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EP. REVIEW: Warlords of Sigrdrifa


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harminia



Joined: 24 Aug 2015
Posts: 1987
Location: australia
PostPosted: Mon Oct 19, 2020 4:27 pm Reply with quote
I haven't watched ep 3 yet (haven't been in the mood for moe shenanigans), but this is a show I'm sort of half into? Like, I live in fear it will just be a cute girl doing cute things while also piloting planes and saving earth, and essentially be strike witches/kancolle/etc.
But I'm a fan of Nagatsuki, and there are parts of it I really like. The animation is really good (I agree, Miko's soccer match was a standout), I like that the girls all have different planes (I love that Pink's plane is a sea-plane, so while everyone else is flying off the runway, she's leaving via the waterways), and the tactics in episode 2 weren't bad.

Also, the animation is the ED is amazing. I was just staring at the dress in shock at how amazing it looked.

I'm hoping the series does a bit more with the plot than just CGDCT, so I'll probably try to stick with it, but it's also a series where, if I fall behind and can't be bothered catching up, I'm fine with that.


Plus, I'm waiting for someone to say Gungnir so I can make a Symphogear reference.
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Charou



Joined: 01 May 2018
Posts: 123
Location: Sydney, Australia
PostPosted: Mon Oct 19, 2020 9:34 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
It exceeds this season's Jujutsu Kaisen in my mind, because even outside the battlefield, Sigrdrifa's characters are vibrantly animated.


Jeeze, them's fighting words, Kim.

And I'm so glad someone's taken that fight up. I love both shows, but the amount of almost unnecessarily well-animated low-key moments in A-1's Warlords very, very slightly outweighs the seemingly obligatory sakuga of Mappa's Jujutsu's action. Warlords frequently surprises and delights me, whereas JK is just consistently excellent.

You mention the soccer game, but for me the surprise was the hand-drawn planes early in episode 1. They weren't well animated. They were, in fact, pretty bad at times. But damnit, they were hand-drawn. Not that the 3D modelling for the 'Hero Wings' is bad, but it's nothing we don't see fairly regularly. Hand-drawn vehicles are a treat these days, even when they're not done particularly well. Sort of reminded me of the hand-drawn cars in another beautifully inconsistent A-1 sakugafest, Fate/Apocrypha. They were so good -- but then, of course, near the end, a really awkward 3D jet and CG explosions get unfortunately foregrounded. I'll take the moments for what they are.

This is a fun show to watch straight after The Day I Became a God -- two well-made shows with a child-like, somewhat enigmatic Odin and impending 'end' in one season. What a treat.

Also, seconded re: the ED. It's not just good; it's memorable and poignant. Like most really great credit sequences, the almost inevitable absence of it when the situation gets dire will be jarring in just the right way.
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Animegomaniac



Joined: 16 Feb 2012
Posts: 4070
PostPosted: Tue Oct 20, 2020 8:47 am Reply with quote
I'm enjoying the series but I'm just waiting for the shoe to drop in regards to "Ragnarok", though episode 3 let the cat out of the bag by insisting that Gods really do exist. It's like I said in the other thread, that's certainly Odin by his trappings but he's also one of the oldest Trickster Gods so while he's not Evil, he's not to be trusted.

"Alien invasion", one God, ok but that does not automatically mean other Gods exist without evidence. But if people have seen them, what are they doing?

What is Ragnarok? The Twilight of the Gods, it's not the end of our world, it's more the end of theirs. In other words, for aliens, they use a lot of runes as part of their attacks.

And, yes, beautiful animation, expressive character designs, wonderful voice work, it just needs little kick in the pants in the plot to make it all come together.
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nDroae



Joined: 26 May 2017
Posts: 382
PostPosted: Tue Oct 20, 2020 5:52 pm Reply with quote
This show's viewers are a motley crew, including aviation fans, moe fans, and a number of Re:Zero fans who were (or still are) expecting it to "turn dark." One, MAL user JakkoFourEyes, wrote it off before it began:
Quote:
Meh, the Re:Zero author is only the scriptwriter and does series composition. Doesn't have as much influence on the story as the director, so it's not really a good metric of deciding whether or not it'll be good.
He's not the director or original creator in this case, so don't expect a story of the same caliber as Re:Zero, because he's not in charge.

The original announcement article gave me the impression that he had more control over it than that. (?) animenewsnetwork.com/news/2020-02-29/re-zero-writer-tappei-nagatsuki-nanoha-vivid-artist-takuya-fujima-girls-and-panzer-adviser-takaaki-suzuki-make-warlords-of-sigrdrifa-anime/.156984 I figured perhaps he just wanted to write a lighter, simpler, more straightforward story for a change of pace. Or it could twist hard, we'll see.

Me, I've only seen bits and chibi shorts of Re:Zero, so I'm not hoping for anything like that. Sigrdrifa is looking like it could be the best salve yet for the old wound of never getting a full season of "The Third Aerial Girls' Squad" from Shirobako. Shirobako's creators' later "The Magnificent Kotobuki" was great in its own way, but still left me wanting a show about female pilots of real planes fighting a generic impersonal enemy. Most genres have already had every basic combination done and done well, but moe military hasn't. So I don't need it to set itself apart; I just want it to do a good job of being exactly what it says on the tin. Which so far, it has.

More than usual, this is clearly a case where no matter which direction the show goes, it can't please everyone who's picked it up.
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Zen119



Joined: 20 Nov 2018
Posts: 84
Location: Illinois,USA
PostPosted: Tue Oct 20, 2020 9:02 pm Reply with quote
The reason I picked this up because of the moe military aspect of it and not because its attached to the author of Re:Zero, which is an anime I've not touched yet simply because I'm not interested in its story whatsoever.

But because of his involvement, I'm already expecting some dark turns to go down in later episodes even if it's so far just ok in terms of its execution of story, characters. Whether or not it will make it interesting is up in the air for me.
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WizardOfOss



Joined: 19 Jun 2018
Posts: 76
Location: Oss, Netherlands
PostPosted: Wed Oct 21, 2020 4:22 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
Episode 3 features an extended tour of the landmarks of Tateyama in the Toyama Prefecture...

Not quite: while there is indeed also a Tateyama in Toyama, the Tateyama depicted in this series is in Chiba prefecture, on the Boso peninsula just south of Tokyo. The Umihotaru island, which was heavily featured in both the 2nd and 3rd episode, is part of the bridge/tunnel combination across Tokyo Bay.

As for the main reason to visit Tateyama in Toyama prefecture: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBw1kLcCEY0
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nDroae



Joined: 26 May 2017
Posts: 382
PostPosted: Wed Oct 21, 2020 7:02 pm Reply with quote
^ Haha, maybe that was where the characters went for a vacation in one of the earlier series about an all-female pilot team, 1994's "801 T.T.S. Airbats." anime#369



The thing about the potential for a dark turn is, this isn't like a Madoka situation where the show initially puts up a charade of being completely safe. This show starts with the main character repeatedly seeing entire squadrons of her comrades killed around her, plus we hear at 10:22 in the first episode that Ortlinde, one of the moe girl pilots, has just died. Unlike Strike Witches, where death only seems possible for witches who are nameless and unknown, I expect we'll get to know Ortlinde through flashbacks later on in this series - that seems too good an opportunity to pass up. From Claudia's reaction to the news of her death, it looks like they were close.

All that considered, any dark twist would need to be something a lot more interesting than simply further death and suffering. That would just be more of what the show started from at square one. As Kim wrote in the review of episodes 1-3, "In the end, Claudia is saved by having comrades who will survive with her and share her burden."

(Yeah, it's possible Claudia's reaction was only surprise at the first death of a Named pilot, in which case any flashback of Ortlinde would be through the eyes of the other cast members instead. My first guess is that Claudia's reaction means she knew Ortlinde, because I don't think she'd naively assume the Named were invincible. We'll see.)
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WizardOfOss



Joined: 19 Jun 2018
Posts: 76
Location: Oss, Netherlands
PostPosted: Thu Oct 22, 2020 11:59 am Reply with quote
nDroae wrote:
^ Haha, maybe that was where the characters went for a vacation in one of the earlier series about an all-female pilot team, 1994's "801 T.T.S. Airbats." anime#369

That's one still on my (rather massive) backlog.....

But if that would be Tateyama, considering the amount of snow in those pics it must be almost summer Laughing
(when I visited the Tateyama snow corridor in 2017 just a few days after it opened, there was still 19 meters of snow)

BTW, brilliant avatar! I want a re-release of the movie with him wearing that shirt....
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CorneredAngel



Joined: 17 Jun 2002
Posts: 854
Location: New York, NY
PostPosted: Thu Oct 29, 2020 7:03 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
I don't want to think about the ojisans watching this show at the same time I'm watching the show.


All due respect, yeah, you're not really the target audience for this show. And the kind of guy who *is* the target audience - we get a kick out of jokes at our expense, and on our ground - especially when we know the creators mean well.

Going all the way back to Otaku no Video, if not before!
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zrdb





PostPosted: Thu Oct 29, 2020 10:10 pm Reply with quote
801 T.T.S. Airbats-shit, it's been since forever since I watched that. In ep 4 I really could have done with out the dudes slapping their asses every few minutes-just a little too queer for me. Other than that it was a fun trip.
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15434
Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Fri Oct 30, 2020 10:44 am Reply with quote
I thought episode 4 was genuinely funny, how it did not make sense how the whole underground water area worked that somehow came out of a pool, and the joke with the pretty boy. I also enjoyed all the eye candy. I liked how they just kept running with the butt slaps and eventually a couple of the girls joined in too.

Also, no mention of the new ED that had the girls as penguins and Odin as a magical girl?
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ThatGuyWhoLikesThings



Joined: 04 Jul 2013
Posts: 1000
PostPosted: Wed Nov 04, 2020 11:38 pm Reply with quote
Ngl, I can't at all understand anyone saying the writing quality has taken a dip when this episode had possibly the tightest script yet. All the character beats from the main quartet, and even Amatsuka, the commander, and Odin, were super on point and each conversation felt meaningful without just feeling like exposition. Definitely the best episode so far.
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Yttrbio
Subscriber



Joined: 09 Jun 2011
Posts: 3649
PostPosted: Wed Nov 11, 2020 1:27 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
The twist at the end also gets affected by this approach, because while the horrified reactions from Sonoka and Amatsuka indicate that the plane belongs to someone they knew, there isn't any other context or reason to care at this point. Let's hope that the following episodes do some proper work filling in the gaps without compromising the narrative's momentum.
Her death has been a shadow hanging over the show for some time now. I thought the show was doing a great job of bringing up the topic and its impact on the team without just bringing the show to a halt for an exposition or a flashback, followed by people talking about their feelings. If narrative momentum is what you want, it seems to be exactly what you're asking for.
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CrownKlown



Joined: 05 May 2011
Posts: 1762
PostPosted: Wed Nov 11, 2020 4:03 pm Reply with quote
Animegomaniac wrote:
I'm enjoying the series but I'm just waiting for the shoe to drop in regards to "Ragnarok", though episode 3 let the cat out of the bag by insisting that Gods really do exist. It's like I said in the other thread, that's certainly Odin by his trappings but he's also one of the oldest Trickster Gods so while he's not Evil, he's not to be trusted.

"Alien invasion", one God, ok but that does not automatically mean other Gods exist without evidence. But if people have seen them, what are they doing?

What is Ragnarok? The Twilight of the Gods, it's not the end of our world, it's more the end of theirs. In other words, for aliens, they use a lot of runes as part of their attacks.

And, yes, beautiful animation, expressive character designs, wonderful voice work, it just needs little kick in the pants in the plot to make it all come together.


Odin is and never was a trickster god. He is the sworn blood brother of the trickster god loki, whom I think you are thinking . Odin is the classic father of the gods Ala Zeus .
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Yuvelir



Joined: 06 Jan 2015
Posts: 1529
PostPosted: Sat Nov 14, 2020 7:26 pm Reply with quote
(Episode 6)
When the pillar was pried open I went on overdrive. From Odin's surprised expression (which apparently turned out to be anticipation), to the mention of the dead (which couldn't be Einherjar, as valkiries didn't deliver them) to... [expletive] Thor. That surprised me the most. Upon seeing him I expected him to be some Jottun, not Odin's son. But hey, maybe Odin does want to deliver Ragnarök. Odin's ultimate objective with this mission will be what determines this series' setting and outcome. If all the primary pillars contain gods, I hope Heimdall is inside one of them as that would make for one hell of an irony.

CrownKlown wrote:
Odin is and never was a trickster god. He is the sworn blood brother of the trickster god loki, whom I think you are thinking . Odin is the classic father of the gods Ala Zeus .

Just a liiittle less horny.
He has a few ploys under his belt but yeah, the trickster god title definitely go to the one whose pranks went so far that he kickstarted the apocalypse.
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