Dinaranger/Characters

DinaRangers

 * Chromatic Arrangement: The three DinaRangers. Maya is r, Miki is g, and Saori/Shiori is b.
 * Four-Temperament Ensemble: There's only a maximum of three DinaRangers at any time, but with both Saori and Shiori, all four temperaments are covered.
 * Maya: Choleric
 * Miki: Melancholic
 * Saori: Sanguine
 * Shiori: Phlegmatic
 * Heroic Willpower: Deconstructed. Only those with the mental fortitude necessary can be DinaRangers, and there are only four known candidates who meet that requirement. If it weren't for this restriction, they wouldn't be so short-handed in the fight against the Zofa.
 * Also Reconstructed. Heroic Willpower is also the reason why it takes longer for a DinaRanger to be corrupted by Zofa cells than most people. It's come in handy on two occasions:
 * Military Superhero: Dina appears to be a defense contractor, which would make the DinaRangers this trope.
 * Most Common Superpower: It's a hentai. What did you expect?
 * Muscles Are Meaningless
 * Romance Genre Heroines
 * Red DinaRanger Maya is The Crusader. This is best exemplified by her unwillingness to back down even if it means fighting her own mother.
 * Yellow DinaRanger Miki is The Boss, although Maya is the de facto leader of the group. She desperately wants to prove that she deserves her position, especially to Emika.
 * The first Blue DinaRanger Saori doesn't get a whole lot of time for characterization, but she seems to be The Nurturer in the little time we see of her.
 * Her successor and sister Shiori is The Waif. She's only been in one fight so far, and hardly accomplishes anything, but the fact that she agrees to take Saori's place despite knowing of the danger reveals that she has a touch of iron.

Maya Ayase

 * Action Girl: While the rest of the DinaRangers may be merely faux, Maya, the de facto leader, has consistently proven herself as a very capable fighter. In Chapter 9, !
 * Determinator: Knowing that she may have to fight her brainwashed mother doesn't make her back down. The fact that the Zofa Soldiers are human beings doesn't make her back down. Seeing doesn't make her back down, and in fact sends her flying into a rage.
 * For Great Justice: When asked by her enemies if she really has the stomach to harm Zofa Soldiers, knowing that they were once innocent humans, she uses this as a reason to continue fighting.
 * Green Eyes
 * Green Eyed Red Head
 * Kimono Fanservice: In between Chapters 4 and 5 is a piece of art showing Maya getting ambushed by a Zofa Soldier at a festival.
 * The Hero
 * Super Mode: Maya triggers hers at the end of Chapter 8.

Miki Fujiwara

 * Chronic Hero Syndrome: "Right now, my reason for fighting is so that I can protect everyone." Her reasons for helping everyone are not entirely selfless, however....
 * Daddy's Girl
 * Friendless Background
 * Glory Seeker: Downplayed. She just wants people to stop seeing her as just a subject of nepotism, by showing off her skill in combat.
 * Nepotism: Before she became a DinaRanger, she was assigned to mission control. While everyone else in that position was a top graduate from the military academy, Miki only got the job because she was Commander Fujiwara's daughter. Once she learned that she was compatible with the DinaSuit, she would go out of her way to show how capable she was in battle, so that others would recognize her for her skill, instead of recognizing her as "the Commander's daughter."

Saori Uchihara

 * I Will Protect Her: Saori decided against telling her younger sister Shiori that she was compatible with a DinaSuit, because she didn't want her to put her life on the line as well.
 * Meaningful Name: Sao (さお) means blue.

Shiori Uchihara

 * The Call Knows Where You Live: She is initially hesitant to take up her sister's mantle, but when her school gets attacked by the Zofa, and she sees what has become of Saori, she accepts.
 * I Will Find You: Her reason for joining the DinaRangers is to take back her big sister.
 * Little Sister Heroine
 * Meaningful Name: Shii (しい) means blue.
 * Ordinary High School Student: Because Saori withheld the truth, Shiori never suspected that she too was compatible with DinaSuit technology, until Chapter 2.
 * Shy Blue-Haired Girl
 * Silk Hiding Steel
 * Taking Up the Mantle
 * The Watson

Commander Zen Shingo Fujiwara

 * Badass Mustache
 * Dad the Veteran
 * Nepotism: He assigned his daughter Miki to Dina's mission control crew, deeply offending the more deserving candidates who didn't make the cut.

Chief Misaki Kamura

 * Hot Scientist

Emika Saejima
"Emika: No!! Not when I finally worked up the nerve to apologize to Miki!! Not when I'm finally ready to change my outlook!!"
 * Purple Eyes
 * Redemption Equals Death: In Chapter 10, Emika decides to redeem herself by finding some way to help Miki. Unfortunately, this directly leads to.


 * Redemption Equals Sex: Deconstructed beyond all repair, in the scenario above.
 * The Resenter: For the longest time, Emika held a grudge against Miki. While Emika had to study hard to make it to her high position in Dina's command center, Miki was given a position alongside her because she was the Commander's daughter. Later, Miki was discovered to be one of the few compatible with a Dina Suit. Emika greatly resented Miki's unbelievably good fortune... until Chapter 10, where she concludes that her negative attitude caused Miki to come back incapacitated, and decides to turn over a new leaf.
 * Survivor Guilt: When Miki is brought back comatose in Chapter 10, she feels that what happened was all her fault.
 * White-Haired Pretty Girl: Emika.

Zofa

 * Aliens Speaking Japanese: The Zofa always speak in Japanese, even when not addressing humans.
 * Exclusively Evil
 * Bizarre Sexual Dimorphism: Granted, we've only seen one male Zofa so far, but he looks much more alien than the all-female Generals.
 * Brains and Bondage: The Zofa Generals exhibit this trait, at least through their Mad Scientist tendencies. The Soldiers... not so much.
 * Bondage Is Bad: Not your typical form of BDSM, but the design of the Zofa Soldier suits, the Dominatrix-like personalities of the Zofa Generals, and the subjugation of free will give the story overt bondage overtones.
 * Combat Sadomasochist: The Zofa Generals show some degree of this, and the Zofa Soldiers are reprogrammed to enjoy assaulting innocent humans and former friends.
 * Dark Is Evil
 * Despotism Justifies the Means
 * Dominatrix: The Zofa Generals.
 * Dressed All in Rubber: The Zofa Soldiers, and to a lesser extent the Zofa Generals.
 * Mad Scientist: Every Zofa higher-up moonlights as one. Ghana continues to develop increasingly perverse methods to instill perfect obedience in the infectees, Benin developed the Zofa cells to corrupt humans in the first place, and Sierra created a pocket dimension filled with aphrodisiac gas and Naughty Tentacles.
 * Rubber Forehead Aliens:
 * The Zofa Generals have odd skin colors, and a scorpion-like tail in Ghana's case, but are otherwise indistinguishable from humans. In the black and white pages, a Zofa's skin isn't even shaded differently from a human's skin. Considering Ghana's true identity, however, there might be a reason for such similarity between the two races.
 * The Great Leader is a bit more extreme in this regard, with his horned, mildly phallic head.
 * Scary Dogmatic Aliens
 * Theme Naming: The three Generals named so far are all named after equatorial countries in West Africa. Sierra is named after Sierra Leone.

Great Leader

 * Big Bad
 * Hidden Agenda Villain: As indicated in Chapter 6.
 * I Control My Minions Through... Mind Control
 * My Brain Is Big: And somewhat phallic.
 * Take Over the World: His (apparent) goal is to take over the Earth. He doesn't seem to have any real motivation for it, though.
 * The Villain Makes the Plot

Ghana (SaHa name: Gunner)

 * Beware My Stinger Tail: Ghana can use her scorpion tail to tranquilize her enemies, or as a makeshift penis as part of the transformation process.
 * Driven by Envy
 * Exotic Equipment: See Beware My Stinger Tail.
 * Luke, I Am Your Father: Ghana was revealed to the audience to be Maya's mother back in Chapter 2, but for some reason this was treated as a secret until Maya herself discovered this in Chapter 9.
 * The Quisling / Transhuman Treachery: Ghana was once human, but she became fully loyal to the cause (not as a result of brainwashing) after she was abducted by ZOFA.
 * The Resenter: Ghana resents Benin for having been selected as the Great Leader's number two. Benin was the one who engineered the Zofa Cell, but Ghana was the one who researched and developed methods for infecting and transforming humans into Zofa Soldiers. Ghana firmly believes that her contributions far outweigh Benin's, and feels she deserves the promotion more. It certainly doesn't help matters that Benin clearly enjoys rubbing her success in Ghana's face. The end result of all this is that Ghana puts all her time and energy into developing more and more advanced systems of brainwashing, in order to prove her worth to the Great Leader and show Benin up.

Zofa Soldiers

 * Anatomically-Impossible Sex: Justified by the fact that the Zofa cells make major changes to an infectee's biology. Whenever intercourse is shown, the parties involved are all either aliens, or humans in the late stages of infection.
 * A Nazi by Any Other Name: They are considerably more Nazi-like in the first three chapters, even shouting "Hail!" in the unofficial translations. This characterization has been dropped from Chapter 4 on.
 * Cannon Fodder: The beginning of Chapter 7 shows two of the villains discussing their decision to distract the DinaRangers with a scattered attack force composed entirely of Zofa soldiers. It is implied that the DinaRangers had to kill them.
 * Clothes Make the Maniac
 * Combat Stilettos: Starting in Chapter 7.
 * Compressed Hair: The Zofa uniform is so tight that it manages to take the victim's long and/or poofy hairstyle, and compress it so tightly against her head that she appears bald.
 * Discount Lesbians
 * Evil Feels Good: As the victims of Zofa cells will very loudly announce, repeatedly.
 * Face Heel Turn: Weaponized by the high-ranking officers of the Zofa.
 * Faceless Goons: Becoming a Zofa soldier involves being turned into one of these. The bodysuit includes a skintight covering of the face and head which leaves only the eyes exposed, and only two soldiers thus far have displayed the ability to remove it willingly (for certain values of the word "willingly").
 * Feel No Pain: The Cells plant artificial nerves into the body, which cancel out pain and amplify pleasure.
 * Fetish: One of the ways the Zofa Cell reprograms humans is by giving them a Zofa Soldier fetish. Having sex with Zofa Soldiers, becoming a Zofa Soldier, turning others into Zofa Soldiers...
 * Hermaphrodite: From Chapter 3 onward, they can become these at will.
 * Laser-Guided Amnesia: The ability of the Zofa officers to control their brainwashed soldiers hinges on erasing their personality and their memories.
 * Loss of Identity
 * Mind Manipulation
 * Brainwashed
 * Brainwashed and Crazy: Zofa soldiers are willing to attack and transform their former friends and allies.
 * Emotion Suppression
 * Getting Smilies Painted on Your Soul: Of the 'purely sexualized' variety.
 * More Than Mind Control
 * First demonstrated in Chapter 8. Despite 's best efforts to resist being turned into a Zofa soldier, she eventually faints. At this point, an illusion of the Great Leader invades her subconscious and attacks her emotional weak points, causing her mind to crumble and allowing the Zofa programming to take root.
 * In Chapter 11, the Great Leader shows up yet again in 's mind, convincing her that best way to make amends is to infect . From there, swearing her eternal loyalty to the Zofa is only a slippery slope jump away.
 * Paint It Black: In this case, the spontaneous costume change precedes the Face Heel Turn.
 * Transhuman
 * White Mask of Doom