The Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei series for LA at least is a very flawed yet oddly popular anime for LA, from it's long winded exposition about magic, to an overpowered main protagonist and LA doesn't even want to get started with it's incest subtexts and everything..soo yeah LA had some problems with the anime series, so how does the movie Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei Movie: Hoshi wo Yobu Shoujo differ from it?...well...it's more like a sins of the father situation for this movie.
Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei Movie: Hoshi wo Yobu Shoujo follows a basic three act structure, of setup, confrontation and resolution, in which it involves a human experiment runaway by the name of Kokoa wanting to free her other "8", with Tatsuya accepting it, until some other factions comes into the loop, then well it becomes all chaos not long afterwards bringing our confrontation to not only the "villain" of this movie but the other factions with their own agenda to deal with and then the resolution to the movie shortly afterwards.
LA will say this loud and clear for you about the "sins of the father" affecting this movie and that's the problem of Tatsuya Shiba himself, merely for the fact that he's is an overpowered main protagonist easily cuts the tension of MANY scenes in this movie, not the mention the fact that he steals scenes from his friends in the process of this movie for the sake of trying to protect them. Erika and Leo are half-exceptions however let's not kid ourselves, Tatsuya on a large scale pretty much resolves EVERY problem in this movie and being the "Magic Jesus" LA dubbed him he destroys any tension of an imminent threat that the movie had setup for us. Now to this movie's defence, yes LA gets he's the "main protagonist" thus his screentime is somewhat justified not to mention some battles that doesn't affect Tatsuya like Erika and Leo's fight against some of the Elite STARS and Miyuki's role by the climax of the movie were somewhat unaffected by this, what LA just had a problem with is that he STEALS the screentime from the other main characters of this movie in the process of it because he's just so damn powerful in the first place!.
In terms of animation done this time by 8Bit instead of MADHOUSE, the animation is very polished and bright in flavour of the TV series only to a bigger scale, the magic battles and it's aesthetics is also very well done showing off some spectacularly great effects, kinda expected from 8Bit for this one however LA will talk about something that irked LA because of this but that a bit later.
The voice acting is overall consistent with returning voice actors from Saori Hayami to Kana Hanazawa, Satomi Sato, Marina Inoue, Yuuichi Nakamura, Yumi Uchiyama. With some new additions to this movie from Yoko Hikasa as Lina and Konomi Kohara as Kokoa did pretty well overall as well. Really not much to talk about with the voice cast really.
So in talking about Lina, how did Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei Movie: Hoshi wo Yobu Shoujo handle their newer characters?, well Kokoa was nothing but the plot catalyst while Lina and the STARS to Tatsuya were used for some opposition and a bit of chaos to ramp up the craziness of the movie, LA was fine with Lina being in the movie if only to cause a bit of a wall for Tatsuya, Erika and Leo while yeah...LA had a problem with Kokoa as a whole of her being a "catalyst" to the entire movie and LA gets Kokoa purpose IS to move the plot along but yeah show stealer Tatsuya made short work of that anyways.
For fans of Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei, the Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei Movie: Hoshi wo Yobu Shoujo is for what LA sees, is a 90 minute episode of one particular arc (and it's NOT an original work so this is canon). For LA personally, what with LA being griped about Tatsuya Shiba for MULTITUDE of reasons, the animation being one of the highlights of the movie. What LA really got out of this movie, though it's faithful both aesthetically and atmospheric to the TV series and everything, it also brought on for LA that this movie is really a "spectacle over substance" movie, you get a mission, exposition and prep over it then conduct and confront then resolve the mission...lots of gorgeously spectacle magical battles and explosions...but not much to "say" about it all and that's where LA thinks Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei Movie: Hoshi wo Yobu Shoujo falls flat on.
Now in saying all this, is this just like the anime original movies with it's movie only characters that goes away afterwards, it definitely has hints of being so even if this is canon to the original source material, however Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei Movie: Hoshi wo Yobu Shoujo does for LA at least make the spectacle kinda worth the watch even with it's very flawed negatives.
All of the elements of Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei Movie: Hoshi wo Yobu Shoujo, a spectacle over substance, a sins of the father anime series to movie problems and all, the movie is fine...it's fine...it's fine.
