PART 10: HOW TO COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY WASTE GREAT CHARACTER DESIGNS AND CONCEPTS

So the thing the general Symphogear fanbase gained most from GX was fanart of the Autoscorers (the dolls). And I mean a fucking lot of it. They're really lovable from a design standpoint: Aesthetically pleasing, color-matched, and they have unique personalities that are all immediately apparent just from looking at them. But in the show itself, there's nothing to do but dislike them. They're woefully underdeveloped and serve as the vessel behind the most aggravating parts of the show (The stupid as fuck break all gears then lose on purpose thing I talked about before). Their dialogue is grating and used solely as overdone foreshadowing/exposition. It's an utter shame, but people still like them to this day entirely off of how damn good whoever thought them up was.

How do you fuck this up.

Each individual Autoscorer is themed off of music, dances, elements, a suit of old-ass tarot cards, and even have individualized soundclips for when they move about with their movement also based in part around the sound they make. Hell their names are even rooted in angels. It's really well thought out and charming which makes their misuse hurt that much more. Garie moves about by spinning like a music box doll. Micha makes silly as fuck cuckoo clock sounds while having the most erratic and animated movement of the bunch. Leiur has stylish breakdance maneuvers she uses while fighting with her suit of coins in a variety of creative ways. Phara is constantly gripping her dress and Flamencoing all around to dodge attacks and fight using her sword. All of 'em make consistent use of their elemental affinity, and you'd think, "Hey, they pulled all that off, why are you complaining?"

That's why.

The biggest apparent problem is that despite the dolls being designed to be really cool in fights, the choreography is consistently god awful. Instead of the Autoscorers themselves being the big focus of one on ones or even two on ones, They summon a shitload of Noise in every fight that makes the budget go down the drain and makes it so that the Gears are constantly mowing down pointless mobs rather than having meaningful interactions with the Autoscorers. The most you'll see is crap like Garie's infuriating bubble illusion shit, Micha's constant diamond projectiles, a few gusts of wind from Phara, and... actually Leiur probably got off the best as far as her fighting being the focus of her battles. One victory I guess?

Fuck you!

Their personalities have a good basis and in the show you can tell what they were meant to be like, but as stated a bit ago all their dialogue is just shittalking the heroes (and not in a charming way) or spelling out the Ignite plan constantly. It's not like they didn't have any ideas either, there's an entire OVA dedicated to them and it treats them better than anything in the actual show does! What the fuck. Hell, Carol herself has a lot more character in said OVA than in the show, too! The dolls bounce off of each other charmingly, tease their master, have moments together, and everything. The show has very slight and short bits that hint at the things the OVA fleshes out, but it's not given nearly enough focus.

All you needed to do was let the villains banter with each other and the Gears!

I keep going back to this, but the way that their role is set up, again, forces them to win four times in a row and then lose four times in a row. Garie isn't even fucking trying in her final fight, she's screaming about how cool it is that she's about to die. Phara has the perfect counter to her opponent but only uses it to goad her into Ignite so she can lose. Leiur and Micha are at least actually fucking trying to win and have the best fights as a result of it, but by the time they get to them you're already sick of seeing the fucking dolls due to how they're used. It simply doesn't work. No matter how many shirts Micha burns off.

AND EVEN THEN ALL THEY LET HER SAY IS "YES PLAY INTO MY MASTER'S PLAN"

Fuck Symphogear GX.

leiur is so cool what a waste :(

exceptional work as always draku. you should be given the title of MW's Anime Critic

This post was last modified: Oct 18, 2017 at 6:24 AM by Elyk.

Remember Leiur's little sister and how she tossed the boats at Chris at the start of the show which was really cool but then was never even seen again until she was used for a cliffhanger? Where she didn't even accomplish anything and was one shot at the start of the next episode?

Remember Leiur's little sister and how she tossed the boats at Chris at the start of the show and then was never even seen again until she was used for a cliffhanger? Where she didn't even accomplish anything and was one shot at the start of the next episode?

i kept meaning to mention that but in the end forgot to

that was the dumbest thing