Jump to content
Banner by ~ Ice Princess Silky
  • entries
    4
  • comments
    12
  • views
    2,660

My Opinion on a Pretty Neat Show


Tom The Diamond

1,217 views

blog-0441856001365978821.pngSo in spirit of Non-Pony identity day, I changed mine to a really cool character from a really anime. So far only one person recognized it. And so I figured 'Hey, I should get the internet to watch this, so why not tell the internet my opinion on it? After all, the internet loves opinions, and they'll want to see something I gave my opinion on right! : D" So well, here's my opinion on Little Witch Academia.

 

I should start of by saying I'm not really a big anime fan. I mean, I have nothing against Japanese animation, but it just never really appealed to me. I do like the Studio Ghibli films though, and I have watched a few series with friends, but overall it's just something I never really bothered to watch. The few I did seemed dull, with fanservice out the wazoo.

 

Well, I had seen a few pics of this particular anime on Tumblr, so I figured "Hey, why not watch it? It looks pretty interesting." So I watched it and I really enjoyed, I thought it was spectacular! But then I learned something at the end of it that really disappointed me. What was it? We'll get to it later!

 

So, let's get to the story. Akko is a girl who, after watching the performer Shiny Chariot live, wants to be a witch just like her. So, she enrolls in a Witch's School in Britain. Unfortunately, since she is from a regular family, she doesn't really have any natural magical powers like the other witches, and she also finds that Shiny Chariot isn't as revered in the magic world as she thought she was. However, in her Dungeon Crawling class, she's determined to prove herself to her school. Will she succeed?

 

The plot and story of the anime is pretty basic. I mean, it's not bad, and it doesn't do anything wrong, it's just basic. Average. You can kinda predict things if you have a keen mind and are paying close attention. But the story really isn't the main attraction of this, it's the rest. The animation, the characters, the setting, that is what this anime focuses on and by God does it succeed in these aspects.

 

The animation is very lovely. It's vibrant, bouncy, it's a pleasure to look at! The colors and backgrounds are all aesthetically pleasing, In fact the animation actually is quite similar to western animation more so then what you'd expect from typical anime. It kinda resembles Disney-style animation to me. Here are a few spoiler-less gifs showing the animation style, in case you'd like a quick visual example of what I'm talking about.

 

 

blogentry-35-0-97771100-1365974662.gif

blogentry-35-0-15570900-1365974675.gif

blogentry-35-0-06965100-1365974682.gif

blogentry-35-0-49504600-1365974688.gif

 

 

Ok so those gifs? Imagine a whole 30-so minutes of animation like that. It is gorgeous. And are you not a fan of constant fanservice in your shows? Could you care less about panty-shots and extreme cleavage that is no way possible? Well neither were the animators, as this anime has none of that! It's animation that appeals, and by God does it work! On a side note, this anime is very tame. The only real questionable content I could find was a few shots of blood in one scene. But eh, it's very quick, isn't the focus of the shot, and really isn't more then what you'd see in most other PG works.

 

Anyways, the second next thing is characters. I'm not gonna go too in depth here, so expect pretty shallow explanations here, and I'm only gonna cover the 3 main witches.

 

tumblr_ml41so6iE21rmowhqo1_250.jpg

 

The middle one is Akko, the one who the anime revolves around. She wants to be a great wish, but unfortunately she isn't too talented. She's a big fan of the performer Shiny Chariot. The witch on the right is Lotte, who's skilled in magic, eager to learn, yet prefers to play things safe. And then there's Sucy, the fan favorite. Seriously, when you see her on screen, you'll realize why she's regarded as best witch by most. She's deadpan, indifferent, and badass. She's also skilled in potion-brewing. And her animation is the coolest of the characters. Trust me, she's just amazing. On the other characters, there is Diana, who acts as Akko's rival, Hanna and Barbara (Get the reference?) are members of her posse. They play a small role and only get named in the credits. And there's Shiny Chariot, the entertainer that inspires Akko to be a witch. Each of these characters has their distinct personality and animations, which makes them interesting to see how they act off of each other. My only real complaint is that Sucy steals the show whenever she's on screen cause holy crap is she awesome, so other character tend to be overshadowed when she's on. But eh, the characters are still fun nonetheless, and I liked each of them, especially their designs!

 

And finally, the last extremely big thing to note is the settings, the backgrounds, the details. The basic world of 'Academy for Magical Beings' has been around for a long time, popularized by Harry Potter, so it's not really new. Fun, but nothing special. Though the backgrounds do have a ton of details in each, and the background characters all have their own distinct animations. No copy-pasta here. All of it, just like the main animation, is just wonderful to look at. And the background music that accompanies the anime is whimsical, and works well with the animation. Fast paced when it needs to, slow when it doesn't.

 

Anyways, this anime is a treat to watch. It's interesting, fun, happy, and positively gorgeous to watch. Even if you don't like anime normally, you should still consider giving this a watch since it's really different then what you'd expect from anime. It definitely has some western influence in it. It's animation at it's purest, art through-and-through. And it's theme and pacing is similar to that of MLP's, and I know a lot of fans of LWA are also fans of MLP. Odds are if you like MLP, you'll enjoy what LWA has to offer! Seriously, it really isn't hard to find either, just google it and you'll find it. Heck, it's even on youtube.

 

Now, I mentioned there was something that disappointed me. Well, here it is; It's only one episode. A short made with funding from the Japanese Government to help train young animators. There are no plans currently for any follow up, or series. Which is a shame as this would make a wonderful series, the characters and setting at all wonderful! But hey, who knows, maybe if you believe hard enough, they just might make a sequel~

0 Comments


Recommended Comments

There are no comments to display.

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Join the herd!

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...