Solty Rei

Rose, Solty, and Roy

Solty Rei is a Manga and 26-episode Anime series, It was directed by Yoshimasa Hiraike and co-produced by TV Asahi, Studio GONZO and AIC through 2005 and 2006. It was aired in USA in 2009.

The plot follows Roy Revant, a bounty hunter who captures criminals for the Maverick Hunters agency (not that one), in a city where a phenomenon called the Aurora Shell prevents air travel (anything approaching is struck by lightning) and interferes with electronics. Roy is a bitter, sad man who first lost his wife Sarah to illness and then his daughter Rose when the Aurora Shell was unleashed 12 years ago in what's known as the Blast Fall, killing or wounding thousands of people, with many survivors using cybernetic implants to try gaining normal lives.

All of a sudden, however, Roy's rather unhappy life is inverted when an unusual girl literally falls into his life. She's a young woman with cyber implants and quite the amnesia, who attaches herself to Roy after saving him twice. Roy gives her the name "Solty", coming from his old record "Solty Rock", and more or less takes her in as an adoptive daughter. . .

---

Tropes:

• Action Girl: Solty and Rose definitely count. MIranda has her moments too.
• Affably Evil: The girls who work at R.U.C., if they even be called "evil".
• After the Credits: Watch through to the credits of "The Future" (the finale episode) to get an epilogue showing the true ending.
• After the End: The "Blast Fall", an event that didn't quite destroy civilization, but nonetheless totally changed society.
• AI Is a Crapshoot
• Alas, Poor Villain: Sylvia and Celica really didn't deserve to die, and especially not in the way they did. The former was murdered by the man she loved, while the latter gets killed by a sniper in a reckless attempt to avenge her friend.
  • In spite of all he's done, Ashley has his death treated with sympathy as well, especially since it comes after learning his actions were All for Nothing.
• Alliterative Name: Roy Revant, Rita aka Rose Revant, Miranda Maverick.
• Amazon Brigade: The RUC girls, anyone?
• Anachronic Order - In one specific case: If you're watching the DVD set, after episode 9, go to the last disc and watch "B1" & "B2", then go back to 10. B1 & B2 were interquels, set between 9 & 10, but cut from the Japanese broadcast. It's pretty funny, too.
• Anti-Hero: Roy's initial character. He changes as the series goes on.
  • The Anderson siblings also count by virtue of being thieves.
• Badass Adorable: Solty, With a side of Cute Bruiser.
• Beach Episode: Well, a pool episode - Waterside Panic. Fulfills the trope function of putting the cast in swimsuits.
• Beware the Nice Ones: And don't try to electrocute them either. "I hate bad people!"
• Big Bad: R.U.C. Director Ashley Lynx (at least until the final episode)
  • AIs behind the man: Eunomia and Eirene, Dike's (Solty's) "sisters"
• Brainwashed: It is never really clear if Rose was or was not, as the series even mentions that would be a bad idea because it could hamper her performance. It can be assumed that it may have been used earlier on her to prevent her from contacting anyone.
• Bratty Half-Pint: Kasha, who regularly bosses her mother around.
• Conspicuous CG: It's Gonzo.
• Decoy Protagonist: The story follows Roy for most of the series but by the last few episodes, it becomes clear that Solty is the real main character. Or maybe it's both.
• Distant Finale: Takes place several years after the climax, covering how all the protagonists are doing, with the exception of Solty, who had sacrificed her life saving the world from a meteor. After the credits, however, it skips forward again 12 years after that, where Roy, in space, discovers the frozen body of a rotted, but still conscious, Solty floating with the rest of the space debris, and breaks down in tears.
• Diving Save: Done multiple times, by both Roy and Solty.
• Drives Like Crazy: Integra.
• Easy Amnesia: After hitting a metal beam headfirst, Solty can't remember her past or her real name.
• Evil Counterpart: Ashley Lynx is this to Roy Revant, which the two even discuss. As Ashley points out and Roy acknowledges, there was a time when the latter was just like the former, in that they were both ruthless men driven by a desire to be reunited with a lost loved one. The different is that Roy was able to change due to adopting Solty and reuniting with Rose/Rita, to the point that he's perfectly willing to accept his daughter is a completely different person as long as she still accepts him as her father. Rose further points out that Ashley had a chance to change too, since he had Integra, Accela, Sylvia and Accela, but he chose to throw that away out of an attempt to be reunited with Illumina, an attempt that turned out to be All for Nothing since she was Dead All Along. Essentially, Ashley is what Roy would have become if he chose to continue chasing the ghosts of his past instead of appreciating those he has in the present.
  • Eirene and Eunomia are this to Solty/Dike. All three were core computers brought to the colony world by the original colonists, but while Eirene and Eunomia believe humanity needs to be kept under their control, Solty grows to trust humanity enough to let them make their own decisions.
• Expy: Roy is arguably an older and even more bitter version of Rick Deckard, with his hairstyle, trenchcoat and perma-stubble fitting said ex-cop to a tee; although his relationship to androids is much more cordial.
• Faking the Dead: Rose.
• Fan Service: The RUC Transformation Sequence, Solty's frequent backside shots, and the fact that there is a shower or bath scene nearly every episode.
• Faux Affably Evil: Ashley Lynx almost always speaks in a polite, courteous tone, but between his Bad Boss tendencies and the way he values others (via their "superiority"), it's very clear this is just an act. His love for Illumina is genuine, however, and he's devastated to learn that his attempts to reunite with her were All for Nothing.
• Fond Memories That Could Have Been: Roy Revant, Solty's good-hearted but also aloof and coldly distant adoptive father frantically pleaded for his little girl to not go through with the suicidal Heroic Sacrifice to save the planet, even going as far as telling her that he would take her to the amusement park like any father would his daughter. She simply smiles with tears in her eyes, and says that she's happy to have been his daughter, and bravely steps into the shuttle to her doom.
• Get a Hold of Yourself, Man!: Miranda doesn't just hit Roy to bring him out of his Heroic BSOD, she beats the tar out of him. It's stated that this isn't the first time concussive maintenance was applied.
• Goggles Do Nothing: Kasha wears pink goggles on her head for no readily apparent reason.
• Gratuitous English: "I lost my husband and he lost his doughter."
• Hair Colors: Solty, with her grass-green hair and eyes.
• Healing Hands: Solty. It's not as perfect as the trope usually is, but it's better than the alternative.
• The Heavy: Ashley Lynx.
• Heroic BSOD: Roy after Rose's "death".
• Heroic RROD: Integra is limited to three accelerations, or she risks life-threatening neurological damage.
• Hidden Eyes: Solty, just before going Badass.
• Hollywood Cyborg: "Resembles".
• Hot Shounen Mom: Miranda Maverick, though she's adoptive.
• Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: Roy and Solty.
• Humongous Mecha: Walking tank variant.
• If You Kill Him You Will Be Just Like Him: Everybody present pulls this on Rose to keep her from killing the man who murdered her best friend when she was just a child. It works but as soon as Rose is out of sight and earshot, her brother Larry kills the murderer anyway.
• I Know You Are in There Somewhere Fight: Solty, to Rose. It works.
• Ill Boy: Will, the unfortunate victim of medical malpractice.
• In the Name of the Moon: Rose Anderson likes to do this.
• I Owe You My Life: The reason Solty starts following Roy around.
• Intergenerational Friendship: Kasha and Silvia, following their stalking tour together.
• It's Personal: Rose in the episode Revenge.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Roy, Rose, Kasha and the Anderson brothers.
• Just Like Robin Hood: Rose and her brothers become thieves to help provide medicine and other supplies for the 'unregistered' residents.
• Laughing Mad: Accela, during her temporary Freak-Out.
• Lethal Chef: Will. When you'd rather eat MREs "ration packs" than someone's cooking...
  • Solty starts off that way, but improves dramatically with practice.
• Let's Get Dangerous: The weird little girl looks harmless, right up until she punches you into the next postal code.
• Line-of-Sight Name: Solty, from an album cover.
• Long-Lost Relative
• Love Makes You Evil: Ashley Lynx, who is the main antagonist until the final episode.
• Made of Explodium: A scanning machine blows up from just trying to examine Solty.
• Manly Tears: Roy sheds some genuinely believable manly tears when it's known that he might lose one of his daughters, Solty, because of the events of the final episode (staying after the credits shows that Solty survived).
• Master Computer: Eunomia
• Meaningful Echo: Will, who Solty befriends in the desert, often states something and then says, "just kidding!" due to his carefree nature. This happens constantly during his episode until the last time, when he tries to hide the fact that he loves her, even when he knows he'll die soon. After he dies, Solty begins to use that saying from then on, to remind her of him.
• Megaton Punch: The use of Solty's Power Fist.
• Mid Season Wham Episode: The "death" of Rose, just after she is revealed to be the daughter Roy has been looking for all along.
• Motor Mouth: Solty, too.
• Nice Girl: Solty and Miranda.
• Not Blood Siblings: Rose has this on both ends. She's the adopted sister of the Anderson brothers, but she's also the biological daughter of Roy, making Solty her adopted sister.
• Not So Different: Solty and Rose. The two of them couldn't be more different if they tried but both are amnesiacs who were born under different names (Dike and Rita Revant, respectively) and, upon regaining their memories, renounce their old names in favour of their aliases.
• No Transhumanism Allowed: Averted. The series is full of cyborgs and genetically altered individuals.
• Outliving One's Offspring: Roy's daughter, Rita Revant, is said to have died but Roy believes her to be alive. During the series, the Action Girl Rose is revealed as Rita, her DNA and memories affected by the Blast Fall.
• Parental Abandonment: Done for a good cause by Rita "Ravant's" father.
• Police Are Useless: They don't even investigate attempted murder unless you come file a report.
• Powered Armor: The RUC team.
• Power Glows
• Power Fist: Solty, when it starts vibrating.
• Punch Clock Villain: The girls who work at R.U.C. are perfectly decent people when not on the job, and only qualify as villains by the fact that they work under the Big Bad
• Really Seven Hundred Years Old: Solty, Ashley and Joseph
• Robot Girl: Initially assumed to just have a lot of cybernetic enhancement, Solty is revealed to be one.
• Roof Hopping
• Rummage Sale Reject: Solty picks the... unusual outfit after Roy says he "loves it" without looking at it just to get her to pick an outfit.
• Sadistic Choice: In the Grand Finale, Roy is being forced by Ashley to choose between Rose and Solty, both captured. Roy takes a third option and shoots the tentacles launched at him. Ashley shoots him instead and a very pissed off Solty frees herself.

Roy: Sorry, pal, but I like to make my own choices, and shooting either one of my daughter's for some sick little freak's amusement isn't one of them.

• Shoot the Dog: When Larry Anderson is involved, criminals don't survive the day.
• Small Girl, Big Gun: Kasha, when she grabs and fires a giant bazooka.
• Spirit Advisor: Will serves as a sounding board for Solty's introspection.
• Taking the Bullet: Both Roy and Solty have done this. Comes out better for her than for him. Solty actually catches a bullet, carrying the momentum into a backfist on the attacker.
• Theme Naming: The R.U.C. girls are all named after Japanese cars. The three Master Computers are named for the Greek goddesses of law and order, the Horae.
• Unusual Ears: Solty's are long, pointed, expressive, and the same color as her hair. Kasha actually asks if it's some sort of new fad.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight: Rose holds Roy at gunpoint in the middle of a busy sidewalk, and no one but Solty reacts.
• We Help the Helpless: Rose and her partners.
• Your Princess Is in Another Castle: Episode 23 ends with Ashley and Eunomia defeated, and the city rebuilding, complete with Hard Work Montage. Unfortunately, Solty discovers that Eirene is about to pull a Colony Drop on the city. Not good.