It’s time to discuss the best girl…. almost. Before I get into it, there are some honorable mentions I wanna briefly cover in this paragraph. Lots of them were great and often underappreciated characters, so I want to make sure they get a least a little love. Trisha Elric from Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood is imho the most underappreciated waifu from the series; she’s a beautiful, strong willed and caring woman who managed to change the heart of a heartbroken and lost immortal who saw no value in life. Even when Hoenheim had to leave, she still raised the boys with care and never bad-mouthed their father or resented her lot in life. She was a truly wonderous woman. Another HM is Dusa from Hades. She has the most adorable personality and voice, and I adored all her interactions when playing the game. Even though her and Zagreus don’t end up being romantically compatible they’re both mature enough to remain best friends (I also always let her keep all of the Ambrosia). Yuno Gasai from Future Diary is another one I’d like to mention as she is the progenitor ‘yandere’ that got me into crazy chicks. Lastly, I think most of the Mass Effect female love interests are quite great, in particular Tali and Jack for me. Enough delaying, let’s discuss the defacto best girl! And obviously expect spoilers, you know how this works by now.
#1 Rebecca from Cyberpunk: Edgerunners
One might not expect to find such a gem in a setting as bleak and twisted as Cyberpunk’s. For those unfamiliar Cyberpunk is essentially a dark version of Earth where technology progressed differently and much more rapidly, leading to Corporations having massive power, technology being much more heavily militarily focused, and cybernetics being as commonplace as make up or tattoos are in our world. It’s described as ‘High Tech, Low Life’. Technology is everywhere, even beggars in the streets have some kind of cybernetic and weapons, but life isn’t made better for it. People run the risk of ‘Cyberpsychosis’ if they have too much cyberware in them, which causes them to permanently lose sense of reality and mentally shatter, leading to violent rampages until they get put down like a rabid animal. It’s a terrible dystopia with death and violence teeming in every hour of the day, where walking down the street can even be a risky proposition. It isn’t meant to be a place you’d want to live. Yet in spite of that, I’d take it in a heartbeat if I lived in it with Rebecca.
So what traits can we find in Rebecca? Why is she so special? Rebecca is a character of extremes. She’s spunky, unpredictable, violent, and the definition of ‘ride or die’ levels of loyal. She’s deeply protective of her crew, and honestly a bit crazy. She’s a character that adds much needed levity to the otherwise bleak setting of Cyberpunk, be it from jokes she’s cracking or her spunky and crazy attitude creating humorous situations. When we first see her it’s on David’s first job, and her actions in it are pretty weird from the jump. The person they’re stealing data from gets a sudden schedule change that causes him to leave early, and she stalls him for time in her extreme and off the wall style. Afterwards she introduces herself at a celebration party the gang attends, but even here she does it in her own unusual fashion. I love how the camera even plays into it here, where we see her looking at David for a few moments before finally saying “yo” to get his attention. She’s even kind enough to get him a drink!
Little details go a long way for me, and I love how every interaction we see with her keeps up this consistent thread of her odd characters identity. Even mundane scenes show off her weirder traits, and to this day one of my favorite scenes from any show has to be when David stops by her place to deliver a package for the boss and she answers the door with a gun. It’s fitting of both Cyberpunk as a setting and Becca as a character, and she keeps it up for almost the entire time they’re talking, with David completely unsure what he’s supposed to do. Later on in the show the gang comes across a Cyberpsycho that kills her brother, which leads to her going ape shit trying to kill him (and almost getting herself killed several times). Up until this point she’s constantly shown bickering, cussing out and telling her brother off, yet her reaction here is a clear indicator of how much she really cared about him. A line that perfectly captures their relationship is “You son of a bitch, he was mine to kill!” It sounds heartless at first, but in the context of cyberpunk it does a lot to help us understand them. It tells us that the siblings clearly had an agreement to look out for one another, and that if one of the went psycho the other would be the one to put them out of their misery. It’s a statement that tells us that they had planned to stick together through thick and thin, and her yelling that is her raging against the fact that that plan was cut short.
The aspect that tips Rebecca over the edge for me and above even Toga is her loyalty and dedication. It’s established early on that she has a thing for the main character David, with her even yelling to him “Hey, I ain’t good at playing just friends!”, which ends up being the biggest lie in the whole show. David and another woman Lucy end up together, yet despite that we see Rebecca has his back time and time again. Even when Lucy leaves the crew and David is unsure what’s happening, Rebecca still supports him and keeps him alive on his missions. When he shows signs that the cybernetics are starting to overwhelm him (like him freezing up and having shaky hands), she’s also the only character in the show that voices her concerns clearly and loudly without excuses like the others do. She’s scared that he’s gonna go off the deep end like the psycho that killed her brother, and she doesn’t wanna see that happen to David.
However the scene in the gif below is the one that really drives home for me just how much she cares for David. After he’s trapped into putting on a new power suit that pushes him over the edge into cyberpsychosis, she see’s his crazy eyes. He starts talking to his mom (who is long since dead) about how he’s gonna make her proud and make it to the top of Arasaka like she wanted. He’s gone over the edge into the loony bin, just like the one that killed her brother, and even still she resolves to ride it out with him. Knowing full well it’s a suicide mission. At this point the only thing that might be able to bring him back is if he can be reunited with Lucy, so that’s what she sets out to do. I can’t imagine how hard that would be, especially knowing that as deeply as you care for him you aren’t enough to bring him back. That as much as you love him he doesn’t love you back, and that the only chance they have is for you to take him to the one he does love. Yet she doesn’t lament or curse her lot, she just accepts it. If that isn’t enough to properly convey to you you why I love Rebecca so much and why she’s such an amazing character, I truly don’t think anything will. It’s not just how much she cares, but the fact that she does so in scenarios that shouldn’t facilitate it. Cyberpunk isn’t a setting you think to find such pure love in, and he doesn’t reciprocate it and is openly in love with one of her comrades. Yet in spite of it, as is truly in character for Rebecca, she loves and cares for David in the most extreme way possible. Her and David deserved to end up together and were a much better fit than Lucy, and I will die on that hill.
And… that’s a wrap! Thanks for reading this. I know it may have been cringey or hard to read, but those of you that read each of these entries I appreciate you. As I’ve said before, I love Top 10s and I love sharing perspectives on things we’re passionate on. Reading someone rant on about their favorite females may seem like nothing big, but learning someone else’s thoughts on characters can give you a deeper insight into them (for better and worse). I hope I was able to convince you to think more fondly of the characters I discussed. Who’s your best girl? Let me know in the comments, and let me know any thoughts you had on my entries! Until next time, thank you for reading, and stay healthy!
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