The previews and the OP and ED were the best part, unfortunately. Plus, the file was too LQ, so I didn’t bother with screencaps.
I like the opening theme less than the first 2, but the montage is awesome. I hope As popularity didn’t turn this into a purely action series though.
The beginning is very good, nice voice, memories, drama and Nanoha showing how versatile she’s become (a spell that holds a statue from squashing Yuri Subtext team no 4, more verbal feedback from Raising Heart - Engrish never dies - and general undescribable coolness). The music playing during this scene is the “definitely on speed version” of the usual Nanoha music.
Of course, Nanoha blasts the roof over their heads with Diiiiivine Buster!!!!. One note to the seiyuu: Nanoha’s new voice is great, but this part sounds like a reused sound file from the first series.
Subaru is impressed with Nanoha’s strenth, coolness and warm hands. Cut to 4 years later. The loli has become a kickboxer on rollerblades, is wearing skimpy clothing, and has aquired a hot, a tad Nanoha-looking partner. Unfortunately her voice is higher and whinier than when she was a wimp ready to die in a fire. The partner is carrying guns. I’m curious how this will work out in the “magic attacks meets melee combat” world. Well, not really, my main curiosity is “where is Fate already?”.
The answer comes soon enough: Fate is in a freakin’ helicopter! Wtf is wrong with flying? And she tells Hayate it’s dangerous to leave the door open all the way (to, you know, watch the whole scene live). Excuse me, can we have old Fate back? She could fly over the buildings holding Nanoha, like she did so often in the past.
Cue cool looking Action Scene. The n00bs destroy targets in a rank exam. It looks good, but I’m still not convinced Subaru’s glove and Teana’s gun work that well in an actual fight. Especially the gun. The duels always got to melee weapon vs weapon. Or are they meant to fight as a pair all the time?
Even so, some parts of the fight felt more like Hollywood action movies, with Teana firing from cover. What about an area attack? They only did something of a kind as a combo. I guess the B rank is too low for the kind of stuff we’ve seen in the first 2 series.
I’ll keep watching this because I am such a fan of the first 2 series, but heck, the episode was disappointing. I’ve really waited for StrikerS, but because I wanted to see the old characters, not new ones. I don’t care about Subaru and Teana, they were introduced too abruptly, they took over the screen like they were main characters.
The previews are the best part, showing Fate in action and the trio (N, F, H) in bed. (Like… huh?) They still didn’t show Arf though. Where is Arf?
