After the last two USN Aircraft Carriers got bows and a huge fuss kicked up...
It might be less poetic than arrows turning into Zeros... but I'd like to see these US carriers with Winchester leverguns or Colt single actions. Indian longbows, sure, but when did crossbows ever = Murika?
I never thought of longbows when thinking about Japan either.
You probably should. The samurai were originally horse archers more than anything else, and the reason their longbow are so asymmetrical is because the underside had to be shortened to be fired from horseback. You might think of katanas nowadays, but the bow was at least as important to the samurai as the katana.
I still say Revolutionary War-era cannons are the best representation of the American carriers. The American carriers use Revolutionary War emblems and iconography more than anything else, cannons (along with sail ships carrying cannons) are their most common emblems, and a very large number of the carriers are outright named after some of those wars. (Saratoga, Lexington, Yorktown, etc.)
Honestly, when I think of the Hornet, I think the best representation of her would be in an early republic Scarlet O'Hara-ish yellow-and-black dress with a cripplingly tight corset. Hornet was the ship that was designed to just barely squeeze into the tiny excess weight allotment the US had from the Washington Naval Treaty - where she had to shed all her armor and much of her elevator strength to fit into the weight limits. I picture her as wearing one of those insane whalebone corsets that crack ribs to fit you into a 20-inch waist while having those crazy 4-foot-radius hoop skirts right below.
While on the subject, how do people think the Hornet II should work? As a separate character or a modernization?
If a rename like Hibiki -> Verniy is the same ship, two ships with the same name should logically be separate characters.
However, I would understand making it a modernization, just to keep the number of unique new girls you have to collect and memorize down. (This would be especially true if there are two girls with the same name, which would be obviously confusing. You'd have to rely upon nicknames to really keep them apart, like "Lady Lex" and "Blue Ghost Lex" for the two WW2 Lexingtons.)
Though an old Minuteman musket or old 19th century rifles or six shooters would seem more "American" in tradition. A Lever action rifle shooting out fighters, or some old Colt Peacemakers to deliver the pride of the American fleet carriers, the "Sunday Punch" from the flight deck. (36 fighters, 36 dive bombers, and 18 torpedo bombers).
