Free! the Final Stroke: The Second Volume

Hinata1329★ 10

This is my very first review and in fact I just realized that it's kinda crazy since I have had this passion for anime and manga my whole life but this franchise ''FREE'' is my favorite of the whole wide world. I have been watching anime since I was probably 6 years old and I have been obsessed with them. However it's truly since the Pandemic of 2020 that I literally decided to literally do daily marathons of all my favorite anime + the seasonal new ones that are coming out year after year and I started buying manga and building my collection for ayear now. Talking back to the anime that is ''Free'' I have read the first light novel + watched the entire 3 seasons several times back to back + watched every Youtube special episodes + every trailer and its international editions + all the OVA episodes + and every single films made in existence ahahahaha = therefore I think I can consider myself an expert on this anime franchise and its amazing characters. Now that I have explained the reasons why I feel I can write an honest review about this I will share my thoughts to help people decide to watch this movie or not. Ok, so just so you know I gave 10/10 to this movie because it sincerely plays back sooooo many key moments of the entire story and the entire whole decade since it first started. Every scene, every dialogue sort of talks back to previous scenes of the very first seasons and the interactions between all the characters are truly pure magic and fan service. This is truly a brilliant movie. It's the latest and in fact second part of the Free! The Final Stroke movies, which are the most recent and latest movies of the entire franchise. Said franchise is now 10 years old and is truly special for me (I'm a former national competitive swimmer and I have swum for more than 20 years therefore I see myself in so many of these moments and movies). The first movie that came out in 2021 ''Free! The Final Stroke'' was ending with two of the major protagonists of the entire franchise, Haru and Rin, parting ways and getting mad at each other as they struggled to reconcile their dreams of world-class swimming with their humble desires as friends. After losing to Albert in Sydney, Haru in particular has been distancing himself from others in order to reach his rival's level—embracing loneliness in the process. The second film gives closure to the lingering plot threads and brooding angst in the first film. I don't want to give any spoiler therefore I want to say that what is special and that fans of the franchise might expect (or not ahahah spoilers free guys ahaha): - Makoto and Haru sharing more moments - Nagisa and Rei involved in swimming once again - new swimmers introduced or developped - Haru and Rin sharing and competing on the world stage This movie truly gave me goosebumps I was smiling all the way through it coz it makes us, as watchers and fans, truly feel we are indeed part of their world. The nostalgic moments and flashbacks aren't annoying, they are on the contrary very helpful. If you love sports anime + you love great friendships and feeling-good moments among the main characters + if you are a longtime or lifetime ''Free'' fan = then this movie is clearly for you. It's 1H45MIN long and it's truly special. Oh and if you love anime such as ''Sasaki to Miyano'' or ''Haikyuu'' or ''Re-main'' then you will LOVE this franchise and movie. Thanks for reading me everybody ;)

No-Life-101★ 7

As usual with the Free! franchise, the animation is smooth and the movie is very colourful! The animation is pretty lifelike with how it interacts with the characters, lighting, textures, and environment. Also, the sound design is pretty cool too, it suits the animation and the scenes nicely. The storyline: Pretty easy to understand and follow, though some moments felt either drawn out or happened too fast so the pacing was a little off for some scenes. It mainly focused on how the characters hit a wall and they had to find their own way through/around it, for some characters it feltlike nice development but for others it felt like it's already been done (either in the show or in other movies). Also, the ending had a familiar Free-like ending that we've seen in previous key moments of the franchise. The characters: Nice to see them again, their designs haven't changed much since the beginning of the franchise, it would have been nice to see them visually change rather than just change their environment. VAs did a wonderful job at bringing the characters to life and adding so many feelings into the scenes too! Overall, it was a good movie that I've been looking forward to. In some ways, I really hope that it was the last part of the franchise since I feel like the characters have reached their full potential and if another movie or show were to be released then it might mess up the pacing and development of the characters. I did enjoy the movie but at the same time, some moments did feel like they have been reused from the show which was a little bit disappointing.