This DBZ fan took a Super Saiyan Vegeta figure and choreographed it through an awesome fist-smashing bout with Symphogear protagonist Hibiki.
Everyone loves a crossover, right? Ever since the rise of super heroes and villains, people have wanted them to cross canons and spar (or, er, do other things). That’s something really great about articulated figurines – get a group of them together and they can interact in scenes with each other for cool crossover photo shoots.
▼ Just like in my Silent Hill vs. Toy Story fanfictions!
NicoNicoDouga video creator hamuan-12 wasn’t satisfied with simple posed photographs. In a blistering video of punches, kicks and family cameos, two stop-motion anime super stars could finally settle their inter-series beef once and for all.
▼ The tweet shows a sample, but click on the link at the bottom to get to the full video!
In the left corner: Super Saiyan Vegeta! Created by S.H. Figuarts, this figurine captures the alien prince in both his ultra-powered Super Saiyan form and just his regular classic form. Vegeta is one of the most iconic and popular characters in Dragonball Z, a compelling anti-hero who went from plotting to destroy the Earth to living as one of its citizens and starting a family.
In the right corner: Hibiki Tachibana! This Figma figurine is the protagonist of Senki Zesshou Symphogear, a show best summarized as “Precure meets mecha“. She’s battled billions of enemies using her fists, laser beams and her own singing voice, but always tries to make friends out of her foes. Will she be a match for Vegeta?
Ready…
FIGHT!
After our fighters make their introductions to each other, we get a classic anime episode title card. Stay tuned for the translation later, because it actually spoils the fight (much like many titles of children’s anime).
The pair take no time to start throwing punches. Hibiki kicks off, leaving a powerful impression in the ground behind her; once close enough to Vegeta to land a punch she does exactly that, but he blocks her at every turn. Take a moment here to appreciate all the great sound effects. Every smack of a blocked punch is matched with a cartoon sound, so this could easily be a fight from the show!
“I’ll tell you now,” Vegeta snarls, “I won’t go easy on you just because you’re a girl.”
The stomach punches, kicks to the face and laser blasts could have told us that. But Hibiki isn’t going down easy, either! When she punches into the ground, it shatters so hard that the surface explodes into flakes of cardboard. Then on her next move, she pummels the father-of-two right in the kisser with a bruising punch.
Hibiki is knocked out by Vegeta’s furious rebuttal, but after a moving montage of her friends (who notably don’t all have figures in the same line as she does) she’s almost ready to get back up. Vegeta won’t give her any spare time to collect herself, however – he busts right through her touching memories, ready for more!
What follows is a stunning cavalcade of lo-fi SFX, using everything from neon lights to cotton wool to tissue boxes. Adult alien man and technology-boosted teenage girl grapple for the upper hand, punching and kicking and firing many flashing lights. All accompanied with JoJo-esque sound effects, of course.
Around 5:50, after Hibiki sends Vegeta careening into a plastic water bottle, an unexpected guest comes flying into the fray to help him.
▼ “Daaaaaaaaad!”
That’s right, it’s Vegeta’s time-travelling son, Trunks! He’s super saiyan too, and ready to fight in the name of his family. Unfortunately, Hibiki isn’t. She ignores him completely.
Sorry, Trunks.
(He gets knocked out shortly after, so it’s probably just as well.)
After a sequence of high-octane, close-quarters brawling, it looks like Vegeta has secured his victory. He tosses Hibiki so hard into the ground she makes a crater, and laughs maniacally once he’s peppered her with energy beams. But this is only at the 9:00 mark, so it’s very little surprise when she gets right back up and assails him with volleys.
▼ Each one of those fists is hand drawn, and animated so that they look like a flurry of punches
Once she’s knocked him down, Hibiki offers him the hand of friendship – “If we just talk it out, we can start to understand each other!” – but Vegeta has apparently forgotten any interest he ever had in pacifism. He smacks her hand away, then blows her into next week with a Big Bang Attack.
The action comes to an abrupt stop when Hibiki begins to sing. This song is a special power-up from her home franchise, and has the unfortunate side-effect of sometimes overloading its users’ bodies and killing them.
Newly energized, she unleashes a sizzling arc of light towards Vegeta’s attack (because of course he didn’t stop firing while she was singing). But it seems to overpower her, and her own lack of defences makes her almost give up…
“Don’t die!”
A hearty handclasp from Hibiki’s mentor gives her a last minute boost of morale. She obliterates everything around her… Including Vegeta. The dramatic BGM falls silent as she crumples to the ground.
“Everything’s gonna be fine… even though that felt like a hundred all-time top fights in one…Gosh, I’m hungry.“
But wait…
Vegeta emerges from the wreckage, bruised, demoted from his Super Saiyan blonde mode, but still standing. He’s the number 1 fighter in the universe! He won’t let things end like this! Hibiki, also exhausted, raises her fist to his… and the final bout commences, both of them mashing all of their strength into the final punches.
And when the dust clears, there is one clear winner.
▼ The episode is titled “Hibiki Awakens! Vegeta falls to her ultimate power“, so…
The credits roll, with multiple credits for the doll companies who created the figures in the video – and just one credit for everything else. All the drawing, lighting, foley art, stage-setting choreography and meticulous, time-consuming pose work was done by just one person, and their name is hamuan-12.
Post-credits, Vegeta reaches an epiphany: Hibiki was able to beat him because she had friends and family to protect, which gave her that necessary edge. She wasn’t fighting just to win the fight… She was fighting because she couldn’t afford to lose. This seems jarring considering Vegeta’s own son appeared mid-battle without comment, but it’s a nice message.
▼ “I fight in the hope I can shake hands at the end!” Hibiki offers her friendship to Vegeta
“That’s why I fight too,” says Trunks, but no one is listening. Vegeta ‘tch‘-es like a real anime badass, and departs. He concedes that Hibiki got under his skin, which is no small compliment! Hibiki compliments his kindness, which is enough to send him running for the far reaches of Namek, and the video ends.
The Internet is raving with praise for the video, which not only lasts about as long as an episode of both characters’ native shows but features the technical prowess of a much larger project.
“This was just incredible.”
“I really want to see a ‘Making Of’ video for this, too!”
“How many times are they gonna say ‘I can keep fighting’?!”
“The love and handicraft that went into this is really something else.”
Some of the fans were clearly disappointed by the predictable ending and begged Vegeta to come back for a re-match. Maybe we’ll see a sequel where Vegeta gets to redeem himself? In the meantime, there’s plenty of great stop motion out there on the web, even if they aren’t as impressively long.
Source: Nico Nico Douga/hamuan-12, Twitter/@hamua-12
Featured image: Nico Nico Douga/hamuan-12