Ichigo (DitF)

Ichigo is a major character from Darling in the Franxx a 2018 mecha anime series co-produced by studios Trigger and CloverWorks. Her name comes from her code number 015 (1 - ichi and 5 - go in Japanese). She is introduced in the story as one of the "Parasites" -- young boy-girl pairs piloting mechas called "FRANXX" and tasked to protect the rest of humanity from invading monsters known as "klaxosaurs". However, she is best known as the childhood friend of the protagonist Hiro and the romantic rival of main girl Zero Two.

During the show's runtime, Ichigo became widely reviled by frustrated users in the online anime communities --- especially Zero Two fans --- with "Bitchigo" becoming a popular nickname for the blue-haired pilot. This is mainly because of an incident in episode 14, which provided the climax of a love triangle set-up involving the two girls falling in love with Hiro. In the episode, Ichigo prevented Hiro from seeing Zero Two and confessed her feelings to him at the same time. However, her confession was rejected, and the love triangle was eventually resolved a few episodes later after she concedes that Hiro and Zero Two were meant for each other. She ends up marrying Goro, her partner who had feelings for her early in the series.

Contest profile
In the saimoe contests, Ichigo plays second fiddle to Zero Two, who is clearly designed as the anime's main girl, and therefore garner the most amount of fans.

As the anime garnered sizable online attention for its waifu wars, users from r/anime anticipated an Ichigo vs. Zero Two final in the subreddit's winter 2018 seasonal contest, providing another extension to the rivalry. While the match did happen (with predictable results), the #2 seeded Ichigo had to win by higher seed as her semi-final bout ended in a rare tied result against #3 seed Rin Shima from Yuru Camp.

In ISML's corresponding seasonal however, Ichigo actually won against Zero Two in their semi-final match, causing her to directly qualify for 2019's main tournament. That result may or may not have involved Violet fans (but that doesn't matter anyway as the Saber-lookalike would've dominated either or them regardless). Of course, 002 got the last laugh as she lasted longer in the 2019 main tournament, while 015 was eliminated three rounds in with only a single win to her name, in what could possibly be her only appearance in the competition....

....until she returned in the 2021 main tournament with a vengeance, having been boosted by Chinese DitF supporters who caught wind of the contest via the Douyin (Chinese TikTok) social media app.

Main Tournament

 * Record: 1 win, 8 losses

r/anime record
Seasonal Salt & other contests

Best Girl