New Magical Girl show!

well, sorta

Around 2011 the car manufacturer, Subaru, teamed up with animation studio Gainax to produce web shorts (that in all resemble a series pilot) to try and appeal to anime fans with a cutesy little magical girl team.

Thanks to positive feedback, we now have a TV series thats just as charming as one would expect

Plot: Star-gazer Subaru goes to school after hours to return a telescope, but magically unlocks doors to other secret rooms, one of which being the club room for a group of magical girls trying to collect "fragments" of an engine in order to help a stranded alien return home.


This is sort of a nice blend of those after school club slice of life anime. I get a nice feeling from it so I'm interested in what they'll do for the rest of the series and if the ending will be the same as the shorts. 

Even though it is a show for older anime fans, I'd be surprised if this changed its tone to be a darker flavor or added uncomfortable fanservice, (I mean, Subaru has their reputation on the line in this after all)
I feel like this will be one that's just nice and fluffy, and that's okay.

Huh, when did this happen? Last I heard we were getting a movie instead. Oh well.

I still remember the shorts, they were nice, if a little lacking. Hopefully this improves on them a bit.

I'm not sure whether I'm going to watch this or not. I have some... trust issues with Gainax.

All the talented people who put Gainax on the map have either gone to Trigger with Imaishi (Who made Gurren Lagann) or Khara with Anno (Who made Evangelion). Ever since they left I don't think they've made one good show. 

The modern day Gainax is better known for stuff like C3-bu which had a neat concept ripe with potential for simple fun. But then the people at Gainax decided that would be too boring. So they shoehorned in a grimdark twist towards the end before realising that it was a really dumb idea leading to the entire conflict being hastily cleaned up in the second last episode so they could end it all on a fanservice comedy episode in a last ditch attempt to bring back all the people who gave up on the series (If you look at the BD sales, you can see how well that worked out).

I'm not saying we're going to get another Madoka ripoff, but I don't want to experience that level of disappointment again. I refuse to take any chances until I know for sure that it's worth my time.

Now see, the stuff about Gainax's staff is actually a valid complaint. Most of the people complaining about this show are doing so because 1) It lacks fanservice and 2) It's not dark and edgy. It's really sad when a magical girl show outside of Precure can't air without people going "Baww we need suffering!"

Oh god the moe slice of life paintball thing. I had forgotten all about that.

I think the latest released Gainax anime I ever watched was Gurren Lagann. If most of their people have moved to Studio Trigger, that would explain Kill La Kill.

RLinksoul wrote:

Oh god the moe slice of life paintball thing. I had forgotten all about that.

Fortunately, so did everyone else. It got referenced in Sabagebu (A shoujo gag comedy about airsoft with throwbacks to old action movies as opposed to a coming of age story gone horribly wrong) when the narrator literally says something along the lines of 'Don't worry guys, this is a gag comedy so it isn't going to suddenly turn dark at any point'

But as of yet I do see that most of the criticisms I've heard are either from the perverts who want something like Prisma Illya (Which is something I personally could do without) or a Madoka ripoff (Although to be fair, I've heard much nicer things about Yuki Yuna than Day Break Illusion).

I still don't get why some people in the anime community are so opposed to watching shows outside of their comfort zone. I love Madoka Magica, but isn't it better to seek out new experiences rather than watch the same show 100 times over?

SquadmemberRitsu wrote:

I still don't get why some people in the anime community are so opposed to watching shows outside of their comfort zone. I love Madoka Magica, but isn't it better to seek out new experiences rather than watch the same show 100 times over?

I remember listing to Anime News Network's podcast where they did an episode discussing moe and the type of fans it has. It was done pre-PMMM so they don't really go into magical girls. but one panelist (who was a fan of moe) said that alot of moe fans have a sort of "check list" in their head when they watch a show and if it has all the elements their looking for then its a good show to them (this could be anything from "girl with blonde pigtails", "girl who makes silly noises" etc.) 
I don't know how true that is. but I think people who live, eat, and breath on sites like TVTropes are proof that some people worship elements of their entertainment instead of the overall quality.

in other words, it feels safe if its familiar. so that sort of thing is probably being used to make a moe slice of life show like Pleiades

I think Subaru (the car sponsor) will probably keep a tight rein on the creative staff in this case. I feel like the darkest we'll ever get is when we explore the villain character, but for now I think its just harmless sparkly fluff

I liked the 2010 mini series and was thrilled to find that it got remade for TV! I've seen up to episode 4 so far, and...to be honest, I'm kinda disappointed and confused. It makes no attempts to make any sense, the situations are melodramatic and cheesy at best, and there's hardly any explanation for anything, and what explanations there are are really complicated. I had to go on TVTropes in order to find out what certain things meant, it was that confusing! I'll still finish it, but I doubt I'll like the series after that.

I had a fun time with this one, very comfortable and relaxing show. On many occasions it seemed like it might go all dark, but it always stayed pretty nice. Every single character is cute, it's amazing. I didn't follow the whole multiple-timeline deal though, that kind of thing always confuses me.

Glad I actually gave it a chance. At first I thought it would actually be about cars and ignored it.