Hiroki Shinohara is a Earth Federation Cosmo Navy officer and a former aircraft pilot, currently serving as the commanding officer of the aircraft carrier Hyuga. He previously served aboard the battleship Yamato during the Garmillas War and the Gatlantis Campaign as second in command of its fighter squadron. He was later transferred to the Hyuga and took commander of its fighter unit. Following his participation in the Iscandar Incident, he was promoted to captain of the carrier as part of Operation DAD.
History[]
Early Life[]
Shinohara grew up with a father who was frequently dissatisfied and angry with him. However, after his father's death early in the planet bombing siege of Earth, Shinohara's hatred for him faded and he eventually came to miss him.[2] As a younger fighter pilot in the 343rd Squadron, he flew with Akio Yamamoto, the elder brother of his future fellow Yamato crew member, Akira Yamamoto.[3][4]
Voyage to Iscandar[]
Aboard Yamato, Shinohara is assigned to Cosmo Falcon number 107, custom painted with a shark's mouth.[5] Operation M2 is his first opportunity for combat after the launch of Yamato, where he joins squadron leader Saburo Kato and others in an advance raid on the Garmillas operating base on Pluto.[6] Shinohara also takes on at least one routine scouting assignment, piloting a Type-100 Space Reconnaissance Plane with Ensign Akira Yamamoto as co-pilot. The two are nearly killed during a mishap upon returning to Yamato, but unlike the furious Yamamoto, Shinohara quietly listens to the deck crew's explanation, and quickly accepts the apology of chief Isami Enomoto.[7]
Shinohara stands with Kato and Yamamoto before flying into battle.
Several months later, Shinohara volunteers for a much more dangerous reconnaissance mission: taking a captured Garmillas Czvarke fighter into the newly discovered Subspace gate subspace corridor network and investigating enemy activity at the network hub, Balun. He chooses the designation "Sword 3" in honor of Yamamoto's deceased elder brother. Upon arriving at Balun, Shinohara is able to collect ample data, but his activities soon draw the suspicious attention of other Garmillas fighters. He turns and makes a run for it, but his ship takes damage just before it enters the gate leading back to Yamato.[3] Seriously injured, Shinohara spends the next several weeks recuperating, and remains aboard Yamato during the critical Battle of the Rainbow Star Cluster. Despite being out of the cockpit, he is healed enough to fight alongside Lieutenant Susumu Kodai and a security team when Garmillas soldiers attempt to board the ship and kidnap a senior crew member.[8] In time, he makes a full recovery and flies with the squadron against Garmillas Imperial Guard fighters and carriers during the Battle of Garmillas.[9][10]
During the return voyage to Earth, Shinohara flies alongside allied Garmillas fighters against a Gatlantis fleet invading the planet Shambleau.[11] About one month later, he once again encounters battle aboard Yamato itself when a battalion of Gami-loid robot soldiers penetrates the vessel's defenses and attempts to seize control. He and Yamamoto use a heavy machine gun from a partially disassembled fighter to briefly fight back the invaders. Their success is short-lived, though, and the better prepared Gami-loid troops push deeper into the ship.[12]
Personality[]
Shinohara spends time with Yamamoto.
Shinohara is friendly and even-tempered, despite the experience of his early life. He generally accepts unexpected developments in an open-minded manner, and responds to adversity calmly. He follows a philosophy of treating those around him with care in order to achieve good results, a practice that he extends even to computers.[6][7]
He works well with his immediate superior, Kato, and gives him personal advice.[2] However, his closest relationship on the mission to Iscandar is with Yamamoto. Shinohara welcomes her into the fighter squadron in a more professionally appropriate manner than his colleagues. The two are able to comfortably open up to one another about their personal lives, and they share prayers for their fallen comrades.[3][12] He keeps any feelings of attraction he has for Yamamoto hidden or expressed indirectly until a wedding reception late in the mission, where he tries--and fails--to embrace her.[13]
As a pilot and soldier, Shinohara is not fearful of combat, and is ready to place himself in harm's way.[3][8][12] However, he is hesitant about high diving.[14]
References[]
- ↑ Official Space Battleship Yamato 2199 website character data
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 "Farewell to the Solar System"
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 "Over the Black Light"
- ↑ "They're Coming!"
- ↑ Space Battleship Yamato 2199, Report 10, July 4, 2013
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 "The Trap on All Sides"
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 "Clockwork Prisoner"
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 "Under a Rainbow Sun"
- ↑ The Planet That We Head For
- ↑ "One Man's War"
- ↑ "Space Battleship Yamato 2199: Odyssey of the Celestial Ark"
- ↑ 12.0 12.1 12.2 "The Forever War"
- ↑ "Memories of the Blue Planet"
- ↑ "The Distant Promised Land"