Free! Movie 5: The Final Stroke - Kouhen

This is my very first review and in fact I just realized that it's kinda crazy since I have had this passion for anime and manga my whole life but this franchise ''FREE'' is my favorite of the whole wide world. I have been watching anime since I was probably 6 years old and I have been obsessed with them. However it's truly since the Pandemic of 2020 that I literally decided to literally do daily marathons of all my favorite anime + the seasonal new ones that are coming out year after year and I started buying manga and building my collection for a ... year now. Talking back to the anime that is ''Free'' I have read the first light novel + watched the entire 3 seasons several times back to back + watched every Youtube special episodes + every trailer and its international editions + all the OVA episodes + and every single films made in existence ahahahaha = therefore I think I can consider myself an expert on this anime franchise and its amazing characters.

Now that I have explained the reasons why I feel I can write an honest review about this I will share my thoughts to help people decide to watch this movie or not. Ok, so just so you know I gave 10/10 to this movie because it sincerely plays back sooooo many key moments of the entire story and the entire whole decade since it first started. Every scene, every dialogue sort of talks back to previous scenes of the very first seasons and the interactions between all the characters are truly pure magic and fan service. This is truly a brilliant movie. It's the latest and in fact second part of the Free! The Final Stroke movies, which are the most recent and latest movies of the entire franchise. Said franchise is now 10 years old and is truly special for me (I'm a former national competitive swimmer and I have swum for more than 20 years therefore I see myself in so many of these moments and movies).

The first movie that came out in 2021 ''Free! The Final Stroke'' was ending with two of the major protagonists of the entire franchise, Haru and Rin, parting ways and getting mad at each other as they struggled to reconcile their dreams of world-class swimming with their humble desires as friends. After losing to Albert in Sydney, Haru in particular has been distancing himself from others in order to reach his rival's level—embracing loneliness in the process. The second film gives closure to the lingering plot threads and brooding angst in the first film. I don't want to give any spoiler therefore I want to say that what is special and that fans of the franchise might expect (or not ahahah spoilers free guys ahaha):
- Makoto and Haru sharing more moments
- Nagisa and Rei involved in swimming once again
- new swimmers introduced or developped
- Haru and Rin sharing and competing on the world stage

This movie truly gave me goosebumps I was smiling all the way through it coz it makes us, as watchers and fans, truly feel we are indeed part of their world. The nostalgic moments and flashbacks aren't annoying, they are on the contrary very helpful.

If you love sports anime + you love great friendships and feeling-good moments among the main characters + if you are a longtime or lifetime ''Free'' fan = then this movie is clearly for you. It's 1H45MIN long and it's truly special. Oh and if you love anime such as ''Sasaki to Miyano'' or ''Haikyuu'' or ''Re-main'' then you will LOVE this franchise and movie. Thanks for reading me everybody ;)

As usual with the Free! franchise, the animation is smooth and the movie is very colourful! The animation is pretty lifelike with how it interacts with the characters, lighting, textures, and environment. Also, the sound design is pretty cool too, it suits the animation and the scenes nicely.

The storyline: Pretty easy to understand and follow, though some moments felt either drawn out or happened too fast so the pacing was a little off for some scenes. It mainly focused on how the characters hit a wall and they had to find their own way through/around it, for some characters it felt ... like nice development but for others it felt like it's already been done (either in the show or in other movies). Also, the ending had a familiar Free-like ending that we've seen in previous key moments of the franchise.

The characters: Nice to see them again, their designs haven't changed much since the beginning of the franchise, it would have been nice to see them visually change rather than just change their environment. VAs did a wonderful job at bringing the characters to life and adding so many feelings into the scenes too!

Overall, it was a good movie that I've been looking forward to. In some ways, I really hope that it was the last part of the franchise since I feel like the characters have reached their full potential and if another movie or show were to be released then it might mess up the pacing and development of the characters. I did enjoy the movie but at the same time, some moments did feel like they have been reused from the show which was a little bit disappointing.

Please know that I've purely rated this as a ten for subjective reasons--those reasons being I adore this show and these characters, regardless of the flaws I found throughout this film, and I'm so sad to see this world go but happy to have a suitable conclusion to it. This film was pretty choppy, which is really my main issue with it, but honestly, that's pretty standard for Free! films. There were lots of moments where the scenes would be cut together oddly or the focus would be about one character/relationship and immediately flip to something else, kind of out of nowhere. Plus, I thought ... there wasn't enough time allotted to certain things that I was looking forward to, like Haru's swim record, Haru's fight with Rin, and the rivalry between Albert and Haru. In fact, I found myself wishing there was a bit more of a solid storyline, rather than it being kind of plotless beyond the final race--which also kind of came out of nowhere since I thought Haru would be doing one type of race but ended up doing another.

I did end up loving said race quite a bit though, and seeing as the characters in Free! are really the things I love, the plot being odd wasn't that important to me. Rather, I was super pleased with some of the character developments and interactions, especially between the people we haven't seen interact all that much yet. There were some interesting pairings for scenes throughout the film that I liked, and I liked getting to see more of Kinjou and his story. There wasn't much time wasted on things we've already gotten closure on, which was nice, but there were still some points of nostalgia, in terms of the characters, that the film played with to really solidify that this was the final journey these characters will ever go on. I found the ending, though strange, a pretty satisfying final chapter for Haru and the rest; it made it clear that their journeys together won't ever end but we, as an audience, can safely leave them now. I feel so fortunate to have finally seen this film and to have been a part of this story for so long. Free! will always be my comfort series, and the fact that it ended so well is awesome. Thank you KyoAni and the Free! team for giving us such an amazing ride with characters that will stay in my heart forever. Finally, to this series that gave me so much:

ありがとう.

Dear KyoAni,
I am truly happy that this actually looks like an end. Hopefully ultimate one. It feels like it was dragged forever. I’m sincerely happy that u managed managed to finish it, now u will have some more time to think about future after shutting down that store to expand the studio itself. Some new material would be nice in that full of sequels library of yours.

But going back to the reviewed piece. I hate Free! franchise, always did. It was lazy, boring and pretty much low effort(except for audio-visuals) production from our beloved studio. Never understood it’s popularity, not even cuz I am ... not in the demographic group, it just insults my intelligence.

STORY: 2
Yeah, continuing last movie’s main con it’s writing is even more dreadful. And it picked up exactly where previous movie left us on. I had have some hopes towards a bit more dramatic/realistic conclusion, or at least tad bit more used that fine set up that last movie managed to deliver, but naw. Writing is all over the place, horribly paced and, for me, left half of the plot lines just… there. Why bother. Too much of everything, no time to breath, as it was forced upon creators to shut it all down within these mere 100 something minutes. Pathetic attempt to cover it up with huge amount of sugar and fluffy ending did not help at all. Never expected to be any good, but that was below even my own expectations. Wondering if cut half of the dialogues it would be any worse? I think not, sadly, it underwhelmed even guy like me, that hates that franchise. Also, what with them fucking gags all over the movie, what was the point? Cringe audiences or what? I’m lost. Definitely weakest in the franchise when it comes to comedy.
But…

ART: 8
But it’s KyoAni, visuals were truly astonishing. Smooth animations with some glorious backgrounds were really pleasing, also framerate and designs did not disappoint. U could see where the budget went(obviously not to the writer). As usual, swimming looked beautiful, with really lovely colour palette, liked as well the way animators uses cgi combining it with digital brushing on top of the animation. Smooth af. I can’t hate in KyoAni technical stuff, cuz there’s rarely any reason to do so. It’s a visual thing, for that reason alone it is worth to finish that thing.

SOUND: 7
Well, obviously, it’s as lively as the animation. OST itself is a bit more unrecognisable throughout animation than usual, feels like it wasn’t there at all here and there, but when it’s needed it can pop up, especially during final scenes. They even put some smile on my face. The anime theme “This Fading Blue” by OLDCODEX is a banger. Only bigger issues I had was the sound mix, some dialogues were hardly heard, also va weren’t as memorable as usual, I believe it wasn’t purposely done though. With that, unfortunately, any good sides of that anime are concluded.

CHARACTERS: 1
Free! franchise always had one of the most flat and bland casts I’ve seen, forgettable characters, poorly written and with bare minimum of any psychological depth. Yeah, it is quite often in sports anime that these things are taken over by sports enjoyment and team work. Not here. Never, not even once, I felt connected in any way to the characters. You could change any of our 4 main characters for someone else and you wouldn’t probably even notice. With this movie it was, however, taken up to whole another level. Not only there were TOO MANY CHARACTERS, but our MCs quite often felt like side characters, just to show up in the last 20-30 mins of the movie to deliver than sweet ending. Kind of justified, but on another hand while I did not like that movie it was WAY TOO SHORT for amount of characters, plot lines and closures it wanted to achieve. Ultimately no one shines, no one has anything important to do, maybe except Kirishima, but even that looses its impact cuz of that horribly fast pacing. Big no no, shame, but as well it’s impressive to make that cast even less impressive. Well done.

ENJOYMENT: 5
It’s quite simple, the movie looks and sounds great, if u are audiovisual freak, you will be at least partly happy. Biggest issue, however, is that while being horribly fast paced and intensive movie it’s ultimately… boring. Except last 20 minutes that were genuinely enjoyable. I’m pretty sure some fans will shed a tear or two. Storywise it’s a dog shit, visuals were beautiful, also sounds lit, so it was enjoyable to some extent, at least for me.

OVERALL: 3
But sad truth is that nothing could save it from being just bland and disappointing. I’m pretty sure that most of the fans will be satisfied tho, get ready for some tears and feels, it was a long ride. Pointless, often literally unnecessary, definitely underwhelming. Not because I don’t like swimming anime, cuz I do, not like we have many of em, well, at least diving ones are quality works. Could it be better? Sure, stupid gags and lazy writing cursed that production. Also not using the build up from the 4th movie was pretty shocking for me.
BUT…

To you, fam of the franchise, no worries, you’ll probably love it as much as usually. It’s still fluffy, has beautiful boiz, looks gorgeous and ultimately it’s a feel good climax to long ass anime. Be happy.

I am, even if that movie was just shit.