You could almost see where the author was going with this. It was meant to be a Deconstruction of many of the themes present in previous works featuring Nanoha. However a tone-deaf author and focus on a thoroughly despicable set of villains robs this work of the very soul of the Nanoha franchise. At its heart, previous works were highly optimistic while also preaching responsibility with power. A beloved facet of the franchise was that villains were generally sympathetic or at least have standards and loved ones. This is true even for characters that were stated to be outright insane such as Precia Testarosta and Jail Scarletti. It also had a bit of tongue in cheek humor inherent in having the "White Devil" as the protagonist.
This series? It not only has none of that but tries to enforce a vision that is counter-conceptual of the franchise, thus the comparison to the works of the inestimable Mr Boll.
Gone is any attempt at interesting or nuanced characters. Thoma is very much a Marty Stu protagonist with extra angst and very little ability to discern between good and evil. Just about all our beloved characters suffer from the Worf Effect, making them ultimately irrelevant to the greater scheme of things. The true nail in the coffin of course is the Huckebein, our antagonists. They perpetuate atrocities and yet claim the moral high ground. They can defeat the protagonists essentially through Ass PullSuperpower Lottery abilities that make the protagonists' collective abilities ineffective. There is no true weight or menace to them, they are victorious simply because they possess the means to nullify everyone else's powers. That does not make them memorable antagonists, it makes them villain sues.
That is perhaps the whole rub with this series. It reads like a badly done self-insert fanfic with a new main character that suddenly knows everyone and is perhaps their only true hope of victory. The villains simply outmatch the heroes because the plot says they do. There is no drama or skill involved, the Huckebein might as well have "god mode" on. The old cast are rendered powerless in their own series in favour of the new protagonist. All of these are hallmarks of bad fanfics let alone official works.
Uwe Boll Does Nanoha (Badly)
You could almost see where the author was going with this. It was meant to be a Deconstruction of many of the themes present in previous works featuring Nanoha. However a tone-deaf author and focus on a thoroughly despicable set of villains robs this work of the very soul of the Nanoha franchise. At its heart, previous works were highly optimistic while also preaching responsibility with power. A beloved facet of the franchise was that villains were generally sympathetic or at least have standards and loved ones. This is true even for characters that were stated to be outright insane such as Precia Testarosta and Jail Scarletti. It also had a bit of tongue in cheek humor inherent in having the "White Devil" as the protagonist.
This series? It not only has none of that but tries to enforce a vision that is counter-conceptual of the franchise, thus the comparison to the works of the inestimable Mr Boll.
Gone is any attempt at interesting or nuanced characters. Thoma is very much a Marty Stu protagonist with extra angst and very little ability to discern between good and evil. Just about all our beloved characters suffer from the Worf Effect, making them ultimately irrelevant to the greater scheme of things. The true nail in the coffin of course is the Huckebein, our antagonists. They perpetuate atrocities and yet claim the moral high ground. They can defeat the protagonists essentially through Ass Pull Superpower Lottery abilities that make the protagonists' collective abilities ineffective. There is no true weight or menace to them, they are victorious simply because they possess the means to nullify everyone else's powers. That does not make them memorable antagonists, it makes them villain sues.
That is perhaps the whole rub with this series. It reads like a badly done self-insert fanfic with a new main character that suddenly knows everyone and is perhaps their only true hope of victory. The villains simply outmatch the heroes because the plot says they do. There is no drama or skill involved, the Huckebein might as well have "god mode" on. The old cast are rendered powerless in their own series in favour of the new protagonist. All of these are hallmarks of bad fanfics let alone official works.