"Commence"

Hope is cornered by Itsuki.

**"Commence"** is the first episode of Interstellar Ranger Commence, followed by "Training".

## Plot

The episode begins with a still shot of a framed picture depicting Hope with two friends. Standing by the door to leave for Cosmos Academy, no one responds to Hope's empty farewell. She leaves home on a quiet, solemn note. While traveling through the city of Yokohama, Hope listens to a calming, uplifting song ("Familiarity" by Business District) to boost her energy and mask her sadness. She and the rest of her classmates then attend an academy ceremony hosted by the ambassador, Ambassador Jorge Avilas. George emphasizes what great importance rangers provide to this future society, as they will have the ability to "bridge the gap between the people of our planet, and the stars above us". After his speech, all eleven students are whisked away on a transport ship headed directly to the elite academy.

On the ship, Hope meets Carmen Avilas who notices her lack of energy. The two begin a short conversation, Hope exclaiming how excited she is to become a Ranger and go on adventures through space. Carmen suddenly recognizes Hope Griffin as the student who replaced her best friend and grows quiet. Meanwhile, Itsuki Reo is already at the academy and preparing to take on the role of class representative. Upon their arrival, Itsuki formally greets his classmates and leads them to their dormitories. Hope excitedly films around her dorm, catching the attention of her roommate Jazz Owens. After a brief introduction, their other roommate, Amai Higashi, arrives. The three sit on her bed and shoot the breeze. Hope appears genuinely happy for the first time in the episode, thinking about how proud her father would be that she's at Cosmos Academy making friends.

The next morning, Carmen and Itsuki meet for breakfast in the cafeteria. Itsuki examines the room to observe his future classmates when Carmen points out "the Griffin girl". Itsuki is under disbelief that Hope had presumably replaced Carmen's friend while Carmen is frustrated and bitter. As rumored by her friend, Hope was apparently a very good student and almost at the top of her class. When Hope and her roommates enter their first class, they're rudely interrupted by Arthur Stepanov who believes Hope "cheated" her way into the academy. After the class is filled, Professor Strong teleports into class and greets his students with the mannerisms of a drill sergeant. He then introduces Itsuki Reo as the son of the famous General Reo, the current bearer of the Azul Force. He mentions that Itsuki will be their class representative despite the traditional protocol, something Jeff Williams briefly jokes about. At the podium, Itsuki anonymously calls out Hope for "taking a shortcut" into Cosmos Academy. In an embarrassing attempt to protect her reputation, Hope stands up in front of the class and calls Itsuki a "dummy", which he subtly repeats at her. After class, she has a video chat with the friends seen in the picture frame and vents out her frustration. She begins to question whether she deserves to be a Ranger at Cosmos when her friends remind her just how proud her father would be. Hope flatly responds that she's achieving her dream in agreement with her friends.

After a montage of the student's first week of school, Itsuki prepares for Saturday, the one day of the week students partake in field training. His father demands that he will get the Azul Force before the call abruptly ends. The next day, the girls suit up in the locker room, Hope being particularly stoked to finally start training. Kayleen notices that their uniforms have no stripes and reminds her peers that they must earn them in order to be considered real Rangers. Out on the field, Professor Strong initiates a sparring exercise. Hope is paired up with Alex, the twin brother of Arthur. Alex resents the fact that Arthur is his brother. He explains to Hope that Arthur is extremely competitive and he'd rather not have him in his life. As Alex vents, Hope accidentally punches him in the face, not noticing how distracted he was. Carmen slyly stands by Itsuki and asks him if he's going to "train" Hope. Itsuki then pulls her aside and mockingly scolds for not taking the academy more seriously, deeming it an insult to the school and the Rangers that came before them. As shown in the montage, Hope has been dozing off in class and struggling with her studies. The class rep then proceeds to "fix" Hope with a personal training regime. The episode ends with the start of one of their session, with Itsuki telling Hope to take a punch at him.

## Major Characters

* Hope Griffin
* Itsuki Reo
* Carmen Avilas
* Jazz Owens
* Amai Higashi
* Professor Parth Strong
* Alex Stepanov

## Minor Characters

* Maria Long
* Arthur Stepanov
* Naomi Amador
* Richie Webber
* Kayleen Huo
* Sebastian Rojas
* Ambassador Jorge Avilas
* General Reo
* Jeff Willams
* Chris Myrthil
* ALICE
* Koromi Reo

## Trivia

* The designs of the shuttles transporting students loosely resembles shuttlecraft found in the 2009 Star Trek film, those these are much larger and have a back door that opens up rear ramp similar to a cargo plane.