Name: "Symphogear, the unsung gem of anime"
Item: Symphogear XV
Rating: 100
Author: Yuukimeister

"Symphogear, the unsung gem of anime"

__This review contains minor spoiler about Symphogear, I've done my best to be as spoiler free as possible __

I really have no clue where to start from, to be honest.
I started Symphogear a little bit for the meme, singing girls fighting, and because a friend recommended me with the premise “Dude, it gets absolutely amazing as it goes on” and I will be honest because the first 4 episodes left me not happy due to the not perfect introduction and old anime type of quality. But after those 4 episodes that I’ve watched in 4 months I watched 4 in one day, then the final episodes of the first season in a day, then I watched Symphogear G in 2 days, then GX in one day to end with AXZ and XV in the span of 3 days.
Symphogear is really hard to describe because it’s massively ridiculous and stupid but it delivers in every area it could ever deliver after its premises and everything comes into place with the many series and everything comes back again and again, all with some beautiful music, incredible characters and some of the best cliffhangers of my entire life; it’s absolutely absurd to think that something like this, most of it going against my standards, completely smashed my expectations and rankings by delivering me one of the best, if not my favorite, anime of all and completely changing my definition of “intensity” and “epic”. Symphogear is an action packed show that will give you no time to rest.

#Meteoroid-falling, burning, and disappear, then… The slow start yet mad ending of the first season ▶ Video I always admit that the first season of Symphogear is quite weak under certain aspects, because it’s weak, but it sets the base for what will come in the long term; because the first Symphogear is absolutely idiotic for what it is and it doesn’t even try to get serious but decides to embrace the stupidity and make it fun, just like the famous Hibiki arcade scene that cringes always, but luckily we can see the first signs of a strong storytelling after some episodes and we get a taste of the true potential of Symphogear : its ability to excel when it needs to become epic. Again, in the first season we can’t get a real taste of what this anime can offer and so the characters are a little penalized under this aspect but yet again they set the bases for something absolutely fantastic : Our main character, Tachibana Hibiki, shows up as a dumb girl that got saved 2 years prior to the events of the anime from a certain death. She was always scared of everything and not sure of what to do but she always wanted to give her best for the sake of keeping a promise she made as a kid and for her wish to see no one dying. As the series goes on Hibiki will radically change and even beat her fear of harming someone else, whoever is, to protect her loved ones which is a thing that might sound childish but it’s an important aspect not only for her character but for the human standard, doing everything you can to protect someone even if it goes against your laws of life. Kazanari Tsubasa started as a literal hot head unable to accept that Hibiki is her new teammate and kept refusing her, refusing even her existence, but anyone can change.

Though, Symphogear starts in a very hot and hard way by showing the grave of the main character and her best friend Miku crying her death wishing her to come back because her life is meaningless without her; then it leaves to the events of the 2 years before the anime where Hibiki got severely hurt and almost died, but eventually got saved by Kanade Amou, who was Tsubasa’s best friend, at the cost of her own life but ironically or not a “piece” of Kanade still lives in Hibiki because a piece of her relic, the Gungnir, got stuck inside Hibiki’s body and became a part of her which is the reason why Hibiki will become a Symphogear user. This is the main reason why Tsubasa can’t accept Hibiki not only as a teammate but also as a friend, Hibiki is the reason why her best sacrificed herself for the sake of someone unknown. Then I mentioned Miku, who is she? As I said she is Hibiki’s best friend, even if their relationship goes beyond this and it’s obvious, and by far one of the best and most important characters of the show because the plot is moved by her and her actions that go to condition Hibiki’s actions, it’s a domino effect, a charming and beautiful one.

For what it goes for the antagonists, well, Finé is the main antagonist of the whole series but sadly she doesn’t appear that real much and only gives us her true shine in the final episodes, but thank God she gave one of the best plot twists of the anime.
On the other hand there is Yukine Chris, an absolute piece of art of character that starts as X and will end up as V which is a thing that will happen to everyone but Chris changes radically the most and in the best way possible. Her past is extremely dark and tricky because after her parents’ death she decides to fight and go against their dream, which was to bring happiness with the music, and she kept saying that it’s a false hope because music can’t bring happiness. Bad take Chris, really a bad take.

It’s quite obvious that the first season started with a relatively low budget because in fact the arts and animations are not really that good, often bad and lack of precision, and you can see that it would need a big budget to become something astonishing and at the end of everything the final 4 episodes were absolutely mad and the studio did the best possible to make the ending as epic as possible with the best animations possible. Feeling gutted that the transformations weren’t that good.

This were the bases for something iconic.

Personal scores :

Story : 7/10
Characters : 9/10
Music : 8/10
Arts : 6/10
Personal Enjoyment : 7.5/10

#In the distance, that day, when the star became music... G starts to show what Symphogear truly is and how amazing it will become ▶ Video G was intense, a lot intense, and I absolutely love it because it dramatically changes everything from the first season in a more action packed, deep, better written show with the best improvement of all : the animations. Finally Symphogear had the budget to show the true power of its fluidity and awesome animations that will come and the first episode starts with a truly magnificent sequence that leaves room to let you imagine what can come after this, but it’s not all. Symphogear G will see the introduction of 3 new Symphogear users that are villain and one of my absolutely favorite antagonists of all time, Doctor Ver, the true definition of a mad scientist who’s lost every gram of common sense. Unlike the first season in G we will see a change of pace that goes absolutely all out and extremely aggressive in terms of intensity, which is something I loved, and start to become what Symphogear really is : fights, music, drama and love. G completely changes the meaning of a show start started as mediocre because of its limitations and shocks with elements that look to the long term and some other elements that come from the past; in fact I really love to praise Symphogear for how it never leaves behind anything and always brings up something them all to give the most complete experience possible, but this may be too much to say so leave it to your eyes.

Symphogear G starts again in a strong way with some strong sequences that go for the drama and death elements and introduce us to our first new antagonist, Maria Cadenzavna Eve, and even more we start with a more major plot twist : Maria is the reincarnation of Finé, which hits hard after all the troubles she gave in the first anime and how she got majestically defeated, of course.
I love Maria because she is such a particular character : always trying to understand if what she was doing was right or wrong, why she doesn’t want to kill even if she knows to be the villain of the show at a certain point, she questions herself on why she is helping Doctor Ver and then she will fall in despair once she realizes everything she’s done, all of the tragedies she was going to cause and how idiotic she was, but she will take her spear and fight again but for the truth. But her only plot twist is not only being a reincarnation, it’s not only this.
With Maria we will meet Shirabe and Kirika, the most loved duo of Symphogear, who are 2 girls extremely bonded to each other and can’t be divided. I love them both, they are the most precious thing this universe has to offer. Jokes apart they go on Maria’s wave length and have the same thoughts and see her as the big sister.

I absolutely need and want to spend some words for Ver : he is completely insane. I rarely see such a controversial and mad character that goes against the common sense of every human and does unmentionable things. His character goes behind the “theory of the Hero” because he thinks he can become the hero of the world, but his time hasn’t come yet and will remain scum of the scum, for now.

But what about the original trio? Hibiki will start developing herself more and more and, despite refusing to fight at the beginning against other humans, she will accept that sometimes fighting someone is the only choice; not only this but she will become the true Hero that Ver admires, even if he actually admires Hibiki for the events of the first series, but she will make him understand what a true hero is and who the hero is. Hibiki will have to face many many problems, as well with her own Gungnir and even with Miku, which will make her mad and almost lose it but a true hero can’t allow this. The masterpiece that Hibiki is begins in G.
Tsubasa will develop a lot and become closer to Hibiki, she will finally accept her as a friend and come to the point of crying when Hibiki is severely hurt, and we will learn more about her past and how she sees her own life, as a blade without feelings meant to protect people.
Chris will also embrace a completely different way of thinking and acting, becoming the best friend of the other two girls and doing her best possible to help them; especially in the final 4 episodes she just becomes masterclass in this aspect.

I need to give some credits to Nastassja, the “mother” of the 3 other girls, who was a particular character always going against her how thoughts and knew that she was in the middle of the right and wrong, faked many things and brought the anime to an almost tragic ending.

The pinnacle of G I can tell that is clearly how you see the different point of views of “what is right” and how the two sides, the Symphogears and the enemies, approach their way to reach the truth : does it have to be without any sacrifices or does it? What is the limit? Am I doing it the right way? Why am I doing it? Every character, every single one, has a different answer for each of these questions and it’s up to the watched to find them all; someone wants no casualties, someone other can’t exclude them, someone wants them. And once again all of this leads to the final 4 episodes of G, which I watched them all in one breath and they were absolutely epic.
The final episodes were full of everything you can name and they were probably one of the best conclusive moments I’ve ever seen ion any anime, everything led to a good ending with the usual amazing final fight that shows everyone why Hibiki is an absolute masterclass of character, but this is not all because the settings for the next season are set already and many questions aren’t answered yet.

I’ve mentioned how the arts massively improved in G, and it’s a fact, because they are much much more fluid now and cleaner, for sure there are some parts where improvements could be made but overall they are absolutely fantastic; the animations of the transformations were absolutely awesome and the fights were a pleasure to watch.

The cliffhangers and plot twists here are absolutely massive.

But it’s not over.

Personal scores :

Story : 9/10
Characters : 9/10
Music : 8/10
Arts : 9/10
Personal Enjoyment : 9/10

#Believe in justice and hold a determination to fist GX redefined Symphogear under any aspect and fixed what had to be fixed ▶ Video GX was special and intense. The third season let space to the three new girls to develop to their best and gave them the answers they needed to succeed and become complete and most of all it gifted an extra shape to the original trio, and redefined Hibiki once more in something even more greater because in fact to me GX is the season where Hibiki is able to shine the most and confronted her biggest fear.

This season introduced probably the best antagonist of Symphogear in terms of personality,
Carol, with her mad insane wish to destroy the world because of the death of his dad, who got executed after curing an entire village and suspected of not being “normal”, and started thinking that a world that rejects the people who help shouldn’t exist; alongside to this she lives with a promise made to his dad, to discover everything of the world, and this made her decide to dissect the world and then destroy it to become the absolute in terms of knowledge. And then we have the Autoscores, dolls created by Carol to help her plan, which are my absolute favorite addition to this season. I absolutely love how each Autoscorer has a particular personality related to its dance style, because each of them tends to fight by moving with dance moves, and there is Garie, my beloved Garie. I really feel like the Scorers gave a particular charm to the show with their craziness and their goals, and the fact that they were dolls and YET felt feelings, really made me happy to watch them. It was also charming to see that every Scorer was particular on her own way and how they literally pushed to the mental limit every character with both insults and extreme acts and this led to how the Symphogears answered to these actions, either in an extreme way or a controlled one.
GX is the place of many insane power ups and many many plot twists that I hardly expected but most of all this is the place of the growing of many characters and the come back of others, because Symphogear never forgets about the characters.
And then we have the original trio of the Gears with an amazing character development and many new surprises : Chris, Tsubasa and Hibiki got finely talked and developed that go in direct contrast to what they were at the beginning, something I love to see, and each time they defeated their issues by even going AGAINST what they previously said, and most of all the power to forgive someone is also there.

GX was able to bring a lot of climax in the anime between the relationships of the character, for a reason or another, and everything was always running on thin ice; are they going to get angry at each other and break the bonds? Is she going to make up her mind and defeat her demons? Can she recover her family? Will she overcome the fear of her father? Is she really going to be able to protect everyone?
Each of these question had a different answer to everyone that led to the glorious ending of the third season, which was absolutely on the peak of the climax and ended up in a badass way that only Symphogear can even think of.

Personal scores :

Story : 9.5/10
Characters : 9.5/10
Music : 9/10
Arts : 9/10
Personal Enjoyment : 9/10

#By shedding many tears, the reality you face is… AXZ was the best set up for a final season that this franchise could ever dream about ▶ Video AXZ was particular because as a sequel it didn’t really please me that much but as a prequel to the final season it is absolutely insane, this season takes everything about Symphogear and says “yeah, let’s change everything gradually until we reach absolute climax and madness”. I’ve mentioned how I think that GX had the best villain but AXZ has the craziest villain of all, a person who is a true demon who lost any human sentiments and completely shatters the human life. In this season the foreshadowing is absolutely strong with so many callbacks to the previous series and even to the previous episodes, which honestly hit extremely hard, but most of all this season is absolutely epic and crazy full of action again. I really liked the villains here but not because of what they did in this season but for their effect on the final season, how they shaped each character and their passive contribute to reach the ultimate goal; Saint-Germain was such a beautiful character. I find absolutely amazing how Symphogear is able to always elevate the level of action in each season and still keep it on a perfect pace with the story and development. I absolutely love the brainless moments of Hibiki. ▶ Video There is an improvement in arts and animations too and they absolutely reach their peak in the final episodes, as usual. Ah yes the final 4-5 episodes are absolutely insane, like completely insane. I praise a lot Symphogear for being able to create such climatic endings each season and AXZ easily has the second best of all.

And everything is set for the final season, the greatest of all.

Personal scores :

Story : 8.7/10
Characters : 9.5/10
Music : 9/10
Arts : 9.2/10
Personal Enjoyment : 9.2/10

#Create a history, with the light God could not know Symphogear XV is the definition of what is epic ▶ Video Forget everything you’ve seen about Symphogear until this point because EVERYTHING changes, EVERYTHING. XV is insanely aggressive, gore, terrific, epic, passionate and again epic; there is literally everything in this season iconified by a sense of absolute madness each single episode where you can’t even take a break to realise what you are watching. I started the season and after the first 4 episodes I said how is it possible to deliver a quality worthy of final episodes right at the beginning of the anime because everything goes literally over the top and destroys every rule of the common sense so far. XV’s big plate is in the villains because the very first you see are not villains, but normal people trying to find a way to regain their humanity and eventually kneeling in front of everyone who gives them a chance to help them, but that’s not all luckily because we will see the comeback of iconic characters, and these returns made me absolutely crazy and made me scream like a fanboy, leading all to the final sequence of episodes which is simply outstanding for how it got build up, for all the hype and the amazing cliffhangers and the ending is simply a pure masterpiece. I won’t hold back and I call Symphogear XV a masterpiece for what it created as an ending to an absolutely iconic franchise.

If there is a thing that I really liked about XV is how the main 3 antagonists are shown in the most human way possible, doing everything in their hands to win because “we are weaker so we can win only by playing dirty”, and how close they are just like a small family where they all trust each other and all the dirty decisions they had to take as a result of following a goal, a dream, they tried to reach; and all of this is completely in fight with the Symphogears who are trying their own best without dirty tricks to keep the world safe. And then again, the final episodes are absolutely amazing and outstanding.

And as a cherry on the top of the cake, the final 2 minutes of the anime brought us to the ultimate realisation of Hibiki.

Personal scores :

Story : 10/10
Characters : 10/10
Music : 10/10
Arts : 10/10
Personal Enjoyment : 10/10

#Symphogear is the result of learning from the past

This franchise is the pure example of how to improve over time all over again to then build up the perfect ending because Symphogear was able to reach the perfect ending to each of the premises it brought us, from Hibiki to even side character, from every Symphogear girl to every villain and the character development here is absolutely wonderful to watch.
On top of everything Symphogear lives with amazing song that are sung in battles, and the best part is that the singers actually sing the song and it’s not pre recorded, and they are absolutely perfect for the battlefield with a good instrumental and wonderful voices with some great musical pace which is fast enough for the battles.

Symphogear’s charm comes from each character and how they grow in the anime, how everyone radically changes and reaches the own conclusion to the problems and understand what she wants at the end of everything, what are the passions and the desires of everyone and most of all this applies to each villain too; remember that everything will come back. This anime is an insanely fun ride for how stupid and brainless it can be at times and how it can switch to serious quickly, from girls riding a rocket to girls fighting a divine entity.

Another thing that I absolutely loved about this anime is how the powers are inspired by the general mythology and how they fit each character’s personality : the elegance of the Ame no Habakiri with Tsubasa, the rough idiotic power of the Gungnir on the idiotic Hibiki, the outstanding power of the Airgetlám with the insanely strong Maria and so on. In fact a lot of Symphogear comes from the unique characters that can be hilarious when needed and extremely emotional and serious when it is again needed; it’s also lovable of each character is extremely different and yet able to bond with everyone else, just like the hot head Chris being able to desire to become the senpai of everyone, how the cold Tsubasa asked to be called senpai from others and started caring about Hibiki and so on. The character development in this anime is really strong.
img45%(https://i.ibb.co/FHmXbMj/vlcsnap-2022-06-03-10h50m21s906.png) img45%(https://i.ibb.co/8s2kZmL/vlcsnap-2022-06-03-10h50m27s981.png)

The arts constantly kept improving and improving and the transformations are a perfect example of how everything was able to progress over time, they simply get more beautiful and dynamic and this is truly beautiful to see.

▶ Video ▶ Video

I’m still amazed of how Symphogear was able to always build everything leading to an incredible ending each season and every time each ending got even more crazy and emotional, it’s simply incredible. Symphogear is really the definition of taking something and making it extreme, bigger, better and more epic, everything with emotions, love, passion and sadness.

This is Symphogear to you : an action packed anime full of everything you can name of with a great writing and even improving over the time and ultimately leading to a beautiful ending, amazing characters and wonderful villains, everything with some great music.