind a quiet, bespectacled demeanor; Ens. Samantha Porter, USN is an American who has managed to retain her bubbly zest for life despite the hardships of being, in effect, her country's Lisa Hayes; and Podporuchik (effectively, Sublieutenant/Lt. jg.) Kim Kavirova, IRN is the most outwardly confident of the three, having grown accustomed to functioning in Russian society, where the men talk a good game but know, in their hearts, that women are the natural leaders.

The Technologists

Nikola Tesla - Though he has no official title, everyone knows Tesla is the reason anybody ever got anywhere with the alien technologies embodied by the Macross. The brilliant Serbo-American technologist-savant was called into the project in 1880 after the great British scientist William Thomson and the famed American inventor Thomas Edison both declared that no one would ever get any part of the alien ship to work. Tesla had the lights on within a day, then busied himself figuring out how the rest of it worked, in the process earning the lifelong enmity of both Thomson and Edison. The many innovations he has teased from the mysteries of the Macross include beam weapons, television, subspace radio, anti-gravity, inertia cancelling, advanced metallurgy, and huge advances in servomechanics. His discoveries made possible not only the rebuilding and eventual operation of the Macross, but also the development of the many accompanying technologies, such as the Armoured Soldiers. As launch day approaches, he is still aboard, working as a sort of unofficial chief engineer. His detractors - and some of his admirers - say that Tesla all but views the Macross as his own creation.

Fritz Krupp - Son of the late German arms magnate Alfred Krupp, the "Cannon King", who was involved in the Macross project from 1880, when Germany joined the Grand Alliance, until his death in 1887. It was the elder Krupp who dubbed the stream of incredible advances flowing from the Macross via Tesla's brain Übertechnologie (the name by which it is still known in Germany), and he who first saw the potential for many of them to be used as weapons. Tesla intensely disliked the elder Krupp for his overbearing persona, his right-wing war-hawk tendencies, and his ruthlessness. However, he and the younger Krupp, a much more approachable sort of man who prefers to be known as "Fritz" by all, are fast friends.

John Trussell - Another of the American technologists brought in to look over the Macross. Specifically, he's the ship's Engineer (with a capital E): the person responsible for looking after the Engine, the colossal mechanical computer at the heart of the ship, which controls all of its functions in one way or another. A student of the late Charles Babbage, he understands analytical and difference engines better than any other living academic, which is why his refusals to accept a military commission or carry a weapon have not stood in the way of his becoming a key member of the Macross crew. Has a good working relationship with Tesla, but does not claim to understand him.

Otto Lilienthal - A German inventor and researcher into heavier-than-air flight, hired by Krupp Sr. in 1882 to help with early development on armament applications for Übertechnologie. Lilienthal created the prototype Fliegenpanzersoldat in 1884, but a personality clash with Krupp led him to leave his countryman's employ and go to work for the British instead. Krupp never forgave Lilienthal, but died before he could make much of an issue of it. The Fliegenpanzersoldat went on to become known by the public as the Armoured Aero-Soldier after development was completed by the British.

Members of the Public

Miss Lynn Mayminster, Countess Macross - Daughter and only child of the late John Wallingford Mayminster, 4th Earl of Macross, a famous explorer who was the first man to set foot inside the crashed alien starship in 1873. Macross was an active member of the Grand Alliance Council until his tragic death in a construction accident aboard the Macross in 1885. Orphaned by the tragedy, his daughter - only ten years old at the time - spent the next few years in boarding schools before returning to the island for the launch ceremony, at which she will be the guest of honor. Cheerful and industrious, Lady Macross admires Lisa Hayes and hopes to meet her during the ceremony. She has inherited much of her father's adventurous streak and secretly wants to be an Armoured Soldier pilot.

Samuel Clemens - American author and humorist, well-known by the pen name "Mark Twain". He has nothing to do with the Macross project (in fact, he thinks the Grand Alliance was a damn-fool idea and the United States ought to have stayed out of it), but was invited to Macross Island and the ship's launching ceremony by his good friend Tesla.


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HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae [View All] Gryphonadmin Mar-24-07 TOP
   RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae Zox Mar-24-07 1
   RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae BLUE Mar-24-07 2
      RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae Wedge Mar-24-07 3
      RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae Nathan Mar-24-07 4
          RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae Gryphonadmin Mar-24-07 5
              RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae BobSchroeck Mar-26-07 20
                  RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae mdg1 Mar-27-07 23
                      RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae StaticdashPulse Apr-04-07 25
          RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae trigger Mar-24-07 6
              RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae Gryphonadmin Mar-24-07 7
                  RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae Mister Fnord Mar-24-07 10
              RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae BLUE Mar-24-07 11
                  RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae Peter Eng Mar-26-07 17
          RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae Mephronmoderator Mar-24-07 8
              RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae Nathan Mar-24-07 9
                  RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae Mephronmoderator Mar-27-07 22
          RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae BLUE Mar-24-07 12
              RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae Gryphonadmin Mar-24-07 13
                  RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae BobSchroeck Mar-26-07 21
      RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae Gryphonadmin Mar-25-07 16
   RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae asuffield Mar-25-07 14
      RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae Gryphonadmin Mar-25-07 15
          RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae asuffield Mar-26-07 18
              RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae RedOtakuKeith Mar-26-07 19
                  RE: HMS Macross: Dramatis Personae MuninsFire Mar-27-07 24


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