This is an anime that excels at its main themes. It is a comedy slice of life show with cute girls doing cute things in a fantasy setting. It is a lighthearted and wholesome anime. It is also completely harmless in its humor, there is plenty of it, and there is a lack of subversion at any point so it is a great choice for both kids and adults that are looking for something that is just nice, positive and easy to watch.
The anime is an adaptation of the light novel series of the same name which started in 2016. Unlike many others these series
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of books, already on the 17 volume with 9 very well translated to English, are also very well written, the little stories are coherent and rather hilarious, enjoyable and follow a logical path. For those wanting to fill the many blanks of an anime adaptation, I 100% recommend them.
The anime itself has beautiful art with good attention to detail on both the main characters and the backgrounds. The animation is good in general, with very good polish, it’s hard to find a frame that looks poorly done or rushed, and, this was very important for me, it favors traditional animation instead of CGI for the most part, magical effects and water being the main exception, which is understandable and looks rather great.
It is worth noting that the animation is surprisingly excellent at times, like with the few fight scenes that happen. It is always interesting to see a slice of life anime with this amount of care for such scenes, something that many fight focused shows lack more often than not. You won’t find a single drop of blood here except for a brief nose bleed one episode. As a side note, it’s very amusing to see how the team seems to enjoy referencing Dragon Ball in particular.
The story is faithful to the light novels and, as the premise says, it tries to teach good positive little lessons, such as that slow and steady wins the race, that the extremes are always harmful, that small moderate efforts are better than doing all of it right away. You get the idea.
Interestingly, the isekai part of this show is only a very small plot point that serves the main character, our now very cute witch Azusa, to change her old workaholic ways and never go back to them. It is interesting because her story could easily work just fine without the isekai part of it. She could have been born in her now new fantasy world, became a witch and end up both immortal and desiring a laid back life on her own, similarly becoming max level with the same little effort every day for 300 years. It is not a big deal though.
As more characters are introduced their personalities clash in hilarious ways here and there. Needless to say, some of the humor is about other characters teasing Azusa, harmlessly really, for the giggles. It is more common in the anime due to its fast pacing, but it is funny thanks in no small part to the amazing voice actresses. The English dub is also surprisingly excellent too and it’s also dubbed to other languages.
There is no romance here of course but the anime doesn't shy away from hand holding, hugs and kisses on the cheek, which is pretty adorable. One character in particular is really mischievous in the most amusing and surprising ways, although it shouldn’t surprise anyone considering what her first name means in Spanish, so she gets a special mention.
Many of the main characters see Azusa, and she in return, as family, mostly sisters even if they’re not related, so their reactions are realistic and make sense for their different personalities. Perhaps the elf girl is portrayed a little off canon at times for the fan service, as she is more competent, even if clumsy at times, in the light novels.
Finally, the music score is pretty light and doesn't get in the way during the show either. The celtic like vibes are more than welcome and fit nicely with the fantasy setting. I must say that the opening song was a little strange at first, since it's just the original voice of Azusa in this one, speaking very fast at first, but it's very catchy and will easily glue to your mind, plus she's a delight as per usual.
All in all, I was going to give this show a 9, just for the very few things that annoyed me here and there. But then I remembered that many effects are actually voiced and they never stopped to greatly amuse me. So I’m going to round up the score to 10 thanks to that brilliant idea that really added to the comedy and lighthearted tone of the show. It is not perfect, and the studio is relatively new so it doesn't have a big following so don't let the overall scores discourage you. In the genres that it is competing in, it is outstanding. I hope that it gets a second season in the future.
Jul 10, 2021
This is an anime that excels at its main themes. It is a comedy slice of life show with cute girls doing cute things in a fantasy setting. It is a lighthearted and wholesome anime. It is also completely harmless in its humor, there is plenty of it, and there is a lack of subversion at any point so it is a great choice for both kids and adults that are looking for something that is just nice, positive and easy to watch.
The anime is an adaptation of the light novel series of the same name which started in 2016. Unlike many others these series ... |
