Symphogear Retrospective: Part 5

Introduction / It all led up to this...

The final season of Symphogear, the crowning moment or sadly flopping failure. But it IS my favourite show, so you can be cautiously optimistic if you want! After 4 previous seasons that I've covered, easily making this my largest writing project looking at a single piece of media, we have a lot to get through.

You will be completely lost if you start reading here, but the preceding parts also clock in at a total of 68,000 words and I know that people don't have infinite time. So the tiniest recap of the previous recaps (with links to the full retrospectives):

Symphogear: Hibiki becomes a Symphogear user, her friend finds out, the moon gets damaged.
Symphogear G: The moon is stopped from falling, three new heroes join the team.
Symphogear GX: A sad alchemist girl and her doll minions threaten to destroy the world.
Symphogear AXZ: The illuminati want to use magic to unite mankind in a fight against the Gods.

Wow, I just saved you so much time! Although you kind of miss some of the finer nuances, like my rating system! I grade every episode on 4 scales:

🌟GLORIOUSNESS: Cool stuff gets you points!
🎶 MUSIC: Cool music gets you points!
🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: Breakneck pace or wild chronology gets you points!
🧼 SLEAZINESS: Not being a creep gets you points!

Now then, let's get going. Time to take those previous 68,000 words and add another 18,010 for a combined total of about 86,000 words. Easily my biggest writing project both on this blog (...so far) and non-fiction in general.

Create a history, with the light God could not know.

The final logo is glorious! Dark Hibiki is fully gone, we're back to the white silhouette and even the wings from season 1 though you can still see her cool scarf as well. By her feet is a burst of rainbow wings or flames. No clue what the XV is supposed to mean (it sure doesn't have anything to do with Roman numerals, though I'd take another 10 seasons of this in a heartbeat), but that subtitle sure calls out the Gods... I guess Adam was onto something last season, huh?

Who is Adam you ask?! A quick summary just for you, because you asked so nicely:

Status quo, open points, problems & questions:

The main problem in the world recently has been the alchemists of the Bavarian Illuminati. Mages that want to control the world or unite the world or destroy the world, it varies. It looks like their nefarious leader Adam was destroyed at the end of the last season though.
Noise (monsters that disintegrate humans that can only be killed by symphogear) are the main weapon used by these alchemists. They often come in convenient marble-sized summoning stones.
Keeping the world safe from all this is the UN agency called SONG and the symphogear users unique to this agency.

Hibiki is doing good! Her best friend Miku keeps her grounded and optimistic. They have both been cleansed from the Curse of Balal, which is the same as the concept of Original Sin, making them potential vessels for Divine Power.
Tsubasa hasn't done pop idol stuff in a bit and is still struggling with her complex family legacy (by which I mostly mean her grandfather being a patriotic monster). In general she's in a good place though!
Chris had a lot of coming to terms with her traumatic past last season, but she came out of that doing a lot better! She's still rude and fiery, of course.
Maria is doing good, continuing her big sister role for Shirabe and Kirika and drawing power from the memory of her own sister Serena.
Shirabe continues to be the quieter side of the pair of youngest gear users. No traces of Finé left inside her and she's doing good.
Kirika got pretty hurt last season in a dramatic save, but she's fine by now. She continues to be the spontaneous one of the group.
Elfnein isn't a symphogear user, but she's a SONG employee and had a tumultuous ride. She is a genderless homunculus from GX that is now their main scientist / only alchemist. Her body is technically Carol's, who she is a clone of. The Ignite Module that she created in the past has since been destroyed.

The Curse of Balal stops humanity from understanding each other. Adam wanted to disable it to unite mankind somehow. That's probably a bad thing? We'll see, probably!
There was some friction at the end of the last season where SONG is part of the UN and almost had to work directly against Japan (and Tsubasa's jerk grandfather, who now seeks divine power). We'll see how much of that comes up again...

You've been very patient, good job! But it's time to start this last round:

Episode 1: From the Horizon of Mankind's History / "Welcome back! I'll be fighting my hardest in my own way!"


Summary	A vaguely familiar corridor, is this the Frontier?! A dying man is launching something he calls a "network jammer" to the moon. With his dying breath he apologises to Finé. One hell of a cold open! Speaking of cold, we join the SONG submarine base in the Antarctic where they are travelling to investigate a mysterious sarcophagus. Just in time too, a gigantic laser shoots out from a frozen over lake as they make the last stretch of their approach by chopper. A large colossus breaks through the ice and our heroes jump out of the helicopters to meet it, giving us Hibiki's transformation. It's the longest and most elaborate we've seen so far and it's so good! It highlights her fighting style and her scarf. Accompanied by an excellent Hibiki song the battle starts, the priority of our heroes is to protect a nearby observation station and pacify this monster. The monster seems to be on the defensive, mostly trying to take down anything that gets close. Even a spectacular team-up attack between Hibiki and Maria does little other than crack a central gem in its hull. Its counterattack is devastating and freezes our heroes in place. Some techno-babble explains that its attacks contradict known physics, breaking the theoretical minimum temperature by several thousand degrees. So obviously it is now time for a flashback on how we got there! Hibiki singing the school song as a make-up exam while Miku accompanies her on piano and her friends peek in from the classroom door. After that Hibiki and Miku go on a date, buying a Birthday gift for Chris and eating snacks together in the Ferris Wheel. It's cute and not even a crudely slotted in bit of exposition (about a joint space program between Japan and the US heading to the moon soon) can kill the vibes. An off-shore cruise research laboratory masquerading as a cruise ship exploding in the nearby harbour will do the trick though! And Hibiki is called back towards the base. Apparently the remnants of the autoscorer Tiki exploded as a result of (clearly not sufficiently) careful examination. The only clue that they were able to extract before things were critically wrong are coordinates in Antarctica. Some weird stuff has been happening there lately, including finding a frozen scorpion that belongs in the middle east. Separate research into the Bavarian Illuminati gave them the information about this sarcophagus... HALFWAY POINT And with that we're caught up! To our heroes being frozen and in big trouble. While the lumbering sarcophagus approaches them they are observed by two hidden figures. A girl with pointy ears and a girl with dog ears... new villains?! They have a phone call with a woman (with regular ears) and it becomes clear that they want to use the sarcophagus for something. The research base is sending up flares to support the symphogear users, raising the temperature enough to break them out of the ice but drawing the attention of the sarcophagus. They're going to have to make this count! Which means a 6-way unison song and awesome action highlighting for each of our heroes. Hell. Yes. Due to their heroics the base is able to evacuate. It looks dicey for a second when the monster pulls Hibiki into the frozen lake (where she can't sing), but she is able to send it flying high up in the sky with a massive attack. As it starts to fall back down they unleash their gears to the new mode they used in the finale of AXZ to transfer their powers to Hibiki, using it here to unleash a devastating ranged attack on the tumbling sarcophagus. That's one enemy down! A solid start! After the excellent song over these non-standard credits we see the researchers investigate the insides of the inert sarcophagus. There's a mummy in there alright, the mummy of a Custodian, a God. It's wearing a very conspicuous golden bracelet...
Review	It can't possibly keep up this level of quality but that was PHENOMENALLY good. Which the scores will definitely show in a second. Immediate stakes, a bit of slice of life, a hint of our new villains, and an amazing action set piece. Very, very promising as opening episodes go.
Scores	9/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: That whole fight against the sarcophagus was just a delight, each of its four distinct stages had so many solid moments sprinkled in. And Hibiki and Miku going on a date together is also glorious! 9.5/10 🎶 MUSIC: A new Hibiki song, a new solo rendition of the school song and then a 6-way unison. We're getting spoiled over here! There is also a specific bit of music right after the unison where the sarcophagus and Hibiki clash that doesn't have vocals but it's SO good at hyping me up. 10/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: Not a single clue what that cold open was about. And the audacity of having a flashback in the middle of that big fight is just peak Symphogear nonsense. 9/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: The poses while they're frozen by the sarcophagus ice beam could have been a lot worse but they sure aren't perfect. 9.4/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: There is no way it can keep this up. Every season so far has had exactly one episode that meets or beats this score. It's one hell of a statement of intent though. Now, let's goooooo!

Episode 2: The Day the Sky Falls / "I fear these peaceful school days will not last much longer."

Summary
It's kind of weird to actually see a last time on segment to kick off an episode, but that's what we're getting. After that it's time for a new opening! It's rocky, seemingly a bit darker than the ones we've had so far, but quickly veers into something more poppy. It features our heroes out in town with partially out of frame shots of our new villains(?). And a lot of imagery about how far everybody has come before devolving into high octane action as usual. The new villains look wild and fun! Weirdly, the opening ends on the frozen scorpion that was found. Didn't think that one would be that relevant.
A small slice of life scene of Chris going to school and Hibiki being pushy about the cool Birthday gift her and Miku got her. It's sweet! Even if Chris is pessimistic about how long this calm can last.
Tsubasa is practising for a music show! Maria and Ogawa are there to cheer her on because she's kind of out of it. Looks like there will be a concert in three days, that's exactly what I asked for! She is down because of what happened on the way back from Antarctica. Meaning it's flashback time!
The American carrier that took over transport duty for the corpse of the Custodian is under attack by Noise, Kirika and Shirabe are dispatched by missile to go save them. They transform mid-jump and we follow Kirika's transformation which is... oh, oh no. Which is portraying her pole-dancing on her scythe. No thank you.
Fortunately we have a fun deckside brawl against some classic Noise designs and this duo is always so fun in fights. It's a nice highlighting of how far they've come, they don't struggle at all against this large group of Noise.
It's not just Noise though, the girl with the wolf ears is here! Her name is Elsa, the alchemist pulling the strings of this attack. They follow her into the bowels of the ship, but not even a well placed surprise attack can keep a separated Shirabe down for long. We have switched to a Shirabe song by now and with Kirika's help she easily overpowers Elsa. They weren't even singing in Unison yet!
Elsa claims that she was holding holding back, that her objective was completed, but we'll see. The mummy was fine, which was the only sensible target on board. She teleports out after a brief telepathic conversation with her... ally? Boss? The woman in the car from the previous episode, who is called Vanessa.
This weird behaviour is what's got Tsubasa worried (and boring geopolitical stuff surrounding the mummy), Maria asks her to cheer up and Tsubasa accepts on one condition...
HALFWAY POINT
Tsubasa's grandfather is mad again, this time at SONG handing over the mummy to the Americans. He's been around a lot lately, to the point that the bridge crew even points this out!
I guess we skipped ahead those three days, we see our heroes (minus Tsubasa and Maria, who cancelled last minute) stuck in traffic on the way to Tsubasa's concert. The reveal isn't held off for long, of course Tsubasa's request was obviously for Maria to join her on stage once again.
Just because it's predictable doesn't mean it's not awesome though, I have missed these concert performances and it looks amazing, it really is going all out. The arena is bigger than ever and the song goes well.
Aaaaand then everything goes wrong, we really are grabbing back to previous seasons' concerts entirely huh? A whole pile of Noise spawn right in the arena and make a huge mess. We see a LOT of people get disintegrated by them. Tsubasa and Maria transform quickly and attack, they're not evening singing which fits the drama but is kind of weird inside the fiction.
They are fighting with all their might but casualties keep piling up, it's a gruesome scene. The other 4 gear users are delayed and now the girl with the pointy ears is here, we won't learn her name for a while but this is Millaarc. She has demon wings and some sort of shapeshifting powers where she can use those wings to wrap around her arms or legs to empower them.
She is also playing dirty, pulling an innocent girl in the path of Tsubasa's attack who only just manages to hold back her attack. Millaarc responds by gruesomely killing her hostage in front of Tsubasa anyway, sending her into despair. She uses this moment to do... something to Tsubasa, a spell of sorts? Her eyes briefly flash like stained glass windows. No clue what that's about yet.
This appears to have been her objective though, and after ordering a final attack on the arena Millaarc withdraws. Tsubasa and Maria are seemingly the only survivors in ruined arena, this one is going to leave some scars... With that the credits hit.
After the credits we see an American research lab scan the mummy, when the scan hits its prominent golden bracelet a light flashes, reducing the rest of the mummy to ash. What is going on over there?!
Review
Ooof, that got darker than I expected. Was Symphogear ever this gory? Or did I just forget how it could be? Hibiki did lose her arm that one time which was pretty brutal. We haven't seen this level of gore in a while though, and I'd rather we hadn't.
Looks like our villains have a pretty concrete plan though, something about the mummy and also directly attacking the symphogear users. I guess we'll find out more next time!
Scores
7/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: Kirika and Shirabe had an awesome fight and I love that they just unequivocally won. The gore is causing the minus points here, wow did that feel unnecessary. I get that stakes are important, but it could have... splattered less, you know?
9/10 🎶 MUSIC: During the ship brawl a comms tower falls on Kirika (she was fine) but she hurriedly rushed through her line to finish it in time before it hit her. Which was fun and cute. On top of that we got a Kirika song, a Shirabe song AND a concert performance. That's just excellent stuff throughout.
10/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: We continue to do the weird thing where a scene is interrupted by a sizeable flashback that is super relevant. I'm here for it, but it is wild. I considered deducting points for the episode having a last-time-on, but honestly I think we'll need them and I hope they become the default.
6/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: Speaking of hoping for things... we REALLY didn't need that sleazy Kirika transformation, ugh. It wasn't the worst, but it felt so gratuitous and superfluous. Also, Elsa's main attack is attaching a sort of claw thing to the small of her back using a cable which isn't a great look, but the main deduction here is that transformation.
8/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: That one had a rough spot or two, not gonna lie. Would have preferred a change or two both in what happened and how it was presented. It was still good though and surely it'll get better now!


Summary	It's kind of weird to actually see a last time on segment to kick off an episode, but that's what we're getting. After that it's time for a new opening! It's rocky, seemingly a bit darker than the ones we've had so far, but quickly veers into something more poppy. It features our heroes out in town with partially out of frame shots of our new villains(?). And a lot of imagery about how far everybody has come before devolving into high octane action as usual. The new villains look wild and fun! Weirdly, the opening ends on the frozen scorpion that was found. Didn't think that one would be that relevant. A small slice of life scene of Chris going to school and Hibiki being pushy about the cool Birthday gift her and Miku got her. It's sweet! Even if Chris is pessimistic about how long this calm can last. Tsubasa is practising for a music show! Maria and Ogawa are there to cheer her on because she's kind of out of it. Looks like there will be a concert in three days, that's exactly what I asked for! She is down because of what happened on the way back from Antarctica. Meaning it's flashback time! The American carrier that took over transport duty for the corpse of the Custodian is under attack by Noise, Kirika and Shirabe are dispatched by missile to go save them. They transform mid-jump and we follow Kirika's transformation which is... oh, oh no. Which is portraying her pole-dancing on her scythe. No thank you. Fortunately we have a fun deckside brawl against some classic Noise designs and this duo is always so fun in fights. It's a nice highlighting of how far they've come, they don't struggle at all against this large group of Noise. It's not just Noise though, the girl with the wolf ears is here! Her name is Elsa, the alchemist pulling the strings of this attack. They follow her into the bowels of the ship, but not even a well placed surprise attack can keep a separated Shirabe down for long. We have switched to a Shirabe song by now and with Kirika's help she easily overpowers Elsa. They weren't even singing in Unison yet! Elsa claims that she was holding holding back, that her objective was completed, but we'll see. The mummy was fine, which was the only sensible target on board. She teleports out after a brief telepathic conversation with her... ally? Boss? The woman in the car from the previous episode, who is called Vanessa. This weird behaviour is what's got Tsubasa worried (and boring geopolitical stuff surrounding the mummy), Maria asks her to cheer up and Tsubasa accepts on one condition... HALFWAY POINT Tsubasa's grandfather is mad again, this time at SONG handing over the mummy to the Americans. He's been around a lot lately, to the point that the bridge crew even points this out! I guess we skipped ahead those three days, we see our heroes (minus Tsubasa and Maria, who cancelled last minute) stuck in traffic on the way to Tsubasa's concert. The reveal isn't held off for long, of course Tsubasa's request was obviously for Maria to join her on stage once again. Just because it's predictable doesn't mean it's not awesome though, I have missed these concert performances and it looks amazing, it really is going all out. The arena is bigger than ever and the song goes well. Aaaaand then everything goes wrong, we really are grabbing back to previous seasons' concerts entirely huh? A whole pile of Noise spawn right in the arena and make a huge mess. We see a LOT of people get disintegrated by them. Tsubasa and Maria transform quickly and attack, they're not evening singing which fits the drama but is kind of weird inside the fiction. They are fighting with all their might but casualties keep piling up, it's a gruesome scene. The other 4 gear users are delayed and now the girl with the pointy ears is here, we won't learn her name for a while but this is Millaarc. She has demon wings and some sort of shapeshifting powers where she can use those wings to wrap around her arms or legs to empower them. She is also playing dirty, pulling an innocent girl in the path of Tsubasa's attack who only just manages to hold back her attack. Millaarc responds by gruesomely killing her hostage in front of Tsubasa anyway, sending her into despair. She uses this moment to do... something to Tsubasa, a spell of sorts? Her eyes briefly flash like stained glass windows. No clue what that's about yet. This appears to have been her objective though, and after ordering a final attack on the arena Millaarc withdraws. Tsubasa and Maria are seemingly the only survivors in ruined arena, this one is going to leave some scars... With that the credits hit. After the credits we see an American research lab scan the mummy, when the scan hits its prominent golden bracelet a light flashes, reducing the rest of the mummy to ash. What is going on over there?!
Review	Ooof, that got darker than I expected. Was Symphogear ever this gory? Or did I just forget how it could be? Hibiki did lose her arm that one time which was pretty brutal. We haven't seen this level of gore in a while though, and I'd rather we hadn't. Looks like our villains have a pretty concrete plan though, something about the mummy and also directly attacking the symphogear users. I guess we'll find out more next time!
Scores	7/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: Kirika and Shirabe had an awesome fight and I love that they just unequivocally won. The gore is causing the minus points here, wow did that feel unnecessary. I get that stakes are important, but it could have... splattered less, you know? 9/10 🎶 MUSIC: During the ship brawl a comms tower falls on Kirika (she was fine) but she hurriedly rushed through her line to finish it in time before it hit her. Which was fun and cute. On top of that we got a Kirika song, a Shirabe song AND a concert performance. That's just excellent stuff throughout. 10/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: We continue to do the weird thing where a scene is interrupted by a sizeable flashback that is super relevant. I'm here for it, but it is wild. I considered deducting points for the episode having a last-time-on, but honestly I think we'll need them and I hope they become the default. 6/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: Speaking of hoping for things... we REALLY didn't need that sleazy Kirika transformation, ugh. It wasn't the worst, but it felt so gratuitous and superfluous. Also, Elsa's main attack is attaching a sort of claw thing to the small of her back using a cable which isn't a great look, but the main deduction here is that transformation. 8/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: That one had a rough spot or two, not gonna lie. Would have preferred a change or two both in what happened and how it was presented. It was still good though and surely it'll get better now!

Episode 3: Penny Dreadful / "Your actions are illegal under some law whose name I can't remember!"

Summary
The Americans are investigating the bracelet and are being nationalistic about it. I'm sure that will go well! The opening hits, after which we see Miku and Hibiki deal with the fallout of the disaster in the last episode in their own way. Miku is watching the news, informing herself. Hibiki is reassuring a parent on the phone. We get the detail snuck in that her parents are trying to both be in her life but not living together.
The wolf girl and the demon girl, Elsa and Millaarc, are making a trade with some shady businessmen at a dock. They are spotted by some bikers and give chase, deploying Noise in their chase. Our heroes pick up the Noise signals and deploy Chris and Hibiki. (Maria and Tsubasa are still hurt from the concert showdown, with Tsubasa being unconscious.)
We follow Chris' transformation. It's... fine? Mostly fine. They are in time to save one of the bikers and are being badasses about it, it's a solid scene and just really fun. Elsa and Millaarc joining the battle kind of evens the playing field. Millaarc is roughly evenly matched and seems to shake off the stained glass eye curse that worked on Tsubasa. The enemy flees at that not working, taking whatever they traded with them. Not on Chris' watch though! She manages to take a sniper bow shot at them and force them to abandon the by now very dented case that they got from the shady businessmen and teleport out.
Turns out the case was full of bags of donor blood of a very rare type? That's not disconcerting at all! Since they managed to save a witness they now know that some organisation is assisting these alchemists, but it's unclear who exactly. America is suspected, of course.
HALFWAY POINT
Elsa recovers from the battle and Millaarc is very kind to her, looks like our villains legitimately care about each other and are kind. I wonder what their motives turn out to be, because they are clearly not bad people. They are awaiting Vanessa's arrival, who was out of the country until now.
Back at SONG HQ a raid of a US facility is discussed, there is footage of Vanessa at the site, the Custodian bracelet and several inconsequential relics have been stolen. Looks like we know why she was out of the country.
They are interrupted by Tsubasa coming to the bridge, she's awake! And immediately gets berated by her grandfather on a video call. Did I mention how I hate this jerk? He doesn't even believe that songs can save the world! His words get to Tsubasa, more than they did last season. Looks like she has been set back a bit in her thinking, even referring to herself as a sword again.
Shirabe and Kirika are outside talking about everything that happened, Kirika has the brilliant idea that if the enemy wants blood then surely they'll attack a facility like that big hospital over there! And, miraculously, she's right. They spot a desperate Millaarc on the roof of the hospital who is in no mood for talk.
Shirabe transforms and- I'm almost afraid to look. Oh hey, it's... perfectly fine? Like, it's fun and playful and gives her ice skates for a bit. Hell yeah! She and Kirika start taking out the summoned Noise without breaking a sweat. They even land a solid and fun attack on Millaarc and she crashes into the roof of the building.
At Millaarc dramatically screaming out that she will protect her family, Vanessa arrives! She somehow fires an EMP missile and... rocket fists? She appears to be a cyborg of some kind. Her and Vanessa are there to save Millaarc and even got more blood from the hospital while Millaarc was distracting our heroic duo. With a dramatic declaration that they are Noble Red they teleport away while Shirabe and Kirika have to deal with a hospital where the power has been cut.
Right before the credits we see a brief scene, Elsa and Millaarc getting their much-need blood transfusions and Vanessa presenting the Custodian bracelet to her employer on a video call, it's- oh God damn it, it's Tsubasa's grandfather.
Review
This was good! It moves fast and it didn't dwell on the horrors of the previous episode too much. Was it an outlier? Is this season just a weird, wild ride? I don't know!
Scores
8.5/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: Chris and Hibiki versus Elsa and Millaarc was a VERY well choreographed and fun fight full of neat little touches, them walking past each other in opposing directions with the camera directly to their side was an especially cool shot. And Kirika and Shirabe are always fun to watch in action.
8.5/10 🎶 MUSIC: An excellent Chris song, Shirabe's song again, not much to write home about. Except for the bit where Kirika calls out to Shirabe to combine their weapons and Shirabe sings "Ready, go" which is both an answer and a part of the lyrics. I have missed them doing that trick!
9/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: Between the crammed in villain reveal, the hospital randomly being correct, Tsubasa being fine, yeah this was a pretty chaotic episode. Though not quite as chaotic as the last two.
8/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: Right, Chris' transformation. She squeezes out and launches bullets from her cleavage to load her guns. Which is... unnecessary, but I guess kind of in line with Chris. It could have been worse!
8.5/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: Just a solid score again, nice! I'm worried about how the Tsubasa thing will develop though, I fear that's going to get worse before it gets better...


Summary	The Americans are investigating the bracelet and are being nationalistic about it. I'm sure that will go well! The opening hits, after which we see Miku and Hibiki deal with the fallout of the disaster in the last episode in their own way. Miku is watching the news, informing herself. Hibiki is reassuring a parent on the phone. We get the detail snuck in that her parents are trying to both be in her life but not living together. The wolf girl and the demon girl, Elsa and Millaarc, are making a trade with some shady businessmen at a dock. They are spotted by some bikers and give chase, deploying Noise in their chase. Our heroes pick up the Noise signals and deploy Chris and Hibiki. (Maria and Tsubasa are still hurt from the concert showdown, with Tsubasa being unconscious.) We follow Chris' transformation. It's... fine? Mostly fine. They are in time to save one of the bikers and are being badasses about it, it's a solid scene and just really fun. Elsa and Millaarc joining the battle kind of evens the playing field. Millaarc is roughly evenly matched and seems to shake off the stained glass eye curse that worked on Tsubasa. The enemy flees at that not working, taking whatever they traded with them. Not on Chris' watch though! She manages to take a sniper bow shot at them and force them to abandon the by now very dented case that they got from the shady businessmen and teleport out. Turns out the case was full of bags of donor blood of a very rare type? That's not disconcerting at all! Since they managed to save a witness they now know that some organisation is assisting these alchemists, but it's unclear who exactly. America is suspected, of course. HALFWAY POINT Elsa recovers from the battle and Millaarc is very kind to her, looks like our villains legitimately care about each other and are kind. I wonder what their motives turn out to be, because they are clearly not bad people. They are awaiting Vanessa's arrival, who was out of the country until now. Back at SONG HQ a raid of a US facility is discussed, there is footage of Vanessa at the site, the Custodian bracelet and several inconsequential relics have been stolen. Looks like we know why she was out of the country. They are interrupted by Tsubasa coming to the bridge, she's awake! And immediately gets berated by her grandfather on a video call. Did I mention how I hate this jerk? He doesn't even believe that songs can save the world! His words get to Tsubasa, more than they did last season. Looks like she has been set back a bit in her thinking, even referring to herself as a sword again. Shirabe and Kirika are outside talking about everything that happened, Kirika has the brilliant idea that if the enemy wants blood then surely they'll attack a facility like that big hospital over there! And, miraculously, she's right. They spot a desperate Millaarc on the roof of the hospital who is in no mood for talk. Shirabe transforms and- I'm almost afraid to look. Oh hey, it's... perfectly fine? Like, it's fun and playful and gives her ice skates for a bit. Hell yeah! She and Kirika start taking out the summoned Noise without breaking a sweat. They even land a solid and fun attack on Millaarc and she crashes into the roof of the building. At Millaarc dramatically screaming out that she will protect her family, Vanessa arrives! She somehow fires an EMP missile and... rocket fists? She appears to be a cyborg of some kind. Her and Vanessa are there to save Millaarc and even got more blood from the hospital while Millaarc was distracting our heroic duo. With a dramatic declaration that they are Noble Red they teleport away while Shirabe and Kirika have to deal with a hospital where the power has been cut. Right before the credits we see a brief scene, Elsa and Millaarc getting their much-need blood transfusions and Vanessa presenting the Custodian bracelet to her employer on a video call, it's- oh God damn it, it's Tsubasa's grandfather.
Review	This was good! It moves fast and it didn't dwell on the horrors of the previous episode too much. Was it an outlier? Is this season just a weird, wild ride? I don't know!
Scores	8.5/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: Chris and Hibiki versus Elsa and Millaarc was a VERY well choreographed and fun fight full of neat little touches, them walking past each other in opposing directions with the camera directly to their side was an especially cool shot. And Kirika and Shirabe are always fun to watch in action. 8.5/10 🎶 MUSIC: An excellent Chris song, Shirabe's song again, not much to write home about. Except for the bit where Kirika calls out to Shirabe to combine their weapons and Shirabe sings "Ready, go" which is both an answer and a part of the lyrics. I have missed them doing that trick! 9/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: Between the crammed in villain reveal, the hospital randomly being correct, Tsubasa being fine, yeah this was a pretty chaotic episode. Though not quite as chaotic as the last two. 8/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: Right, Chris' transformation. She squeezes out and launches bullets from her cleavage to load her guns. Which is... unnecessary, but I guess kind of in line with Chris. It could have been worse! 8.5/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: Just a solid score again, nice! I'm worried about how the Tsubasa thing will develop though, I fear that's going to get worse before it gets better...

Episode 4: The Name of the Flower is Amalgam / "I forgot to keep struggling until I won."

Summary
After a bit more Millaarc and Vanessa looking after Elsa and the opening (I guess those last-time-on segments didn't stick around at all) we join Hibiki and Miku at school. Hibiki is worried about Tsubasa and also laments not having much time to do "normal" teenager stuff. Miku suggests maybe going for Karaoke and taking Tsubasa along.
First though, work needs to happen! SONG has gathered the stockpiles of the rare blood that Noble Red wanted and is keeping it secure (which feels quite cruel as tactics go, but I guess it makes sense). Tsubasa brushes off the meeting to go train and then brushes off Hibiki's suggestion of karaoke. She really is out of it, huh?
Noble Red is back to full strength and is meeting Tsubasa's grandfather in person, looks like a planetary alignment can activate a relic as well and that's what they're trying to do to the Custodian's bracelet. The activation appears successful but then goes horribly wrong. The old man tries to offload some of the dirty work to Noble Red, asking them to take care of his agents that messed up the blood exchange last episode. One of them makes a grab for the bracelet and puts it on and instantly explodes in a fiery blaze. Whelp.
There is some talk about a barrier failing and Noble Red summons a pile of Noise to attack their own base. Not sure what's going on there. Hibiki and Maria are dispatched to the scene and we get the latter's transformation. It's (mostly) good! It has some elements of rhythm gymnastics where the ribbon is replaced with her whip sword, it's fun.
That means we get Maria's song for the battle, she focuses on the Noise while Hibiki faces Vanessa and obviously tries to get an idea of her motivations. Vanessa is being kind of vague here, saying they want to go back to being normal girls and become friends with everyone. You don't need to sell Divine Relics to shady old men for that, I'm pretty sure.
Maria has wrapped up the fight with the Noise and joins the duel with Vanessa, putting her even more on the back foot. Fortunately for her this was all just a distraction so Elsa and Millaarc could get the bracelet and the old man out of there.
As Vanessa is about to leave Hibiki makes one final plea, can't they get along? Vanessa answers with a very firm no. People reject and ostracize what is different. This hits a nerve for Hibiki, she has had that happen for her after surviving the disastrous concert all the way back in season 1. With that Vanessa flies off.
HALFWAY POINT
SONG is investigating the destroyed lab where Noble Red activated the bracelet. Meanwhile Noble Red are sleeping off the battle in a junkyard, turns out Vanessa flying away is because the teleports are set to a fixed point (which was that base). Guess they're not going to be able to do that for a while. They really are being portrayed as the underdogs here (no pun intended, Elsa, despite your wolf ears), which is an interesting characterisation. They had to sacrifice their base to cover up the activation of the relic. Elsa has a plan though, revealing a tracking device she found on Vanessa...
Back at SONG base we see that their coverup didn't even work, the Aufwachen waveform generated by activating the relic was picked up after all. Even some residual discordant music that was probably caused by the bracelet actually being used. Worse yet, for Noble Red that is, Maria planted a tracking device on them so they know exactly where to find them.
Our heroes deploy in full force (we get Hibiki's transformation again) and Noble Red is there to meet them. As soon as our heroes hit the ground from their helicopter they- explode?! Noble Red has mined the quarry they are in and this whole thing was one big trap. Meaning they are stuck in place until they can get rid of the mines.
Noble Red uses this to trigger some kind of weird super attack on them, constructing an extradimensional maze around them that splits them up and traps them inside. They call it a Conceptual Labyrinth, take a weird moment to specify that it is over 380,000 kilometers of labyrinth when seen from the inside and charge up and detonate a huge attack inside it. It takes a lot out of them, but it seems to be very effective.
They charge up for another attack while the symphogear users are down. Hibiki in her delirious despair hallucinates a conversation with Saint-Germain who reminds her to never give up. Offering her a hand... The second attack hits, even harder than before, and the labyrinth detonates in a gigantic explosion.
Only to reveal 6 unscathed symphogear users coated in barriers of alchemical gold. These forms are called Amalgam, the combination of a symphogear and an alchemical Faust Robe, created with the knowledge of Elfnein and Saint-Germain.
It easily overwhelms the enemy but Hibiki, as always, holds back her final attack, stretching out her hands to Vanessa. Before she can reply the mission is called off though, from SONG's side, looks like their base is breached and the bridge crew is being held at gunpoint. What is going on?! Credits hit.
Review
We are already speeding along nicely with the plot. Sounds like we're about to have Tsubasa's grandfather make his play against SONG, we understand Noble Red a lot better and we have a fun new power. Yeah, this was a good episode.
Scores
9/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: Did I mention that Saint-Germain's ghost was actively in that last battle? It was so fun! She wasn't acknowledged by anybody so I'm not sure how "real" that is, but it sure was cool!
8.5/10 🎶 MUSIC: She even joins in with the song! And before that we had a solid Maria song when they were going up against Vanessa by herself.
8.5/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: The tracking device thing IMMEDIATELY being resolved was pretty chaotic, but overall this was a straightforward episode.
8/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: Elsa finding the tracking device on Vanessa involves her diving under the blanket they are sleeping under together. Her intent here is ambiguous for a short but very unnecessary amount of time. Between it and an needless shot of Maria's boobs jiggling in her transformation... yeah, not perfect.
8.5/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: Settling into a nice rhythm with these, let's keep it going!


Summary	After a bit more Millaarc and Vanessa looking after Elsa and the opening (I guess those last-time-on segments didn't stick around at all) we join Hibiki and Miku at school. Hibiki is worried about Tsubasa and also laments not having much time to do "normal" teenager stuff. Miku suggests maybe going for Karaoke and taking Tsubasa along. First though, work needs to happen! SONG has gathered the stockpiles of the rare blood that Noble Red wanted and is keeping it secure (which feels quite cruel as tactics go, but I guess it makes sense). Tsubasa brushes off the meeting to go train and then brushes off Hibiki's suggestion of karaoke. She really is out of it, huh? Noble Red is back to full strength and is meeting Tsubasa's grandfather in person, looks like a planetary alignment can activate a relic as well and that's what they're trying to do to the Custodian's bracelet. The activation appears successful but then goes horribly wrong. The old man tries to offload some of the dirty work to Noble Red, asking them to take care of his agents that messed up the blood exchange last episode. One of them makes a grab for the bracelet and puts it on and instantly explodes in a fiery blaze. Whelp. There is some talk about a barrier failing and Noble Red summons a pile of Noise to attack their own base. Not sure what's going on there. Hibiki and Maria are dispatched to the scene and we get the latter's transformation. It's (mostly) good! It has some elements of rhythm gymnastics where the ribbon is replaced with her whip sword, it's fun. That means we get Maria's song for the battle, she focuses on the Noise while Hibiki faces Vanessa and obviously tries to get an idea of her motivations. Vanessa is being kind of vague here, saying they want to go back to being normal girls and become friends with everyone. You don't need to sell Divine Relics to shady old men for that, I'm pretty sure. Maria has wrapped up the fight with the Noise and joins the duel with Vanessa, putting her even more on the back foot. Fortunately for her this was all just a distraction so Elsa and Millaarc could get the bracelet and the old man out of there. As Vanessa is about to leave Hibiki makes one final plea, can't they get along? Vanessa answers with a very firm no. People reject and ostracize what is different. This hits a nerve for Hibiki, she has had that happen for her after surviving the disastrous concert all the way back in season 1. With that Vanessa flies off. HALFWAY POINT SONG is investigating the destroyed lab where Noble Red activated the bracelet. Meanwhile Noble Red are sleeping off the battle in a junkyard, turns out Vanessa flying away is because the teleports are set to a fixed point (which was that base). Guess they're not going to be able to do that for a while. They really are being portrayed as the underdogs here (no pun intended, Elsa, despite your wolf ears), which is an interesting characterisation. They had to sacrifice their base to cover up the activation of the relic. Elsa has a plan though, revealing a tracking device she found on Vanessa... Back at SONG base we see that their coverup didn't even work, the Aufwachen waveform generated by activating the relic was picked up after all. Even some residual discordant music that was probably caused by the bracelet actually being used. Worse yet, for Noble Red that is, Maria planted a tracking device on them so they know exactly where to find them. Our heroes deploy in full force (we get Hibiki's transformation again) and Noble Red is there to meet them. As soon as our heroes hit the ground from their helicopter they- explode?! Noble Red has mined the quarry they are in and this whole thing was one big trap. Meaning they are stuck in place until they can get rid of the mines. Noble Red uses this to trigger some kind of weird super attack on them, constructing an extradimensional maze around them that splits them up and traps them inside. They call it a Conceptual Labyrinth, take a weird moment to specify that it is over 380,000 kilometers of labyrinth when seen from the inside and charge up and detonate a huge attack inside it. It takes a lot out of them, but it seems to be very effective. They charge up for another attack while the symphogear users are down. Hibiki in her delirious despair hallucinates a conversation with Saint-Germain who reminds her to never give up. Offering her a hand... The second attack hits, even harder than before, and the labyrinth detonates in a gigantic explosion. Only to reveal 6 unscathed symphogear users coated in barriers of alchemical gold. These forms are called Amalgam, the combination of a symphogear and an alchemical Faust Robe, created with the knowledge of Elfnein and Saint-Germain. It easily overwhelms the enemy but Hibiki, as always, holds back her final attack, stretching out her hands to Vanessa. Before she can reply the mission is called off though, from SONG's side, looks like their base is breached and the bridge crew is being held at gunpoint. What is going on?! Credits hit.
Review	We are already speeding along nicely with the plot. Sounds like we're about to have Tsubasa's grandfather make his play against SONG, we understand Noble Red a lot better and we have a fun new power. Yeah, this was a good episode.
Scores	9/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: Did I mention that Saint-Germain's ghost was actively in that last battle? It was so fun! She wasn't acknowledged by anybody so I'm not sure how "real" that is, but it sure was cool! 8.5/10 🎶 MUSIC: She even joins in with the song! And before that we had a solid Maria song when they were going up against Vanessa by herself. 8.5/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: The tracking device thing IMMEDIATELY being resolved was pretty chaotic, but overall this was a straightforward episode. 8/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: Elsa finding the tracking device on Vanessa involves her diving under the blanket they are sleeping under together. Her intent here is ambiguous for a short but very unnecessary amount of time. Between it and an needless shot of Maria's boobs jiggling in her transformation... yeah, not perfect. 8.5/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: Settling into a nice rhythm with these, let's keep it going!

Episode 5: The Hidden Thing in the Bag / "Tsubasa, what's gotten into you?"

Summary
Wait, the last time on is back? So confusing when we get them and when we just don't... Hibiki offers her hand to Vanessa, the mission is aborted because SONG HQ has been compromised. Noble Red flies off and the opening hits.
Looks like this is a legal loophole used by the Japanese government to investigate SONG and restrict their activity until they're done. It's pretty clear who is behind this. Tsubasa strangely agrees with the search. Fortunately our heroes aren't fully grounded, they get to keep their gears as long a they don't use their cool new amalgam power.
Meanwhile Noble Red is meeting with Tsubasa's grandfather who returns the Divine Bracelet to them along with a large new stock of blood. He's not happy with them though, and their inability to get rid of the symphogear users, basically threatening them.
So it's time for some tragic backstory! Of how Vanessa was a relic researcher for the Illuminati that got caught in an accidental explosion and then turned into a cyborg and experimental subject. This is where she met her two friends, Millaarc and Elsa. They eventually escaped and were then hired by Tsubasa's grandfather.
A covert phone conversation between Commander Genjuro and his brother (who is a fancy government official) confirms that they are keep an eye on their father, Tsubasa's grandfather. And reminds us subtly that there will be a joint moon mission soon.
We have a cute slice of life bit of the gear users and Elfnein where they consider how to spend this unexpected time off.
HALFWAY POINT
The answer is a day on the town! We follow Hibiki, Miku, Tsubasa and Elfnein during some shopping, some food and then of course Karaoke where Elfnein sings something super dramatic. Tsubasa isn't having fun though, she says her mind isn't in the right place...
Miku lashes out unexpectedly at Hibiki because Tsubasa isn't having fun! Where did that come from?! She explains herself that the situation reminds her of when she inadvertently got Hibiki stuck at a concert by herself where she almost got killed (which kicked off the whole show). And she now blames herself for Hibiki continuing to put herself in danger to save others. The comparison is a bit of a stretch, but I get that this was an important moment for both of them.
Unfortunately a SONG cuts off any chance for Hibiki to respond, Noise have appeared in town! There is a slightly awkward moment where Hibiki and Miku don't know what to say to each other, resorting to platitudes instead ("I'll talk to you later", "Stay safe"). After that Miku and Elfnein run off in the direction of the shelter and Tsubasa and Hibiki transform.
Tsubasa's transformation is super fun! I know she's not in the best place right now, but there's a bunch of fire and swords and a phoenix in her transformation, it's just pretty. She is being the perfect sword again, gracefully working her way through the battlefield and dispatching foes.
Hibiki is rougher by comparison but no less effective, and in a moment of growth for her, is wondering who summoned these Noise, trying to figure out where they are. (There's also a little subplot where the Japanese investigation plot gets resolved.)
Tsubasa is getting more aggressive, looks like she is seeing Millaarc instead of the Noise she is actually fighting. Her attacks are complete overkill because of this, oh no! There is definitely some sort of mind control thing still going on with her.
We are finally shown where the summoner of the Noise is, it's Millaarc and she was tailing Elfnein and Miku! Oh no! Millaarc reveals that she's there for Elfnein and there's a fakeout where it seems like she kills Miku as the credits hit.
Review
Of course Miku isn't dead, they wouldn't kill her off like this. But also, oh no! She's in trouble and the last interaction between her and Hibiki was one of unspoken conflict! And I'm also worried about the Tsubasa thing.

So... what was up with this episode title? I assumed it'd be something with Elsa's suitcase thing that her weapon is in, but she was barely in this episode. Very confusing.
Scores
7.5/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: A solid action scene and the brief slice of life hangout was fun. But a relatively quiet episode this time.
8/10 🎶 MUSIC: Tsubasa's battle song was alright, Elfnein's karaoke song was charming. Good enough!
9/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: Just immediately wrap up the investigation subplot the same episode in which it was explained, sure!
8.5/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: There was an unnecessary bath scene where Hibiki explains her karaoke plans to Miku, but it was surprisingly restrained. Opting more for cute than sleazy. Docked points, but nowhere near as bad as it could have been.
8.3/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: It was a useful episode, it put a lot of pieces in the correct positions, and for that it was pretty solid!


Summary	Wait, the last time on is back? So confusing when we get them and when we just don't... Hibiki offers her hand to Vanessa, the mission is aborted because SONG HQ has been compromised. Noble Red flies off and the opening hits. Looks like this is a legal loophole used by the Japanese government to investigate SONG and restrict their activity until they're done. It's pretty clear who is behind this. Tsubasa strangely agrees with the search. Fortunately our heroes aren't fully grounded, they get to keep their gears as long a they don't use their cool new amalgam power. Meanwhile Noble Red is meeting with Tsubasa's grandfather who returns the Divine Bracelet to them along with a large new stock of blood. He's not happy with them though, and their inability to get rid of the symphogear users, basically threatening them. So it's time for some tragic backstory! Of how Vanessa was a relic researcher for the Illuminati that got caught in an accidental explosion and then turned into a cyborg and experimental subject. This is where she met her two friends, Millaarc and Elsa. They eventually escaped and were then hired by Tsubasa's grandfather. A covert phone conversation between Commander Genjuro and his brother (who is a fancy government official) confirms that they are keep an eye on their father, Tsubasa's grandfather. And reminds us subtly that there will be a joint moon mission soon. We have a cute slice of life bit of the gear users and Elfnein where they consider how to spend this unexpected time off. HALFWAY POINT The answer is a day on the town! We follow Hibiki, Miku, Tsubasa and Elfnein during some shopping, some food and then of course Karaoke where Elfnein sings something super dramatic. Tsubasa isn't having fun though, she says her mind isn't in the right place... Miku lashes out unexpectedly at Hibiki because Tsubasa isn't having fun! Where did that come from?! She explains herself that the situation reminds her of when she inadvertently got Hibiki stuck at a concert by herself where she almost got killed (which kicked off the whole show). And she now blames herself for Hibiki continuing to put herself in danger to save others. The comparison is a bit of a stretch, but I get that this was an important moment for both of them. Unfortunately a SONG cuts off any chance for Hibiki to respond, Noise have appeared in town! There is a slightly awkward moment where Hibiki and Miku don't know what to say to each other, resorting to platitudes instead ("I'll talk to you later", "Stay safe"). After that Miku and Elfnein run off in the direction of the shelter and Tsubasa and Hibiki transform. Tsubasa's transformation is super fun! I know she's not in the best place right now, but there's a bunch of fire and swords and a phoenix in her transformation, it's just pretty. She is being the perfect sword again, gracefully working her way through the battlefield and dispatching foes. Hibiki is rougher by comparison but no less effective, and in a moment of growth for her, is wondering who summoned these Noise, trying to figure out where they are. (There's also a little subplot where the Japanese investigation plot gets resolved.) Tsubasa is getting more aggressive, looks like she is seeing Millaarc instead of the Noise she is actually fighting. Her attacks are complete overkill because of this, oh no! There is definitely some sort of mind control thing still going on with her. We are finally shown where the summoner of the Noise is, it's Millaarc and she was tailing Elfnein and Miku! Oh no! Millaarc reveals that she's there for Elfnein and there's a fakeout where it seems like she kills Miku as the credits hit.
Review	Of course Miku isn't dead, they wouldn't kill her off like this. But also, oh no! She's in trouble and the last interaction between her and Hibiki was one of unspoken conflict! And I'm also worried about the Tsubasa thing. So... what was up with this episode title? I assumed it'd be something with Elsa's suitcase thing that her weapon is in, but she was barely in this episode. Very confusing.
Scores	7.5/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: A solid action scene and the brief slice of life hangout was fun. But a relatively quiet episode this time. 8/10 🎶 MUSIC: Tsubasa's battle song was alright, Elfnein's karaoke song was charming. Good enough! 9/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: Just immediately wrap up the investigation subplot the same episode in which it was explained, sure! 8.5/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: There was an unnecessary bath scene where Hibiki explains her karaoke plans to Miku, but it was surprisingly restrained. Opting more for cute than sleazy. Docked points, but nowhere near as bad as it could have been. 8.3/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: It was a useful episode, it put a lot of pieces in the correct positions, and for that it was pretty solid!

Episode 6: Xenoglossia / "That's right, this song resounds with my heart just like Apple..."

Summary
And a last-time-on again, even in abbreviated form the goodbye between Hibiki and Miku stings. We see Hibiki and Tsubasa at the crime scene investigation. There's a lot of blood. And I absolutely do not believe either of them is hurt. The opening hits!
SONG is suspecting that this was very much a planned attack, that the Japanese investigation and the Noise attack both were just a smokescreen to pull this off. We are reminded of just how unique both Elfnein and Miku are. An alchemist with (parts of) Carol's knowledge and one of only two people free of the Curse of Balal. (They do obviously see them primarily as people though, and want to rescue them.)
Noble Red is... somewhere, some kind of new base, Vanessa is working on building an extractor for the Divine Power within the Custodian bracelet. Elsa announces that Millaarc is returning with the captives, plural. Told you they were okay!
Tsubasa gets a call from her horrible grandfather who finally makes it unambiguous what is going on, there is definitely some kind of spell on her and he implants the suggestion that she should come to his side when she is ever conflicted. All of her reverting back to her past "I am just a sword" nonsense is almost definitely part of this as well.
Genjuro explains that the blood found on the crime scene isn't Miku's or Elfnein's, to great relief of our heroes. They now know that this was a kidnapping, not a murder. Shirabe asks the smart question of why Noble Red would be interested in Miku, good job Shirabe! I guess it's time for everybody to find out about the divine power stuff...
We already know this though, so we cut to Elfnein who has been taken to a place she knows well. A place she helped construct, the remnants of the Châtteau de Tiffauges, Carol's stronghold from Symphogear GX. No sign of Miku, but I'm sure she's okay! We flashback to their kidnapping, getting the full story. The blood belongs to an annoying man that was part of the SONG investigation that I glossed over. And we learn that Noble Red very much knows what Miku and Elfnein are each capable of.
Miku is important because she's free of the Curse of Balal, Elfnein is there because she can activate... something in the Châtteau. Not the whole thing, but a large generator powered by discarded doll bodies...
HALFWAY POINT
Miku is dreaming, thinking that she has to make up with Hibiki, but is disturbed by a mysterious figure in the distance of her dreamscape. Wearing a familiar golden bracelet...
This has clearly been too quiet of an episode, Vanessa has discovered that SONG has evidence connecting Noble Red to Tsubasa's grandfather and ambushes a convoy of cars transporting this. Ogawa is in charge and uses fun ninja tricks to evade her, car and all. All to buy time for his saviours to arrive, which turn out to be Chris (whose transformation we follow again) and Maria.
It is now a high speed highway scene with our combatants jumping from car to car and trying to save as many civilians as possible. It's a fun scene! And Vanessa makes it even better by trying to confuse Maria about her relic, the Airgetlám. Turns out it's a relic with origins shrouded in mystery? Is it just an attempt at confusion or is there actually something going on there...
The highway has been blown up, Maria keeps Vanessa busy while Chris saves the civilians, it's an excellent scene. They are able to corner Vanessa but are interrupted by... huh, this can't be good. A gigantic column of light, of Divine Power, shoots up from the Châtteau de Tiffauges. Vanessa exclaims that it's too early for materialisation. Maria recognises the "song" that accompanies this event and a weird monster materialises in the air above Carol's former stronghold... Credits hit!
Review
For how light this episode was on action or songs or Hibiki it got quite a lot done! It's like the show is hurriedly putting in place for its finale. But... this is episode 6? What is going on here? I'm not complaining, I'm just confused and fascinated.
Oh, and I want Hibiki to rescue Miku please.
Scores
8.5/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: A relatively unspectacular episode is saved by the super fun Chris-Maria-Vanessa fight, it is inventive and fun and shows so much growth for Chris where she able to save those around her. Yes please!
7.5/10 🎶 MUSIC: Chris' song is nice and used well in the fight, the reveal of her carrying the car lines up especially well with that part of the song's lyrics. Buuut that's only one song for the whole episode. The disharmonious sound that the divine summoning makes and Maria's Apple song in a flashback don't really count. Even if they appear to be mysteriously connected.
8/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: We really have quite a lot of moving parts at the moment, huh? But at least it was mostly chronological today.
9.5/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: Miku is unclothed in her dreamscape bit, but if somehow feels less sleazy. Is that just me having been conditioned by this show and others? Not sure!
8.4/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: The streak of "solid but not phenomenal" continues, though it's interesting to see how it is because of different categories every time.


Summary	And a last-time-on again, even in abbreviated form the goodbye between Hibiki and Miku stings. We see Hibiki and Tsubasa at the crime scene investigation. There's a lot of blood. And I absolutely do not believe either of them is hurt. The opening hits! SONG is suspecting that this was very much a planned attack, that the Japanese investigation and the Noise attack both were just a smokescreen to pull this off. We are reminded of just how unique both Elfnein and Miku are. An alchemist with (parts of) Carol's knowledge and one of only two people free of the Curse of Balal. (They do obviously see them primarily as people though, and want to rescue them.) Noble Red is... somewhere, some kind of new base, Vanessa is working on building an extractor for the Divine Power within the Custodian bracelet. Elsa announces that Millaarc is returning with the captives, plural. Told you they were okay! Tsubasa gets a call from her horrible grandfather who finally makes it unambiguous what is going on, there is definitely some kind of spell on her and he implants the suggestion that she should come to his side when she is ever conflicted. All of her reverting back to her past "I am just a sword" nonsense is almost definitely part of this as well. Genjuro explains that the blood found on the crime scene isn't Miku's or Elfnein's, to great relief of our heroes. They now know that this was a kidnapping, not a murder. Shirabe asks the smart question of why Noble Red would be interested in Miku, good job Shirabe! I guess it's time for everybody to find out about the divine power stuff... We already know this though, so we cut to Elfnein who has been taken to a place she knows well. A place she helped construct, the remnants of the Châtteau de Tiffauges, Carol's stronghold from Symphogear GX. No sign of Miku, but I'm sure she's okay! We flashback to their kidnapping, getting the full story. The blood belongs to an annoying man that was part of the SONG investigation that I glossed over. And we learn that Noble Red very much knows what Miku and Elfnein are each capable of. Miku is important because she's free of the Curse of Balal, Elfnein is there because she can activate... something in the Châtteau. Not the whole thing, but a large generator powered by discarded doll bodies... HALFWAY POINT Miku is dreaming, thinking that she has to make up with Hibiki, but is disturbed by a mysterious figure in the distance of her dreamscape. Wearing a familiar golden bracelet... This has clearly been too quiet of an episode, Vanessa has discovered that SONG has evidence connecting Noble Red to Tsubasa's grandfather and ambushes a convoy of cars transporting this. Ogawa is in charge and uses fun ninja tricks to evade her, car and all. All to buy time for his saviours to arrive, which turn out to be Chris (whose transformation we follow again) and Maria. It is now a high speed highway scene with our combatants jumping from car to car and trying to save as many civilians as possible. It's a fun scene! And Vanessa makes it even better by trying to confuse Maria about her relic, the Airgetlám. Turns out it's a relic with origins shrouded in mystery? Is it just an attempt at confusion or is there actually something going on there... The highway has been blown up, Maria keeps Vanessa busy while Chris saves the civilians, it's an excellent scene. They are able to corner Vanessa but are interrupted by... huh, this can't be good. A gigantic column of light, of Divine Power, shoots up from the Châtteau de Tiffauges. Vanessa exclaims that it's too early for materialisation. Maria recognises the "song" that accompanies this event and a weird monster materialises in the air above Carol's former stronghold... Credits hit!
Review	For how light this episode was on action or songs or Hibiki it got quite a lot done! It's like the show is hurriedly putting in place for its finale. But... this is episode 6? What is going on here? I'm not complaining, I'm just confused and fascinated. Oh, and I want Hibiki to rescue Miku please.
Scores	8.5/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: A relatively unspectacular episode is saved by the super fun Chris-Maria-Vanessa fight, it is inventive and fun and shows so much growth for Chris where she able to save those around her. Yes please! 7.5/10 🎶 MUSIC: Chris' song is nice and used well in the fight, the reveal of her carrying the car lines up especially well with that part of the song's lyrics. Buuut that's only one song for the whole episode. The disharmonious sound that the divine summoning makes and Maria's Apple song in a flashback don't really count. Even if they appear to be mysteriously connected. 8/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: We really have quite a lot of moving parts at the moment, huh? But at least it was mostly chronological today. 9.5/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: Miku is unclothed in her dreamscape bit, but if somehow feels less sleazy. Is that just me having been conditioned by this show and others? Not sure! 8.4/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: The streak of "solid but not phenomenal" continues, though it's interesting to see how it is because of different categories every time.

Episode 7: Cutting the Tangled Thread / "If we're completely surrounded by danger, we have no choice but to fight!"

Summary
A recap of Elfnein discovering the generator? No wait, we see more stuff happening! Millaarc mind controls her to unseal it and activates it. Looks like this is what they needed Elfnein for. And with her usefulness ended Millaarc decides to play with her some more, hoping to break her mind with her mind control.
That sounds horrific, fortunately she doesn't get anywhere. She is thrown out of Elfnein's mind by... somebody very familiar. Carol?! Do shreds of Carol's consciousness remain inside of her own body? Whatever this was took a lot out of Elfnein though, causing her to faint.
After the opening we are swiftly caught up to where the previous episode ended. Activating the generator caused the bracelet to output far too much divine energy and this release of it power and materialisation of... something is the exhaust, the overflow, of this process. And Maria recognises the sound the bracelet makes.
The other gear users are deployed by helicopter, we follow Kirika's slightly-too-poledancy transformation again, and battle is engaged! The creature is a mass of tentacles and high power lasers, this is... one hell of a fight for episode 7. I'm pretty sure we've had finale fights less over the top than this.
It even has the unfair reality-reversing healing that we saw in the previous season. Fortunately we know what works against that, the team's God-killer, who saves the day (and more specifically an overextended Kirika), to punch a tentacle apart.
The creature is unphased though! It quickly ensnares her, she is able to break free but the effort (on top of worrying about Miku) causes her to drop her transformation. Without Hibiki there isn't much our heroes can do and they retreat.
Vanessa teleports back to the Châtteau de Tiffauges, grateful for (but confused by) the guardian it has summoned and is quickly brought up to speed on what happened. Millaarc reminds her that there is a loose end to tie up, wow she really has it in for Elfnein huh? (Or she's just generally cruel.)
Tsubasa continues to act weird under her mind control, people are definitely catching on that something is up with her that is outside of her control. But there's no time for that now, Maria ordered an analysis from the bridge crew! The weird bracelet "song" is undoubtedly linguistically related to the Apple song passed down in her family for generations.
The show reminds us that this is the same song that Maria used at the end of Symphogear G to unite the world's phonic gain and stop the fall of the moon... where is this subplot going? Fascinating!
HALFWAY POINT
We get a flashback to the start of the season, Miku and Hibiki in their Ferris Wheel date. Miku said something innocent up there. About the theoretical situation where she is the one that needs to be stopped from doing something bad... she makes Hibiki promise that she'll stop her if needed. That's not a worrying thing to be reminded of at all!
Noble Red moves in to finish off a still unconscious Elfnein. Surely they wouldn't! Okay good, Elfnein was just faking her unconsciousness by now and roll out of the way of Vanessa's strike. Still though, this is a precarious situation. Vanessa taunts her, asking her why she even wants to live, wasn't she part of a plot to destroy the world quite recently?
Elfnein takes this remark very seriously, this isn't her body, she lives on for more than herself, she can't die now. It's a good, dramatic moment. Vanessa respects it, but that doesn't stop her from closing in to finish her off. Elfnein calls out for somebody, anybody to save her.
At the very last second, a swordswoman steps in and deflects the blow. A VERY FAMILIAR swordswoman. It's the autoscorer from Symphogear GX that used to work under Carol! She is swiftly joined by her three allies, the gang's all here! They knock back Noble Red and flee carrying Elfnein. They were apparently discarded/faulty bodies chained to this generator to provide power to it.
The autoscorers are well aware that Elfnein isn't Carol, but she's sort of kind of like her so they will protect her for now. Elfnein uses the cover provided by the autoscorers to use Noble Red's technology and call home to SONG. They are relieved to find out that Elfnein and Miku are alright, but aren't really able to help with that beast hovering over the Châtteau. Looks like Elfnein and the autoscorers are on their own for now.
And Noble Red has just caught up to them! The yellow and green ones (Phara and Leiur) stay behind to cover the retreat of their master and allies. It's pretty clear that they aren't going to come out of this one alive. Or clear to us and the other autoscorers, Elfnein is struggling to accept this. Micha (the red one) keeps an ambushing Millaarc busy. It's just Garie and Elfnein left now.
They are heading for Miku, trying to save her, Garie carrying Elfnein, and throwing her right as a missile hits her. The autoscorers have failed. It's a touching moment. Garie tells Elfnein to be brave even when she is alone, like her true Master always was...
Noble Red strikes, is this the end for Elfnein? It is not! She blocks Vanessa's killing blow using an alchemical shield. Dramatic music hits. A harp is summoned. A transformation hits. We know this transformation, we know it well despite only having seen it twice before many seasons ago.
It is Carol's Faust Robe, Vanessa says more to herself than anybody else that she's sick of last second miracles when they are short on time. It isn't Elfnein that answers her, that is not her voice. It is Carol, declaring that she is the murderer of miracles. Cut to credits over one of her songs. Hell. Yes.
Review
Aaaaah! Carol is back! And the autoscorers saved the day! I love this show so much! Aaaaaah!
Scores
10/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: The first 10 ever in this category. But it earns it. Both the Autoscorers saving the day and then the Carol return are PHENOMENAL highlights of this already excellent episode. And that's before even going into the finale-level action scene in the first half. There's even a super fun jump scare for the bridge crew where Elfnein calls home and it's just the autoscorers on screen at first that I wasn't able to mention. Or Elfnein complimenting Micha's claw hands that she's self-conscious about as her last words to her. Aaaah!
7.5/10 🎶 MUSIC: A fun Kirika song for the first battle, an excellent musical sting for the save by Hibiki, and of course that awesome Carol song over the credits. Good stuff! Even if none of it truly soared.
9/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: These stakes, these reveals, in episode 7! We have quite a lot of season left, I promise! What are you doing, show?!
10/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: Ooh, a perfectly clean one. Yes please! That's going to be one hell of a score.
9.1/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: There we go, that's more like it. This was such a good episode! Carol returning is such a move to make, I don't even care how temporary it turns out being.


Summary	A recap of Elfnein discovering the generator? No wait, we see more stuff happening! Millaarc mind controls her to unseal it and activates it. Looks like this is what they needed Elfnein for. And with her usefulness ended Millaarc decides to play with her some more, hoping to break her mind with her mind control. That sounds horrific, fortunately she doesn't get anywhere. She is thrown out of Elfnein's mind by... somebody very familiar. Carol?! Do shreds of Carol's consciousness remain inside of her own body? Whatever this was took a lot out of Elfnein though, causing her to faint. After the opening we are swiftly caught up to where the previous episode ended. Activating the generator caused the bracelet to output far too much divine energy and this release of it power and materialisation of... something is the exhaust, the overflow, of this process. And Maria recognises the sound the bracelet makes. The other gear users are deployed by helicopter, we follow Kirika's slightly-too-poledancy transformation again, and battle is engaged! The creature is a mass of tentacles and high power lasers, this is... one hell of a fight for episode 7. I'm pretty sure we've had finale fights less over the top than this. It even has the unfair reality-reversing healing that we saw in the previous season. Fortunately we know what works against that, the team's God-killer, who saves the day (and more specifically an overextended Kirika), to punch a tentacle apart. The creature is unphased though! It quickly ensnares her, she is able to break free but the effort (on top of worrying about Miku) causes her to drop her transformation. Without Hibiki there isn't much our heroes can do and they retreat. Vanessa teleports back to the Châtteau de Tiffauges, grateful for (but confused by) the guardian it has summoned and is quickly brought up to speed on what happened. Millaarc reminds her that there is a loose end to tie up, wow she really has it in for Elfnein huh? (Or she's just generally cruel.) Tsubasa continues to act weird under her mind control, people are definitely catching on that something is up with her that is outside of her control. But there's no time for that now, Maria ordered an analysis from the bridge crew! The weird bracelet "song" is undoubtedly linguistically related to the Apple song passed down in her family for generations. The show reminds us that this is the same song that Maria used at the end of Symphogear G to unite the world's phonic gain and stop the fall of the moon... where is this subplot going? Fascinating! HALFWAY POINT We get a flashback to the start of the season, Miku and Hibiki in their Ferris Wheel date. Miku said something innocent up there. About the theoretical situation where she is the one that needs to be stopped from doing something bad... she makes Hibiki promise that she'll stop her if needed. That's not a worrying thing to be reminded of at all! Noble Red moves in to finish off a still unconscious Elfnein. Surely they wouldn't! Okay good, Elfnein was just faking her unconsciousness by now and roll out of the way of Vanessa's strike. Still though, this is a precarious situation. Vanessa taunts her, asking her why she even wants to live, wasn't she part of a plot to destroy the world quite recently? Elfnein takes this remark very seriously, this isn't her body, she lives on for more than herself, she can't die now. It's a good, dramatic moment. Vanessa respects it, but that doesn't stop her from closing in to finish her off. Elfnein calls out for somebody, anybody to save her. At the very last second, a swordswoman steps in and deflects the blow. A VERY FAMILIAR swordswoman. It's the autoscorer from Symphogear GX that used to work under Carol! She is swiftly joined by her three allies, the gang's all here! They knock back Noble Red and flee carrying Elfnein. They were apparently discarded/faulty bodies chained to this generator to provide power to it. The autoscorers are well aware that Elfnein isn't Carol, but she's sort of kind of like her so they will protect her for now. Elfnein uses the cover provided by the autoscorers to use Noble Red's technology and call home to SONG. They are relieved to find out that Elfnein and Miku are alright, but aren't really able to help with that beast hovering over the Châtteau. Looks like Elfnein and the autoscorers are on their own for now. And Noble Red has just caught up to them! The yellow and green ones (Phara and Leiur) stay behind to cover the retreat of their master and allies. It's pretty clear that they aren't going to come out of this one alive. Or clear to us and the other autoscorers, Elfnein is struggling to accept this. Micha (the red one) keeps an ambushing Millaarc busy. It's just Garie and Elfnein left now. They are heading for Miku, trying to save her, Garie carrying Elfnein, and throwing her right as a missile hits her. The autoscorers have failed. It's a touching moment. Garie tells Elfnein to be brave even when she is alone, like her true Master always was... Noble Red strikes, is this the end for Elfnein? It is not! She blocks Vanessa's killing blow using an alchemical shield. Dramatic music hits. A harp is summoned. A transformation hits. We know this transformation, we know it well despite only having seen it twice before many seasons ago. It is Carol's Faust Robe, Vanessa says more to herself than anybody else that she's sick of last second miracles when they are short on time. It isn't Elfnein that answers her, that is not her voice. It is Carol, declaring that she is the murderer of miracles. Cut to credits over one of her songs. Hell. Yes.
Review	Aaaaah! Carol is back! And the autoscorers saved the day! I love this show so much! Aaaaaah!
Scores	10/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: The first 10 ever in this category. But it earns it. Both the Autoscorers saving the day and then the Carol return are PHENOMENAL highlights of this already excellent episode. And that's before even going into the finale-level action scene in the first half. There's even a super fun jump scare for the bridge crew where Elfnein calls home and it's just the autoscorers on screen at first that I wasn't able to mention. Or Elfnein complimenting Micha's claw hands that she's self-conscious about as her last words to her. Aaaah! 7.5/10 🎶 MUSIC: A fun Kirika song for the first battle, an excellent musical sting for the save by Hibiki, and of course that awesome Carol song over the credits. Good stuff! Even if none of it truly soared. 9/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: These stakes, these reveals, in episode 7! We have quite a lot of season left, I promise! What are you doing, show?! 10/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: Ooh, a perfectly clean one. Yes please! That's going to be one hell of a score. 9.1/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: There we go, that's more like it. This was such a good episode! Carol returning is such a move to make, I don't even care how temporary it turns out being.

Episode 8: XV / "Such words are not fit for a villain to say."

Summary
After a brief reminder that yes, Carol is back and the opening we are for some reason not given an episode title... surely that doesn't mean anything dramatic. Don't look up at the episode title, play along. I censored it for a reason.
The aufwachen wave form for Carol's Faust Robe is picked up by SONG, that's Carol alright. No tricks, no illusions, Carol. And she's strong, singing with all she has. Noble Red go all out against her, all three at the same time, and they don't stand a chance, not even putting a dent in her alchemical shields.
After driving off Noble Red the spirit of Elfnein convinces Carol to prioritise rescuing Miku, and they have a very cute conversation. They are both very grateful for the autoscorers that were able to make this possible.
After that Carol calls SONG, she explains that she is going to save Miku and expects the symphogear users to take care of the divine creature. She says they are able to do it, despite the evidence to the contrary from the previous episode.
HALFWAY POINT
Carol explains to Elfnein that the creature hovering over the Châtteau is basically temporary storage for the divine energy before it can be sent into Miku. So what needs to happen to free Miku is to defeat this beast allowing Miku to be removed from the altar. She intends to use the power of the Châtteau, which has several powerful records built into it.
To activate this will require a tremendous amount of phonic gain, so our five active gear users (Hibiki is still unconscious) deploy to the area and start their superb songs. They've gotten stronger and those that need Linker have it, but this is still a huge gambit that takes a lot out of them. It doesn't appear to be enough though, Carol wonders why missing a single person is making such a big difference...
Her thoughts are interrupted though! Noble Red has fuelled up on weird blood and engages her again. It goes exactly as well as last time, but they have an ace up their sleeve. The conceptual labyrinth! They are able to surround Carol and deploy it, trapping her inside!
For a moment Noble Red thinks itself victorious, then the labyrinth starts to glow with rays of gold and shatters, a beam bursting forth from it and piercing the heavens. Carol sang all out to break through the labyrinth, it took a lot out of her but the phonic gain was massive.
Our heroes were caught in the beam of light and made use of it, the music swells as they descend from the clouds in angelic forms. Carol is unable to sustain her transformation though, and even her consciousness fades, putting Elfnein back in control of their body. She runs off to save Miku.
Noble Red moves to stop her, but something is very wrong with them. They are rejecting the special blood? Did Tsubasa's grandfather double-cross them and give them a bad batch? (Yes, he did.)
But, we have a divine creature to slay. Those angelic forms should be a decent substitute for activating the Châtteau's destructive forces. And they fire off a barrage of creative and spectacular attacks!
One small problem, by which I mean big problem, it's reverting the damage again. The bridge crew is doing something to support the battle, launching something... we only know of one thing that works against this though...
It's Hibiki! No angelic form, only barely out of the sickbay, but she is there to save Miku! Her angelic-transformed friends shield her approach as her gear cries out and falls apart around her, she only has one shot at this. Each of her friends has a little highlight as they help her along, and it's so very dramatic and cool! At the last second she is able to trigger her Amalgam form, at least, and punches right through the creature's strongest beam attack yet. She punches right into the beast!
As she does, we switch perspective to Elfnein and the altar on which Miku lies. Looks like the power was never meant to flow into Miku, Miku was supposed to flow into the power and now is actively doing that! Her body dissolving into Divine Power and being drawn upwards. That's not good at all!
So when Hibiki breaks through into the creature's hollow interior she is greeted by a very familiar sight. Her best friend Miku, dressed in a purple robe. A golden bracelet on her arm. She is confused, even more so as Miku wordlessly transforms into a slightly fancier form and declares that she is not Miku, she is Shem-ha. The one worshipped by mankind as the God of this planet. And then we get the episode title. XV. Smash cut to credits, which feature a montage of Miku throughout the series. Aaaaah!
Review
This series has a fun tradition of naming one episode per season after the season itself. Specifically the penultimate one. And then the final episode is named after the season's subtitle. The only season that breaks this format is Symphogear G, which doesn't have an episode simply titled G.

To intentionally break this rule in this way is so very fun, it feels like a declaration that the stakes are raised. That everything that comes after can and should be counted as finale.
I hope they can back that up!
Scores
9/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: Carol continues to be a badass, the angelic forms were excellent to see again, Hibiki going into battle anyway and being awesome. Yeah, this is good stuff!
9/10 🎶 MUSIC: The tiny musical bit from episode 1 is back! Played this time to lead us into the angelic forms. Also, an excellent Carol song and a fun song for the angelic form fight that isn't really sung by anybody. Yeah, good stuff!
10/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: We had one (1) hint of Hibiki getting close to waking up before we saw her get launched into battle. The rest is all done after the fact in an economical flashback, just to make the reveal cooler. Also, the utter moxie of pulling off that episode titling stunt is just excellent chaos.
9/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: There is a slightly eye-rolling moment in Chris and Maria's team-up attack where they press their boobs together. It just feels so unnecessary! But at least it's short.
9.3/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: Another phenomenal episode! Surely they can't keep this up all the way to end now. That would be madness!


Summary	After a brief reminder that yes, Carol is back and the opening we are for some reason not given an episode title... surely that doesn't mean anything dramatic. Don't look up at the episode title, play along. I censored it for a reason. The aufwachen wave form for Carol's Faust Robe is picked up by SONG, that's Carol alright. No tricks, no illusions, Carol. And she's strong, singing with all she has. Noble Red go all out against her, all three at the same time, and they don't stand a chance, not even putting a dent in her alchemical shields. After driving off Noble Red the spirit of Elfnein convinces Carol to prioritise rescuing Miku, and they have a very cute conversation. They are both very grateful for the autoscorers that were able to make this possible. After that Carol calls SONG, she explains that she is going to save Miku and expects the symphogear users to take care of the divine creature. She says they are able to do it, despite the evidence to the contrary from the previous episode. HALFWAY POINT Carol explains to Elfnein that the creature hovering over the Châtteau is basically temporary storage for the divine energy before it can be sent into Miku. So what needs to happen to free Miku is to defeat this beast allowing Miku to be removed from the altar. She intends to use the power of the Châtteau, which has several powerful records built into it. To activate this will require a tremendous amount of phonic gain, so our five active gear users (Hibiki is still unconscious) deploy to the area and start their superb songs. They've gotten stronger and those that need Linker have it, but this is still a huge gambit that takes a lot out of them. It doesn't appear to be enough though, Carol wonders why missing a single person is making such a big difference... Her thoughts are interrupted though! Noble Red has fuelled up on weird blood and engages her again. It goes exactly as well as last time, but they have an ace up their sleeve. The conceptual labyrinth! They are able to surround Carol and deploy it, trapping her inside! For a moment Noble Red thinks itself victorious, then the labyrinth starts to glow with rays of gold and shatters, a beam bursting forth from it and piercing the heavens. Carol sang all out to break through the labyrinth, it took a lot out of her but the phonic gain was massive. Our heroes were caught in the beam of light and made use of it, the music swells as they descend from the clouds in angelic forms. Carol is unable to sustain her transformation though, and even her consciousness fades, putting Elfnein back in control of their body. She runs off to save Miku. Noble Red moves to stop her, but something is very wrong with them. They are rejecting the special blood? Did Tsubasa's grandfather double-cross them and give them a bad batch? (Yes, he did.) But, we have a divine creature to slay. Those angelic forms should be a decent substitute for activating the Châtteau's destructive forces. And they fire off a barrage of creative and spectacular attacks! One small problem, by which I mean big problem, it's reverting the damage again. The bridge crew is doing something to support the battle, launching something... we only know of one thing that works against this though... It's Hibiki! No angelic form, only barely out of the sickbay, but she is there to save Miku! Her angelic-transformed friends shield her approach as her gear cries out and falls apart around her, she only has one shot at this. Each of her friends has a little highlight as they help her along, and it's so very dramatic and cool! At the last second she is able to trigger her Amalgam form, at least, and punches right through the creature's strongest beam attack yet. She punches right into the beast! As she does, we switch perspective to Elfnein and the altar on which Miku lies. Looks like the power was never meant to flow into Miku, Miku was supposed to flow into the power and now is actively doing that! Her body dissolving into Divine Power and being drawn upwards. That's not good at all! So when Hibiki breaks through into the creature's hollow interior she is greeted by a very familiar sight. Her best friend Miku, dressed in a purple robe. A golden bracelet on her arm. She is confused, even more so as Miku wordlessly transforms into a slightly fancier form and declares that she is not Miku, she is Shem-ha. The one worshipped by mankind as the God of this planet. And then we get the episode title. XV. Smash cut to credits, which feature a montage of Miku throughout the series. Aaaaah!
Review	This series has a fun tradition of naming one episode per season after the season itself. Specifically the penultimate one. And then the final episode is named after the season's subtitle. The only season that breaks this format is Symphogear G, which doesn't have an episode simply titled G. To intentionally break this rule in this way is so very fun, it feels like a declaration that the stakes are raised. That everything that comes after can and should be counted as finale. I hope they can back that up!
Scores	9/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: Carol continues to be a badass, the angelic forms were excellent to see again, Hibiki going into battle anyway and being awesome. Yeah, this is good stuff! 9/10 🎶 MUSIC: The tiny musical bit from episode 1 is back! Played this time to lead us into the angelic forms. Also, an excellent Carol song and a fun song for the angelic form fight that isn't really sung by anybody. Yeah, good stuff! 10/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: We had one (1) hint of Hibiki getting close to waking up before we saw her get launched into battle. The rest is all done after the fact in an economical flashback, just to make the reveal cooler. Also, the utter moxie of pulling off that episode titling stunt is just excellent chaos. 9/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: There is a slightly eye-rolling moment in Chris and Maria's team-up attack where they press their boobs together. It just feels so unnecessary! But at least it's short. 9.3/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: Another phenomenal episode! Surely they can't keep this up all the way to end now. That would be madness!

Episode 9: I Am a Father / "I kinda realized this halfway through, but this is really not something I can help you with."

Summary
We get the same little Miku montage again, but now Hibiki is narrating. It's very dramatic! Almost a callback to the Miku narration that bookended season 1. After the opening we see Hibiki is visiting her dad, I guess she wanted a taste of normalcy that didn't remind her of Miku. Looks like she is temporarily suspended from symphogear-ing because of her use of the Amalgam mode.
She opens up to her father about what happened, which means we get to see the rest of the scene. The rest of what happened. Miku or rather, Shem-ha, was struggling staying stable at the sight of the moon (which is where the Curse of Balal is broadcast from). Tsubasa's grandfather uses this exact moment to activate Tsubasa's programming, causing her to immobilise her allies and take Shem-ha away to her grandfather.
We follow Tsubasa, who is having a lot of doubts about if what she did was the right thing. The mind control is really doing a number on her. Her grandfather explains that what Miku is wearing is a Faust Robe based on the mirror relic from season 2 (the same one her symphogear at the time was based on) and that he is trying to reprogram her to be a weapon for Japan.
SONG isn't going to take this sitting down, they have acquired orders to arrest Tsubasa's grandfather and they bring Maria along (the only adult in the remaining group) to ensure things go smoothly... I'm kind of worried if it will.
HALFWAY POINT
Back to the framing device of Hibiki telling her dad about all of this, who admits that he has no idea how to help with any of this. I guess we needed a reminder that he is a completely useless man, huh?
The arrest attempt is happening. It's a strike team from SONG, Maria, Genjuro, Ogawa and Tsubasa's dad (who helps disable mansion security). Unfortunately things immediately go wrong, there are Noise all over the place!
Maria fends them off while the others search the mansion. Genjuro is the one to find his father waiting for them. I guess we're getting a boys fight for a change. To make things a bit more dramatic (and because Maria is basically done with the Noise distraction) we also have Tsubasa entering the battle, facing off against Maria. Maria does her best to talk sense into her friend, it's very touching. They have grown so close over the seasons.
Her words are getting through to her friend, and a well-placed slap knocks the mind control out of her. Hooray, Tsubasa is back! With some new traumas, but at least her ordeal is over now.
Which means that it's now time for the fighting boys, Genjuro is doing well but doesn't want to kill his father and this hesitation is exploited and he is defeated.
In all this commotion Noble Red has infiltrated the manor! The blood poisoning is still really doing a number on them, but they push through and are trying to transfer control of the divine power (or the direct feedback system set up to attempt to control it, at least) to them. This causes Miku Shem-ha to wake up, who viciously attacks them and appears to kill all three of them. Oh no! I know they're the villains, but they seem to have a tragic backstory and I can't help feel bad for them.
Back outside, Tsubasa's is sobbing on the ground while Maria tries to console her. Both of them have dropped their transformations. Which is bad news for Maria because Tsubasa's grandfather catches her off guard and sends her flying with a punch.
Tsubasa rushes to her side to check on her friend, her grandfather triggers her mind control to come to his side and is disappointed that it doesn't work. He has the utter gall to draw a pistol and fire a shot at his granddaughter, which is dramatically caught by... his own son, Tsubasa's father!
The old man is ecstatic at this development, which feels wildly inappropriate, but Tsubasa appears to have gained resolve from her father's sacrifice and her grandfather's horrible act. She transforms, it is time for some justice!
To the credit of his martial prowess, he is able to go toe to toe with her, deflecting even her strongest attacks. She has one ace up her sleeve though, which managed to get approved seconds before she uses it by the bridge crew, the Amalgam mode! Using it she summons a gigantic multi-pronged sword that shatters her grandfather's blade.
Her killing blow doesn't land though, her uncle Genjuro jumps in front of it and she holds back, detransforming and crying out in frustration. The earth begins to shake,a large red beam pierces the sky, it's pretty safe to assume that Shem-ha is behind it.
With the lifted restriction on the Amalgam mode Hibiki is no longer suspended and she is called into base. As she leaves, her father gives her a dumb reason for why he believes that curses and blessings are very similar and can turn from one into the other (they're written similarly), but it's what Hibiki needed to hear. With her spirits lifted she rushes off to face her destiny. Credits start rolling.
After the credits we are shown the Lunar ruins on the moon begin to glow... something big is going to happen.
Review
I guess if we're drawing inspirations from previous seasons it makes sense that we'd revisit the daddy issues from Symphogear GX. I'm just glad that Hibiki's dad wasn't in this more. And that Tsubasa's mindcontrol has been broken, wow that was a rough patch for her for a while.
Scores
7.5/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: Tsubasa versus Maria and Tsubasa versus her grandfather were solid fights and I liked the dramatic breaking of the mind control, but I didn't care much for the Genjuro fight.
7/10 🎶 MUSIC: We only get a single song all episode! Tsubasa's battle song resounds when she faces her grandfather which is exactly the correct thing for that scene and a great fit, but why was this the only song?!
9/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: Relatively straightforward, but the framing device of Hibiki telling her dad about stuff is a nice touch of narrative complexity. And the dramatic bit with Noble Red coming out of nowhere was fun.
8/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: One of Tsubasa's attacks against Maria strikes her chest and butt which are each granted a shot all of its own that we just didn't need to jiggle a bit. It really breaks the drama!
7.9/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: Somehow the worst episode of the season so far, but it did slot a lot of pieces into place for... whatever we will get next. I don't think any of us are ready, I'm definitely not ready.


Summary	We get the same little Miku montage again, but now Hibiki is narrating. It's very dramatic! Almost a callback to the Miku narration that bookended season 1. After the opening we see Hibiki is visiting her dad, I guess she wanted a taste of normalcy that didn't remind her of Miku. Looks like she is temporarily suspended from symphogear-ing because of her use of the Amalgam mode. She opens up to her father about what happened, which means we get to see the rest of the scene. The rest of what happened. Miku or rather, Shem-ha, was struggling staying stable at the sight of the moon (which is where the Curse of Balal is broadcast from). Tsubasa's grandfather uses this exact moment to activate Tsubasa's programming, causing her to immobilise her allies and take Shem-ha away to her grandfather. We follow Tsubasa, who is having a lot of doubts about if what she did was the right thing. The mind control is really doing a number on her. Her grandfather explains that what Miku is wearing is a Faust Robe based on the mirror relic from season 2 (the same one her symphogear at the time was based on) and that he is trying to reprogram her to be a weapon for Japan. SONG isn't going to take this sitting down, they have acquired orders to arrest Tsubasa's grandfather and they bring Maria along (the only adult in the remaining group) to ensure things go smoothly... I'm kind of worried if it will. HALFWAY POINT Back to the framing device of Hibiki telling her dad about all of this, who admits that he has no idea how to help with any of this. I guess we needed a reminder that he is a completely useless man, huh? The arrest attempt is happening. It's a strike team from SONG, Maria, Genjuro, Ogawa and Tsubasa's dad (who helps disable mansion security). Unfortunately things immediately go wrong, there are Noise all over the place! Maria fends them off while the others search the mansion. Genjuro is the one to find his father waiting for them. I guess we're getting a boys fight for a change. To make things a bit more dramatic (and because Maria is basically done with the Noise distraction) we also have Tsubasa entering the battle, facing off against Maria. Maria does her best to talk sense into her friend, it's very touching. They have grown so close over the seasons. Her words are getting through to her friend, and a well-placed slap knocks the mind control out of her. Hooray, Tsubasa is back! With some new traumas, but at least her ordeal is over now. Which means that it's now time for the fighting boys, Genjuro is doing well but doesn't want to kill his father and this hesitation is exploited and he is defeated. In all this commotion Noble Red has infiltrated the manor! The blood poisoning is still really doing a number on them, but they push through and are trying to transfer control of the divine power (or the direct feedback system set up to attempt to control it, at least) to them. This causes ~~Miku~~ Shem-ha to wake up, who viciously attacks them and appears to kill all three of them. Oh no! I know they're the villains, but they seem to have a tragic backstory and I can't help feel bad for them. Back outside, Tsubasa's is sobbing on the ground while Maria tries to console her. Both of them have dropped their transformations. Which is bad news for Maria because Tsubasa's grandfather catches her off guard and sends her flying with a punch. Tsubasa rushes to her side to check on her friend, her grandfather triggers her mind control to come to his side and is disappointed that it doesn't work. He has the utter gall to draw a pistol and fire a shot at his granddaughter, which is dramatically caught by... his own son, Tsubasa's father! The old man is ecstatic at this development, which feels wildly inappropriate, but Tsubasa appears to have gained resolve from her father's sacrifice and her grandfather's horrible act. She transforms, it is time for some justice! To the credit of his martial prowess, he is able to go toe to toe with her, deflecting even her strongest attacks. She has one ace up her sleeve though, which managed to get approved seconds before she uses it by the bridge crew, the Amalgam mode! Using it she summons a gigantic multi-pronged sword that shatters her grandfather's blade. Her killing blow doesn't land though, her uncle Genjuro jumps in front of it and she holds back, detransforming and crying out in frustration. The earth begins to shake,a large red beam pierces the sky, it's pretty safe to assume that Shem-ha is behind it. With the lifted restriction on the Amalgam mode Hibiki is no longer suspended and she is called into base. As she leaves, her father gives her a dumb reason for why he believes that curses and blessings are very similar and can turn from one into the other (they're written similarly), but it's what Hibiki needed to hear. With her spirits lifted she rushes off to face her destiny. Credits start rolling. After the credits we are shown the Lunar ruins on the moon begin to glow... something big is going to happen.
Review	I guess if we're drawing inspirations from previous seasons it makes sense that we'd revisit the daddy issues from Symphogear GX. I'm just glad that Hibiki's dad wasn't in this more. And that Tsubasa's mindcontrol has been broken, wow that was a rough patch for her for a while.
Scores	7.5/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: Tsubasa versus Maria and Tsubasa versus her grandfather were solid fights and I liked the dramatic breaking of the mind control, but I didn't care much for the Genjuro fight. 7/10 🎶 MUSIC: We only get a single song all episode! Tsubasa's battle song resounds when she faces her grandfather which is exactly the correct thing for that scene and a great fit, but why was this the only song?! 9/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: Relatively straightforward, but the framing device of Hibiki telling her dad about stuff is a nice touch of narrative complexity. And the dramatic bit with Noble Red coming out of nowhere was fun. 8/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: One of Tsubasa's attacks against Maria strikes her chest and butt which are each granted a shot all of its own that we just didn't need to jiggle a bit. It really breaks the drama! 7.9/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: Somehow the worst episode of the season so far, but it did slot a lot of pieces into place for... whatever we will get next. I don't think any of us are ready, I'm definitely not ready.

Episode 10: Not a Crude Color of Rust / "We decided to turn everyone into monsters!"

Summary
From the gigantic beam of light a gigantic veined stone pillar rises, Shem-Ha rides it up from the ground. She doesn't show it overtly but she's clearly upset that they were trying to control her, she laments that there can be no true understanding between people (blaming the curse of Balal) and attacks.
Maria transforms to deflect the attacks while Tsubasa and the non-combatants flee the scene. Shem-ha taunts Maria for holding back with her attacks, she clearly doesn't want to harm Miku. During a quiet part of the battle (Maria is grappling Shem-ha with her chain-sword), Shem-ha has a closer look at her opponent and focuses on her left arm, seeming to recognise it... She says as much and asks if Maria is a descendant of Enki. Interesting!
The battle heats back up with Noble Red dramatically joining the battle on Shem-Ha's side, not only are they alive they are far stronger than we have ever seen them. A red sigil glowing on their foreheads. Maria was only buying time for the others to get to safety which has now happened, so she retreats.
After the opening Tsubasa is informed that her use of the Amalgam was legal after all. Looks like we time-skipped a bit, her father has passed away and was buried. Hibiki genuinely and warmly welcomes Tsubasa back, the others support her sentiment. Tsubasa wasn't expecting this and struggles to take Hibiki's hand. Hibiki will have none of it and grabs her hand for her. It's sweet!
Meanwhile Shem-Ha is gather up power through computers somehow, vaguely explaining that she is language itself and that she's using the direct feedback system in reverse to do this. Vanessa is barely listening though, instead trying to piece together what happened to her and her friends. Because she remembers dying. We flashback and see them brought back, their monstrous powers enhanced far beyond their original hybrid form. They are now "complete monsters", never able to return to the human forms that they were fighting to reclaim.
They grieve this loss, but Shem-Ha proposes a solution, to aid her and erase all rejection and solitude from the planet. That doesn't sound ominous at all! Shem-Ha explains that she wants to return the planet to how it was 5000 years ago. She also empowers two teleportation vials (that Noble Red and past villains have used to get around) so that it glows yellow instead of red-pink... I wonder where those lead now.
Meanwhile SONG is heading for the launch site of the joint American-Japanese moon mission. They aren't the ones being sent up though, an American special forces unit is going and they are running security to ensure everything goes smoothly (because clearly something is going on up there and it seems related to Shem-Ha's plans). The rocket is scheduled to launch in three days!
HALFWAY POINT
A montage of evacuation, of patrolling, we've skipped ahead 2 days. It's time for some action! A huge swarm of Noise appears during Shirabe and Kirika's patrol. We follow the former's transformation and get her song as they tear into the enemy. Looks like the other two patrol groups are facing attacks as well.
With a spectacular flourish Elsa arrives on the scene, wielding every weapon we have seen her use so far at the same time. In much the same way Millaarc arrives to face Tsubasa and Maria, all her limbs empowered while keeping her wings. And Vanessa pushes back Hibiki and Chris with a barrage of multi-limbed strikes.
Noble Red is clearly out to stop the rocket, it's Elsa's job to take down the rocket while the other two keep the gear users busy. After declaring that they are Noble Red, not just the crude colour of rust (weird to see an episode title so clearly explained for a change) she combines all her weapons to basically form a wolf-shaped mech suit around herself and attack the rocket which goes up in a gigantic ball of fire.
Elsa laments, mostly to herself, that she has always felt walled off from humanity. Despite her goal being achieved she continues her fight with Shirabe and Kirika, who start a unison song to keep up with her. A dramatically amalgam transformation does the trick though, and their transformation and attacks are SO fun. The touches of gold give them an ancient flair and their attacks are as inventive as ever.
With a gigantic spinning bear trap move they take out Elsa's empowered form and explain to her the lessons they learned about walls not being there to keep people out. Between those two counters Elsa's resolve is thoroughly broken, but Noble Red's mission is still a success.
Vanessa and Millaarc jump to their bested ally's side to catch her and prepare to teleport out using one of the golden vials they got from Shem-Ha. Tsubasa rushes in though! She grabs the vial and breaks it at her feet, hoping to warp straight into their base and rescue Miku no matter the cost. Her friends and Noble Red both rush in to try to get caught in the teleportation as well and everybody makes it.
Cut to the SONG bridge where a scanning grid is zooming out and out on a map, looking for the signals of our users. They seemingly have disappeared from world! Smash to credits.
After the credits we see Hibiki wake up in a stone room. Chris is there with her, staring out the window in disbelief... at the earth floating in the sky. We're on the moon, baby!
Review
It couldn't resist taking us to the moon, and I'm so glad it did. It has played such an integral part in the series and it might finally be time to get some answers!
This was such a fun and good episode, bring it on!
Scores
9/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: Kirika and Shirabe fights are always so fun and I really dig the Noble Red upgrades. Also, WE'RE ON THE MOON NOW.
7.5/10 🎶 MUSIC: Fun Shirabe song and a fun Shirabe+Kirika unison. Nothing we haven't heard before, but it's still very fun.
10/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: Two time skips, a mostly offscreen revival of Noble Red, a surprise teleport to the moon, yeah that's a 10.
9.5/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: While Vanessa fights Hibiki she uses a measuring tape to briefly ensnare Hibiki around her waist. I think this was meant to read as an "oh no, she's taking my measurements" joke, as it causes Hibiki to blush. It felt weird though.
9/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: Just an excellent episode, only slightly held back my the music not truly soaring. You know what soars though? The moon! Let's do this!


Summary	From the gigantic beam of light a gigantic veined stone pillar rises, Shem-Ha rides it up from the ground. She doesn't show it overtly but she's clearly upset that they were trying to control her, she laments that there can be no true understanding between people (blaming the curse of Balal) and attacks. Maria transforms to deflect the attacks while Tsubasa and the non-combatants flee the scene. Shem-ha taunts Maria for holding back with her attacks, she clearly doesn't want to harm Miku. During a quiet part of the battle (Maria is grappling Shem-ha with her chain-sword), Shem-ha has a closer look at her opponent and focuses on her left arm, seeming to recognise it... She says as much and asks if Maria is a descendant of Enki. Interesting! The battle heats back up with Noble Red dramatically joining the battle on Shem-Ha's side, not only are they alive they are far stronger than we have ever seen them. A red sigil glowing on their foreheads. Maria was only buying time for the others to get to safety which has now happened, so she retreats. After the opening Tsubasa is informed that her use of the Amalgam was legal after all. Looks like we time-skipped a bit, her father has passed away and was buried. Hibiki genuinely and warmly welcomes Tsubasa back, the others support her sentiment. Tsubasa wasn't expecting this and struggles to take Hibiki's hand. Hibiki will have none of it and grabs her hand for her. It's sweet! Meanwhile Shem-Ha is gather up power through computers somehow, vaguely explaining that she is language itself and that she's using the direct feedback system in reverse to do this. Vanessa is barely listening though, instead trying to piece together what happened to her and her friends. Because she remembers dying. We flashback and see them brought back, their monstrous powers enhanced far beyond their original hybrid form. They are now "complete monsters", never able to return to the human forms that they were fighting to reclaim. They grieve this loss, but Shem-Ha proposes a solution, to aid her and erase all rejection and solitude from the planet. That doesn't sound ominous at all! Shem-Ha explains that she wants to return the planet to how it was 5000 years ago. She also empowers two teleportation vials (that Noble Red and past villains have used to get around) so that it glows yellow instead of red-pink... I wonder where those lead now. Meanwhile SONG is heading for the launch site of the joint American-Japanese moon mission. They aren't the ones being sent up though, an American special forces unit is going and they are running security to ensure everything goes smoothly (because clearly something is going on up there and it seems related to Shem-Ha's plans). The rocket is scheduled to launch in three days! HALFWAY POINT A montage of evacuation, of patrolling, we've skipped ahead 2 days. It's time for some action! A huge swarm of Noise appears during Shirabe and Kirika's patrol. We follow the former's transformation and get her song as they tear into the enemy. Looks like the other two patrol groups are facing attacks as well. With a spectacular flourish Elsa arrives on the scene, wielding every weapon we have seen her use so far at the same time. In much the same way Millaarc arrives to face Tsubasa and Maria, all her limbs empowered while keeping her wings. And Vanessa pushes back Hibiki and Chris with a barrage of multi-limbed strikes. Noble Red is clearly out to stop the rocket, it's Elsa's job to take down the rocket while the other two keep the gear users busy. After declaring that they are Noble Red, not just the crude colour of rust (weird to see an episode title so clearly explained for a change) she combines all her weapons to basically form a wolf-shaped mech suit around herself and attack the rocket which goes up in a gigantic ball of fire. Elsa laments, mostly to herself, that she has always felt walled off from humanity. Despite her goal being achieved she continues her fight with Shirabe and Kirika, who start a unison song to keep up with her. A dramatically amalgam transformation does the trick though, and their transformation and attacks are SO fun. The touches of gold give them an ancient flair and their attacks are as inventive as ever. With a gigantic spinning bear trap move they take out Elsa's empowered form and explain to her the lessons they learned about walls not being there to keep people out. Between those two counters Elsa's resolve is thoroughly broken, but Noble Red's mission is still a success. Vanessa and Millaarc jump to their bested ally's side to catch her and prepare to teleport out using one of the golden vials they got from Shem-Ha. Tsubasa rushes in though! She grabs the vial and breaks it at her feet, hoping to warp straight into their base and rescue Miku no matter the cost. Her friends and Noble Red both rush in to try to get caught in the teleportation as well and everybody makes it. Cut to the SONG bridge where a scanning grid is zooming out and out on a map, looking for the signals of our users. They seemingly have disappeared from world! Smash to credits. After the credits we see Hibiki wake up in a stone room. Chris is there with her, staring out the window in disbelief... at the earth floating in the sky. We're on the moon, baby!
Review	It couldn't resist taking us to the moon, and I'm so glad it did. It has played such an integral part in the series and it might finally be time to get some answers! This was such a fun and good episode, bring it on!
Scores	9/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: Kirika and Shirabe fights are always so fun and I really dig the Noble Red upgrades. Also, WE'RE ON THE MOON NOW. 7.5/10 🎶 MUSIC: Fun Shirabe song and a fun Shirabe+Kirika unison. Nothing we haven't heard before, but it's still very fun. 10/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: Two time skips, a mostly offscreen revival of Noble Red, a surprise teleport to the moon, yeah that's a 10. 9.5/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: While Vanessa fights Hibiki she uses a measuring tape to briefly ensnare Hibiki around her waist. I think this was meant to read as an "oh no, she's taking my measurements" joke, as it causes Hibiki to blush. It felt weird though. 9/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: Just an excellent episode, only slightly held back my the music not truly soaring. You know what soars though? The moon! Let's do this!

Episode 11: In the Beginning Was the Word / "Who was it who wanted to connect with others — to let them know how they felt?"

Summary
Clearly after being put on the moon in the cliffhanger what we want is a historical flashback, right? No?! Tough! We join a fight in progress: Shem-ha is fighting the boy we saw die at the start of the season, Enki. Shem-Ha has the upper hand with her transmutation magic and turns Enki's left arm to silver. As the infection crawls up his arm he cuts off his own arm, and fights to a lethal draw with one arm. Shem-Ha is dead and he is dying, tying directly into the opening scene. Hmmm, his dropped silver arm looks familiar...
After the reveal that this flashback was a dream Maria had and the opening we finally go to the moon. Maria and Tsubasa were separated from the others (presumably we're in three groups?). Maria is analytical about the situation, looking around, Tsubasa is sad about not being able to take Hibiki's hand earlier. Their conversation is interrupted by Maria's gear pendant shining brightly and its light opening a nearby door...
Noble Red is also here! Vanessa and Elsa run into each other. Vanessa laments that the return vial broke in the confusion, Elsa's weapon system broke and she's basically defenceless. Which is bad timing because the Lunar Ruins are full of custodian security systems (similar to the sarcophagus fight in episode 1).
Hibiki and Chris have just run into similar forces and Hibiki transforms as they both engage the enemy. Even at such a range the SONG base can recognise the gears activating, Shirabe and Kirika just transformed as well. Maria and Tsubasa haven't, which worries them.
We see the two groups of symphogear users and the pair of Noble Red users tear through the defences, with Hibiki being the absolute highlight in terms of power. She is utterly unstoppable.
Meanwhile the revived Shem-Ha in Miku's body is pleased with how things are progressing, the roots of Yggdrasil are spreading around the entire world. Miku's spirit inside of her tries to argue with her, that this isn't what she wanted at all. It's a disconcerting sequence, fortunately her girlfriend will come save her soon... right?
HALFWAY POINT
The reason why Maria and Tsubasa didn't transform is that they have encountered zero resistance, what is going on here? What makes them different? They find a control room of sorts where a hologram of Enki appears. It is the operating system of this part of the Lunar Ruins which happens to be the core of the Curse of Balal, are we finally getting some answers?
Maria and Tsubasa are able to use the control room to call home to SONG and relay the information they've learned. And, wow, it's a lot. Humans were engineered from the very start by the custodians to be cells inside a planetary supercomputer. Shem-Ha rebelled against this for greedy reasons (both sides were bad). Even though the Custodians managed to defeat Shem-Ha she was able to turn herself into the concept of language, allowing her to return to life when enough of fragments of her being were united together. The Curse of Balal was designed to counter this and prevent it from ever happening, after setting this up the custodians abandoned the Earth as a failed experiment.
Fortunately Millaarc finds them at this point and interrupts this huge lore dump by attacking them all out. She tries her mind control on Tsubasa again but she's not falling for that trick a second time. This is such a fun fight, the fully monstrous Millaarc has even more vampire powers, turning into bats and everything, and even summoning a blood-coloured duplicate.
But this is Maria and Tsubasa, they have both come such a long way, and with a resounding rendition of their concert song that introduced us to Maria all the way back in season 2 they begin to push back. When it appears to still not be enough we have a dramatic triggering of the amalgam forms and it's amazing. With one final spectacular combo attack they wipe out all (but one of) the bats that Millaarc had transformed into.
Kirika and Shirabe homed in on the noise as we see the final Millaarc bat scurry off to find her friends. That's four out of our six heroes united. They call back in to SONG to report the good news, but the base is in trouble! Not just the base, the Earth! Shem-Ha is making her move, Yggdrasil pillars rising all across the earth, starting to build the terminal network for the mind-controlling supercomputer. Uh oh!
Review
Weirdly little happened this episode, a bit of exploration of the lunar ruins and a fight or two, within the show this can't have been more than a few hours. It was excellent though! Even if this backstory of what the Curse of Balal is is... pretty far fetched and out there. Nobody said it had to be something sensical, after all.
Scores
8.5/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: The backstory fight between Enki and Shem-Ha was weirdly gory which detracts, but fortunately Hibiki kicking ass and the Maria-Tsubasa-Millaarc fight are awesome enough that it's still a respectable score.
9/10 🎶 MUSIC: An excellent Hibiki song is overshadowed slightly by the new rendition of the Maria-Tsubasa duet. Hell yes!
10/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: If the backstory wasn't enough chaos yet, the mildly chaotic lack of chronology when jumping between the different groups would have bumped it up a few more points.
8.5/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: Shem-Ha is creepy to Miku in their mindscape bit and Millaarc and her body double sure jumped at Tsubasa and Maria crotch-first. They're short moments, but they're not necessary.
9/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: An excellent episode! Despite the elaborate backstory/flashback segment. And this should clear everything up as we flow into an explosive finale!


Summary	Clearly after being put on the moon in the cliffhanger what we want is a historical flashback, right? No?! Tough! We join a fight in progress: Shem-ha is fighting the boy we saw die at the start of the season, Enki. Shem-Ha has the upper hand with her transmutation magic and turns Enki's left arm to silver. As the infection crawls up his arm he cuts off his own arm, and fights to a lethal draw with one arm. Shem-Ha is dead and he is dying, tying directly into the opening scene. Hmmm, his dropped silver arm looks familiar... After the reveal that this flashback was a dream Maria had and the opening we finally go to the moon. Maria and Tsubasa were separated from the others (presumably we're in three groups?). Maria is analytical about the situation, looking around, Tsubasa is sad about not being able to take Hibiki's hand earlier. Their conversation is interrupted by Maria's gear pendant shining brightly and its light opening a nearby door... Noble Red is also here! Vanessa and Elsa run into each other. Vanessa laments that the return vial broke in the confusion, Elsa's weapon system broke and she's basically defenceless. Which is bad timing because the Lunar Ruins are full of custodian security systems (similar to the sarcophagus fight in episode 1). Hibiki and Chris have just run into similar forces and Hibiki transforms as they both engage the enemy. Even at such a range the SONG base can recognise the gears activating, Shirabe and Kirika just transformed as well. Maria and Tsubasa haven't, which worries them. We see the two groups of symphogear users and the pair of Noble Red users tear through the defences, with Hibiki being the absolute highlight in terms of power. She is utterly unstoppable. Meanwhile the revived Shem-Ha in Miku's body is pleased with how things are progressing, the roots of Yggdrasil are spreading around the entire world. Miku's spirit inside of her tries to argue with her, that this isn't what she wanted at all. It's a disconcerting sequence, fortunately her girlfriend will come save her soon... right? HALFWAY POINT The reason why Maria and Tsubasa didn't transform is that they have encountered zero resistance, what is going on here? What makes them different? They find a control room of sorts where a hologram of Enki appears. It is the operating system of this part of the Lunar Ruins which happens to be the core of the Curse of Balal, are we finally getting some answers? Maria and Tsubasa are able to use the control room to call home to SONG and relay the information they've learned. And, wow, it's a lot. Humans were engineered from the very start by the custodians to be cells inside a planetary supercomputer. Shem-Ha rebelled against this for greedy reasons (both sides were bad). Even though the Custodians managed to defeat Shem-Ha she was able to turn herself into the concept of language, allowing her to return to life when enough of fragments of her being were united together. The Curse of Balal was designed to counter this and prevent it from ever happening, after setting this up the custodians abandoned the Earth as a failed experiment. Fortunately Millaarc finds them at this point and interrupts this huge lore dump by attacking them all out. She tries her mind control on Tsubasa again but she's not falling for that trick a second time. This is such a fun fight, the fully monstrous Millaarc has even more vampire powers, turning into bats and everything, and even summoning a blood-coloured duplicate. But this is Maria and Tsubasa, they have both come such a long way, and with a resounding rendition of their concert song that introduced us to Maria all the way back in season 2 they begin to push back. When it appears to still not be enough we have a dramatic triggering of the amalgam forms and it's amazing. With one final spectacular combo attack they wipe out all (but one of) the bats that Millaarc had transformed into. Kirika and Shirabe homed in on the noise as we see the final Millaarc bat scurry off to find her friends. That's four out of our six heroes united. They call back in to SONG to report the good news, but the base is in trouble! Not just the base, the Earth! Shem-Ha is making her move, Yggdrasil pillars rising all across the earth, starting to build the terminal network for the mind-controlling supercomputer. Uh oh!
Review	Weirdly little happened this episode, a bit of exploration of the lunar ruins and a fight or two, within the show this can't have been more than a few hours. It was excellent though! Even if this backstory of what the Curse of Balal is is... pretty far fetched and out there. Nobody said it had to be something sensical, after all.
Scores	8.5/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: The backstory fight between Enki and Shem-Ha was weirdly gory which detracts, but fortunately Hibiki kicking ass and the Maria-Tsubasa-Millaarc fight are awesome enough that it's still a respectable score. 9/10 🎶 MUSIC: An excellent Hibiki song is overshadowed slightly by the new rendition of the Maria-Tsubasa duet. Hell yes! 10/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: If the backstory wasn't enough chaos yet, the mildly chaotic lack of chronology when jumping between the different groups would have bumped it up a few more points. 8.5/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: Shem-Ha is creepy to Miku in their mindscape bit and Millaarc and her body double sure jumped at Tsubasa and Maria crotch-first. They're short moments, but they're not necessary. 9/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: An excellent episode! Despite the elaborate backstory/flashback segment. And this should clear everything up as we flow into an explosive finale!

Episode 12: Senki Zessho / "I didn't know taking another's hand needed so much courage."

Summary
No opening anymore. These days have passed. We see what is happening on Earth while Maria and Tsubasa fight Millaarc. The Yggdrasil pillar is slowly rising into the sky and also burying deeper into the earth. Shem-Ha monologues about her plan being complete soon, that she will use this army of a united mankind to strike back at the custodians that abandoned her here.
She is interrupted in these musings by a single figure that has come out to face her. Drawing upon all the courage that Miku showed as well when they were kidnapped by Millaarc, Elfnein stands to face this God. Carol is there to back her up once again and as she takes over and transforms we dive straight into battle.
It's a plan born from desperation, their Faust Robe and her song is powered by their collective memories. On top of that any damage that is able to inflict is easily negated by Shem-Ha. After a double fake-out she manages to snare Shem-Ha though. With a gigantic alchemical spell she strikes a devastating blow at Shem-Ha, regardless of Miku's safety.
Do we even want this to have worked? It didn't though. Shem-Ha used Miku's relic from Symphogear G and its powers of negation to absorb the blow. Is she really unstoppable? This was the one big move that was left for SONG. To make matters worse her plan is coming to fruition, Yggdrasil pillars pop up out of the ground all over the world and connect. Looks like we're all caught up to the cliffhanger we ended on last episode!
HALFWAY POINT
Back on the moon Chris and Hibiki are trying to talk sense into Vanessa and Elsa. Elsa seems open to conversation, but Vanessa doesn't accept this yet. She is here to destroy the Curse of Balal and give Shem-Ha free reign to unite all of mankind into a monstrous army. I guess we've got one more fight ahead of us against Noble Red.
After Chris' transformation song and a cool reveal where Vanessa now has two additional robot arms, the battle commences. After a few cool initial exchanges Vanessa transforms further into her final form. A sort of bee-shaped droid thing. Nothing a well timed amalgam transformation can't fix though.
This completely overwhelms Vanessa and her attack goes astray, blowing a hole into the exterior wall of the temple. That's not good, we're on the moon! As Noble Red is sucked out of the hole Chris charges up a new arrow attack and fires, missing Noble Red and projecting a shield behind them so the hole seals and they are safe inside.
Vanessa is thoroughly beaten though, she doesn't have a whole lot of limbs left. Good thing she's a robot. Chris talks to her about the importance of having a place to call home, which is a big thing for Chris and shows off how far she herself has come. She gets through Elsa and Millaarc and even Vanessa. Great! We've saved the day!
...except Shem-Ha has the ability to embody Vanessa, taking over her body. She will finish the job herself and destroy the control center, and with it the Curse of Balal. Vanessa struggles to get the words out, beseeching Hibiki to destroy her.
Hibiki hates this idea, but there is no other way, she strikes out right after Vanessa is able to touch the control center. An injected virus converts the control center's AI with a copy of Shem-Ha, she thinks she has won (and maybe she has), as she starts triggering the self-destruct protocols of the facility she explains that it was the world being united in song to stop the moon from falling that first reawakened her consciousness.
The camera pans out as the lunar ruins explode, back on earth the embodied Shem-Ha hovers over a beaten Carol/Elfnein. Her victory is complete. Yet she frowns up at the sky, what is going on up there?
A tunnel of blue light, its walls lined with familiar blue stones. Noble Red's Conceptual Labyrinth! And flying down this seemingly endless tunnel are Noble Red and our heroes in Amalgam mode. We did go out of our way specify that it was 380,000 kilometers long after all. Which is almost exactly the distance between the earth and the moon.
This takes everything that Noble Red had left, and they disintegrate into into particles of light. This also disperses the Labyrinth and Hibiki begins to fall, but Tsubasa grabs her hand. Without hesitation this time. All six of our heroes start to fall to earth.
In the meantime we see that SONG has been hard at work trying to block the technological invasion that came with Yggdrasil spreading across the planet. We have a super late introduction for two of Ogawa's brothers who apparently helped make this possible. It's a big "humanity can work together to resist evil" moment and it's quite well done!
Inspired by this news our heroes try to salvage their free fall, singing out their superb songs in an attempt to trigger X-Drive and stop their fall. The amalgam shields around them fail as they sing out, turning them into blazing balls of fire. Shooting stars across the night sky.
At the sight Shem-Ha smiles condescendingly, complimenting them on being able to return from the moon. But that they are burning up and this is their end. As the camera pans to follow the fiery path of these meteorites they change colour and course, forming a full rainbow of colours before smashing into the ground.
As the dust clears we are shown angelic forms more impressive than any we have ever seen, X-Drive was successful, let's do this! As the opening theme hits we cut to credits.
Review
AAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah! Let's go!

Was this technically more than a "Let's get them home from the moon" episode? I guess not, but it hit all the notes and I am so ready for the finale.
Scores
9.5/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: Was I annoyed with how gruesome things got for Vanessa? Yes. Is that reflected in the score? Yes. The Carol fight, the Amalgam fight versus Vanessa, the meteorite reveal, God this episode had a lot of good beats. And a gorgeous bit of animation where Hibiki runs and transforms to stop the overtaken Vanessa from destroying the control center. Excellent stuff all 'round.
8.5/10 🎶 MUSIC: Speaking of good beats, we had Carol's excellent battle song and a very good Chris song for the Vanessa fight but nothing new or very spectacular... yet.
10/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: Having the first half of the episode overlap chronologically with the previous episode, cramming in just a smidge more Shem-Ha backstory, paying off the 380,000 kilometre thing, surprise brothers for a secondary character. Yeah, maximum score, without a doubt.
10/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: I... I think we're clean? Yeah. Huh.
9.5/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: Oh wow, that's the highest score all season and the third-highest score across all seasons so far. (The finale to s1 and the opening to GX exceed it, but only just.) An absolutely phenomenal episode that promises a LOT for the finale.


Summary	No opening anymore. These days have passed. We see what is happening on Earth while Maria and Tsubasa fight Millaarc. The Yggdrasil pillar is slowly rising into the sky and also burying deeper into the earth. Shem-Ha monologues about her plan being complete soon, that she will use this army of a united mankind to strike back at the custodians that abandoned her here. She is interrupted in these musings by a single figure that has come out to face her. Drawing upon all the courage that Miku showed as well when they were kidnapped by Millaarc, Elfnein stands to face this God. Carol is there to back her up once again and as she takes over and transforms we dive straight into battle. It's a plan born from desperation, their Faust Robe and her song is powered by their collective memories. On top of that any damage that is able to inflict is easily negated by Shem-Ha. After a double fake-out she manages to snare Shem-Ha though. With a gigantic alchemical spell she strikes a devastating blow at Shem-Ha, regardless of Miku's safety. Do we even want this to have worked? It didn't though. Shem-Ha used Miku's relic from Symphogear G and its powers of negation to absorb the blow. Is she really unstoppable? This was the one big move that was left for SONG. To make matters worse her plan is coming to fruition, Yggdrasil pillars pop up out of the ground all over the world and connect. Looks like we're all caught up to the cliffhanger we ended on last episode! HALFWAY POINT Back on the moon Chris and Hibiki are trying to talk sense into Vanessa and Elsa. Elsa seems open to conversation, but Vanessa doesn't accept this yet. She is here to destroy the Curse of Balal and give Shem-Ha free reign to unite all of mankind into a monstrous army. I guess we've got one more fight ahead of us against Noble Red. After Chris' transformation song and a cool reveal where Vanessa now has two additional robot arms, the battle commences. After a few cool initial exchanges Vanessa transforms further into her final form. A sort of bee-shaped droid thing. Nothing a well timed amalgam transformation can't fix though. This completely overwhelms Vanessa and her attack goes astray, blowing a hole into the exterior wall of the temple. That's not good, we're on the moon! As Noble Red is sucked out of the hole Chris charges up a new arrow attack and fires, missing Noble Red and projecting a shield behind them so the hole seals and they are safe inside. Vanessa is thoroughly beaten though, she doesn't have a whole lot of limbs left. Good thing she's a robot. Chris talks to her about the importance of having a place to call home, which is a big thing for Chris and shows off how far she herself has come. She gets through Elsa and Millaarc and even Vanessa. Great! We've saved the day! ...except Shem-Ha has the ability to embody Vanessa, taking over her body. She will finish the job herself and destroy the control center, and with it the Curse of Balal. Vanessa struggles to get the words out, beseeching Hibiki to destroy her. Hibiki hates this idea, but there is no other way, she strikes out right after Vanessa is able to touch the control center. An injected virus converts the control center's AI with a copy of Shem-Ha, she thinks she has won (and maybe she has), as she starts triggering the self-destruct protocols of the facility she explains that it was the world being united in song to stop the moon from falling that first reawakened her consciousness. The camera pans out as the lunar ruins explode, back on earth the embodied Shem-Ha hovers over a beaten Carol/Elfnein. Her victory is complete. Yet she frowns up at the sky, what is going on up there? A tunnel of blue light, its walls lined with familiar blue stones. Noble Red's Conceptual Labyrinth! And flying down this seemingly endless tunnel are Noble Red and our heroes in Amalgam mode. We did go out of our way specify that it was 380,000 kilometers long after all. Which is almost exactly the distance between the earth and the moon. This takes everything that Noble Red had left, and they disintegrate into into particles of light. This also disperses the Labyrinth and Hibiki begins to fall, but Tsubasa grabs her hand. Without hesitation this time. All six of our heroes start to fall to earth. In the meantime we see that SONG has been hard at work trying to block the technological invasion that came with Yggdrasil spreading across the planet. We have a super late introduction for two of Ogawa's brothers who apparently helped make this possible. It's a big "humanity can work together to resist evil" moment and it's quite well done! Inspired by this news our heroes try to salvage their free fall, singing out their superb songs in an attempt to trigger X-Drive and stop their fall. The amalgam shields around them fail as they sing out, turning them into blazing balls of fire. Shooting stars across the night sky. At the sight Shem-Ha smiles condescendingly, complimenting them on being able to return from the moon. But that they are burning up and this is their end. As the camera pans to follow the fiery path of these meteorites they change colour and course, forming a full rainbow of colours before smashing into the ground. As the dust clears we are shown angelic forms more impressive than any we have ever seen, X-Drive was successful, let's do this! As the opening theme hits we cut to credits.
Review	AAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah! Let's go! Was this technically more than a "Let's get them home from the moon" episode? I guess not, but it hit all the notes and I am so ready for the finale.
Scores	9.5/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: Was I annoyed with how gruesome things got for Vanessa? Yes. Is that reflected in the score? Yes. The Carol fight, the Amalgam fight versus Vanessa, the meteorite reveal, God this episode had a lot of good beats. And a gorgeous bit of animation where Hibiki runs and transforms to stop the overtaken Vanessa from destroying the control center. Excellent stuff all 'round. 8.5/10 🎶 MUSIC: Speaking of good beats, we had Carol's excellent battle song and a very good Chris song for the Vanessa fight but nothing new or very spectacular... yet. 10/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: Having the first half of the episode overlap chronologically with the previous episode, cramming in just a smidge more Shem-Ha backstory, paying off the 380,000 kilometre thing, surprise brothers for a secondary character. Yeah, maximum score, without a doubt. 10/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: I... I think we're clean? Yeah. Huh. 9.5/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: Oh wow, that's the highest score all season and the third-highest score across all seasons so far. (The finale to s1 and the opening to GX exceed it, but only just.) An absolutely phenomenal episode that promises a LOT for the finale.

Episode 13: Let's Make History with a Light That Even the Gods Don't Know / "With the seven of us together, overthrowing a god or two should be simple!"

Summary
We get treated to their landing again. God, they look so cool. All of their hair shines in their gear colour and everything. Carol/Elfnein is also back on her feet. It's seven against one. Shem-Ha tries to unbalance Hibiki, asking if she's really able to face her while her friend is her vessel. Hibiki is not deterred though. She promised Miku that she'd stop anybody causing trouble, regardless of who it is.
Music starts. GOOD music. Hibiki sings. And Tsubasa. And Chris. Maria, Shirabe, Kirika, even Carol joins in. This is it. This is everything we have worked up towards. Shem-Ha unleashes devastating attacks and strong shields, but it matters not. Not even her attack negation is working in the face of this.
Her symphogear-negating relic is a threat, to be sure. But she is still completely overwhelmed. Our heroes aren't exactly sure how they are this effective, but they'll take it. Shem-Ha unleashes her true form, taking on a weird mechanical form with Miku perched at the top.
With a declaration that she didn't want the power she wanted the future that this power could build she fills the sky with an army of custodian combat drones similar to the ones we saw on the moon in Antarctica.
Our heroes cut through them, but the time this buys Shem-Ha allows her to launch a ramming attack at Hibiki. Shem-Ha taunts Hibiki, that she is trying to build a future where nobody has to cry due to a lack of understanding. The message is clear as day, she's talking about Hibiki and Miku and how they left things.
Hibiki vows that this time she will put her feelings into words. Shem-Ha counters that any words she has would be imperfect. That her vessel, Miku, allowed her in if only for a second because she couldn't put her feelings into words. Tsubasa catches Hibiki as she is flung back from the attack.
With an opening bought by a mech attack formed by Maria, Shirabe and Kirika combining powers (don't ask, there's a LOT going on in this fight), all seven of our heroes strike at Shem-Ha. Cracking both her extended form as well as their own gears.
Shem-Ha is only able to escape by pretending to be Miku and asking in her voice if Hibiki is going to kill her with her god-killing fist and using that opening to fling everybody backwards again. She charges up a big attack, the very attack that was so lethal to Enki that he cut off his own arm, and fires it at our heroes.
As the smoke from the massive explosion clears a single figure is blocking the attack. Carol is using her transmutation magic to fire back into the beam, burning her memories as well as Elfnein's. Carol asks Hibiki what she is going to do, what she wants to do. Hibiki cries out that she wants to take Miku for herself.
With herculean effort Carol manages to deflect the beam and even grazes Shem-Ha, turning a piece of her headdress to gold which is a fun touch. This took everything she had though, and she collapses to the ground, detransforming. Shem-Ha is frustrated, impatient, but pleased that this pest is no longer in the picture.
She was awaiting the lunar eclipse so the last remnants of the Curse of Balal would be extinguished, allowing her full mind control over humanity. The network of Yggdrasil pillars is working as an engine to speed up the rotation of the earth and makes this happen in seconds. Looks like we're in trouble! We see our heroes and humanity fall under the control of Shem-Ha. Purple particles glowing all around everybody she has under her spell.
After a monologue I won't bore you with she thinks to look down. There was one person we didn't see fall under this spell. One person who hasn't been affected by the Curse of Balal for a long time now. Hibiki is charging up energy around herself in turn, glowing in gold.
They start to fight each other one on one as the music swells. Hibiki yells that she will take Miku back. Shem-Ha says that she will fail, the her fists can only bring curses. Hibiki shuts her down with a single "Even So!". The music hits, it's the opening theme. She is convinced she can do this. For the future of the planet! For Miku! Her passion (and the divine humanity-unifying energy she had been gathering) start to wake up people around the world including her allies, gathering their hopes in her fist. Without the Curse of Balal people can understand each other and work together.
With an outstretched hand Hibiki rushes right into Shem-Ha's strongest attack and shatters it without effort, embracing Miku and severing the connection to Shem-Ha, dispelling Miku's transformation and with a declaration of love, carefully carrying her back down to the ground.
HALFWAY POINT - Yes, we have half an episode left. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!
In an improvised SONG base we see the bridge crew work, trying to figure out what to do about Yggdrasil. We also see an unconscious Miku and Elfnein, both seemingly unharmed but out of it. In Elfnein's dreamscape it is time for a tearful goodbye. Elfnein confronts Carol, asking her why she didn't burn Elfnein's memories but instead burned her own existence. Carol tries to play it off as greed, not wanting the memories Elfnein has of Carol to disappear, but we all know what's going on. With a final mysterious whisper in Elfnein's ear Carol vanishes forever.
Elfnein is shocked awake by an earthquake! It looks like whatever terraforming Yggdrasil was doing is kicking back into overdrive despite Shem-Ha being gone. A last task remains, travel down the main shaft, deep into the crust of the earth, and destroy Yggdrasil's core, hopefully halting the terraforming process.
Battered and bruised they set out, wishing that things will work out somehow. We see their progress through the eyes of the bridge crew as suddenly enemy signals appear all around them. A final line of custodian defence drones, thousands of them.
Our heroes aren't sure what to do, they don't have the power left to face such an army. Right as all hope seems lost a song sounds out. A transformation song. A barrage of powerful purple lasers from above fly past our heroes and take out the swarm of enemies in one barrage. A fully transformed Miku descends, tired of not standing side by side with Hibiki. Her and Elfnein are both fine and they slapped this together off screen in record time!
Hibiki enquires after Carol and Elfnein reveals the last message she was given: They shouldn't destroy the core of Yggdrasil, this will just move the control module to a different pillar/shaft and won't solve anything. They need to take control of it using phonic gain, just like they tried (and failed) to do with the Châtteau de Tiffauges earlier in the season and then order the Yggdrasil network to self destruct.
Elfnein explains that things are different this time. This time they have Miku, bringing the total to seven, which is an alchemically important number. The amount of notes in a musical scale, the amount of planets in the solar system, the very idea of a universal language itself is a combination of seven harmonies. This is also how their attacks were effective against Shem-Ha earlier (which Carol filled the seventh slot).
With this realisation and a vague plan our heroes arrive at the bottom of Yggdrasil and the crystalline control structure in its center. One final song to save the world, with everybody together. It's softer, calmer, more emotional. As the song grows and swells the room glows in gold and ghostly visions flow forth from Yggdrasil's core...
A smiling Finé, side by side with Enki. Professor Nastassja hovering over Shirabe and Kirika, Dr. Ver behind her. Noble Red, Saint-Germain and her allies, Carol and her father, Serena, Tsubasa's father and yes, even Kanade. It has everybody that was lost, everybody that was redeemed, everybody that brought them here.
A final superb song, in seven-way unison, why not I'm crying anyway. The control room responds and crystal pillars light up in each of their seven colours before the room explodes and the heroes beat a hasty retreat. They rush up the shaft, doing their best to outrun the explosion as their gears fall apart around them.
Behind them in the flames a monstrous figure emerges, a Shem-Ha made of smoke and devastation reaches up towards them with a yell of effort and grabs them in her gigantic arms as the explosion overtakes them.
In a barren mindscape Shem-Ha confronts Miku and Hibiki, asking them why they resisted fusing together so strongly, why resist breaking the Curse and work with partial understanding. Miku explains that it is exactly this partial understanding that allows people to care for others and come to love them. Even if this might cause trouble in the future they can forge the future with a light that even the Gods don't know. Shem-Ha smiles at this, bequeathing the future to humanity or the two of them specifically. With the last of her strength she stretches out her monstrous arms and carefully deposits our heroes back on the surface, clear of the column of fire.
Triumphant music plays, the same triumphant music we have closed 4 previous seasons with as well. Commander Genjuro helps Hibiki to her feet and with everybody looking at the rising dawn the credits hit.
As the credits roll we are treated to a seven-way rendition of the concert song that Tsubasa and Kanade performed to kick off season 1. It's gloriously full circle.
After these very nice credits we are shown a gravesite. Tsubasa finally has a chance to pay respects to her father. Everybody is there to accompany her. Miku narrates about the difficulties of connecting to others without inadvertently hurting people. The scene fades to a later time.
Hibiki and Miku, walking hand in hand under a gorgeous night sky. They're going to watch shooting stars again. Miku hesitates, she says there is something she has wanted to tell Hibiki for a very long time now. Hibiki says she has something exactly like that to say to Miku as well. Looking up into the sky she says that she hopes that they have the same thing to say to each other. As two shooting stars shoot across the sky, the screen fades.
Review
I love this show so much! Do I even need to say anything? Can I even say anything?! This is my show. The one that I care about the most, it's the best show for me. And thank you so much for joining me on this journey.
Scores
10/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: It would have been nice to have gotten a kiss. Also, this is absolutely a perfect score.
10/10 🎶 MUSIC: If you count the credits song this had THREE SEVEN-WAY UNISONS.
10/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: So, so much stuff is crammed into this episode. I didn't even go into the length explanation the SONG bridge crew has for Ryoko creating seven symphogear for exactly this reason and yadda yadda yadda. It was all so very much. Perfect score.
10/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: Technically Hibiki and Miku were naked in the mindscape where they made their case at Shem-Ha. It didn't feel sexual though. These were more their spirit forms? I don't know. Or maybe I just want a perfect score for this episode. Not as if you'll stop reading right here because of it.
10/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: It was a wild ride, but it utterly and completely sticks the landing. I love this show so much.


Summary	We get treated to their landing again. God, they look so cool. All of their hair shines in their gear colour and everything. Carol/Elfnein is also back on her feet. It's seven against one. Shem-Ha tries to unbalance Hibiki, asking if she's really able to face her while her friend is her vessel. Hibiki is not deterred though. She promised Miku that she'd stop anybody causing trouble, regardless of who it is. Music starts. GOOD music. Hibiki sings. And Tsubasa. And Chris. Maria, Shirabe, Kirika, even Carol joins in. This is it. This is everything we have worked up towards. Shem-Ha unleashes devastating attacks and strong shields, but it matters not. Not even her attack negation is working in the face of this. Her symphogear-negating relic is a threat, to be sure. But she is still completely overwhelmed. Our heroes aren't exactly sure how they are this effective, but they'll take it. Shem-Ha unleashes her true form, taking on a weird mechanical form with Miku perched at the top. With a declaration that she didn't want the power she wanted the future that this power could build she fills the sky with an army of custodian combat drones similar to the ones we saw on the moon in Antarctica. Our heroes cut through them, but the time this buys Shem-Ha allows her to launch a ramming attack at Hibiki. Shem-Ha taunts Hibiki, that she is trying to build a future where nobody has to cry due to a lack of understanding. The message is clear as day, she's talking about Hibiki and Miku and how they left things. Hibiki vows that this time she will put her feelings into words. Shem-Ha counters that any words she has would be imperfect. That her vessel, Miku, allowed her in if only for a second because she couldn't put her feelings into words. Tsubasa catches Hibiki as she is flung back from the attack. With an opening bought by a mech attack formed by Maria, Shirabe and Kirika combining powers (don't ask, there's a LOT going on in this fight), all seven of our heroes strike at Shem-Ha. Cracking both her extended form as well as their own gears. Shem-Ha is only able to escape by pretending to be Miku and asking in her voice if Hibiki is going to kill her with her god-killing fist and using that opening to fling everybody backwards again. She charges up a big attack, the very attack that was so lethal to Enki that he cut off his own arm, and fires it at our heroes. As the smoke from the massive explosion clears a single figure is blocking the attack. Carol is using her transmutation magic to fire back into the beam, burning her memories as well as Elfnein's. Carol asks Hibiki what she is going to do, what she wants to do. Hibiki cries out that she wants to take Miku for herself. With herculean effort Carol manages to deflect the beam and even grazes Shem-Ha, turning a piece of her headdress to gold which is a fun touch. This took everything she had though, and she collapses to the ground, detransforming. Shem-Ha is frustrated, impatient, but pleased that this pest is no longer in the picture. She was awaiting the lunar eclipse so the last remnants of the Curse of Balal would be extinguished, allowing her full mind control over humanity. The network of Yggdrasil pillars is working as an engine to speed up the rotation of the earth and makes this happen in seconds. Looks like we're in trouble! We see our heroes and humanity fall under the control of Shem-Ha. Purple particles glowing all around everybody she has under her spell. After a monologue I won't bore you with she thinks to look down. There was one person we didn't see fall under this spell. One person who hasn't been affected by the Curse of Balal for a long time now. Hibiki is charging up energy around herself in turn, glowing in gold. They start to fight each other one on one as the music swells. Hibiki yells that she will take Miku back. Shem-Ha says that she will fail, the her fists can only bring curses. Hibiki shuts her down with a single "Even So!". The music hits, it's the opening theme. She is convinced she can do this. For the future of the planet! For Miku! Her passion (and the divine humanity-unifying energy she had been gathering) start to wake up people around the world including her allies, gathering their hopes in her fist. Without the Curse of Balal people can understand each other and work together. With an outstretched hand Hibiki rushes right into Shem-Ha's strongest attack and shatters it without effort, embracing Miku and severing the connection to Shem-Ha, dispelling Miku's transformation and with a declaration of love, carefully carrying her back down to the ground. HALFWAY POINT - Yes, we have half an episode left. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! In an improvised SONG base we see the bridge crew work, trying to figure out what to do about Yggdrasil. We also see an unconscious Miku and Elfnein, both seemingly unharmed but out of it. In Elfnein's dreamscape it is time for a tearful goodbye. Elfnein confronts Carol, asking her why she didn't burn Elfnein's memories but instead burned her own existence. Carol tries to play it off as greed, not wanting the memories Elfnein has of Carol to disappear, but we all know what's going on. With a final mysterious whisper in Elfnein's ear Carol vanishes forever. Elfnein is shocked awake by an earthquake! It looks like whatever terraforming Yggdrasil was doing is kicking back into overdrive despite Shem-Ha being gone. A last task remains, travel down the main shaft, deep into the crust of the earth, and destroy Yggdrasil's core, hopefully halting the terraforming process. Battered and bruised they set out, wishing that things will work out somehow. We see their progress through the eyes of the bridge crew as suddenly enemy signals appear all around them. A final line of custodian defence drones, thousands of them. Our heroes aren't sure what to do, they don't have the power left to face such an army. Right as all hope seems lost a song sounds out. A transformation song. A barrage of powerful purple lasers from above fly past our heroes and take out the swarm of enemies in one barrage. A fully transformed Miku descends, tired of not standing side by side with Hibiki. Her and Elfnein are both fine and they slapped this together off screen in record time! Hibiki enquires after Carol and Elfnein reveals the last message she was given: They shouldn't destroy the core of Yggdrasil, this will just move the control module to a different pillar/shaft and won't solve anything. They need to take control of it using phonic gain, just like they tried (and failed) to do with the Châtteau de Tiffauges earlier in the season and then order the Yggdrasil network to self destruct. Elfnein explains that things are different this time. This time they have Miku, bringing the total to seven, which is an alchemically important number. The amount of notes in a musical scale, the amount of planets in the solar system, the very idea of a universal language itself is a combination of seven harmonies. This is also how their attacks were effective against Shem-Ha earlier (which Carol filled the seventh slot). With this realisation and a vague plan our heroes arrive at the bottom of Yggdrasil and the crystalline control structure in its center. One final song to save the world, with everybody together. It's softer, calmer, more emotional. As the song grows and swells the room glows in gold and ghostly visions flow forth from Yggdrasil's core... A smiling Finé, side by side with Enki. Professor Nastassja hovering over Shirabe and Kirika, Dr. Ver behind her. Noble Red, Saint-Germain and her allies, Carol and her father, Serena, Tsubasa's father and yes, even Kanade. It has everybody that was lost, everybody that was redeemed, everybody that brought them here. A final superb song, in seven-way unison, why not I'm crying anyway. The control room responds and crystal pillars light up in each of their seven colours before the room explodes and the heroes beat a hasty retreat. They rush up the shaft, doing their best to outrun the explosion as their gears fall apart around them. Behind them in the flames a monstrous figure emerges, a Shem-Ha made of smoke and devastation reaches up towards them with a yell of effort and grabs them in her gigantic arms as the explosion overtakes them. In a barren mindscape Shem-Ha confronts Miku and Hibiki, asking them why they resisted fusing together so strongly, why resist breaking the Curse and work with partial understanding. Miku explains that it is exactly this partial understanding that allows people to care for others and come to love them. Even if this might cause trouble in the future they can forge the future with a light that even the Gods don't know. Shem-Ha smiles at this, bequeathing the future to humanity or the two of them specifically. With the last of her strength she stretches out her monstrous arms and carefully deposits our heroes back on the surface, clear of the column of fire. Triumphant music plays, the same triumphant music we have closed 4 previous seasons with as well. Commander Genjuro helps Hibiki to her feet and with everybody looking at the rising dawn the credits hit. As the credits roll we are treated to a seven-way rendition of the concert song that Tsubasa and Kanade performed to kick off season 1. It's gloriously full circle. After these very nice credits we are shown a gravesite. Tsubasa finally has a chance to pay respects to her father. Everybody is there to accompany her. Miku narrates about the difficulties of connecting to others without inadvertently hurting people. The scene fades to a later time. Hibiki and Miku, walking hand in hand under a gorgeous night sky. They're going to watch shooting stars again. Miku hesitates, she says there is something she has wanted to tell Hibiki for a very long time now. Hibiki says she has something exactly like that to say to Miku as well. Looking up into the sky she says that she hopes that they have the same thing to say to each other. As two shooting stars shoot across the sky, the screen fades.
Review	I love this show so much! Do I even need to say anything? Can I even say anything?! This is my show. The one that I care about the most, it's the best show for me. And thank you so much for joining me on this journey.
Scores	10/10 🌟GLORIOUSNESS: It would have been nice to have gotten a kiss. Also, this is absolutely a perfect score. 10/10 🎶 MUSIC: If you count the credits song this had THREE SEVEN-WAY UNISONS. 10/10 🎬 NARRATIVE CHAOS: So, so much stuff is crammed into this episode. I didn't even go into the length explanation the SONG bridge crew has for Ryoko creating seven symphogear for exactly this reason and yadda yadda yadda. It was all so very much. Perfect score. 10/10 🧼 SLEAZINESS: Technically Hibiki and Miku were naked in the mindscape where they made their case at Shem-Ha. It didn't feel sexual though. These were more their spirit forms? I don't know. Or maybe I just want a perfect score for this episode. Not as if you'll stop reading right here because of it. 10/10 🧮 TOTAL SCORE: It was a wild ride, but it utterly and completely sticks the landing. I love this show so much.

Overall Thoughts & Graphs / The final graphs! 😭

And there we have it, Symphogear XV, the final part of my favourite show. In a way it felt like a greatest hits compilation, it was so very full of call-backs and rethreads from previous seasons. But in another it takes everything that came before and sets out to surpass it.

I think maybe it succeeded? What do the silly numbers say:

Gloriousness has a few dips, but it soars to heights never seen before twice!
Music was very stably sliding down as the season went on and then suddenly found its feet and went back up again. That episode 8 spike is where Carol returns.
Narrative Chaos was at an all time high. This was definitely the most challenging season to keep up with, I don't even need to scroll down to watch the comparison. Absolutely mad pacing.
Sleaziness struggled. I wish it had just been a boring flat 10/10 across the board. We really didn't need any of that. A few 10s though, those were nice to see.
For the total scores we only have a single episode scoring under an 8?! That is very impressive!
That leaves the season averages, and it should come as no surprise that every single category is better than it has ever been.

Some categories only went up a tiny smidge, some had decent growth, and then there's the narrative chaos category.

Messaging & Arcs / So... what is this show even about?

It can be very easy to just get swept up by a show and just enjoy the ride, especially a show as frantic and enthusiastic as Symphogear. But it's important (or at least interesting) to see what a show is actually trying to say, what (if anything) it is trying to teach us.

I think the main messages of Symphogear are tied to each of its core characters, so let's go down the list and see exactly what journey they took, shall we?

(It also gives me an excuse to use stills from the delightful highlighting they all got in the final credits.)

Hibiki is our hero and is carrying the show throughout. After her harsh trauma of a near-death experience at the instigating concert disaster (and sustained bullying for being one of very few survivors) she has deeply tucked away survivor guilt and is trying her best to be helpful, useful, to everybody around her.

Over the course of the show she is absolutely unwavering in assuming the best of everybody around her, regardless of how nefarious their actions seem. She will assume that things can be talked out and an agreement can be reached. This isn't portrayed as a flaw, even though the show has plenty of characters expressing frustrations with her attitude. And she is successful with so many of the show's villains, winning them over in the end.

Hibiki teaches us about optimism, being true to yourself (even if it means understanding you don't know something) and facing the Gods themselves to save your lesbian wife.

Tsubasa is the most experienced gear user and the legacy member of the team with her familiar ties to Commander Genjuro and many other high-ranking political figures. The concert that scarred Hibiki left at least as much survivor guilt for Tsubasa, but the main loss for her that day was Kanade. The person she looked up, relied on, trusted to always be there. The other half of her idol duo and quite clearly her girlfriend. This caused her to shut herself off, living only to fight, referring to herself as a sword.

Over the course of the show we see her slowly open back up to people, allowing them in and for her to care about and trust them again. She learns that she can have allies while still honouring Kanade's memory. On top of that she is able to face her family, from a literal duel with her horrible grandfather to a reckoning and reconciliation with her absentee father.

Tsubasa teaches about moving on from loss, grief and trauma, about allowing people back in and getting to choose your family.

Chris is the first of our redeemed villains and the final part of the season 1 trio of gear users. She lost her parents at a young age and because of that got stuck in a foreign country for many years. On her return to Japan she gets taken by Finé before (the precursor to) SONG can take her in, meaning she ends up on the wrong side of that conflict.

Over the course of the show she gets betrayed by Finé and at first just wants to mitigate the damage she helped cause without involving anybody. But that's not healthy! So a begrudging cooperation forms, her love of singing is rekindled, she learns to accept and rely on her teammates. Even a direct confrontation with her past in Symphogear AXZ only temporarily shakes her.

Chris teaches us that past mistakes need not define you, that it is good to trust people around you when they deserve it and that a gruff exterior can be a front for a very kind person.

Maria is the face of the villains in Symphogear G, pretending to be a reincarnation of Finé to keep her fragile alliance united. This goes dramatically wrong and even if it hadn't, the despicable Dr. Ver was planning to betray her from the start anyway and take the lunar ruins for himself. When we meet Maria she has already taken Shirabe and Kirika under her wing. We learn quite quickly that her sister Serena was also a symphogear user and she sacrificed herself when an experiment went wrong.

Over the course of the show Maria learns how to function in a less hierarchical group, finding her own identity rather than feeling like she is stealing the powers from Hibiki or Serena (whose two symphogears she uses across the seasons). Her being a descendant of Enki (and her relic literally being Enki's arm) doesn't really factor into her arc at all. She bonds with Tsubasa as an equal in many ways, with them both being idols who lost somebody very dear to them that have struggled to make connections.

Maria teaches us that it doesn't matter where you came from, it matters what you head towards. That it is okay to admit that what you were doing was wrong and renounce what you once stood for. That you can move forward.

Shirabe followed Maria in her rebellion like Maria and Kirika was raised by the FIS as a Receptor Child, a potential candidate for Finé reincarnation. With the major difference that Finé actually is awakening inside her (she gets over it though). She cares about her two friends, unequivocally her family, very much but struggles to allow anybody else in.

Over the course of the show she slowly learns to trust others and work together with them. She stops envying Kirika for her easy outgoing nature and becomes a full-fledged member in her own right. Despite being the youngest together with Kirika the two of them are the first to figure out unison which makes them a force to be reconed with.

Shirabe teaches us that it's okay to not always wear your heart on your sleeve, that it's important to let the walls you build not hold you back from reaching out and that it's important to fight for those that you believe in.

Kirika is an open book, she is cheerful and upbeat, despite having gone through traumas very similar to Shirabe and Maria. Her cheerfulness is very much a front, her putting on a smile to cheer up her friends.

Over the course of the show she learns to also be honest with herself and those around them. That she is who she is not despite but because of the rough path that lays behind her (though I disagree with some of the messages that that means those that forced her down that path should be forgiven).

Kirika teaches us that it's also okay to always wear your heart on your sleeve, to allow room for feeling bad as well and to try your best every day.

Miku is a gear user both last and least, only transforming briefly in Symphogear G where she is controlled and wielded as a weapon and then not until the second half of Symphogear XV. Despite this she is a core part of the show as Hibiki's best friend, confidante and wife. She is completely intertwined with Hibiki's journey and arc, but also has enough going on herself. She used to be very competitive and it wasn't until she met Hibiki who was selflessly trying to help others that she reflected and tried to improve herself.

Over the course of the show Miku finds out about Hibiki's dual life and comes to terms with the danger her friend puts herself in, deciding to help her friend in any way she can and aim for a world where nobody has to fight. Even after being cleansed from the curse of balal she struggles to be honest with her feelings, but she is always by Hibiki's side and ready to help her friend.

Miku teaches us to be true to ourselves, that it's okay to not always compete with others, and to always support your lesbian wife.

Religion, mythology and conspiracy theories also play a big role in this show and it was hard to find a fitting section to briefly talk about this, so I guess here will have to do. It's hard to not bring in religion when your finale resolves around killing God, but even beyond that the show goes out of its way to tie the show's narrative into all sorts of things.

There's the Tower of Babel mythology from the first season, an Atlantis-style sunken civilisation in Symphogear G, alchemy and illuminati aplenty in the second half of the show. From big concepts like Original Sin to small things like Maria's Apple song almost definitely being a reference to the forbidden fruit in the garden of Eden. Hell, Noble Red this season consisted of a werewolf, a vampire and Frankenstein's monster in a nod to classic monster media.

So... what does the show want to say by bringing all of these things together? Honestly? I don't know.

Part of that might be missing literacy on my part, part of it is probably that there isn't really much thought there other than rifling through each of these categories for interesting elements to include is a well of inspiration that most stories shy away from. I guess this very irreverence is a lesson in itself, it's okay to draw inspiration from weirder things as long as you don't horribly mistreat the topics. Symphogear, in all its weirdness, never called religion evil, for example.

Hmm, kind of a weird note to end on... if only there was more to talk about...

Next Up! / Hold up, what do you mean?!

This is the end of Symphogear. The story is concluded. That's it... right?

Not quite, there's rumblings of something new on the horizon. And not just the usual stuff about live concerts or the mobile game, it looks like we're actually getting more anime. During the 10 year anniversary celebration in November of 2022 a very nice little retrospective video ended in the following reveal screens:

Followed by:

It is entirely unclear what this is going to be and in the 9 months since this announcement we have heard exactly nothing. Will it be an alternate universe? A prequel? A sequel after all?!
Will Hibiki and Miku finally kiss on screen?

Only time will tell. But I'm looking forward to it!✨

With a song in my heart. 🎶

Mara's Monologues & Musings

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