A to Z Challenge: Azonia, Ariel, and Annie

And so it begins!  Since I'm taking a lot of time on these entries, I'm going to do more than one thing on a lot of them.  Enjoy, phantom readers!

Azonia is part of the first series of Robotech, the Macross Saga.  She doesn't appear until about a third of the way through.  After numerous defeats and setbacks, the Zentraedi commander Dolza decides to put the female warrior Azonia in charge.

The Zentraedi are a warrior society that's strictly separated on gender lines, so Azonia commands an entirely female unit.  Putting her in charge is also kind of a big blow to Breetai, the former Zentraedi commander.  Getting replaced is bad, but by a female is 10,000 times worse!

Anyway, not a whole lot changes under Azonia's command.  Like Breetai, she's not willing to launch an all-out attack on the human-manned SDF-1 to find the elusive "Protoculture matrix."  Mostly she just watches the human ship.  The attacks launched under her command are mostly carried out by the evil Khyron the Backstaber.

Because she never really accomplishes much, she's eventually replaced--by Breetai.  In the climactic final space battle, she stays on Breetai's side against Dolza and the other Zentraedi.  Though it's not shown, her ship is shot down and crashes on Earth, where she's rescued by Khyron and becomes sorta his girlfriend.  They wouldn't show anything on American TV especially but the implication in the books is that they become lovers and she's sort of his second-in-command, which irks Khyron's crew, who aren't used to a female bossing them around.

Azonia and Khyron

Ultimately Azonia is at Khyron's side when he kamikazes his warship into the SDF-1 and SDF-2.  That's the end of her.  Seriously, this isn't a soap opera or comic book where people are coming back all the time.  And she wasn't really that important to bring back.

***

Ariel and Annie are part of the third series, known as Mospeada in Japan. In that the Invid Regess controls all of Earth.  She's obsessed with finding a perfect form for her and her race.  To that end she has "Genesis Pits" strewn around the planet to experiment with different lifeforms.

One of these is a sort of Lost World filled with dinosaurs.  When Scott Bernard and his team fall into this Lost World and defeat the dinos, the Regess starts to think that maybe humans might be worth more than slave labor.  So she creates a "simulagent," or an Invid agent who's made with human DNA to fit in.

Ariel

Ariel is the simulagent.  She winds up being found by Scott Bernard's team and to him she looks like his old girlfriend Marlene who died during the REF counterattack against the Invid.  Since she has no memory, he decides to call her Marlene.

"Marlene" was supposed to communicate with the Invid Regess, but something went haywire so that she had no memory of being human or Invid--she was a blank.  She did have a peculiar talent to sense the approach of the Invid, which would cause her to writhe in pain.

In one episode the team is trapped by a sandstorm and Marlene passes out.  Her teammate Rand went to find some water and passed out on an Invid Flower of Life.  He had a trippy dream where Marlene was abducted by a dragon and he went in pursuit of her.

Marlene and Scott Bernard have a friendly relationship, but things get more intimate when the team finds the abandoned city of New Denver.  Marlene and Scott explore the city together and the sees of love are planeted.

In another episode the team is separated with Marlene and Lancer going off together.  Marlene is confronted by another human-looking Invid, Sera and learns about the past of the Invid.  But it's not until the team gets to the Invid's main hive of Reflex Point and she's wounded that she realizes what she is by the green blood coming from a cut.

You green-blooded son of a bitch!

She runs away but later during the attack she manages to transfigure into pure energy and lead her friends into the main five to confront the Regess.  She tries to convince the Regess to stop the attack, but it's not until the human fleet assaulting Earth launches "Neutron" missiles to destroy the hive (and much of the planet) that the Regess decides to leave.

As for Ariel, she stays with Lunk and Annie while Scott Bernard goes to look for the SDF-3.  But when Scott comes back a few months later, Annie has gone and Lunk and Ariel have had a thing going on.  But Ariel goes with Scott on the Ark Angel to find the SDF-3.

She's imprisoned by the intelligence people on the Ark Angel where Scott tries to get her to tell them where the Regess is so maybe they can find the SDF-3.  While imprisoned, she and Scott actually fuck where they think cameras aren't watching--but they are.  D'OH.  Eventually with Ariel's help they find the Regess and SDF-3.  She and Scott survive and wind up getting married and living Happily Ever After.  I guess.

In the ill-fated Shadow Chronicles animated movie Ariel gets superpowers, sort of a cross between Nightcrawler and Jean-Grey of the X-Men.  She even gets a new costume complete with a boob panel!  I guess you can decide for yourself if that's an improvement.

Annie

Meanwhile, Annie is a little girl who's survived the Invid invasion of Earth.  Whether she's 17 or 13 or younger is a matter of some debate.  She's the third person to join Scott Bernard's team when they find her outside a South American city after her latest "boyfriend" kicked her out.

Most of the time she doesn't do a lot of fighting because she's a kid but she has some uses.  Like when they stage a concert as a distraction to steal Protoculture, Annie whips the crowd into a frenzy so they can escape.

Most of the time Annie rides in an old APC with Lunk, a former Southern Cross soldier who joins the team shortly after Annie.  He maintained an Alpha fighter in his barn that helps the team fight the Invid.  Annie tells Lunk he's going to be her new boyfriend but they never hook up.

Annie was with Rand and Scott Bernard when they fell into the Invid Genesis Pit.  At one point she's possessed by the Invid Regess to deliver a dire warning to the others that the earth is doomed.  Later she and Rand blow up an Invid living computer (basically a big brain) in an Invid fortress.

In one episode the team has a birthday party for her with mint chocolate cake, her favorite.  The team even puts on an air show and fireworks for her.

In another episode the team finds an old dam with a jungle the Invid have roofed over.  Living in the jungle are a tribe of people who used to work on the dam.  There's a kid among that tribe named Magruder and Annie helps him to become a man by helping him distract the Invid while the team opens up the dam to destroy the Invid hive.

Annie is going to stay with Magruder but they wanted her to do manual labor and junk so she returns to the team a short time later.  During the battle for Reflex Point, Annie drives Lunk's truck.  Later she, Lunk, and Ariel go to start a farm.  Again Annie doesn't really want to do manual labor so she goes back to find Magruder.  They get married and become "neogeneticists" who clone dinosaurs like Jurassic Park!