SNS3 / SNSF tries to wrap up and give some closure to the SNS series with a final big bang. It takes place right after the final scene in the second season, though there are some continuity issues. The season has lots of jarring, unexpected plot twists that wind up taking the series down an unexpectedly bizarre path. This series also continues what SNS2 started, which is focus more and more on pure action instead of character development, and what you end up with is a lot of effects with no heart.
If you absolutely must watch this, know that the action sequences are nice but reminded me a lot of the Gundam 00 movie, a lot of new gimmicks with little or no formal introduction. And if you're looking for tsundere Shana, you might as well wait for the final Shana-tan as her trademark personality is all but absent in this series. Note that in the remainder of the review I will be drawing lots of comparisons to Inuyasha The Final Act, which in my opinion serves a very parallel purpose in the Inuyasha series.
Animation:
There's not much to complain about here, you can expect roughly what you saw in SNS2 but just grander in scale, i.e. good color balance with lots of attention to weapon/status effects. If anything, there's a larger amount of background scene changes than in prequels.
Character styling is identical to SNS2 except for Yuji who somehow morphs into something like Bankotsu from Inuyasha. There are also a lot of new characters given the increased scope of warfare against Bal Masque. One potential downside is that many of the core characters from SNS1 and 2 have very little screentime/closure. Remember all the school friends in SNS1 and 2? Some of them aren't even worth a cameo now.
Battlewise, expect plenty of it and in large scale. While there is obvious attention to Shana/primary flame hazes, there's also hordes of minor flame hazes battling countless plain-vanilla monsters. If you're just looking for a lot of action, there's a lot of it here; though you'd have to wade through the relatively action-free first arc.
Sound:
The music in SNSF is pretty on par with SNS traditions. If anything, Kotoko's new OP was a bit more rock based than usual; I ended up preferring the nice EDs by Altima. BGM is inherited from previous seasons so you can expect familiar tunes/tracks. A few new BGM tunes are introduced for all the new characters as well.
VA-wise, all VA talents (at least for characters who still have a place here...) return. As mentioned earlier, Shana's script is practically tsundere-free minus one utterance of "urusai urusai urusai!" I believe that the VAs did as much as they could given their relative unimportance relative to the supposedly massive plot.
Story:
I'm not quite sure what the director was going for here. There are so many elements that did not feel right in this series. The pacing was off, there was too much exposition when it didn't matter and not enough when needed, the rising action took way too long, the climax was pitiful and felt like a song that never ends, and the conclusion just screamed "Potential OVA" despite the title with the "Final" modifier.
Whereas SNS2 had relatively little exposition, there is absolutely no exposition here whatsoever. If you haven't watched SNS2, then the beginning will be completely baffling. If you have watched SNS2, it will only be mildly confusing. Basically, at the end of SNS2, Yuji has to choose whether to go with Yoshida or Shana. He somehow decides that either option would not be satisfactory, and decides to contract his body out to a previously-unknown Tomogara called the God of Creation and joins Bal Masque to fight against Shana.
As for pacing, all that was introduced basically in the first episode. The show then spends a good half dozen episodes preparing for a massive battle between the Tomogara and the Flame Haze, in the process introducing a bunch of seemingly-important characters that end up being virtually irrelevant in the grand scheme of things; and all the while you sit there going wtf what is Yuji thinking without ever getting a clear answer.
Not to be completely negative, a few things do get sorted out in this season, such as Magery's Silver; and you do get to see Shana in some new outfits. But really, after the conclusion you just sit back and think "what was the point of all that?" That's not the ideal question to be asking after the end of such a massively complex plot.
Character:
In general I prefer series that have few but well-developed characters. I will make exceptions for series that have lots of well-connected (relationship-wise) characters. This series is neither. SNSF blatantly introduces numerous characters, be it leaders of the Flame Haze or Tomogara, that, despite grand expositions, have little importance other than dishing out some action and giving a reason to hire more VAs.
There is literally no attention to Yuji whatsoever as the camera perspective is pretty focused on Shana. However, as Yuji is the only thing making Shana's dere come out, her lines come out like a rock here. Don't expect any significant developments, or explanations for decisions made by characters in the show.
Value:
It really pains me to see a series that had such a good foundation go to waste. Final series are supposed to wind down open questions in a series. I liked the approach in The Final Acts where incremental developments brought incremental closure to parts of the series. Here, the "one shot that rings through the universe" approach feels overly grand and pretty much serves as just an excuse for all the action.
