SI-VIS: The Sound of Heroes

TL;DR:
If you're here looking for an action-packed show that will dazzle you with its musical score, this show's not for you.
If you're open to a more emotionally complicated exploration of a character trying to follow his dreams while navigating a peculiar, twisted world in a life that's been turned upside down, then I think you'll enjoy this one.
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SI-VIS is a show that doesn't quite live up to the expectations written on the tin, but it still dives into a poignant, interesting story that--preliminarily, at least--is well worth watching if you can make it past the first episode.

If ... you go in expecting something akin to similarly-marketed "action musical" media like KPop Demon Hunters or Vivy: Fluorite Eye's Song, I fear that you'll be disappointed. The first episode of SI-VIS is, to put it lightly, not an effective hook. Aside from like 2 seconds in the whole episode, the audio mixing leaves the music feeling like an afterthought, with the music muffled and significantly more quiet than literally anything else happening, even when the performance looks front-and-center on the screen. Suffice it to say, that's not ideal for a music anime. Moreover, the characters don't come off as anything special, and you spend a lot of time with them without getting to know much of anything about them. The animation's good, but not amazing; the fights won't wow you, but it's not going to detract from everything else.

But once you get to the subsequent episodes, however, it feels like a completely different story--a story about dreams, remembrance, and being true to yourself. The music still feels like an afterthought, but the story and themes come together nicely in a way that leaves me looking forward to more.

And that brings me to the "Mixed Feelings" rating for this preliminary review:
If you're here looking for an action-packed show that will dazzle you with its musical score, this show's not for you.
If you're open to a more emotionally complicated exploration of a character trying to follow his dreams while navigating a peculiar, twisted world in a life that's been turned upside down, then I think you'll enjoy this one.

SI-VIS comes off as nothing more than just another addition to the growing pile of off-brand ''Symphogear'' knock-offs.

Borrowing the same story structure and singing concept and executing it in the most uninspired way it possibly can. Lacking any of the charm and ingenuity that made Symphogear such a beloved success.

Going in to this anime you can expect the cast to be a mishmash of generic archetypes you usually see in band-type anime dynamics. They behave in the predictable way these derivative characters typically tend to do...

There's the:

Short-tempered hothead Punk
Indifferent Tsundere Gyaru
... Kind Soft-Natured one
Cool Onee-san
Mute girl who is the key to everything

-and to round this group off we have our main character Kyouya, who exhibits all the traits of the stock naive protagonist (With bright red hair included) who bounces between either being annoying or plain boring.

By putting Kyouya at the centre of this story I feel this makes the show completely fall apart, because he simply isn't a likeable lead.

Especially when comparing him to his ill-fated big brother Yosuke (Essentially the Kamina of this story) who dissapointignly meets his end in only the first episode.

The show immediately feels desperate for us to accept Kyouya, forcefully shoehorning his awkwardly placed backstory in the first 3 minutes of the premiere episode. It just makes the narrative flow and pace feel so clunky and only serves to make Kyouya look even more of an irritating dork.

This kid dances on an icy winter road in front of speeding a truck instead of hitchhiking the way how a normal person would (and his dance routine absolutely corny)

As for the performing aspect of the show I must say I am underwhelmed by the music aspect which should not be the case for a music show. None of the songs feel particularly remarkable or memorable and they aren't integrated in to the action portions very well either. There's a lack of an attempt to make the songs feel diegetic the the action itself.

Plot-wise the set up of these disappearing cities and this ominous dimension that spawns obelisks out of the sky is interesting enough, but I don't think this cast is strong enough to back it.

The production quality is consistently good, but it won't blow you away either. It does it's job.


Overall I would have liked to see more of an effort put in to the music side of things as well as having more engaging characters to follow.