This second part starts out as a big question mark. While the first half of Synduality: Noir has occasional drama, most of it is just about chilling with the extended cast as they engage in exciting robot battles. While that gives the movie a lot of charm, it means viewers don't know what the bigger story is, nor how the movie can handle the shift to heavier drama and plot. How good are linear stories? Once the good times are over and our cast has to follow the main quest line, will that endearing charm be lost?
The answer is a bit messy. While there's still a lot of fun to be had with these characters and their DayGlo robot, most of the expanded cast gets overlooked when we narrow things down to the key players. Kanata and his current trio of robot companions are fine enough as a group, but they lack the normal relationships and quirky shenanigans that characterized the first game. The only exception is Mystere, whose rude personality and complete lack of respect for his human counterpart makes for some great comedy and a clear contrast to Noir's soft-spoken nature. Overall, however, there will be fewer funny jokes as the supporting characters are left behind and our remaining core characters start to shoulder the heavy drama and backstories tragic.
That trend doesn't improve with the villains, especially Weishei, the scheming mastermind who repeatedly targeted Noir in season one. A lot of time is spent making him as disgusting as possible, with repetitive monologues and cruel smirks along with his truly cruel treatment of his partner Magus his own, which at least makes him easy to resist. Unfortunately, that doesn't make him interesting. Once he takes power as our main villain, any time listening to him wax poetic about his motives or plans feels like dead air. His entire personality boils down to “hating robots” and “evil,” which makes for a functional final boss but not a compelling character.
Luckily, the rest of the cast all work quite well when things get serious. Black Mask, aka Macht Alter, and his stone-faced camp are still pretty funny, even if we have to take him seriously as a villain turned anti-hero. Tokio gets caught up in his stick but still takes advantage of it by deliberately donning the ridiculous “White Mask” character to troll his overly serious opponent. Mystere and Noir's dual search to find their true identities creates a mystery that spans a compelling arc with a few neat plot twists. The highlight, however, is Ciel's storyline, which delivers horror, tragedy, bittersweetness, and catharsis, all in just a few episodes. While none of our characters are overly complex, they are well-rounded and likable enough to be engaging even as the tone seems darker with each episode.
The larger plot is obviously less compelling, if only because it's so standard for a sci-fi anime. Ideal, our forced secret organization, is determined to achieve some vaguely defined mission that needs Noir and Mystere to succeed. Weishit manipulates Kanata seemingly just for fun while almost never doing anything meaningful to achieve his goals. He then reveals his Instrumentality-style plan, which the combined might of our heroes must defeat. It's pretty bland stuff, which is fine when it takes a back seat to the character drama, but it really starts to drag when the battle against Weisheit takes center stage. That leaves the final three episodes feeling rather perfunctory, buoyed only by well-paced action sequences.
On the surface, this season marks a slight but noticeable decline. While season one has its share of exciting plot twists, it can also look pretty good when it needs to. Here, some production difficulties mean that everything in 2D looks at least a little worse than the first one did. Characters will look wobbly and melted when standing still. There are at least some cases where the lip flap does not match the sound at all. The character designs and color palette certainly help the show stand out for the most part, but everything that isn't CG robots or 3D-rendered backgrounds looks scratched.
Luckily, those CG battles are the same. As good as before, if not better. The Coffin mechs still have a familiar flavor, but the various upgrades and redesigns all look sharp and provide some fun new tools for combat. The battles are brilliantly directed and animated with a sense of speed and power that matches the chubby little robots perfectly. The final battle in particular makes great use of the 3D backgrounds and zero-gravity setting to create some great spectacle, and overall the action greatly makes up for the weaker 2D animation. The music is still excellent, although the original STEREO DIVE FOUNDATION opening feels lost.
All told, while the dramatic escalation adds momentum to this second half, it also feels like something has been lost in leaving behind so much of the chilling, fun feeling from part one. The ending wraps up the important story arc while leaving plenty of room to imagine the cast's future adventures, and it's satisfying enough but doesn't leave much of an impact. Perhaps that's almost fitting for a show that, while fun and nostalgic for a certain era of mech anime, never really established an identity for itself. There's no grand, unifying theme to tie the ribbon around at the end, other than the power of friendship and the non-racism of robots. The cast is fun, but not so fun that you crave more adventures once you get the role. Synchronicity: Noir probably ends up better than other video game tie-in series, but within the larger mecha genre, it's still an also-ran.
