For LA, ViViD Strike was hardly on LA's radar during the Fall 2016 Seasonal Roundup and LA really didn't care about it, why?, because of it's predecessor within it's own spinoff...Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha ViViD. Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha ViViD's truncated ending during a TOURNAMENT ARC as well as changing of genres from magical girl fantasy to shounen fighting put LA off the Nanoha franchise, but ViViD Strike! quite honestly is the saving grace and rejuvenation to the ViViD franchise. But this isn't a review of Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha ViViD, it's about ViViD Strike!, let's get on with this.
The plot revolves around Fuuka Reventon voiced by Inori Minase, a girl living in poverty until she chance encounters Einhart Stratos voiced by Mamiko Noto discovering that she has talent for fighting and with Fuuka agreeing, as she gets a job at Nakajima Gym and is coached by Einhart, why?, so that she can face her childhood friend Rinne Berlinetta voiced by Yui Ogura for a chance to see why she changed like she did which caused the rift between the two. The anime's timeline is 2 years after Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha ViViD and sure the main protagonist isn't Vivio, but this integrates Fuuka's main goal to the rest of Vivio's cast.
Let's look at the characters, as one of the best strengths to ViViD Strike!, characters and their character development. The two best characters developed throughout the anime goes to Rinne and Fuuka. Rinne's character development about how she became the stoic, merciless yet revered fighter is what got LA hooked into this anime. LA will go into slight spoilers but let's just say that Rinne was cruelly bullied in school and ViViD Strike! managed to NOT do a typical bullying backstory by managing to USE violence as a means to justify Rinne's bullying BUT with BOTH parties suffering the consequences and quite honestly, LA was utterly shocked by Rinne's actions that broke her into "resolving" the situation, it's a brilliant and visceral yet simple take on the bullying backstory and damn did it have impact. Rinne's backstory given also shows that ViViD Strike cherishes it's morality as "no one is outright evil or no one is always justly good", always a moral gray area which is greatly manifested in Rinne. Yes, Rinne is LA's favourite character, not only due to her badassery, but her character development and backstory helped immensely. Adding to it, Rinne's character development during the tournament also gave her alot more development in the form of her own character resolution. Fuuka herself steadily gains character development during the course of anime but it's mainly together with Rinne due to their clash of ideals that transition into their fists later on. Fuuka not only grows as a fighter but she too steels her resolve in wanting to not only fight Rinne, but get her childhood friend back.
On speaking of clash of beliefs, as ViViD Strike! revels in it's moral gray area, this also manifests in Fuuka's and Rinne's coaches (Nove voiced by Chiwa Saito and Jill voiced by Ayane Sakura respectively). Nove's coaching of putting in the effort and pure determination clashing with Jill's strict and intensive training with Jill's beliefs of thinking that fighters needs to be BORN with talent in order to get anywhere not only adds to their own character development, but due to both their teachings to Fuuka and Rinne, also rubs onto Fuuka and Rinne's own beliefs. Mind you due to the moral gray area, there really isn't "REAL VILLAINS" (Yes, not even Jill is and LA thought that Jill was "evil", but even her beliefs and her actions speak louder not making her evil at all, just putting her best of intentions to Rinne...ohh Rinne's bullies definitely were, but Rinne is equally at fault) in this anime which makes it very good thing due to the anime genre it is.
Back to characters, you'd think that due to the focus largely on Fuuka and Rinne that the rest of the cast are supporting and yes they are.....however because of the basic tournament style, we do get to see WHY the supporting cast wants to fight building their character development, the major one going to Miura Rinaldi voiced by Kanae Ito, Vivo voiced by Kaori Mizuhashi and of course Einhart Stratos. But for the rest, expect them to be the "peanut gallery" watching from the sidelines and telling how certain fighting styles or attacks "hurt" or "have the upper hand" etc.
Finally, LA will say that as "generic" as a fighting tournament anime is, they don't make immediately obvious who's gonna fight who even with the format of a tournament arc making some of the fights like Rinne vs. Vivio all the more impactful, adrenaline pumping and unpredictable as to who's gonna win or not, also during the tournament arc, due to a promise by Einhart, Rinne WAS gonna fight Fuuka no matter what, making who's gonna fight who even more unpredictable, heck even who's gonna WIN is even more unpredictable due to how powerful and balanced each of the main cast them are (obviously this excludes the minor contestants as they get KO'd quite quickly so that the tournament can move on to the more interesting fights).
In the voice acting department however, LA will say that there are some notable "playing against the type" roles LA took notice of from Rinne Berlinetta who is voiced by Yui Ogura (mainly because of her voicing a stoic and apathetic badass) to LA's main surprise of Ayane Sakura voicing Jill (the calm ojou yet almost sadistic belief to her coaching a la tranquil, scheming villainous character something LA has NEVER seen Ayane Sakura do a role in), for the rest of the vocal cast who reprised their roles from Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha ViVid were expected with some squeakers from Kaori Mizuhashi as Vivio, Eri Kitamura as Rio Wezley (her hyper genki tonal vocals get high pitched at times) and Kanae Ito who voiced Miura Rinaldi. Inori Minase who voiced Fuuka Reventon, the main protagonist in ViVid Strike!, she did a decent job overall but she shone when getting into her serious *cough* angry Rem vocals *cough* but LA was more interested in the playing against roles like Ayane Sakura and Yui Ogura...on speaking of which, LA's favourite voice actor from ViVid Strike! would go to Yui Ogura, though she had some competition in the form of Ayane Sakura, Inori Minase and Mamiko Noto but nonetheless, considering how complex Rinne was, it only benefited into LA liking Yui Ogura's performance even more.
In terms of animation by Seven Arcs Pictures, the animation is slightly inconsistent at times especially in the later last quarter of the anime with some facial derps or some lower quality at times. The character designs are expected moe and all the characters are distinct but that's too be expected when many of the characters have their own distinct style (hairstyle, accessories, transformations etc.) but when they really brought their all, is during the fighting and ohh boy did they go all out for that!, the fighting animation is greatly animated and isn't deterred by the lower quality as well (yes, it happens but LA doesn't care, the fight scenes are AMAZING), if there is one praise LA will have to say is the great fighting animation and offside, the facial animation in showing expression in some of the characters were done splendidly.
As much as LA is praising ViViD Strike, LA needs to be a bummer and say some of the flaws, if there are any and yes, LA already talked about the derpy animation at times, but LA will re-emphasis again that the majority of the supporting characters are nothing but that and are more spectators and expositional fighting style manuals than "characters" (exceptions being Jill, Nove, Einhart, Vivio and Miura), next would be the the fact that if your expecting a Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha ViViD sequel, if you read this far, it's quite obvious that the focus isn't to Vivio or it's "her conituation" from Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha ViViD, but with that Fuuka and Rinne's plot focus is more than enough and this is hardly considered a "flaw" more like expectations, LA's anyways, but anyways these flaws hardly deter LA from hating this installment of the ViViD franchise.
ViViD Strike!'s ending like Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha ViViD left on the finals, HOWEVER unlike Nanoha ViViD where it left on the tournament with no compromise, ViViD Strike! on the other hand gave us a compromise in the form of a resolution between Rinne and Fuuka and LA will easily take that, even if ViViD Strike! and Nanoha ViViD Strike! essentially did the same thing of NOT finishing a tournament, hell in ViViD Strike!'s case, the tournament wasn't the primary focus, it was about Rinne and Fuuka and giving it a resolution was the best compromise to that.
ViViD Strike!, really was a surprise for LA, not only as a fan of the Nanoha franchise but for Fall 2016 Seasonal Roundup as well. As a fan of the Nanoha franchise, ViViD Strike! may not appeal to it's fans due to the change of genre from magical fantasy fights to magical tournament fighting like LA did with Nanoha ViViD but ViViD Strike!'s brilliant character development of Rinne and Fuuka that pretty much carried the entire anime to the amazing fisticuffs battles, clash of ideals and the moral gray area really rang through throughout the entire installment for LA and gave new light to the ViViD franchise and what it can do with it's magical tournament fighting genre. Sure ViViD Strike! has some flaws of inconsistent animation, supporting characters being expositional mouthpieces and nothing more and also the same flaw that got LA pissed off with the Nanoha ViViD of not finishing a tournament did, ViViD Strike!'s strengths definitely outweigh it's weakness. As a Fall 2016 Anime and as an anime LA dismissed while it aired, LA cannot have been more wrong in dismissing this anime and quite honest belongs in LA's Top 5 Best Anime of Fall 2016 to be perfectly honest. ViViD Strike! is most definitely a hidden gem of Fall 2016, be it if your a fan of the Nanoha franchise, the Nanoha ViViD sub-franchise, wanting to see a tournament style anime done with a twist or a complete newbie. ViViD Strike! will get your adrenaline pumpin'!....with heart of course.
