Full Metal Panic! Invisible Victory

Well worth the decade long wait! Looking forward to this coming out on Blu-ray, so that I can add it to my collection.

If you are a fan of the originals, you should be satisfied with this adaptation.

It may have taken 3 seasons but Souske admits that he actually has feelings, not that he understands them.

You must watch season 1 and 3 before watching this series, season 2 is optional but worth watching as a humorous side story, a fundamental understanding of arm slaves, the characters, their personalities and relationships is assumed. This chapter flows nicely with no slow parts as Souske relentlessly peruses Kaname alone and the remaining forces of Mithril struggle for survival after being decimated by Amalgam.

To me it feels like half a season, it ends on such a cliff hanger with a few loose story threads, I just can't wait to see where the story goes from here and hope the story does continue.

There are a few quite disturbing scenes in this series, not suitable for very young minds.

This story takes off right after the second raid so if you haven't watched that or the first season you are going to be lost and confused here.

I am just going to keep this short and say while I am not happy that it's only 14 episodes long (you'll find out why), but it was a nice welcoming back for the series after 13 years.

And i am sure fans will enjoy it.

These comments assume viewers have watched previous 'Full Metal Panic' series.

After the events of 'Second Raid' Amalgam are far from defeated; under the leadership of Leonard Testarossa they soon fight back. Mithril's island base is overrun leaving survivors to flee aboard the submarine Tuatha de Danaan. Meanwhile Kaname Chidori is taken by Amalgam leaving protagonist Sousuke Sagara despondent. He travels to Namsac, a corrupt country. Here he gets involved in competitive mech-fighting. It isn't long before he is facing Amalgam again and working to rescue Kaname.

This is an exciting action packed series that almost entirely foregoes the comedy elements present in earlier series of FMP. The story is much more downbeat with things going badly for our heroes; there are some impressively emotional moments, these include a real sucker punch near the middle of the series. The action is impressively animated in a way that makes the viewer feel part of the action. The characters are good; this includes both established characters and those introduced in this series. The story progresses well but here we come to the series only real problem... the final episode felt more like the last episode before a mid-season break than a finale. I can only hope there will be another series to resolve certain very important plot threads. Overall though I'd certainly recommend this to FMP fans.

These comments are based on watching the series in Japanese with English subtitles.