First Impressions / STRIKE WITCHES

「伝説の魔女達」 (Densetsu no Majo-tachi)
“The Legendary Witches”

For an episode about the witches meeting up again and reforming the 501st Joint Fighter Wing, I don’t think it could have played out any better than having it happen on the battlefield. With Yoshika doing her best to protect the helpless naval fleet against the new variant of Neuroi before them, I was almost giddy when I saw the other witches start showing up in waves to lend a hand. None of the witches’ identities are a secret at this point, but I love the way they tried to give them a bit of a mysterious entrance by not showing their faces right away. The music played during all their entrances added to the heroic feel of it too, making all the subsequent battle scenes pretty cool to watch. In fact, the music added a lot to all of the scenes and really helped give off a sense of urgency when Yoshika was frantically trying destroy the moving core after the Neuroi started regenerating from Mio’s Striker Unit-less attack. It also helped add to the heartwarming reunions, especially Yoshika and Lynne’s. When I first watched this episode, it didn’t even occur to me that the music was what was getting me all excited about seeing all the girls join up again and kicking some alien ass. Only a quick skim through a second time made me realize how unassuming all the tracks were but how much they added to the presentation. In short, it was great screenplay throughout. I loved every minute of this episode.

Story-wise, I thought it was pretty awesome how Mio’s magic-infused katana “Reppumaru” became her new shield. Who needs to block beams when she can dance her way through a barrage of them using the mind’s eye and cut through the large ones that she can’t. Turning twenty years-old may have degraded her magic abilities to the point that she can’t even stop a bullet effectively, but her offensive power with that katana seems to be by far the most powerful out of the group. She looked pretty slick in the white school swimsuit she’s switched to this season, and pretty damn badass when she went free falling and unleashed her “Reppuzan” technique for the first time. As the battle against this Neuroi was the same one we saw last episode during the cold open, there weren’t any new scenes during that part of the battle; however, Mio’s spectacular finish after the Neuroi core was exposed made the whole sequence pretty entertaining to watch again. For now, it looks like Mio’s more or less abandoned the use of guns since all of her magical power rests in her eye and katana, but it never hurts to have a melee specialist in the group that can do that kind of damage and locate Neuroi cores as well.

Seeing as it’s been a while since we’ve seen these characters, it was kind of nice how Minna-Dietlinde Wilcke (Tanaka Rie) reintroduced everyone again by reading orders to have the “legendary” Strike Witches reformed. I didn’t really have any problem remembering who’s who along with their seiyuu, but it’s still cool hearing their full names called out one by one to give each of them a moment in the spotlight. In addition to Lynette and Lucchini whom I made mention of last week, we have Charlotte E. Yeager (Koshimizu Ami), Perrine-H. Clostermann (Sawashiro Miyuki), Gertrud Barkhorn (Sonozaki Mie), Erica Hartmann (Nogawa Sakura), Eila Ilmatar Juutilainen (Oohashi Ayuru), and Sanya V. Litvyak (Kadokawa Mai) on board now. Perrine and Erica are two of my favorites, so I’ll be keeping my eye on the humor they bring this sequel. Next episode looks like a training one, that has Yoshika, Lynette, and Perrine on broom sticks like stereotypical witches. I thought they were going to intercept the new Neuroi invading Romagna from the Adriatic Sea next, but it doesn’t look like things are headed that way just yet.

 

Preview

30 Comments

    2. It’s not really moe overload, lol K-ON can do that for you. I think it’s worth the watch for at least the characters’ storylines at least. They’re more the shine of the series for me. I found the characters themselves a lot better than the storyline that was a little 8| towards the end, but still a fun watch. Easy to marathon to catch up (Shirely is my favourite backstory) and start this promising season two which hopefully will be better and with a punching storyline :]

      Rei
      Reply

  4. Suspected that sword would have a similar use after seeing it glow when Sakamoto finished it. Plus, there’s no way they’d sideline a character like that so they’d need some kind of plot device to get her back in action.

    the_one092001
    Reply

  6. From my point of view this season is whole lot better than the first one in every aspect, well, you can’t expect everything will be good from one studio (I mean GONZO for the 1st season), I can see AIC doing the best here, let’s hope for a good season of these cute little witches 🙂

    MD
    Reply

  7. Loved how the Witches recognized each other’s arrival via the type of weapon that was discharged against the Neuroi (e.g. long range armour-piercing snipe = Lynne, missile barrage = Sanya etc.)

    I also liked how they used their improved abilities from the first season (e.g. Perrine’s electrical discharge attack and directly ramming/flying through the Neuroi by Erica – discovered by Charlotte in S1). But as the enemy has also levelled up, looks like they’ll need the training in the forthcoming third episode.

    Zyl
    Reply

  8. Looks like there is effective non-witch anti-Neuroi weaponry, but the Venezian fleet (I figured it was SW-universe Italy due to the flags and colours before it was even announced) were slaughtered.

    Jusuchin
    Reply

  9. Besides the destruction, I expect to see the neuroi witch again, though it got “destroyed” last episode. But they really need to communicate with them somehow. I haven’t re-watch the 1st season; but I barely recall there was a human faction trying to use neuroi technology for they own purposes. I hope they pick that plot line again.

    Island Esper
    Reply

  11. Feeling giddy seeing cute girls that kick alien ass get reunited? *Raises hand*

    Mio in white sukumizu FTW. Already Seto Saori is starting to get comfortable filling in Chiba Saeko’s shoes, even doing Mio’s trademark merry laughter with ease.

    It’s hard to pick which girls screentime I most look forward to for the coming 10 weeks, though the pair that comes out top for me is still Eila x Sanya, girls from mystical snowy northern countries intrigue me for some reason.

    This week’s ED is still Yoshika and Mio, though expect the following weeks to be sung by the other witches, as with the season 1 ED.

    Kinny Riddle
    Reply

  12. Tanaka Rie is back! Ahhh… This anime is such a guilt trip… The only people who changed costumes were Sakamoto(from black to white one-piece swimsuit) and Shirley(from brown to red flight jacket).

    The Ultimate Bystander
    Reply

  14. i finally peeped this series…and…… i enjoyed it, DEAR GOD I CANT BELIEVE I ENJOYED IT!!!!…*weeps for about 3 minutes*…………anyway i got ONE question.
    HOW the hell do they fly with their legs spread constantly without the propellers hitting each other???? i really can’t believe that the Japanese would leave such an obvious flaw in engineering.

    BROOKLYN otaku
    Reply

    2. LOL, that is a very good question. Probably created a magical barrier to stop them from colliding, or they trained hard to do so. The light novels probably bring some light to it.

      Sora no Kaze
      Reply

    3. They’re were told not to put their legs together during training of the new recruits! So obvious….

      What I want to know is why are they using Magitech instead of pure magic???

      The Ultimate Bystander
      Reply

      1. I went through a bunch of SRW videos on youtube, and I think I figured it out. It’s somewhat similar to the DyGenGuard’s Zankantō Un’yō no Tachi (1:35-2:25 in this clip) attack.

        And as you said, she’s now a total melee specialist… not unlike the DyGenGuard. 😛

        Hayate Yagami
        Reply

      2. Yeah, I remember that one. Interesting how a lot of the SRWA3 videos that I recorded for GameFAQs people still seem to be up on YouTube after all these years. See here. Heh, I’m also the one who made the Macross 7 Infinite SP Song Trick video.

        Divine
        Reply

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