*Review contains minor spoilers, nothing major, but proceed at your own caution.*
Senki Zesshou Symphogear... I've never been so happy to have accidentally stumbled upon an anime in my life. Also, I will be speaking mainly of this anime, but I will be mentioning the following 2 seasons as well.
Now, before we get going, I'd like to make it clear that this anime is nowhere near perfect. It most definitely has it's flaws, some bad animation here, some poor plot choices there, plot armor galore over yonder, I could go on. But that doesn't change the fact that this anime does one thing, and it does
...
it incredibly well:
FUN.
When a lot of people complain about Symphogear, I always see that they seem to take it too seriously. With that, I tell you, that you should watch this anime for pure, unadulterated, fun, explosions, and a kickass soundtrack that you're probably going to be wanting to locate and download. Which I have. All of it. So good.
Anyways, on to the actual review.
Story:
It's certainly not a bad story, there are worse ones out there, however you will see that it's rather cliche once you start getting a few episodes in. One of the worst parts about Symphogear, is it's rather cliche story, and this applies to the following seasons as well, since they all follow the same rough format that season 1 does. However, while looking at it by me saying that, it may seem rather uhh... "meh". But, I should also mention, that Symphogear KNOWS that it's bad. It knows that it's cliche, and it uses that to it's advantage. Yes, it's a cookie cutter that was built out of the body of season 1, and yes, seasons 2 and 3 were made with that exact same cookie cutter, but DAYUM is that a nice cookie cutter. Normally, if an anime is too cliche, it dies because the audience has seen it before (which admittedly, may very well still apply to some people when they decide to watch this) however, the other aspects of the show are what genuinely carry this anime to glory, the characters, the music, the important animation, all of that combines to patch up those nasty things that the plot just literally can't even. I should also mention that the overlying plot is only affected by this. There are a bunch of sub-plots which are actually quite unique and well thought out, for example, the backstories of the main characters.
Overall, you've seen this plot before, and you'll know it when you see it. But the rest of the anime will more than make up for it, which is impressive considering how important plot tends to be.
Art: 7
I admit, the animation for this anime kinda dies at points. There's a scene where Tsubasa and her Manager are walking down a hall and rather than an animated walking animation, it is merely their unmoving bodies swaying in a small figure 8 pattern. Now, remember what I said about this series being fun? Yeah. It is. "Bu-but, HOW could it POSSIBLY be fun with animation like THAT!?" you may ask. Well I'll tell you, the animation for unimportant things like that walking scene, or someone writing something down on a piece of paper, THOSE are animated quite poorly sometimes. HOWEVER. The producers of this anime were smart, and funneled most of what little budget they had into the action scenes, and other important scenes. A lot of anime, even high budget anime that have all-round great animation, tend to have action scenes that are simply just as good as the rest of the anime, and when you're expecting MORE from an action scene, it can be a little underwhelming. Symphogear, with it's poor budget, knocks up the budget big time for their action scenes, making amazing looking scenes that are animated fluidly. I should also add that this anime liked to have it's action scenes on the go. While a lot of anime take a lot of camera cuts and angles in rapid succession to show a fight, which works well don't get me wrong, Symphogear does it itself a whole bunch, but they ALSO love to follow the action as it moves, meaning you'll get panning action sequences at high speed that look simply amazing (not to mention badass as hell) and really gives the viewer an impression of the speed at which the Symphogear users are fighting. While they obviously don't do this all the time, you'll see it used quite a bit, and it's a nice addition. Back to that bad animation for a moment, and also referring to when I said that people always take this anime too seriously if they hate the anime. The bad animation that pops up? It's reaally bad. So bad in fact, that it's laughable. I actually laugh at this animation, it is so bad. Now I can't forgive it for these atrocities of animation, but hey, you can always get a chuckle out of it! I should also mention that while this anime DOES have some very bad animation issues, those absolutely horrendous only pop up around 3 or 4 times in the entire anime, so they don't overly take away from it as a whole. Seasons 2 and 3 undergo a SERIOUS budget boost however, and nearly every issue that season one had in regards to animation was fixed, or improved past that.
Overall, while this anime has some undeniable animation issues, it isn't bad enough to take away from the series enough to ruin the experience.
Sound: 10
I'm including the soundtrack in this, it's a must. This anime is one that is in the "Music" genre, and normally, when you see "Music" tagged on to an anime, with a premise like that of Symphogear, you get frilly cute J-Pop songs, or at least, expect them. That is far from what you'll be getting out of Symphogear. Let's lead in to the music by starting with the voice actors! Tsubasa is voiced by Nana Mizuki, whom is a very well-off musical artist in Japan. Not only does she do an excellent job of voicing the stoic Tsubasa, she carries that voice into her songs which all have an oriental theme. Nana Mizuki also created and sings the OP of each of the seasons, season 1 being "Synchrogazer". Aoi Yuuki voices our main Character, Hibiki Tachibana. Perhaps you've heard Aoi before, she's done quite a few roles. Tornado from One Punch Man, Madoka from Madoka Magica, Victorique from Gosick, the list goes on. Aoi isn't a song artist, however in this series, she sings all of her own songs, which is a rather impressive feat for anyone. This adds to the immersion of the series, since there is no clear difference in voice, unlike when another person sings a song in place of a voice actor. This applies to every single character in the entire Symphogear anime. Each voice actor does all of their own singing, and they do a damn fine job. Each character even has songs that are styled towards them. As mentioned, Tsubasa sings what I call "Technoriental" and Hibiki sings "Electroceltic" technobagpipes included. Other characters are introduced later on, one of which sings aggressive rock, and in season 2, another which sings pure electronic, as well as another that sings perhaps a more punk-style of rock. Mentioning the characters further would be too large a spoiler however. Back to the actual music. Every song was crafted FOR the anime, none were taken from elsewhere. The producers made it a priority to make the music as excellent as they possibly could, as the anime revolves around music, and make it well they did indeed. I should now mention that all of these amazing songs are placed in as character songs (songs which are sung by the characters) and of course, since having characters singing all of the time would be stupid, there is regular soundtrack to go alongside it. Nothing too special about it, in all honesty. The background music you hear in scenes without characters singing is just sorta there, nothing too memorable, but not bad either. Just there. As far as voice acting goes... really well done! They got a very solid cast of voice actors, they didn't lose out anywhere there, however I should mention that ONLY the first season... has the most horrendous case of Engrish that I've ever heard. Thank god for subtitles. They gave up on attempting English in the following seasons, for good reason. As for the Japanese voice acting, emotions are portrayed very well, Hibiki always sounds like she should, cheery and upbeat, Tsubasa sounds like a strong "don't mess with her" type, the list goes on.
Overall, the character songs make this anime absolutely amazing, and are one of it's biggest selling points. The background music and such isn't so up to par, but the sheer quality of the character songs truly outshine the little problems that the background music brings forth. While there was a bit of laughably bad Engrish, the voice acting was excellently done, especially with how each voice actor sings their own songs.
Characters: 9
Each character is very well made, and while maybe cliche in a sense, they use cliches that haven't been milked to death. Hibiki is outgoing and cheery, which is the worst offender, however Tsubasa is a strong, stoic type, with more behind her exterior than first meets the eye. Another character may simply be passed off as a bit of a tsundere, but actually isn't, far more complex than that. Each main character has a backstory, not all of which are fully gone into in-depth, but all are at least mentioned at one point or another. Furthermore, these backstories can do a great job of defining why a character acts the way they do, and if this process ins't the one that explains it, you'll simply find out later on. Every character has a unique purpose, and each characters continues to fulfill that unique purpose effectively, without giving too much attention to any singular character. Even the side characters are well thought out, they don't FEEL like complete side characters because they actually get quite a lot of interaction with the true main characters as well as major plot elements. The villain however, is quite cliche. Like mentioned previously though, this hardly counts since the producers did this on purpose. This anime is supposed to be stupid, but handled well.
Overall, the characters are all well thought out, and despite being less-used cliches, they have reasoning to back themselves up. Every characters does exactly what they're supposed to do, with a high degree of effectiveness, no single character could replace another. Even the side characters are given a good amount of attention. The villain is rather cliche, but it doesn't hurt too much.
Enjoyment: 10
As I have been consistently mentioning, this anime is FUN. Don't go into it for serious plot developments and incredible levels of character development, go and watch it to watch your favourite heroes beat the crap out of a bad guy. With music. I have given this anime a nickname, as have other people. "Micheal Bay: The Musical" There isn't a whole lot of down time in this anime, for the most part it splits up action and comedy, however it also has a few much darker elements in store for you to keep you on the edge of your seat. Drama is a thing as well, it may have been kind of forced, but it changes up the pace, so see that as you will. Regardless, the main point of this anime is lots of bright colors, explosions, awesome fight scenes, badass soundtracks, hell, even moments that could make you tear up a little bit.
Overall, watch this for fun! If you go in expecting something serious from an anime about magical girls blowing up monsters with the power of songs and friendship, you're gonna be sad. You'll be happy to know that if you enjoyed this series the first time, it doesn't get boring easily either. So feel free to rewatch it!
Overall: 9
Culminating everything I've mentioned... this anime is just jolly good fun. Over-the-top fight scenes, an incredibly enjoyable soundtrack, equally likeable main characters, which all excel at doing their own thing. It's a giant blob of stupidity and cliches, yes, but it knows that and uses that as a grounds for making itself more awesome. "Ah well, we've already used this many cliches, let's overcome this insurmountable feat with an attack powered by friendship and unicorn souls!" and as dumb as that sounds, it doesn't get boring, it is truly something you just have to experience for yourself to understand. This anime is a great watch for practically any age, as it covers a lot of things, however, there's no real nice pretty age to acceptable watch it at. If a kid tries to watch it, there's some pretty bloody stuff that happens, if an adult watches it... it's an anime filled with magical girls! Perhaps teens can get away with it. Disregarding social standards however, this anime IS a great, fun watch, for all ages!
Extra note:
While this anime may seem to be the type, it VERY rarely sexualizes it's characters, I can recall a total of 5 scenes throughout all 3 seasons, one of which was a beach episode, another was a bath scene, both of which are anime staples. Even during transformation sequences, season 1 has next to no sexualization at all, the camera doesn't even zoom in on the characters body. Season 2, with their updated budget, opted to have a fancy camera-spinning close-up transformation scene, but even still, the camera never clearly focused on anywhere such as the butt or breasts, it just panned over them as though they were any other body part such as an elbow or a foot. Season 3 starts getting to borderline as it adds in a bit of jiggle to some characters during these sequences, but thinking realistically... I think some jiggle may happen... they certainly didn't blow it out of proportion, and even further, they kept the camera moving with no clear fanservice shots. As for actul in-fight scenes, the rules apply as if it were anime men fighting, nothing is sexualized or focused upon, if you want to see something you can look for it obviously, but it isn't shoved into your face. There are a few instances of blatant fanservice as I previously mentioned, but that count is very low. A good job goes to the producers for that decision as well, the quality of this anime would have dropped big time were it made as an ecchi.
Sep 12, 2016
Senki Zesshou Symphogear
(Anime)
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*Review contains minor spoilers, nothing major, but proceed at your own caution.*
Senki Zesshou Symphogear... I've never been so happy to have accidentally stumbled upon an anime in my life. Also, I will be speaking mainly of this anime, but I will be mentioning the following 2 seasons as well. Now, before we get going, I'd like to make it clear that this anime is nowhere near perfect. It most definitely has it's flaws, some bad animation here, some poor plot choices there, plot armor galore over yonder, I could go on. But that doesn't change the fact that this anime does one thing, and it does ... |
