Magical Girls have taken many forms over the years. From the simple and innocent days of “Himitsu no Akko-chan” (1962) and the transforming heroines of “Sailor Moon” (1992) to the modern subversions like “Puella Magi Madoka Magica” (2011), magical girls come in all kinds of styles and stories in anime. Studios Moe and J.C. Staff in adapting “Magilumiere Magical Girls Inc.” present something we haven’t seen before; working magical girls.
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Strange monsters known as Kaii are an ever-present danger. To combat them, a new industry has boomed; magical girls. Various companies offer their services to keep the public safe. In this world, fresh graduate Kana Sakuragi is having no luck finding a job after a string of failed interviews. Her only real strength is her memorisation skills. A chance encounter with magical girl Hitomi Koshigaya leads her to being hired at Magilumiere Inc., a small start up with unusual staff and even more unusual methods.
This is magical girls in a corporate setting. There is no grand destiny, talking animal sidekick, or power of friendship being used to save the world, just people working for a paycheck. It’s a demystifying effect and one that normalises the world as we experience it and makes it more accessible. While magic exists, it functions more like computer coding than anything arcane. Kana is the POV into this working world, and her sweet and uncertain but determined attitude makes her a plucky protagonist. The other employees of Magilumiere Inc. are the more interesting ones. Koshigaya is brash and lackadaisical at times, but she is never neglectful in her job and is a good mentor to Kana despite their differences. Programmer Nikoyama is brilliant but introverted and Midorikawa is the hyper-competent head of sales. It’s company boss and founder Shigemoto that is the biggest curiosity. His blank eyed face is at odds with how he dresses like a magical girl himself and is obsessively passionate about good magical visuals.
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So they’re a group of misfits whose pluck and caring is at odds with the big business approach that favours efficient results over compassion. But this isn’t really that kind of underdog story. Nor is it a workplace comedy based around magical mishaps. It’s also not much of a personal journey for Kana as, despite going through a couple of small crises of confidence, she remains the same throughout. Despite hints of all these things they’re not grown enough and the show feels meandering and directionless for the most part. It also doesn’t help that whilst the action scenes look nice, the fights lack urgency. Even when characters say that the magical girls are in danger it never gets tense or makes you think they might not survive. It’s still entertaining, and many of these elements are possibly being set up for the second season that has been announced. The problem is that finishing this season as it is now doesn’t feel very satisfying.
The best episodes are the duo of 8 and 9, which sees the team attending a magical technology conference. These two episodes open up the world building, add to the vague threat of the kaii monsters mutating beyond what the magical girls can fight, and take their time to develop one of the main characters; that being Nikoyama. They work because they make the most of the concept and characters in a way that other episodes don’t. The show is the first outing for director Masahiro Hiraoka whose only major credit is as a background artist on “Spy x Family”. A tighter direction would have been better here, but I think those two specific episodes really show that Hiraoka has potential and in time could make something really great rather than simply good.
The show is Studio Moe‘s first full series, but J.C. Staff have done a little bit of everything. As such, their style can be best described as versatile but not stunning. They do shine a bit more in those fight scenes and every couple of episodes you’ll get a little “wow” moment. And being a magical girl show, of course there are transformation scenes with all the necessary spinning and sparkles. Out of the solid voice cast the standout is Yumiri Hanamori as Koshigaya. If you’re familiar with her work as Nadeshiko in “Laid Back Camp” this is as far away from that as you can get, yet still full of energy and personality.
It’s always refreshing to come across a series that brings something new to a familiar concept, and “Magilumiere Magical Girls Inc”. does just that with an entertaining premise and a strong start. The characters are likable, and while the animation never quite dazzles, it has moments that showcase the strengths of a studio like J.C. Staff. Unfortunately, the series is held back by a lack of focus and the feeling of being an incomplete story. Hopefully, a second season will build on this foundation and bring everything together more cohesively.
