Score: B+

The Fall Season is underway and it starts off on a serious note with the Magical Girl Raising Project (Mahou Shoujo Ikusei Keikaku). This could be called the season of the Mahou Shoujo anime. I could easily see this being the most serious of them even though this episode was mostly a lighter introductory episode. Although it being a light novel adaptation, I kind of expected we would take at least the first episode before things got too serious. The episode probably did the smart thing by having the initial scene be dark and bloody. That way people won’t be caught offguard when the next episode likely starts things down the path of being a dark death battle. So far this is simply a First Look post. Whether I pick it up or not for the full season depends on how other episodes play out.

I didn’t really mind the first episode taking it easy and let us get to know our lead. Koyuki is a pretty cute girl and it will be interesting to see how she handles herself. While there are a large number of magical girls, the definition of that word is stretched out pretty far. It feels like a series that takes into consideration that the classic definition of a magical girl isn’t the only one out there. The way it acknowledges that is by having a variety of types. We have magical girls who look like witches, knights, ninjas, nuns, etc. And really you can point to various series where that is the case. For a lot of shows “magical girl” just means a girl who can use magic XD.

Heck we even have the show acknowledging that a few shows have gone with the gender swap idea for a magical girl. There have been a few shows where guys transform into magical girls themselves and this show also has that going for it. Koyuki’s childhood friend Souta is as big a fan of magical girls as she is. So it does make sense when we are talking about magical powers that you would have a few guys out there that would be qualified. All these girls are transforming anyways so why not have a guy in the mix? I do somewhat worry about this guy considering the tone of the show. It is possible Souta either gets killed early on or turns on Koyuki early. I just can’t see a very positive result for this guy.

Anyways this episode mostly introduced us to the situation that is going on and Koyuki herself. The episode revealed Koyuki’s special gift is the ability to hear the voices of those in need. That is a power that is great for a helpful kind of magical girl who isn’t actually fighting evil or anything. It fits her positive personality in wanting to give and have mahou shoujos be a force for good. However, in a brutal fight to the death that seems like a horribly useless power. If the competitions can stay focused on the scoreboard then she has a great advantage. Koyuki can find those in need faster than anyone else and her innate power boost is enough to deal with minor crisis. But, I’m not sure what she can do in a battle to the death unless she has some additional combat abilities that we haven’t seen.

There are still a lot of questions though. We know things are going to get deadly serious, but so far we don’t know why. Why do they have to cut the amount of magical girls in that area? They just picked Koyuki a short time ago. If there was some sort of limits shouldn’t they already have figured that out and simply not had as many? Also why is this looking to be turning into a battle to the death? If you need to cut the numbers by a little less than half…aren’t there non-violent means of doing that? They have a scoring system that was introduced in this episode. Can they not simply cut the people who don’t have a high enough score after a certain time period?

Is the system going to turn this into a battle to the death? Or are the various girls going to decide that themselves? I can see some of the magical girls having some more combat focused abilities that would help them score faster than actually doing good deeds. But it seems crazy that anyone would rationally choose a murderous path when there are other options available. It is hard to figure out this company when we don’t know why they are making magical girls in the first place. There doesn’t seem to be much of a threat out there that would warrant giving these girls power. Though I suppose if you simply treat it like making superheroes to make cities safer then there is some logic to it. I’m just very curious about this company and their motives.

There isn’t that much to say right out of the gate though. So far the concept has been introduced for these girls being selected through that free to play game. We also know that they have an ability to mess with the memories of those that see them. Having magic in play, it does make sense to have powers that can help conceal their identities and activities. I am just curious to see how this all plays out and how good this show might be. The second episode should be key in determining that. They ended this episode with the announcement of cutting back on the number of girls. The system for this cutback and how the girls respond to it will be something to see.