- Last OnlineYesterday, 11:16 AM
- GenderFemale
- BirthdayFeb 8, 1998
- LocationLuxembourg
- JoinedApr 28, 2017
No friend yet.
RSS Feeds
|
![]()
Feb 26, 2019
The one thing I appreciate the most about this, what I think to be very underrated anime, is the fact that you start off by disliking/hating the protagonist, Ange.
We are introduced when Ange is Princess of Misurugi, and right from the get-go we see how sheltered she is, when she witnesses a child being ripped away from its mother for being a Norma (a human incapable of using Mana). The mother is furious at her behaviour, about how she tells her to just let her daughter go and that it is the best for the country.
The mother's hatred is immediately projected unto the
...
viewer, who recognizes how ignorant Ange is. She is the typical princess type that cannot do anything by herself.
However, when it turns out that she herself is a Norma, Ange is thrust into the Hell that she previously defended. She now experiences cruel treatment from Jill and the other Normas, as well as the terror of fighting DRAGONs. She is first-hand confronted with death and pain, and comes to slowly realize just what she had been defending and turning a blind eye on in the past.
It is then that we slowly start to warm up to her. Ange goes from a whimpy, helpless princess to a confident, strong woman who is able to hold her own in battle. We see how she realizes that this is now her life, and she decides that she will not simply be killed by a DRAGON, but will fight for her survival and that of her fellow Normas.
That is what I love so much about Ange. She accepts that her past views were wrong, and at the end does everything she can to help the Normas and overthrow the policies in place that treat them as slaves. She goes against her own family because she realizes the horrors that they have allowed to happen.
Concerning the romance plot, I guess it was pretty solid. Without infringing on the actual problems and battles of the show, the love story between Ange and Tusk is slowly build up, and makes for some quite comedic moments. It's good to see how, slowly, Ange starts to let Tusk in and they end up genuinely loving the other to the point where they are ready to sacrifice themselves for the other.
The lesbian romance is, in my person opinion, unnecessary and really just pure fan service. However, it does make a lot of sense, given that Normas are solely women. It would be impossible for them to have a male lover since they are never in contact with any men. So, in a world where they can die any day, it would be normal for them to look for some form of intimacy.
I also quite liked the development of the secondary characters like Hilda (whom I greatly disliked at first) and Jill, and even Momoka, who is a loyal friend to Ange. They all get time to be developed and change, going through their own little story as they follow Ange.
I would recommend the anime to anyone who is looking for a solid plot with kickass characters. There is no shortage of death or even gore, as well as comedy and romance. All these things are balanced in a very good way to the point that no element outshines the other. They are simply part of life.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
What did you think of this review?
Nice
 0
Love it
 0
Funny
 0
Confusing
 0
Well-written
 0
Creative
 0Show all
![]()
Apr 4, 2018
Despite having watched the entire anime, Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei failed to impress me or leave a lingering memory, unlike other anime I have watched (ex. Naruto, Claymore). Let's go point by point shall we?
1. ART STYLE
Alright. I love the art style of this anime. I honestly do. MKNR has a very nice use of colours and I just love the way the eyes are drawn. It is one of the good points about this anime.
2. PLOT
Now the plot is a different story.
Despite being centred around the development of magic and the interference from other countries, the plot was one of the weaker
...
things this anime has to offer.
Maybe I'm just picky, but this anime did not manage to bind me to it. It did not keep me on the edge of my seat whenever an episode ended with a cliffhanger.
I was curious, yes, but I could also have stopped watching it all-together. I did, in fact, stop watching it at one point, but then semi-forced myself to watch on. Maybe as a personal challenge, or maybe because I just wanted to be done with it. I honestly don't know. But I can say that I would not have missed anything had I not finished this anime.
3. MAIN CHARACTER(S)
Now the point that really irked me.
First of all, we have Tatsuya Shiba, a secret military Special Lieutenant that acts as a bodyguard for his little sister Miyuki. Tatsuya himself does not express any kind of emotion, and if he does, it's for a very short moment. I understand that, as a child who fought in a war, he is not like other kids. But even so, the complete lack of any personality makes him a character that is, for me, quite poor. He himself even states that he does not have any emotion.
Characters like that can work — e.i. Sesshomaru from Inuyasha or Ulquiorra Cifer from Bleach — but in Tatsuya's case, it did not. At least not for me.
Not to mention that he is ridiculously over-powered. They even compared him to God, for Pete's sake. Give me a character that's strong and I'm all yours. But don't give me some over-powered, unemotional pretty boy that might as well marry his sister in the end.
Second, we have his sister Miyuki. Oh boy did this girl annoy me. Miyuki is your typical sweet and beautiful girl that every boy falls in love with. But, as already mentioned, she only has eyes for her own BROTHER. I mean, come on, the two are SIBLINGS. And yet I continuously got the feeling as though I were watching an anime involving incest. At one point, I even researched if the two were actual siblings and got even more creeped out when I realized that, yes, they really are.
For those people who like this genre of entertainment, go right ahead and watch it. But for me it was just the big No-No of this show.
Miyuki is almost as shallow a character as her brother, and the only thing that even gives her any kind of relevance in the anime is the fact that she is the sister of Tatsuya and is therefor under his protection. Besides that, there is nothing I can find that made me like this character even one bit.
4. SIDE CHARACTERS
Ah, finally. A redeemable element about this anime. If I had to choose, I would say that the side characters had me more involved than the main ones. To be honest, I'm a sucker for romance anime, so of course, when I see former adversaries fall in love or the budding relationship between two knuckleheads and/or two awkward characters, that is something I look forward to.
Which is why I found myself rooting more for the side characters than the main ones. Scratch that, I only rooted for them. For me, it's a sad thing when the side characters, who sometimes only have about maybe 30 minutes of screen time in 26 episodes, have me more entranced than the main ones. I actually felt more connected to them than Tatsuya or Miyuki.
5. WORLD BUILDING
To be fair, the world building was an element that, in my eyes, had a good concept. Setting the anime in the modern world is always interesting. It makes us wonder how this world operates, what the differences are between different magical worlds and what of the past the creator kept by.
In the modern world, magicians use so-called CADs to quicken the process of activating their magic. This fits perfectly into our current tendency of doing things in a fast way. People are just as rushed as they were in the past, even if the tasks can be accomplished relatively easily.
It's also quite interesting to see how the Blooms of the school — meaning the 1st Course students — see the Weeds of the school — the 2nd Course students. We have the old but always reliable element of social classes and the fight to tear down the walls that uphold those lines. As such, we can see the sheer arrogance that 1st Course students exude simply for having the emblem of a flower on their jackets. It was one of the things that actually made me feel something for the characters, even for the main one. Social discrimination is always a welcome tool in order to make an anime seem more mature.
The hints to the past, such as the fact that Tatsuya trains under a main that is a professional shinobi, is also a welcome sight. It shows that the past still plays a big role and might in some cases even be superior to the modern magic, i.e. Yoshida Mikihiko's Ancient Spirit Magic.
CONCLUSION
In conclusion, I guess you could say that it's possible to enjoy this anime. It isn't all bad, but it also isn't the best I've seen so far. But I guess everybody has to see for themselves if they like a show or not, and to make their own opinions.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all
|
