March 18, 2004
Maburaho Episode 1
"They Came..."
Did you read Harry Potter? Its global popularity more than guarantees a large number of hangers-on, imitations, copycats and other works in the same genre. Not that anime hasn't been here before, but with this show, it seems even more obviously the result of Pottermania.
The art for this show is appealing to me, cute (without being overly so) character designs, and female characters of suitable attractiveness (and bounciness). Right, bounciness, this is defintely a show for boys, with fanservice thrown all over the place (not to mention this is a show about a loser guy with beautiful women falling all over him).
For a few seconds there, the show has you worried that it's going to be like every other harem show, or show of this type, but in the background, you always have the feeling that there's at least something different (and there is).
It all seems a little transparent. Apparently our hero is descended from a line of great magicians, though his direct ancestors have been far below average. Unfortunately, he doesn't seem to have gotten the power, because he can only use magic eight times (the number of times being the measure of a magician's power). The popular theory, then, is that his child could be an extraordinary magician.
Yeah, right.
This show isn't about his kid though, so let's be honest. Obviously he's the mage of great power, and the fact he can only do it eight times is probably because each of the eight times he's able to do something unbelievably crazy. (That's not even mentioning how absurd an idea that his genes are going to be the ones to produce this super magician, when they must have thought the same about his pathetic previous ancestors, right?)
Then, of course, in the end, when he's out of magic, there'll still be one girl who still loves him, and they can ride off into the sunset.
That's just my guess anyways.
Rating: B+
Posted by Kei at March 18, 2004 12:21 AM