Flandre Scarlet

Illustrator [http://www.pixiv.net/member.php?id=13336149 ものべ]
Basics
Origin Name	フランドール・スカーレット; Flandre Scarlet; ɸɯɽandoːɽɯ̥ sɯ̥kaːɽetto
Other Names	Sister of the Devil; 悪魔の妹
Age	Approximately 495 Years
Eye Color	Red
Hair Color	Gold
Moe Points	sister; loli
relative characters
Remilia Scarlet; Reimu Hakurei

Flandre Scarlet(フランドール・スカーレット) is the younger sister of Remilia Scarlet and a vampire who has lived for over 495 years.

General Information

Flandre is the extra boss of Embodiment of Scarlet Devil as well as a target in the Extra Stage of Shoot the Bullet. In Embodiment of Scarlet Devil, she was called Imouto-sama(妹様); "your honor, little sister of the mistress" by Patchouli Knowledge.

Flandre has lived for at least 495 years, but since she goes crazy a little (due to emotional instability), she has never been taken outside the mansion, and as she herself never tried going outside for the respect she has to her sister, she was raised knowing nothing about the world. However, she has shown a desire to go outside after witnessing the events of Embodiment of Scarlet Devil. Her initial attempt to do so was blocked by Patchouli Knowledge's rain summoning magic, but since then she has been shown outside the mansion when she was destroying a meteor.

She is normally cute and quiet, but since she does not know the proper way to attack humans, she is unable to go easy on them and blows them away without a trace. In the first place, until the time when she met either Marisa Kirisame or Reimu Hakurei in Embodiment of Scarlet Devil, she has not seen any humans other than in cooked form.

Abilities

Destroying absolutely anything and everything

Flandre can destroy anything she wants by moving the "eye" of the object, where the tension is highest, into her hand and pouring her power into it, or in other words, she crushes the "eye" and breaks the target. In Bohemian Archive in Japanese Red she destroyed a meteor with a single hand and without touching it. According to Flandre in the interview : "She just squeezed and the meteor went boom".

Cloning herself

Flandre is able to clone herself as seen in one of her Spell Cards where she creates 3 clones that helps her in the battle. Grimoire of Marisa states that the clones "attack as they like" which could mean they're able to think independently to some grade. It also categorize it as a Slave Type meaning they're under the command of the original Flandre.

Superhuman Attributes

As a vampire, Flandre possesses superhuman capabilities, such as enhanced strength and speed seeing that she can swing an oversized sword, thought not as quickly as she would like to; and, like her sister Remilia, she has nimbleness of a tengu as well the bodily and regenerative ability.

Character Design

Flandre's depiction in Perfect Memento in Strict Sense

Name

The name Flandre (best pronounced as 'Flan-drah') is a modern French term for Flanders, a region which makes out the northern part of Belgium. They speak Flemish, a variety of Dutch. In Dutch, it's pronounced as 'Vlaanderen'. Note that the pronunciation of her name in the Japanese goes more along the lines of "Flandoor" rather than "Flander" since her name in katakana was not フランドル which would have been the more relevant katakana for "Flandre", but rather with the vowel after the "d" extended (but also remember that there isn't actually any right or wrong of how to pronounce the names in non-Japanese languages. Technically, they're all unofficial).

Design

In Embodiment of Scarlet Devil's official art, Flandre has red eyes and short blond hair, which is tied into a single ponytail on her left side. Wears a red dress and vest, with a pink shirt underneath and socks. Also wears a pink mob cap with a red ribbon attached. Her wings appear to be made of iron and prism shards. She carries a matching metal wand with her, which might be the mythical Lævateinn. Arranged from her back to the tip of her wings her 8 crystals are presented as follows: light blue, blue, purple, pink, orange, yellow, light green and finally light blue again.

Story

Games

Embodiment of Scarlet Devil

After the main events of the game, Flandre makes her way out of the Scarlet Devil Mansion's basement while Remilia is off at the Hakurei Shrine. With no other choice, Patchouli uses her magic to cause a rainstorm around the mansion so that she wouldn't be able to leave it. Soon enough, the player character makes their way to her.

When Reimu finds Flandre, she demands an explanation as to why her sister has been bothering her at the shrine. They decide to have a danmaku battle, and Reimu eventually emerges victorious. Flandre appears to calm down afterwards.

Marisa introduces herself as Reimu, but Flandre sees through the play - apparently she's aware of the magician's identity. After Marisa defeats her, they trade quotes from a certain book, adapted to fit their current situation.

Literature

Bohemian Archive in Japanese Red

Aya Shameimaru reports on the strange explosion of a meteorite above Gensokyo. She learns that Flandre was the one who destroyed it, but becomes increasingly confused as Flandre explains she destroyed it by squeezing the eye of the meteorite in her hand. Even more perplexing information is given by Flandre's older sister, Remilia Scarlet. Apparently, it was planned that the meteorite was supposed to be aimed at the Scarlet Devil Mansion, and that Flandre would destroy it. Inexplicably, Aya ends the article with a report that spring has begun.

In her follow-up, Aya interviews Flandre about the explosion and Remilia's information. Flandre gives the same explanation for how she destroyed the meteorite, and, when questioned, says that her sister just acts like she knows what's happening. Remilia interrupts (for which Aya is thankful), and confirms that what Flandre said was true, insinuating that Aya just can't understand, while giving strange information about the meteorite's source.

Gallery

• 

  Cover of Embodiment of Scarlet Devil, featuring Flandre's silhouette

• 

  Flandre destroying a meteor in her article in Bohemian Archive in Japanese Red

• 

  Flandre and Remilia in the former's interview in Bohemian Archive in Japanese Red

• 

  Flandre in The Grimoire of Marisa

• 

  Flandre's sigil in The Grimoire of Marisa

Spell Cards

• 禁忌「クランベリートラップ」 Taboo "Cranberry Trap"
• 禁忌「レーヴァテイン」 Taboo "Lävatein"
• 禁忌「フォーオブアカインド」 Taboo "Four of a Kind"
• 禁忌「カゴメカゴメ」 Taboo "Kagome, Kagome"
• 禁忌「恋の迷路」 Taboo "Maze of Love"
• 禁弾「スターボウブレイク」 Forbidden Barrage "Starbow Break"
• 禁弾「カタディオプトリック」 Forbidden Barrage "Catadioptric"
• 禁弾「過去を刻む時計」 Forbidden Barrage "Clock that Ticks Away the Past"
• 秘弾「そして誰もいなくなるか？」 Secret Barrage "And Then Will There Be None?"
• ＱＥＤ「４９５年の波紋」 Q.E.D. "Ripples of 495 Years"
• 禁忌「フォービドゥンフルーツ」 Taboo "Forbidden Fruit"
• 禁忌「禁じられた遊び」 Taboo "Forbidden Games"

Additional Information

Trivia

• A silhouette of Flandre occupies the front of Embodiment of Scarlet Devil's jewel case.
• Assuming her birth year by calculating backwards in the Gensokyo Timeline, she's supposed to be born around 1508 A.D. But the "canon-ness" of this assumption is unknown.
• Flandre's Second Spell Card (Taboo "Lävatein" or Lævateinn) shares its name with the sword (wand in some versions) of Loki, a Norse god known for causing mischief. This sword/wand is used by the fire giant Surt in Ragnarok (the Norse equivalent of the Apocalypse) to burn down the whole world, except for one safe heaven. Fitting that Flandre would be wielding a tool of such destructive might.
  • The spell-card reference ("And Then Will There Be None?") to an Agatha Christie novel is definite. It's more speculative but still worth noting that the science-fiction genre saw Philip K. Dick write a novel called "Counter-Clock World" in 1967 and Frederik Pohl write "The Gold at the Starbow's End" in 1972.
• On one end of the Lævateinn that Flandre is seen holding in Shoot the Bullet is very different compared to the Lævateinn that Flandre is seen holding in Embodiment of Scarlet Devil.
• Flandre's wings have an unusual appearance which bears almost no resemblance to a vampire's typical bat-like wings (or even organic matter).
  • The "crystals" on her wings look somewhat similar to the crystals shown on Patchouli Knowledge's spell card, Fire Water Wood Metal Earth Sign "Philosopher's Stone".
  • Strangely, if one uses a bomb against her in Embodiment of Scarlet Devil's Extra, she's shown to have normal wings in bat form.
• In Chapter 9 of Inaba of the Moon and Inaba of the Earth, Reisen Udongein Inaba and Tewi Inaba get lost in the Scarlet Devil Mansion and end up being chased by what looks to be the silhouette of Flandre.

Fandom

Flandre has not made many appearances in the series, but maybe because of her personality and the way she looks and acts, she's become a very popular character. One reason would be because of her theme music ("U.N.Owen was her?"). It is particularly famous, and is often used in MAD videos, and for a time introduced many as "newcomers hoihoi" on Nico Nico to Touhou. Furthermore, the arrangement "最終鬼畜妹フランドール･S" ("Final Savage Sister, Flandre S.") in the album Touhou Strike by COOL&CREATE seems to have been mistaken by many to have been the original music. There is also a remix of her theme with Ronald McDonald and the so-called McRoll and has been the first contact with Touhou for thousands of western Internet users.

• People referring to "U.N.Owen was her?" as the McRoll/Ran Ran Du song is a sore point among many long time Touhou fans.

Big sister China

In fanworks, Hong Meiling seems to be some sort of big sister or playmate to Flandre (rather than Remilia Scarlet). In comedy works, it can be to throw Meiling in the way of more danger. In serious ones, her laid back approach to her job and uncontrollably friendly nature make her a natural choice for reaching out to an otherwise isolated Flandre. Many fan works depict the two going out of their way to help each other on numerous occasions.

Ex boss inspiration

There's speculation that most of the Extra Stage bosses in the windows era up to Undefined Fantastic Object was based, in some way, on Flandre. There are also depictions in fanart with Flandre and some of the other Extra Stage bosses with her. Here are the following reasons:

• Koishi Komeiji is one of the most popular ones. This stems from the fact that they both possess greater powers than those of their sisters Satori Komeiji and Remilia Scarlet. Also, Flandre and Koishi are the younger sister to their sister, who both own a mansion.
  • Some fans think Koishi's ability would make it easier for her and Flandre to communicate.
• Depictions with Nue Houjuu is also common. This stems from the fact that Nue's theme ("Heian Alien") sounds similar to Flandre's theme to some.
• Depictions with Fujiwara no Mokou has dropped with popularity due to the two above, but are still common. The name Mokou means "Scarlet (younger) Sister" and according to ZUN, it can also mean "Paint me red", but it has no connection to Flandre. Another reason for the pairing (platonic usually) is that Mokou is immortal and has little to fear from Flandre's destructive strength.
• Depictions with Suwako Moriya are rather uncommon. The only known relation between Suwako and Flandre is that Suwako also has a spell card to multiply herself.

PC-98 character

Strangely, some fans are now starting to come up with the idea that Flandre has become a "PC-98 character" who has disappeared from the Touhou Project (like Mima and Shinki). This is due to Flandre not making many appearances and because Embodiment of Scarlet Devil was released not far from Mystic Square. Her lack of appearances is however likely to be her limits on movement as her only appearances is within or around the Scarlet Devil Mansion. The number of appearances in-game and within print works is average compared with many other characters. Although when grouped with other characters from Embodiment of Scarlet Devil (Excluding mid-bosses), her appearances do appear to be limited.

• Another factor would be her high, hardly restrained power as having her playable in any accurate sense would make her overpowered. Though in fangames, most go about giving her a glass cannon build (giving her low defenses) or other flaws to offset her massive attack/power ratings.
• Although it is considered senseless by the majority, some fans believe this is due to the issue between fans and ZUN occurred in the Second Touhou Saimoe Tournament. The 8th game of the first round was a battle between Flan and Suika. Although the battle ended with Flan winning, ZUN posted a rough drawing of Suika that hadn't been open to the public with a message saying "don't get defeated by a little sister that hasn't even reached the age of 500." on his blog, which caused a fuss among some fans in both sides.

Miscellaneous

• Strange wings: It has been speculated that her wings are artificial and that she fashioned them herself and then attached them to her body. One source of this is probably due to Reimu Hakurei saying she was unable to fly with those wings and their unusual unnatural appearance. According to fanon, she may have lost her original wings or been born without them.
  • Some artists go about giving her bat form those wings despite her bat form having normal wings in Embodiment of Scarlet Devil.
  • Her wings have caused some artists to her be along side Marx (from Kirby's Super Star), who has similar wings in his boss form.
• Crystal magic: In some fanworks, the crystals on her wings are sometimes shown to be storage for Magical Power.
• Flan-chan:A common meme regarding Flandre is "flan-chan ufufu" (フランちゃんうふふ) since many people attribute the slightly sinister laugh "ufufu" to Flandre, as well as the fact that her name is commonly affectionately abbreviated "Flan-chan" (フランちゃん). Also, some fans will simply shorten Flandre's name to "Flan" (フラン).
• Good vs. Evil: In many fanworks, Flandre is shown with one or two different personalities, or possibly a bipolar one. One is a personality based on her appearance, been very childish, and the other is a super sadistic and violent mass-murder-like personality, based on her possibly accumulated hate of the years trapped in the mansion. However, this is mostly because Flandre destroys things (humans or youkai) without knowing the meaning of it and because she never learned how to attack things properly.
  • In more recent fanworks, some have tried giving Flandre a more complex personality that may mix some of those two types along with other aspects or complexes. This may be due to them being more aware of her Bohemian of Archive Red article where she's shown to be neither of the above two.
• Imouto-sama: Maybe because of the uniqueness of the phrase "Imouto-sama", many fans use this to refer to her. But in canon, it has been only used once by Patchouli in Marisa's Extra story in Embodiment of Scarlet Devil. How common it is used by other residents is doubted (in the Touhou games, most of the character call the others who haven't appeared yet in the game by their title or such indirectly, so they would't reveal their names before their appearances. Perhaps this was the case here too?).
• Theme song controversy: Flandre's theme song U.N. Owen was Her? was at one time wrongly criticized for plagiarism due to a confusion arising from a video uploaded to Youtube. This video, created with a software called Synthesia and showing a MIDI arrange created by COOL&CREATE being played on an interactive piano, was initially uploaded to Niconico; later, an user reuploaded the video to Youtube, but the video's Japanese title was mistranslated as "Death Waltz - John Stump", causing a confusion that led some people to believe that ZUN had plagiarized that song. John Stump did create a song in 1980 called Death Waltz, but it is a joke song impossible to play by a human and it sounds like jumbled noise when played on a synthesizer.
• Jojo Association: Flandre has become a favourite for people to cross over with the Jojo's Bizarre Adventure character Kira Yoshikage, or to be more exact with his stand, Killer Queen. It's power being to turn anything it touches into a bomb or create invulnerable heat seaker bombs. The destruction level and similarity of this stand has drawn people to put the two together.

Official Profiles

Embodiment of Scarlet Devil - おまけ

  悪魔の妹

　　フランドール・スカーレット

　　能力：ありとあらゆるものを破壊する程度の能力

　　エキストラボスです。お嬢様の妹です。

　　吸血鬼にして魔法少女で、４９５年程、悪魔の妹をしています。
　　少々気がふれていて、通常は表に出してももらえません。出ようとも
　　しません。

　　レミリアをお姉様と慕うも、その歯止めの効かない破壊力は、遥かに
　　お姉様を凌ぎます。普段はあまり怒ったりしないのですが、常におか
　　しいので他人には良く分かりません。

　　通常、吸血鬼は食事をするために、人間を殺さない程度にしか襲いま
　　せんが、フランドールは与えられたものしか食べたことが無いため、
　　人間の襲い方を知りません。そのため手加減が出来なく、一滴の血の
　　残さず吹き飛ばしてしまいます。

　　もしかしたら、いつも自分が食べているものが動いている人間と一致
　　しないのかも知れません。
　　毎日食べているものが、見た目ケーキになってたり、紅茶になってい
　　たりしたのですから...

Translation

Sister of the Devil Flandre Scarlet

Ability: Destroying absolutely anything

The Extra Boss. Also the Mistress's younger sister.

She is a vampiric magical girl and has been the Scarlet Devil's younger sister for about 495 years. She's kind of nuts so she isn't usually taken out of the mansion. She also doesn't try going out.

She really respects her older sister Remilia, but her raw destructive power far exceeds that of her sister's. Although she is usually docile, her insanity makes it difficult for others to understand her.

When vampires attack humans, they generally try to take their prey alive so that they can suck its blood afterward, but Flandre has always been fed with cooked dishes, so she doesn't know how to properly attack a human. Whenever she tries to attack a human, she can't control herself and blows them away without leaving a spot of blood.

Perhaps she can't tell that her daily meals are made from living humans. Her meals look like such harmless foodstuffs as cake and tea, after all...

Official Sources

• 2003/08/11 Embodiment of Scarlet Devil - Extra Stage dialogue; afterword.txt (official profile)
• 2005/08/11 Bohemian Archive in Japanese Red - Article and Interview: Flandre
• 2005/12/27 Shoot the Bullet - EX Stage spellcard comments
• 2006/12/27 Perfect Memento in Strict Sense - Sister of the Devil: Flandre Scarlet
• 2008/02/22 Inaba of the Moon and Inaba of the Earth - Chapter 9
• 2009/07/28 The Grimoire of Marisa - Flandre Scarlet's Spell Cards

References

http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Flandre_Scarlet