Sugar Sugar Rune

Sugar Sugar Rune is my favorite Mahou Shoujo anime. Though I generally like the genre, and watch it a lot, I found this anime not only more enjoyable but also deeper then many other anime.

At first I was just in love with the fact the two witches could see the hearts of humans, and I admit, I wish I could do the same. Although the story starts out simple, like they are just playing a game, the story gets deeper, and more serious around half the series. The story is about jealousy, friendship and love. And even though this is common for many mahou shoujo ... series, I find the way it is portrayed in this anime great mainly because it isn't as you would expect. There are things you would expect when watching it, of course, but they are always twisted just a little bit from what I had imagined, and therefore still surprising.

The art, well, I love it. It is beautifull and the animation is clean. I like the character designs, although I do not like all the clothes :P

The sound is good, and although most of the voice actors aren't that popular, they did a great job. The only problem for me was Waffle, who kept reminding me of Honey-sempai.

Characters: I loved them. I never really liked Vanilla though, but all the other characters are fun and easy to relate to. I especially love Pierre, who is cold but still caring and who really helped me enjoy this series. Waffle was annoying sometimes, but certainly near the end of the series, she matured and I realised she wasn't so bad after all.

Enjoyment: I greatly enjoyed this anime, I plan to buy the manga's and dvd box because I would love to see more of it. (I actually already bought a 'sugar sugar rune'goodie bag when I was in Italy, but to my dissapointment it only had barbie stuff in it T-T) This series is number 2 in top 10 anime and I recommend it to everyone!

Sugar Sugar Rune at the surface it seems like a typical run-of-the-mill magical girl series that follows the traditional formula dating back to its predecessors. It has magical transformation sequences, stylish magical wands, and crazy magical items that will make Doraemon proud. The presentation and aesthetics are glamorous. Certainly aim for little girls for its simplicity and amusing appeal. But exploring further down the line, Sugar Sugar Rune rather go a different approach in its theme that even teens and young adults will find it enthralling for its “Shoujo Romance Element” and character exploration that added uniqueness among its competition at the time.

The title has ... a rather unique premise and story mechanics that further enforces the shoujo romance that affects our character's motivation and behavior.

To summarize the story it’s about the adventures of Chocola and Vanilla. They are queen candidate witches sent to the human world to collect heart crystals. Whoever acquires the most heart will become the next successor to the throne and rule the entire magical world. The premise looks simple enough to understand but once the actual heart crystal collecting takes place, this is where the show actually shines its bizarre style of romance.

Sugar Sugar Rune's heart mechanics are more complex but easily digestible. They need to gather the heart crystal opposite sex by making them fall in love with them. Heart crystal varies in color depending on how deep the person has fallen in love with them.

What interesting about heart capture mechanics is that it serves as the introduction of the shows world-building. From the perspective of Chocola and Vanilla will have basic knowledge between the interactions of the magical world and the human world.

The Deus Ex Machina makes sense. We know they will keep collecting hearts from the individual humans so this kind of soft reset in the relationship of our heroines is quite essential for them. Though it may look like the show is working as an episodic guy of the week formula but there are always a consistent build-up and change of pace from time to time. Our heroines are learning new things on each new encounter and there always new things happening in the show that will keep the audience interest.

When it comes to the story the 2 main heroines, Vanilla, and Chocolate style of interaction provided very interesting dynamics. Chocala and Vanilla's personality and behavior are completely polar opposite from each other. Chocola is brave, daring, stubborn, naive, and outgoing while Vanilla is shy, frail, wimpy, level-headed, and strategic. But even with the huge differences Chocola and Vanilla friendship is solid until the end of the series. Even if they are technically rivals, their relationship doesn't falter.

In contrast in the magical girl series that has a lot of magical battles, Sugar Sugar Rune has less of it. Its magical battles are the show weak points for not being animation magic. Instead of focusing on making extravagant magical battles or transformation where the magical girl series are well known for. Sugar Sugar Rune is more like a “Slice of Life Isekai” where it’s about the daily lives of Chocola and Vanilla in the human world, where they learn the complexity of human emotions. Experiencing firsthand the sweet joy and bitter sadness of life that influence their motivations and character development while at the same time fleshing out some side characters among the way that makes each episode enjoyable. There is always a moral lesson to learn and feels a good moment in the show that made it a good slice of life.

The character art style is a combination of vampiric goth design and sweet girlish fashion. This also extends to the Magical World Design of being a Halloween town and Candy Land at the same time which blends creatively well. For me, Sugar Sugar Rune aesthetic is quite unique and the updated anime design from the manga is an improvement.

The OP and ED song has quite a charm for it and the soundtrack has some good moments and timing when it comes to the critical scene. Overall everything in the sound and music department is good.

And for added bonus, the magic incantation is not even random gibberish. If Sugar Sugar Rune doesn’t look European enough, it also sounds one for using a lot of French Word in its magic incantations. Like “Agrandissment” mean “expansion” in French. Expanding further consistently to the names of the character from the magical world like Meilleure, Chocola where “Meilleure” indicates expensive gourmet chocolate in French. And up to places in the magical world like Le Royaume means “Kingdom” in French. There is definitely a huge amount of research is dedicated to it.

Exploring the World Building Further (Minor Spoiler in this Paragraph)

Collecting hearts in the human world is pretty much essential for the magical world for it serves as currency. For example how the magical world economy work is that “Heart Crystals” value can range from “Crimson Heart” which means “Passionate Love” has the highest value amounting to 5000 ecure while a color “Pee Color Heart” is worth 5 ecure. This ecure value can be used as a commodity to purchase magical items in the shop. This item can further help chocola and vanilla in getting more hearts. These items can range from make-up kits that can make you prettier or up to special items that can make people attracted head over heels at you. This does make our girl's morality questionable for playing on other people's hearts. But in the magical world, this is just a daily job routine essential in the magical world. This also differentiates the magical world from the human world. The ecure currency also serves as a metric in measuring the 2 witch candidate’s progression.

Witches and wizards are forbidden to fall in love with humans. It will spell death or punishment for whoever defiles the rules. Wizards and witches have only one heart while humans can produce an unlimited amount which makes absolute sense.

Exploring the Franchise Further (Contains some Major Spoiler) (Go to the “Final Thoughts” if you don’t want to get spoiled)

Anime VS Manga

I don’t usually talk about the source material of an anime unless it’s absolutely necessary if I feel the show is incomplete or the ending is unsatisfying but Sugar Sugar ending just makes me feel I want to know more. The anime has left me with a lot of unanswered questions that made me unsatisfied. After I finish reading the manga this where I discovered the anime has some technical flaws and essential differences. First off is that the manga dig more into details about technical stuff that the anime just summarize and skip which is to be fair it’s doesn’t affect the core narrative but you are surely going to skip a lot of interesting details. Another thing is the complete diverge of story direction, but there is a reason for this. The sugar sugar rune anime ended in 2006 while the manga ended in 2007. From the start to the middle the anime and manga share a similar story narrative with little technical changes but a major separation in the story was made midway. Meaning the anime ending is an anime original. To me, the manga has a superior story pacing and lore that make every loose piece of the puzzle connected. But even with some shortcomings that the anime has it still a good standalone show even if you don’t have any knowledge of the source material. It just the manga become an essential read after finishing the anime for it will fill up the void of unanswered questions.

Final Thoughts

Sugar Sugar Rune nowadays is not for everybody because its art style, animation, and episode duration are not appealing to try out for modern audiences. But if you don’t mind the gothic cute art style and episode count while the same time looking for simple magical girl series without any too much elaborate magical battles. Sugar Sugar Rune is certainly a good magical girl series to try out. It has good humor, likable characters, an easily digestible story, and some good slice of life moments that is worth checking it out.

And if you still end up wanting more? I recommend reading the manga for the deep story lore.

"I'm gonna knock you out!" if you don’t read the manga!

Summary: I watched it and hated it, but I suppose that being a 26-year-old introverted girl who has seen a lot of much better anime has a lot to do with my profound lack of enjoyment of Sugar Sugar Rune. I wish I could say I would recommend it to at least 8 to 12-year-old girls but honestly I can’t say I would: this will be a negative review. Anyone who’s interested in the show’s positive points, please look elsewhere.

So, Sugar Sugar Rune. I somehow missed the Sailor Moon craze when I was still a small kid so I actually don’t have a lot of ... background in mahou shoujo, which I attempted to remedy by picking up this show. The reviews were pretty good, promising a surprisingly nuanced, slightly dark twist upon the genre so often accused of being rife with overblown drama, too much saccharine and self-righteousness. I was instantly attracted by the series’ premise: two young witches who are childhood friends vying to become the next heiress to the Magical Kingdom’s throne. Both have their own sets of strengths and weaknesses, ultimately challenging and completing each other in the new and unfamiliar Human World. Will their friendship endure under the pressure to compete, especially when a mysterious bishounen is thrown into play?

The biggest disappointment for me will have to be the wasted character potential, translating into wasted plot potential. Ostensibly we have two main characters who balance each other out, and around whose interactions, trials and tribulations I expected the show to be built. First, we have Chocolat Meilleure, an extraverted, bright, spirited, feisty young girl. She is strong and fearless, and while she may be a bit stubborn, brash and strong-headed, she always means well and she’s not afraid to admit her mistakes. She is very open and spontaneous which helps her to make friends, and to those friends that she makes she is fiercely loyal. Her temper and foul mouth are considered to be good qualities in the witch society and a lot of show’s plot revolves around how that clashes with what’s considered good behavior among normal humans.

Her opponent-cum-best friend is Vanilla Mieux, a lovely, nurturing, gentle and kind girl. She’s introverted, shy, and scares easily, but she makes up for it by being very studious, hard-working and smart, and while her timid demeanor made her unpopular back in Magical World, she has the chance to blossom now that she’s in the Human Realm. Thus, the show had an excellent chance to show how two very different people can walk towards the same goal each in their own way, relying each on their own strengths of character, and still be friends, working together despite all that divides them. “Being friends with someone who isn’t like you isn’t only possible, it’s exciting and opens a lot of possibilities and manners of thinking before you if you’re open-minded and want to make it work”. “If you believe in yourself, work-hard and embrace what makes you unique, you can achieve anything you want”. I thought Sugar Sugar Rune would be about this, or at least something in a similar vein. Welp, forgive me for having high expectations.

The penultimate quest that drives the plot of this 51-episode series, the mystery of who’s going to ascend the Magical World’s throne proves to be solved in the very first episode. Just by watching the opening and looking at the mid-episode commercial break screens can you accurately say who’s going to be the next queen by the end of the show, roll credits, everybody can go home now. From the very beginning of the show it’s just “Chocolat!” over and over again. My question is: why bother with the pretense of having two main characters, if you’re not going to give the other one equal attention, screentime or development, or any meaningful role at all? Right off the bat you see Vanilla fulfilling just three functions, and those three won’t change at all during the course of the series: a) damsel in distress, b) Chocolat’s caretaker and cheerleader, c) a background off of which Chocolat’s character is constructed and supposed to shine that much brighter. That is to say, the show’s true heroine is Chocolate, and to rub it in we have Vanilla. They are supposed to be these childhood friends with an indestructible bond who complete each other and balance out each other’s flaws but all I have seen is codependence and Chocolat mooching off Vanilla’s goodwill and support.

I won’t lie: I have major issues with the brattish character of Chocolat, how they pit her against the gentle Vanilla and every step of the way tell us “Vanilla is okay, but Chocolate is the real star”. They aren’t subtle about it in the least, even their surnames speak volumes: while Vanilla’s means “better” in French, Chocolat’s of course, is the superlative “best”. It seems a bit like a misguided attempt at feminism in the deeply patriarchal Japanese society – choosing a strong and confident girl as the main character above the meek and domestic one is certainly far from traditional and I would applaud it if not for the fact that Chocolat doesn’t have much going for her besides being the not-your-run-of-the-mill magical girl character. She’s brave and strong, okay, I get that and I admire that, but she’s also ridiculously stupid, clueless, annoyingly rude and if not for the help of her friends she would’ve been dead or disqualified ten times over. She’s the focus of the story from day one, and while you would initially sympathize with her because she unwittingly antagonizes everyone in the Human World with her brashness, isn’t good with studies and has no parents or backing in contrast to the well-mannered and well-read Vanilla whose mother is the reigning queen and who enjoyed the life as a princess up until now, you quickly come to realize that Chocolat’s the over-privileged one here. Girls idolize her, boys adore her for being a great pal and occasionally swoon over her tsundere-ness, she has a loving family of aunt, uncle and grandfather, she is super-popular in the Magical World, she has two loyal knights who have been in love with her since back when they were kids (who worship the ground she walks upon and whom she strings along just like that), the mysterious bishounen is head over heels for her and everyone, including Vanilla’s mom queen Candy never shut up about how her courage and strength are exactly what they need in a future queen. Not to mention it turns out that she has some kind of super-special power to purify evil and her supposedly deceased mom is actually very much alive.

Vanilla, for her part, has been shunned for her meekness in the Magical World for as long as she remembers, never had any friends besides Chocolat, and while the Human Realm seems to be the place where she can finally be herself and be appreciated for that, it turns out that all the girls hate her guts, and while she seems to do well among the boys, no recurring character of any importance seems to care about her. She has two boys who are shown to be smitten with her, but they are so unimportant we never even get to know their names. She finally seems to get a chance towards more agency and character development near the end of the series with the short-lived Ogre Princess arc, where she decides to quit being on the sidelines and take Chocolat on, embracing her dark side, but even there she’s relegated to being mysterious bishounen Pierre’s second choice and the victim of his machinations. No one seems too worried about her when she crosses over to the dark side, no one makes any persistent attempts to get her to change her mind besides Chocolat. If anything, all the other characters either tell Chocolat she needs to focus on the becoming the queen instead of trying to get Vanilla back, or they want to help Chocolat, but just because they can’t bear to watch her being sad, not because they actually give a damn about Vanilla. She ends up being “rescued” by Chocolat from being the Ogre Princess which is very ironic because it was something that she chose for herself, for the first time in the series. The power of friendship prevails, so to speak, which again would be great if they actually showed us why or how the two girls became friends in the first place and what makes them so irreplaceable to each other, but all we get is “they are and have always been BFFs, just because”. Oh-kay.

Sugar Sugar Rune is profoundly underwhelming because it flirts with so many interesting themes and then dumps them. The Ogres are the apparent main antagonists, but wait… They aren’t actually that bad, they’re just misunderstood and wrongly oppressed so they have no choice but to fight back? Nah, well, it’s all true but they’re still evil, because damn, we need someone to be a baddie! The witches have hearts, the very essences of their being that they must under no circumstances give away lest they die on the spot? Oh, it turns out that the Ogres can implant black hearts of envy and hate into the witches which let them harness the humans’ negative emotions too, which they normally can’t do AND they get an extra spare heart! Cool, right? Well, turns out it isn’t because the black heart will fight with the witch’s original heart and cause her a great deal of pain. So, the black hearts that represent the negative emotions are supposed to hurt witches, but unless someone sticks the actual thing into their breasts, they can feel sadness, anxiety, jealousy et cetera just fine without any complications or pain. And can I just say one thing about the series’ main love story? When was it exactly that our brazen heroine started falling for the gallant Pierre? Well, kids, it all happened that day when *drum roll* he ate soup with carrots to impress her, and he HATES carrots. Is that super romantic or what?

With ridiculous, filler-laden plot, two-dimensional characters, lackluster animation and entirely forgettable music, Sugar Sugar Rune is just meh. It might have an interesting premise and a pleasing aesthetic, but with its only message being “you gotta be strong and brave, because if you are nothing else really matters and everyone will suddenly start loving you” it just doesn’t do it for me, as I don’t think it will for anyone with half a brain. It’s just frustrating to watch.