Friday, June 29, 2018

FIF#57-The Ancient Magus Bride

Chise Hatori is a 15 year old girl from Japan who has been sold into the service of a mysterious mage named Elias.  When she was younger, Chise was abandoned by her family and felt cursed with the sight of supposed otherworldly beings.  Elias, a magus with the skulled head of a horned beast, can sense great potential in Chise and accepts her as both his servant and as his student in the art of all things magical.  In his home in the English Countryside, Chise will find her sights welcome and the hole in her life filled…even if that might mean becoming the bride of the ancient magus.

As far as fantasy Anime series go, The Ancient Magus Bride seems to have set a new high bar with the one and only episode ive seen so far…and also I just found out this wasn’t even part of the main TV series but a prequel OVA (is that even better?)  I knew very little going into it besides the title, the look of the supposed Magus and the bride herself.  I also gathered that the series has some Beauty and the Beast vibes to it and I can see why.  Even though Elias cant really project facial emotions…cause his head is a skull, his voice actor does a great job at conveying those underlying feelings.  You can tell something about Chise, besides her being really cute, stirs things inside of him.  Same goes vice versa for Chise, who is clearly the true star of the series.  Even without the later knowledge that she can see the supernatural, she can sense when Elias is in a bad mood or holding something back.  Granted, the series begins years after she and Elias probably met so there’s history there still to be explored.  I felt so bad for little Chise in the flashbacks of the first episode.  Why was she abandoned?  How did she get her supernatural sight?  Why wouldn’t she let anyone give her a hug?  Granted her foster family seemed a bit shady so it’s probably good she didn’t stick around them.  But there was a nice girl who offered her water, only for a pesky spirit to break things up (which only Chise could see).  Man, Chise is a world of hurt and I only ever wanted to see good things happen to her.  Will that happen in this series?  Me giving a damn only one episode in almost compels me to watch to find out.  And even if that wasn’t the case, crap is this show gorgeous as heck.  There’s a very Miyazaki/Ghibli feel to Magus Bride’s art style and story execution.  Much like Spirited Away or Howl’s Moving Castle, the world feels lively with magical possibilities and creatures to populate it.  God only knows that there are more than fairies and moving books in Elias’s mansion and I want to know what else is in there.

Huh, all that praise I guess I should find a way to continue watching this series.  I might even add it to my Custom Toonami Line Up with Legend of the Galactic Heroes, Gundam Build Drivers, Full Metal Panic and My Hero Academia.  Very rarely can a first episode alone snag my attention for a series.  The Ancient Magus Bride was hailed as one of the biggest hits of the fall season last year and im inclined to believe the hype.  Once I clear through the OVA’s other two episodes ill be into this series and hopefully ill be ready for one helluva ride.


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