Vividred Operation- Finale

While the crow begins rampaging with her new-found power, Kenjirou deduces that Rei is still alive within the center of the Alone she has become. With the crow taking off to head towards the Manifestation Engine, Akane finds Rei’s key, which she believes may hold the key to their victory. The crow arrives at Blue Island and starts draining the Manifestation Engine, causing blackouts all over the world. Akane and the others soon arrive at the scene, with each girl giving their remaining suit power to help Akane break into the crow. Akane manages to reach Rei and together they dock to become Vivid Red, allowing them to overcome the crow’s power and destroy her. After the battle, the mysterious being Kenjirou saw seven years ago appears, revealing Rei’s world has been restored. Promising that they’ll see each other again, Rei leaves Akane her scarf before heading back to her home. Some time after life returns to normal, Akane once again sees Rei.

• The Alone’s unusual nature are more similar to the Angels from Neon Genesis Evangelion rather than the Neuroi of Strike Witches. Thus, we see some more (comparatively) grotesque Alone compared to the cleaner designs found in the Neuroi.

• Admittedly, I have not had time until recently to finish the Winter 2013 anime line-up until a few days ago. Thus, I had spent the last few days catching up: the advantage of doing so is that I can watch the episodes without the need to wait a week for the next to come out.

• While Vividred Operation may not have a particularly strong story, it more than compensates through stunning visuals and through giving viewers a sense that even where the show is more serious, it ends up being fun anyways.

• Havoc-Grade payloads don’t do anything against the super-charged Alone: this cliché has been around since the 1950 version of War of the Worlds; this has been noted on my Strike Witches Movie review previously, where I state that the effectiveness of contemporary military hardware is related with the plot. As such, to ensure that extraterrestrial beings and another anomalies are not wiped out by period weapons, they often have capacities to shrug off our weapons, thereby giving the writers the justification for fielding unorthodox technology.

• The last episode’s title is the series’ namesake, involving Rei and Akane docking to form Vividred. Despite lacking a Palette suit (at least, that’s what I think they’re called), Rei is able to complete the docking procedure.

• At this point, the rules in-show themselves break down and contradict what was said in previous episodes about docking. I do not care in the slightest.

• Vividred summons a final attack, akin to those found in existing magical girl and super sentai shows, to finish off the final boss.

• All of the laws of conservation and physics are broken in some way, shape or form during the course of Vividred Operation. Kenjirou shadows on this, and notes that he would begin his research from scratch.

• If there is a single point that Vividred Operation tries to bring to the table, it is that friendship is sufficiently powerful a motivator to overcome anything, and here, will dismiss physical laws to achieve a certain end. This thematic element is similar to those found in virtually every other magical girl or super sentai show.

• The same entity that appeared before Kenjirou in the past reappears, affirming its status as somewhat similar to the Forerunners; in this case, the entity decides that humanity has passed the test, and agrees to resurrecting Rei’s homeworld.

The last time I wrote about Vividred Operation here, it was January. The finale has long come and gone now, and having had the opportunity to watch it, I can honestly say that Vividred Operation can be thought of as a light-hearted caricature of the whole magical girl and super sentai genre, featuring over-the-top dialogue, flashy transformation sequences, and unnecessarily unusual attack names. These traits are packaged into an anime with excellent animation and sound quality, resulting in a show that is fun to watch. As Vividred Operation does not attempt to take itself seriously at any point, any discussions about plot and character development is hardly relevant. For nitpickers, the plot is cliché (dialogue-wise)  and overly idealistic (friendship is capable of doing what Havoc-grade payloads cannot), if one must know. However, I am quite happy to overlook these elements because, at day’s end, the anime satisfies a single criteria in my books: it is fun to watch, and that alone makes Vividred Operation worthwhile as a means of kicking back after the daily routine of going to school/work. Vividred Operation succeeds as a fun anime, and if it was intended to act as a light-hearted parody of the magical girl and super sentai genres, then I offer bonus points for hitting the nail on the head.