Winter 2014 Anime Season Review, 3 of 5

Here comes the next set of reviews for the past anime season. Read on.

Witch Craft Works was everything I had hoped it would be and more. There wasn’t much fanfare around this show when it started, and I don’t know that even now it gets as much attention as it should. I can tell you that it suffered from the apparent backlash that some shows have gotten for sporting leading ladies with ample endowments. This is the second of two shows this season that received some pre-season derision from potential viewers over this fact, people who assumed it meant the show itself would be a simple trashy fan-service romp. Like with Soni-Ani anyone who avoided this show thinking that is sorely mistaken and missed out on a great show.

The story is complex due to not a lot of the reasons for events being explained. But the story never feels like it’s stagnating. It moves forward, just keeping you tantalizingly at arm’s length from the full story. That has a lot to do with the fact that the manga it’s based on is ongoing. It’s got Kill la Kill kind of over-powered battles, but not quite the same sort of absurdity – though it’s weird saying that about a show about magic and witches (tells you something about KlaK). It’s absolutely fantastic all around, and has the greatest ending theme hands down (witch, witch).

Inari, Kon Kon, Koi Iroha is a slightly uncommon show. The female lead comes into the powers of a fox goddess after befriending her due in part for often visiting her shrine and saving one of her young foxes. The show is a rom-com as the M.C uses her new-found power to try to win the love of a guy she’s got a crush on, and the goddess starts falling in love with the M.C’s older brother. It’s kinda cute and painful seeing the goddess try to endear herself to the brother who is completely a tsundere towards her. The depiction of how she truly adores and treasures her friendship with the M.C, even while continuing that relationship is literally killing her, is so bittersweet. Yet the comedic moments, particularly with the other deities, are rich, even if not side-splitting. All said this show is absolutely terrific. It is a real gem, even without blasting anything out of the park.

Engaged to the Unidentified is a slightly odd one. It’s one part romance, one part comedy, a little supernatural, and a dash of slice-of-life. A girl is saved by an unidentified mysterious animal when she was a child, but couldn’t remember it. Her grandfather arranges for them to marry when she’s older as a way of thanking the one who saved her. The only problem is she’s kinda shyly indifferent to the idea, her older sister has a thing for little sisters, and her betrothed lacks any facial expressions, or much outward emotion whatsoever. The older sister Benio’s love for her little sister and soon to be little sister-in-law leads to fairly hilarious moments, while also being more than a little creepy. But the relationship angle can be a little dull between Kobeni and Hakuya. Neither seems too actively interested in moving it one way or another, and given that only a few other people even know about the relationship at all, there isn’t a lot of outside pressure to get things moving. Of those who know, Benio is against it due to her siscon predilection, and Mashiro, Hakuya’s little sister, is too easily swayed by distractions, and too busy fearing Benio’s siscon/lolicon predilection, to make too much effort. The comedy is the real focus here. It’s good; not great, but good. Overall the show is the same; good, not great.

Z/X Ignition is a bit of a lot of a mess. Concept wise it has tremendous potential. At certain moments, especially in the early going, it had the impression that it would be played a lot more like a more darkly serious show along the lines of a Fate/Zero or something like that. The general story certainly has that potential. On the other hand, the basic mechanics of the show lend it to being played like a more juvenile series, along the lines of a Yu-Gi-Oh. It seemingly struggles between these two posts, not sure which it wants to go more towards. Things are worsened by the pacing and plotting of the show. The way the second through sixth or seventh episode all take place prior to episode one is not a new trick, but didn’t work at all well for this series. It just muddled and depreciated the show. The characters are nothing spectacular but are decent enough that if the story was a little better plotted the show would be much better. It’s interesting enough that I want to see where it goes, but I don’t have the confidence it’ll last long enough to get there. Don’t count on a season two.

Magical Warfare also suffers from poor pacing. The story is a unique in its approach to magic’s existence in the world, and in how people attain magic. This isn’t necessarily a good thing, however, since the explanation and mechanics of how people gain magic simply by witnessing it, conflicts with the concept of magic being limited. It aspires to a grand tale about magic and the war between different magic clans. But as has been increasingly par for the course, rather than personal issues and relationships running interlaced or concurrent to the broader conflict, the story is focused on the personal stuff, the conflict being shoved to the background. By the late part of the show, and I mean the last couple episodes, efforts to refocus on the broader conflict are paltry and ultimately the rush of wrap the season kills any effective direction to that goal. Like with any anime, the extent to which a show has faults tends to be exaggerated when the show decides to run through parts of the show at seemingly Mach speed. Once more this is a show whose framework offers a potential for a great show, but the execution here is anything but great. Thus the show is anything but great. This one ranks near or at the bottom of the list for the season.