The Fall Anime 2025 Preview Guide - SI-VIS: The Sound of Heroes

Members of the SI-VIS co-ed vocal unit are wildly popular both inside and outside Japan. Their true secret identity is a group of heroes who fight against a mysterious calamity threatening to destroy the world. Through their live performances, they gather the power to fight.

SI-VIS: The Sound of Heroes is an original anime project by Aniplex and Sony Music. The anime series is streaming on Crunchyroll on Saturdays.

I feel like SI-VIS: The Sound of Heroes is trying very hard to be a modern Macross. That may not actually be the case; after all, the combination of pop music and fighting science fiction isn't necessarily exclusive to that storied franchise. But there's still something about this premiere that has me thinking that it desperately wants to be more than it is, quite possibly by riding on the coattails of a familiar franchise.

That may be unfair of me. SI-VIS: The Sound of Heroes could simply be trying to combine the candy-colored world of idol anime with something a little different, and on that front, I can't say that it fails. Pop supergroup SI-VIS has rocketed to stardom with their collection of pretty members, most of whom, judging by this episode, dance while only Siren sings. But they've become so ubiquitous that takeovers of Shibuya by pop-up concerts are the norm, and Aomori country kid Kyoya desperately wants to be part of it – especially since group leader Yosuke is his cousin. But like most of the public, Kyoya is unaware that SI-VIS is just a front for protecting Tokyo from…uh…monsters? Aliens? I'm not sure, but the creatures can apparently vaporize large swathes of city if their “mirage” touches down.

On the one hand, I'm glad SI-VIS: The Sound of Heroes doesn't overexplain. There's an incredible lack of infodumping, and that's generally a good thing. Yosuke never tells Kyoya what's going on; the story shows him starting to figure it out. We don't know how long any of this has been going on or why SI-VIS is uniquely able to keep it at bay. The episode gives us the space to start formulating our own theories while also leaving the door open for the possibility that whatever vanishes isn't destroyed, but perhaps simply moved. While I wouldn't call it anything approaching a masterclass in trusting the audience, it's still a welcome method of storytelling.

The “but” you sense coming is that there's not quite enough information that is given, and it's withheld in an obnoxiously familiar way. Yosuke (like Asuka in DIGIMON BEATBREAK, actually) says that he'll tell Kyoya “later,” and of course, he's removed from the narrative just before he's able to provide that. It's a cheap narrative trick, and while there are some decent stakes with it, when combined with the very tropey other members of the group (including nonverbal Nagi, whom I suspect of being one of the mysterious creatures SI-VIS is fighting) and the overt silliness of the premise, it doesn't quite work. That said, this really does need a second episode to make its case. The music and visuals are catchy enough that I don't mind giving it one.

I don't believe that Yosuke's dead. This episode certainly does its best to drive home the idea that he is, from no one remembering that SI-VIS ever had a leader to his image vanishing from photos, but since this series ultimately seems to be about hope, actually killing Yosuke would run counter to that message. Plus, Siren flat-out implies that Yosuke can be brought back if Kyoya devotes himself to the fight against Mirage. Quite frankly, no one in these two episodes seems quite smart enough to resort to manipulating Kyoya, so I suspect she believes what she says.

More saliently, she tells Kyoya that Nagi can only be seen with enough Idea. I'm still fuzzy on what Idea is precisely, but the fact that she appears and disappears depending on a person's quantity of it indicates that nothing invisible is truly gone. If SI-VIS fights using Idea (I think), then it's the key to overwhelming Mirage and reclaiming the people and places it consumed. What that has to do with singing and dancing is less clear; once again, I can only assume this series is taking a page out of Macross' book, though perhaps the idea is that entertainment brings people together.

As you might guess, this second episode doesn't do much to clarify the story's elements for me. While I appreciate that it's taking time to show how devastated Kyoya is by both the shattering of his world and the loss of Yosuke, I still feel very much at sea. None of the characters are particularly interesting or likable, and the lack of clarity is a problem. Still, I really liked Kyoya playing Yosuke for a young boy in the crowd. Siren encourages him to dance for, and June tells Soji to quit taking his frustrations out on Kyoya, because he was once <>like him, which is a good character moment. This continues to have potential without grabbing me, which may indicate that the old three-episode test is what's needed to truly decide whether it's worth your time.

Do y'all know how bad I want a new Symphogear? That wonderful show gave us five absurd seasons that turned shark-jumping into an Olympic sport—and I've been chasing that singing dragon for years since. How come that Princession Orchestra show hasn't been licensed here yet? Anyway, my worship at the altar of Nana Mizuki and Satelight means I was pretty well primed to recognize what SI-VIS wants to be. Oh sure, it presents to be a basic idol series with a group of performers that the main boy Kyoya is dreaming of joining. But there are just enough question marks to the context and framing tones to make me figure something else had to be going on here—or at least, that's what I hoped.

It's not that Kyoya's quest to get to Tokyo and try out for the idol group was particularly bad. It's a bit rote, but I can enjoy music/idol stories well enough so long as they're earnest. I like Kyoya's moxy, and his encouraging reaction to the mysterious girl was a good way to demonstrate the double-edged feeling of putting out art. Yes, your expression should be your own; you are free to be cringe, but also? Having someone actually notice and appreciate your efforts feels good. And with where it ends up going, this noticeable focus on the relationship between performer and audience gives SI-VIS an edge in its theming even before things go all topsy-turvy.

There are just so many multi-layered conversations about what's really going on with this idol group—plus there is the anime's insistence on doubling back on reveals and developments, like about how much Kyoya's mentor Yosuke knew he was coming. It's like the show is creating a plot smokescreen to prepare viewers to be caught off-guard, and I have seen Symphogear's first episode like a half-dozen times, so I knew to be ready to be caught off-guard. The oddly detailed support bridge for the idol performance and the intense show countdown were further tip-offs.

So maybe I wasn't surprised, but boy was I elated when Kyoya and Mystery Girl wound up in some messed-up Persona-ass Dark World, got ambushed by some monsters, and had to be saved by said idol group singing while fighting them. It's Symphogear—it's just Symphogear for bisexuals. Hell yeah. The animation fidelity isn't quite all the way there, but the scrappy energy it's got for the performance of its concept is enough to carry it. Having an audience reaction component gives the show its own flavor, I think, leaning into the absurdity of these people doing their idol bits even as they're blasting monsters apart, and viewers are tapping their toes during it. The song's pretty cool, and Yosuke does a Rider Kick—I'm only human. Even with Yosuke's rather telegraphed death, the way he carries the scene makes him come off so awesome that it still elicited a "Man…" from me. SI-VIS is kind of a dumb show at its base. But it understands the idea of "Hype" as a resource—both within audience reactions and without—and if it can sustain that energy, it will absolutely be worth a weekly check-in to see if it can carry the spirit of the ever-irrepressible Tachibana Hibiki.

I mean it even ends on a black-screen credit-scroll with the theme song, just like a Symphogear premiere, come on—

After jumping in with both feet at the start, aggressively making its appeal clear to sickos like me, SI-VIS expectedly pulls back for some proper infodumping in this second episode. There's a fair amount that's important because it contextualizes exactly what our heroes are doing and the emotional thrust of it, while also giving the story its own angles, apart from the musical monster-mashing it shares so much with Symphogear (plus Macross, as others have pointed out). Thing is, I'm picking up enough of what SI-VIS is laying down already that I'm fine with this much dialogue-heavy downtime just in its second week. Mileage will probably vary for other viewers.

Seeing the grieving process over Yosuke, from Kyoya and the others, forms the backbone of this episode. It's a simple enough trick, but having Kyoya go from the happy-go-lucky type he was at the beginning to sullen, frustrated, and generally lost in what he's supposed to do works. It adds impact to the end of that roller coaster ride that was the first episode. Plus, Kyoya does actually decide what he wants to do by the end, so that's good. As flaky and flippant as Siren has seemed in instances (one reason I'm already digging her as a character), she proves to be the right person to reach out to Kyoya to pull him out of his funk. It's simple, but the power of music as part of the process, especially as Kyoya's dancing alongside Yosuke defined so much of their relationship, makes for a heartening eureka moment.

It also intersects with the more specific, complex mechanics of SI-VIS and its bigger ideas about music, performance, and entertainment. The monsters (they're called XENOS, apparently) straight-up eat the existence and memories of those they consume, which is a heavy idea that immediately makes viewers question how deep it could go, backstory-wise. It also raises some other questions, if you ruminate on it for too long, about how hard it would actually be for SI-VIS's record-label monster-fighting force to compel others to believe them. In this context, it helps ground why they're on their own and why their battles have to be a "secret." And on-theme, it speaks to age-old ideas about music and entertainment keeping people uplifted and hopeful even as crises unfold. Making those audience interactions a component of how the SI-VIS powers work further ties them in.

Necessary as it arguably is, it's still an exposition-heavy episode where, as I said, some of the more overt plot points don't hold up super-tight. And not all the characters are as defined as they discuss these points and grapple with their own grieving process, parallel to Kyoya. Also, the mysterious Nagi already feels underutilized and her existence nebulous in her brief poof-in. And Kyoya's little dancing scene in the revelatory musical bit by the end looks awkward. But maybe, in this kind of low-key fall season, I want a solid original show that can follow up a cool fight with fair explanations and emotional elements without being totally up its own ass. SI-VIS is that lucky show that I want to like, which is making it easy to do so. For now, I'll keep watching it to see if it can deliver even more on its potential, or if it tragically tumbles before it gets to the closing number.

SI-VIS: The Sound of Heroes represents something of a clash of genres and appeals, for me. On the one hand, despite how much I love music and musical storytelling, I don't have a lot of love for the modern style of J-Pop idol storytelling in anime, which misses more often than it hits in my estimation. On the other hand, I'm a tokusatsu freak, so if you give me an alien invasion and a band of color-coded and thematically unified superheroes who want to punch those aliens' lights out, then I'm all-in. So, when it comes to SI-VIS, I guess you could say my feelings are torn.

I think I would be a lot more enthusiastic about SI-VIS if I felt more for its main characters. Our hero, Kyoya, has inherited the shameless love of dancing in public and chasing pop-star fame from his idol anime forebears, but he's also found himself smack-dab in the middle of a Gatchaman plot. I don't dislike Kyoya, but he lacks the charisma I generally prefer my superhero protagonists to possess. The other members of SI-VIS, too, are only given a basic introduction here, so there's not much to say about their chemistry as a team. The group's music is serviceable, but generic. The 80s and 90s pop that defined titles like Macross has a lot more texture and style, in my opinion, and if we were going for a modern group of musical tokusatsu heroes, I think the more pronounced style of a TOGENASHI TOGEARI-style rock band would stand out a lot more.

That said, once the premiere fully commits to the action-adventure half of its premise, there's plenty of fun to be had. The animation is solid, and the direction does a good job of making the Mirage threat feel significant and imminent. The loss of Yosuke has the potential to give Kyoya the depth that he lacked in this premiere, and future episodes will have a lot of opportunities to establish the relationships of the core group even more. So, consider SI-VIS a prime candidate for the ol' three-episode challenge. I don't want to get my hopes up too high, but I reckon that this show can still impress me, yet.

I don't think that SI-VIS intended the cold open of its second episode to be so hilarious, but I genuinely couldn't help but break out into laughter when Kyoya's enthusiastic, anime-protagonist style class introduction got interrupted so suddenly by a PTSD flashback of Yosuke's horrible and bloody death. If I have any major misgivings that still haven't been resolved as of yet, it's the fact that Kyoya is just not a very compelling protagonist. The show's attempts to give him depth and relatable emotions, like that opening scene I just described, mostly fall flat.

Kyoya isn't a godawful hero, though; I don't grit my teeth in irritation whenever he speaks, nor do I actively find myself wishing for him to get whacked by the Mirage. Plenty of action-adventure anime have gotten by on mediocre main characters by falling back on a compelling premise, a strong supporting cast, and well-directed spectacle. Unfortunately, as far as the premise goes, I can't say that there's much juice here that can compensate for the charisma that Kyoya lacks. The Mirage are an enemy that feel mysterious and all-powerful just for the sake of it, and I've seen far too many anime mishandle the same setup to give SI-VIS the benefit of the doubt. This second episode tries to pull the viewer in with a lot of melancholy and exposition-heavy scenes that aim to demonstrate the dire straits SI-VIS find themselves in and the reality-altering powers the Mirage seems to wield. It never amounts to anything substantial, however. All of the usual bits and pieces of an anime's opening episodes are here, but the show adds up to less than the sum of its parts.

I think you could say the same about the characters, too. Kyoya already feels like a bust; I don't suspect he's suddenly going to become a wellspring of complexity and relatability anytime soon. As of this second episode, I don't think any of SI-VIS' other characters are going to pick up the slack. Nagi remains more of a MacGuffin than a real person, and all of the time that the episode spends on Siren feels like a pale imitation of the kinds of character introductions that worked so well in shows like Girls Band Cry. When Nina and Momoka busted out an impassioned street performance in that show, it was impossible not to fall head over heels for them and their story. When Siren does basically the same thing to inspire Kyoya, it is impossible not to notice how stiff and awkward the animation is, or how the show didn't even try to hide the fact that it just slapped an MP3 of some studio recording onto the dialogue track in the editing suite.

In short, I don't think I need another episode of SI-VIS to know that this show isn't going to work for me after all. There are aspects of it that might well make for perfectly FINE Entertainment in fits and starts, but a show has to do better than that to earn my hard-won free time, even in a season as slim as this one.