#I've been meaning to reblog a bunch of magireco anime reviews

[thewhitefluffyhat]

How do you feel the anime is doing in handling the elements from the game? I think they've made some very meaningful changes to get rid of much of the padding and improve the ot/character beats. In the recent episode they didn't even include Homura and Madoka's search subplot, despite the easy fanservice there.

Oh geez, what a timing-dependent ask!  This was sent right around Episode 8, I believe.

And yes, I’ve been mostly enjoying the anime changes so far, particularly some of the little character details.  Kaede holding up that drawing of Rena, Mitama’s horrifying new food combinations, Iroha having to bail out Felicia when she gets in a fight… there are a lot of moments that are unique to the anime, yet feel so wonderfully true to the characters it seems like they should have been in the game!

(Also much like Doroinu’s Valentine’s event sections, it’s really obvious that he’s more confident in writing the original cast than the f4 team is…)

The changes to the rumors have also been intriguing, and I think generally for the better.  Things like the Breakup Staircase requiring you to write your name on a specific staircase, or how the rumor of the Endless Solitude requires that only one person can enter at a time… it all works towards the rumors feeling more like genuine urban legends.

Still, I did think Kaede and Rena’s arc was unfortunately rushed, and witch fights tend to go by really fast too.  So even though Madoka and Homura are my favorites from the original quintet, I was outright happy to see them removed if it meant better pacing and focus on the important parts of Ch5.

(More detailed discussion of Episodes 9 and 10 below.)

And to some degree, that really did happen!  I’m watching alongside my little brother, who not only hasn’t played the game, but he’s also very skeptical of gacha adaptations.  And both of us loved Sana and Ai in Episode 9.  (He even found it the first episode so far that managed to touch the spark the original anime had!)

I thought it was particularly well done in how it balanced including just enough of Sana’s Magical Girl Story to explain her character, without going overboard and piling on so much suffering it seemed too over-the-top.

That being said, while Sana and Ai were great, Iroha and Sana’s relationship… really took a backseat.  Iroha in general has been frustratingly passive so far, despite the early episodes seeming like the anime might be trying to fix some of that.  But with the little Kyuubey being the one to force Iroha to jump from the tower, and in getting rid of the Ai fight, Iroha now comes across as even more useless and disconnected than in the game.  :/

And… then there’s anime Alina.  Who at this point, consists entirely of meme poses, manic cackling,  and shouting her lines from the game at 2x speed.  I was hoping that Episode 10 would at least have Yachiyo mention her background as a famous artist, and that it would give Alina a bit of a humanizing moment with her relationship with Mifuyu, but… nope.  Instead, she jumped straight over Jojo and landed in Higurashi with those faces.

(Which is kind of an insult to Higurashi, tbh.  Even Meakashi-hen Shion has more of a reason and behind her wild actions than Alina here…  unless you buy the theory that Alina’s doppel doesn’t just drive witches and rumors berserk, that is.)

Quite a disappointment, especially when the OP looks more like Alina from her MGS.

Aside from Alina, Magius as a whole seems more reasonable and morally gray, which is a major improvement from the game.  (Especially if, as Episode 10 kind of implies, Mami joined without being brainwashed!)  I suppose if nonsensical Alina is the price I have to pay for the rest of Magius being sane, it’s still a tradeoff I would make… but oof, what a cost.

And I’m worried about what this means for Alina’s role later in the plot.  Right now, it seems quite possible she’ll be the one who corrupts Touka and Nemu, rather than the other way around.  The way that Alina can control witches with her doppel also seems like foreshadowing for what she does in the game’s Ch10… yet doesn’t solve the problem that she has no relation to the rest of the themes Magireco’s main plot is trying to explore.