So I was watching StrikerS, and about 4 or 5 episodes into my watchings, I realized I hadn’t even thought about blogging. At all. It totally flew out of my mind. Things makes StrikerS one of the few shows in recent memory that caused that to happen. It was a pretty good watch overall.

Things to do while watching StrikerS. First, ignore almost everything that is referenced between when A’s ended and this one began. If you let references to things like Chrono being married or the pasts of all these new characters, you really will be confused. I just went with the flow.

The other really important thing is to set aside a large block of time. I was up way too late finishing off the series yesterday. It was worth it. I imagine it was a rather highly anticipated anime, and I know I was looking forward to it. It’s just that shows I look forward to, if they turn out to be good, I have a lot of trouble stopping in the middle. (A bit ironic that.)

One of the coolest bit of StrikerS, and indeed all of Nanoha land, would have to be the intelligent devices as well as all associated magical technology. In fact, those devices seem to be getting smarter every time there’s a continuation. Still, a very complete world built on quasi-science has been constructed, with excellent detail. History and current simultaneous events.

Also, for some reason at nearly every display of what’s been defined as way beyond average magical power, I tend to get excited. So that happens a lot. Cool fights just can’t be beat. And I have a soft spot for when ordinary becomes extraordinary as well.

Looking at the characters a bit again, I finally got a good look at Admiral Chrono. I actually got a sense of him having grown up and become a bit more mature. Or he was just that way to start with. Either way, he works better as an adult than Nanoha. (The jury’s still out on how well Fate translates to an adult. Perhaps because she’s a bit quiet.)

I should ignore this, but it’s bothering me more than the others, but, wasn’t Arf older before? She seems to have shrunk as Fate’s gotten older. Yuuno has also made some breif appearances, and he seems to have have aged as well, although he doesn’t seem to have aged much.

Then there’s Vivio. The catalyst of the main action this time around. She was being way too cute at first. Thankfully that didn’t last long. It was a bit unsettling. So then the main action she started. That’s what I call all hell breaking loose. A lot of simultaneous stories making for some rather dense time. I’m sure the count down timer of one episode was actually less time than it took to watch.

But right, September 12th for Section Six. (The date, a coincidence?) Vivio’s kidnapping, while the catalyst, was not nearly as disturbing to me as Ginga’s kidnapping. Beating the hell out of someone and then stuffing them in a suitcase is just not cool. Then she comes back all evil. Really all hell breaking loose.

What really, really, got me about the end though, was that Quattro was a rather evil bitch there. Egging Vivio on for starters, but in general a one up on being up to no good. It’s still bothering me in fact. Interesting detail: adult Vivio’s hair is done up the same way as normal Nanoha. Child Vivio, combat Nanoha.

The ending events itself was probably a bit of let down, but I think that’s because the way the story was told this time was different. StrikerS wasn’t a story about one person’s struggles. This was about everyone’s dreams and recovery. The epilogue is the best proof of this.

Props for the written out credits epilouge, but everything everyone was doing in it was a dream somehow expressed earlier by them in the series. Further, all of it appears to have been made directly or indirectly possible by having been part of Section Six.

I guess I feel a tiny bit let down by the fact that Section Six was dismantled. I think somehow everyones’ dreams merging into one would have been cooler. There are too many variables now for a continuation, if that makes any sense. Too many directions the show could head in, because they created some new characters that they spent a lot of time developing.

Two final notes before I stop writing here. Is it just be or are there a lot of adopted people/people with family issues? It feels like only Nanoha had a proper childhood (to some extent) and now everyone is leaning on everyone else to fill in their gaps and keep on living.

Also, what happened to the high council then? Thinking about the ending has ticked me off a bit now. It was definitely more fun watching it than pondering it. My thoughts feel rather disorganized.

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 1st, 2007 at 5:37 pm and is filed under Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha StrikerS, Anime. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.