Tales of Symphonia: Sylvarant OVA 1-4 [END]

That cool pose the main characters do in the opening song

Hiya guys, anaaga is bringing some old stuff again! The final OVA of the Tales of Symphonia series will air sometime at the end of this year, so I figure I should do the two ToS series now rather than two weeks before the final OVA. Don’t want to rush things ^^

The first episode of Tales of Symphonia is pretty monotonous; it’s a typical start for a game-based anime. Our Chosen one Colette is chosen (duh) by the angels to embark the journey of the World of Regeneration. She has to go to the Tower of Salvation created by the angels in order to achieve her goal of saving the world. Since the journey will be full of danger because of the Desians, who happened to attacked Colette at church too (although the Desians that Lloyd will meet later denies it). Collete will be accompanied by a mercenary called Kratos (aka hot BAMF) and her teacher…What’s her name again? Anyhow, Lloyd, our protagonist, can’t stop thinking about Colette because they’re practically lovers here. Suddenly at night the Desians attacked the village, searching for a boy with gem, which happens to be Lloyd. Lloyd accidentally uses the gem’s (Exsphere) power to defeat the Desians, revealing his secret to the villagers. Next day, Lloyd leaves the village with Genis (pronounced Genius lol) in order to catch up with Collete, their teacher, and Kratos. By the way, listen to the history the teacher taught at the beginning of the episode, about how the two heroes Martel and Mithos were able to bring peace into the world by stopping the Kharlan War.

Dating is hard when you get hooked up and ditched at the same day

*stares at flying human*

Ending the first episode summary with a journey

Back to Colette in episode 2. We get to see the world is slowly being ruined, and Colette is more determined to save the world now. Seeing the world like that, Collete becomes depressed but is cheered on later on since Llyod and Genis catches up with them. The group spends the first half of the episode defeating the two monsters for the Seals, and Kratos and Llyod have some kind of deep conversation about Llyod’s reason of becoming stronger. Surprisingly it’s not for avenging his mother (Why does Kratos know about this?), but it’s for Colette’s sake. Wait, that’s not a surprise anymore. While they’re moving on, the group didn’t realize that Colette was about to get killed while she was sleeping, thanks to Genis for being a excellent guard. Anyhow, Colette is still alive though (UGH) because the girl with that talking fox ended up not killing her, and we know this because the girl’s red hair friend said that the girl has no guts to kill. Back to the current situation, the Desians are surrounding them, and the group has no choice but to use Colette’s angelic power, which is making her enemy’s power fading by her singing. WOW, so amazing. Colette can’t take it anymore though since she’s still weak, so she fainted and the group has no choice but to escape…Helped by the girl that tried to kill Colette secretly. We find out that her name is Sheena, and once more she tries to kill Colette only being stopped by Kratos and his sexy moves; the group spares her though because she saved their lives.

You’d think she’s thinking about the world right now, but she’s actually staring at her own face #vanity

That bird is actually a Pokemon

Now onto episode 3. Before the action starts, Colette and Llyod are having one of their PDA moments. Llyod realized then that Colette’s sense is all gone; she can’t sleep, eat, and drink; after they destroyed the second seal, Colette realized that she can’t sense anything anymore, even hot and cold. Lloyd becomes frustrated of course since Collete didn’t tell him about it. Anyhow, now to the action. Sheena is struggling to defend herself from a bunch of Desians who jus burned a village but is saved by Lloyd and the others. The group and the rest are then head to the closest Desian base to save the villagers that are captured. Much to Llyod’s horror, the base is full of villagers that are being used to cultivate Exspehers. Here Llyod learns the truth about her mother: her mother was an experiment and she became a monster because the perfected Desian (the one that Llyod has) took control over her body, and the one who killed his mother is his own father (which, we all found out thanks to that stupid flashback). Llyod goes berserk and tries to kill the Desian commander but loses. Just when he’s about to get killed, Kratos saves Lloyed and kill the Desian commander. Because Llyod finds out about the truth about Exspheres (that it’s made out of human lives), Llyod throws his Exsphere that Kratos picked up later on. Yes, Llyod destroyed the last seal without the Exspehere, with lots of struggle. Llyod becomes all emo and depressed because of his family, but then he realized that Colette is suffering more because Colette lost her voice. After Colette consoles her (not with sex, unfortunately), Llyod goes to Kratos and asks for his Exsphere back. Llod realizes that Colette is suffering a lot and decides that he will protect her, even though if he has to use the Exsphere’s power. Lloyd decides that if Colette loses all of her sense, he will be the one that will feel everything just for Colette.

Still no sex

Gee, I wonder who Lloyd’s father is!

Everything is wrapped up in episode 4. Well, everything for the Sylvarant part. Colette secretly goes to the Tower of Salvation with Kratos in order to give up the last two things remain in her: her heart and memories. Awakened by the noise of the broken barrier, Llyod and the others try to catch up with Colette, but instead they find out the truth behind their journey; Genis’s sister (AAHH WHAT’S HER NAME!?!?) tells Lloyd that the whole point of this journey is Colette’s death (which is actually all right in my opinion), since Colette is sacrificing everything she has to become an angel. Llyod doesn’t want to give up though, and just when he’s about to continue walking, some bishie dude named Yuan, the leader of Renegades. FINALLY, Yuan tells them what the salvation is all about. It’s the project by the angels of choosing someone to become a vessel for Martel, the dead hero. Yuan gives them a lift to Tower of Salvation because they have the same goal. Seeing Kratos at the entrance of the Tower of Salvation, Llyod asks Kratos for help, but Kratos refuses to because he’s SHOKKU one of the four Seraphim that manages the world, hence explains the girly-looking wings he showed. Yuan attacks Kratos, and Llyod’s groups moves on into the Tower of Salvation.

But Llyod is too late, because Colette is unconscious now since her body is officially a vessel. Of course, she said goodbye to Llyod first. After losing conscious from fighting with the ugly angel, Llyod wakes up only to find himself in Renegades’s HQ. Yeah, Yuan killed the ugly angel. Yuan explains that their purpose is to stop the salvation system, even if it means to kill the Chosen One (which doesn’t work unfortunately); Llyod is necessary to stop the salvation system, but Yuan becomes a greedy dude for some unknown reason and refuses to tell Llyod why he’s necessary. So YEAH, it was actually the Renegades not Cruxis who attacked Colette at church. Anyhow, Sheena appears like a badass and rescues Llyod’s party. Sheena tells Llyod that there might be a way to cure Colette, but they have to go to Sheena’s world, the other world that’s not known by the Sylvarant civilians. Sheena tells them that they might not be able to go back to Sylvarant, but Llyod doesn’t mind because he’s over-obsessed with Colette and her conscious. Llyod’s party, joined by Sheena now, uses the vespa-look-alike vehicles to cross the dimension into Tethe’alla, the other world. And ohai there evil-looking blond bishie.

In an empty room with a flying old man, and glowing? THIS LOOKS SUSPICIOUS

Show off

If you can’t make a cocky smile, then you’re not a bishie #bishierule

End Thoughts:

The first part of the Tales of Symphonia series didn’t impress me at all. I’ve heard so many good things about it so I expected something great from the ToS series. I need to stop expecting too much from a series because this is what happens when I expect too much. Sure, ToS has a pretty interesting concept. It’s understandable that the first part of the OVA will not be that stunning, but god the first part was boring. No, we’re not talking about Blood-C kind of boring where the character is doing monotonous activities in every episode to the point where you want to kill the characters. ToS the first part is monotonous, but in a RPG way. Know those characters in games that act as a guide? Or the characters that always give you quests? Or explanations when the player just arrive in town? Or an old man that gives direction (Gintama pun here)? YES, it’s THAT kind of boring! Everything is explained so monotonously. Suddenly an angel pops out, telling Colette the direction to the Tower of Salvation. Then there’s Sheena who was able to explain all about Tethe’alla in three minutes. Oh wait, Yuan and his explanation about Cruxis in two minutes! There are times when an audience will be in SHOKKU with the revelations in the anime because, WOW it’s a SHOCK! But in here? I’m seriously not feeling it.

Yuan: *explains about Cruxis and angels*

Lloyd and his group are in SHOKKU mode

Me:……*picks nose*

It’s not that ToS is predictable, but everything feels like a breeze; it just passes, nothing outstanding or remarkable at all.

And the characters? I have mixed feelings about them. They are not developing at all, but it’s understandable since this is the first of three parts. However, the only character I like here is Kratos because he’s hot. First, why are Colette and Llyod twelve years old? THEY’RE UNDERAGE. HOW THE HELL CAN LLYOD BE TALLER THAN ME, AND I’M DAMN 17 YEARS OLD!? I have no problem with Colette at all, but sometimes she annoys me to death. Like that time when she smiles. And smiles. Then smiles. Again, smile. But props to her for willing to sacrifice herself just for her world. Stupid, but yeah, that’s a lot of to sacrifice right there. The person I can’t stand here is Llyod. He keeps saying that he will “get stronger” to “protect Colette,” but all he did is talking about it, not putting it into action. It amazes me how he’s so weak in the first three OVAs, then suddenly he effin glows in the fourth OVA and starts shooting some gold beams out of nowhere. Jeez, that fails so bad.

So yeah, all hail Kratos…But not his costume. Seriously, who the heck designed the costumes for the characters? I’m fine with Colette’s, Genis’s sister’s, and Genis’s, but Kratos’s clothes is just plain horrid. He’s wearing tight pants that aren’t even leather or cool. His cape looks like a misshaped wings. And don’t even let me start on that part around his shoulder. Every time I see that part, my heart starts crying because it looks so terrible on Kratos. Metaphor, foreshadowing, eff that. Kratos’s clothes is horrible, and that’s it. Surprisingly, I like Llyod’s costume. Father needs to learn from his son. Fortunately, his clothes did get better at the end of the fourth OVA. The pants don’t look as tight as before, and SOMETHING covers his armpit. About time Kratos.

Thankfully, the animation for ToS is GREAT. Everything’s smooth and sharp, and the colors are so PRETTEH. And gosh, the soundtrack is just amaziiiingggg. Everybody should listen to ToS soundtrack ASAP and get hooked with it. I didn’t like the OP song at first, but I got addicted to it. That voice is just pure amazing. And the BGMs fits the scenes perfectly. Unfortunately, that still didn’t make ToS: Sylvarant remarkable.

Overall, Tos: Sylvarant is so-so. It’s interesting, but it’s not being executed greatly. Some will be mad at me for not liking this, but WHATEVER. Anime is all about first impressions and prequels. I refuse to watch sequels of things that bore me to death. Unfortunately, ToS isn’t as bad as Blood-C. It’s good, but it needs to be more striking and conspicuous.  But yeah, I’m going to watch this until the end because it’s interesting, and I have a feeling it will be more exciting later on. I hope.