Mahou Shoujo Ikusei Keikaku

-- MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS -- If want to watch this anime expecting to see kawaii Magical Girls helping people in need, then you may want to turn and look for another anime, because this is more of a Magical Girl "hunger games" than it is a "Magical Girls helping other people" anime. Magical Girls are killing each other, left and right leaving tomato sauce everywhere. DO NOT WATCH THIS IF : -AGAIN, if you do not want to witness kawaii Magical Girls killing each other than helping innocent people -You hate an unless mc (due to being a Pure Magical Girl but nonetheless pretty much useless unless she's helping normal people as a Magical Girl) -Quickly grow attached to characters on your anime journey of this series, who may end up dying leaving you with tears rolling down your eyes. WATCH THIS IF YOU : -Like survival anime, in this case Magical Girl hunger games -Like gore (any form of tomato sauce spilling) -Like action anime with superpowers -Like pure evil Magical Girls This is pretty much all I'm willing to tell you , I left most of the detailed stuff out to avoid further spoilers and let you, "The Anime Watcher", experience this yourself if you choose to watch this anime. Overall in my opinion, It was an okay anime that entertained me on Sundays during the Fall 2016 anime season. Sayonara Senpai, and thanks for taking the time to read this review, hope it makes you motivated to try this anime, or avoid it due to the content.

I spent 288 minutes watching magical girls killing each other. It was a confounding experience. Mahou Shoujo Ikusei Keikaku is a series about random girls getting selected as a candidate to become a magical girl. What you'd expect afterwards is them working together in order to repel evil from their world which is stained by evil demons and monsters. But no. Instead, you get to see them kill each other relentlessly for pretty much no valid and/or appealing reason at all. A normal anime watcher would probably find this anime shit. However, I am abnormal. This level of edginess is just about right for me. But the story wasn't that good so the edginess alone doesn't really impress me enough. Still, seeing retarded kids die once in a while isn't so bad. Therefore this anime was perfect for me at the time. The only thing this show lacked was a good ending. The one currently is quite bland I thought I was watching Twilight all over again. Recommended to those who wants to see a magical girl battle royale with a mediocre story.

The greatest failure of this series is the lack of characters importance. I'm not kidding, I note that, with exception of one, the characters are become or cliche or unidimensional villain. This anime is the best example from a light novel compressed adaptation. I don't know the quality of the original material, however, this detail is notable. However, is entertaining. I special critizice the fleeting appearance of the many magical girls characters and the lack of the shock factor in many deaths. However, I praise the loyalty and respect from the series essence of the final chapter. Note: the blood and the violence excess doesn't mean good quality.

*sorta spoilers* I started watching this anime with a friend and by episode 6 we decided to wait until it was done airing to finish it and wow I'm glad we did. I liked where every episode left off, it was so cliffhangery. We were constantly comparing it to Madoka, which I'm sure everyone does, so we constantly ragged on it. As we watched it further we disregard the similarities and started appreciating it more and more. We felt more connected to the characters because of the constant showing of their "real lives". And we had fun(very depressing fun) betting on who would die next. Not so much as a strong ending but still a good watch. I feel like if you watch the first two or three episodes you will end up wanting to know what happens next. sorry if this is a shit review i'm drunk and never had skills in writing.

So, I'll be honest with you, I was really hyped for this show. Sure, it was being done by a studio that isn't very well known, but the premise pulled me in. Studio Lerche also did a good job with Magical girls fighting to the death. Sure, it probably wouldn't be a masterpiece, but at least it would give me what I expected. A good battle royale, kill-'em-all. Sadly, that wasn't really what I got. Instead I got a boring piece of trash. Magical Girl Raising Project is about 16 girls who all become magical girls because of this mobile game. What a bunch of casual gamer trash! They then have to compete among each other to survive. They compete by collecting magical candies that you get from helping people, although we never actually see these magical girls helping people. Kind of odd. They then turn to murdering each other, and the show forgets that the competition was about magical candies and helping people, not who can murder more people. Honestly, this side of the anime showed much more promise. Sadly, the show can't follow up on the potential and the disappointment was crushing. Despite this, there is one form of entertainment that the story brings to Raising Project. Laughing at how poorly executed it was. So, I'll be honest with you, again, after my expectations were crushed just like my will to live, at least the fight scenes could be decent, and I could have not TOTALLY wasted my time on this show. To quote Donald Trump-sama, "Wrong". Besides the fact that each and every fight in this anime that is literally about fighting each other is bad, they are also weighed down b the fact that Raising Project crams all of a characters development in ONE EPISODE. Bravo! So, the structure for an episode where someone dies basically goes like this. 2 characters fight. 1 beats the other. Right before said defeated character dies, all of her development is crammed into that 1 episode. To be fair, some characters that die didn't get the privilege of Studio Lerche giving them any development at all. Ok, so the protagonist probably doesn't deserve her own paragraph, but I don't know how to write so, eh. The protagonist of this instant classic (if you couldn't tell, that was sarcasm) is known as Snow White. As a protagonist, she fills many roles, like helping to move the pilot forward, like any good character. Unless you're a pussy and don't believe in murdering other people. Don't be a pussy like Snow White. She ultimately does nothing to advance the narrative, a horrible trait to have as protagonist. She is super whiny, which becomes a bore to watch after like, 1 second. So, yah, she sucks. [SPOILER ROUND] Yah, this show sucks. I think I've established that. What I haven't established is some of the specifics of why this show sucks. Or basically, why the ending sucks. If you haven't seen the show, its best to skip this paragraph and go straight to my closing thoughts and scores. Let me just say, Magical Girl Raising Project was an interesting ride. It will most likely be one I remember for awhile, even if it is for the wrong reasons. I reached the end of the show, and there will only two girls left. Snow White (the whiny bitch), and Ripple (look at those tits!). One thing this show did well was character design. Ripple's design was always mediocre, but in the final scene, she actually looks badass. Of course, this scene takes place months after the events of Magical Girl Raising Project. Apparently, Ripple and Whiny Bitch have been helping people since Monokuma from Dangan Ronpa was destroyed. They fight, and the show ends at that. This is probably the best scene in the entire show, and is actually not half bad. It almost shows some synergy between the girls, and it is the nicest-looking scene in the show. The roller coaster ride is over, and it is now up to us, the community, to give our final judgement on the show. [CLOSING THOUGHTS] Magical Girl Raising Project was a clusterfuck that couldn't decide on what it really wanted to be. Did it want to deconstruct the genre, or be a simple battle royale? The character designs look nice, but I can't help feeling there wasn't one true vision behind them. Some look like big-titted hookers, while others look like traditional magical girls. Also, these are the most un-magical girl magical girls ever. Being one seems extremely lame. Wow, I get to jump around on buildings. And I also get to jump on buildings. And I guess murder people? If this show didn't call itself mahou shoujo, I would have never guessed. Slightly off-topic, but damn were there a lot of plot holes. Maybe not SAO-level plot holes, but still. Overall, this show was just kind of average. Nothing stands out as especially horrid, or good. Would I recommend it? Eh, probably not, unless you want to watch everything the Fall 2016 anime season and to offer. Art: 6/10 Story: 4/10 Sound: 5/10 Characters: 3/10 Enjoyment: 5/10 Favorite character: Ripple Favorite episode: 12 (The show ends) Recommendation level: Very low Overall: 5/10

Preface: Since quoting philosophers out of context and completely out of place is the bread and butter for each and every self-proclaimed ANIME EXPERT amongst MAL reviewers out there, I figured I might as well kick this one off just like that. With that said, Immanuel Kant once used to say "blablabla and then some more, Top Speed/Winterprison/Hardgore Alice BEST GIRL" and just like that or perhaps even not, most people simply Madokan't believe it whenever there's a new dark magical girl anime since let's be really, really honest: There's only so much you can deconstruct and when, back in the days, Urobuchi Gen invented magic, suffering and, of course, girls, we all knew the cheap copycats would want to have a piece of the cake as well. Needless to say, I think stiff Madokants shouldn't really lose their heads over there being other things right next to their favorite title but what do I even know. In more recent news, the review itself features spoilers yet no scores and also doesn't mention Madoka since I figured that'd be for the better. Writing: You know, I'm really glad about what MahoIku isn't: This could have gone down the Akuma no Riddle or Mirai Nikki route of one cannon fodder after another challenging only the really boring protagonists and getting offscreened as a result but I'm really glad it didn't and achieved what these two couldn't: Bringing to life a rather diverse, colorful cast of characters where you're actually inclined to pick your many favorites. Which brings us to this essentially being another Battle Royale-esque story following the very primitive principle of getting you to like a few characters and then taking them away from your clutches because now that's how you get an emotional reaction from your audience. It admittedly lacks any sort of grace, yes, but if executed well, can work some wonders. Does MahoIku achieve that though? Actually, yes, mostly. There is reason for me to believe that the author is really, really clever, namely him bringing his A game to the table with conceptually smart ideas as far as the characters are concerned: - Ruler is among the hardworking elite on paper except life played her a different card and now she's stuck with making coffee and given her superior, one can't fault her too much for probably thinking she's the smartest person in the room. This, of course, leads to an inferiority complex and the strong desire to boss other people around, something her power does for her except it's specific enough for her to need help by other people. Ironically, several of her servants would argue she doesn't behave any different from her actual boss (which I'd disagree with but oh well) and what causes her undoing is one of her subjects taking her orders too seriously at any given point of time. - Cranberry, on paper and in practice, is the strongest character around but due to her own tunnel vision of only seeking the strong, doesn't really accomplish any of her goals and gets killed by Tama, the weakest character who only ever strolled along. - Winterprison comes across as someone not very good at socializing apart from interacting with her lover Sister Nana, who, very much on the opposite end, takes socializing to the point where she genuinely believes that making friends in a death game would be the best way to go which goes down as badly as you'd expect, with Winterprison sacrificing her own life to ensure Nana's survival who, however, couldn't live without Winterprison and chooses suicide instead. This was generally really well done as their romance was quite possibly the most genuine, heartfelt one I've seen in 2016 and the characters had all the necessary build up for their conclusion to be quite a blow to the stomach. - Hardgore Alice is brilliant insofar as that everything from the first time she gets mentioned screams "Surely she's a villain!": She's the mysterious sixteenth person thrown into a death game, has an unhealthy obsession for the protagonist, kills someone in cold blood the moment she meets her, has the cloth of a dark goth girl and her name contains "Hardgore", albeit only because her powers lead to her getting turned to mincemeat but how were we supposed to know? The audience is with Snow White insofar as that almost everything revolving around Alice leads up to misinterpretation (fun fact: in the fanbook, she gets five stars for "Wrong First Impression") until you really get to know her and she's about the nicest girl in the universe. Her power also matches her greatly as in that he always wanted to die before meeting Snow White, yet can't in magical girl form, only to die in human form after finding hope for herself. - Calamity Mary, someone who's never been up to any good as someone who divorced her husband and hit her child, gets a companian through Magicaloid, who's a homeless teenage girl with no parents around. The writing sadly doesn't really do much with that but it's a cool thing on paper at least. - The family theme goes on with Ripple, someone who had a genuinely terrible family life, moved out and is now going through some hard times and Top Speed, someone who used to be a troublemaker in the past and can therefore relate to Ripple and wants her to change accordingly just like herself, now a soon-to-be (or not) loving mother. While Ripple's growth feels somewhat artificial (as she only really warms up a few second before Top Speed's death), it's generally neatly done. If anything, MahoIku really doesn't go by the numbers but at the same time, also doesn't construct and kill off its characters without rhyme or reason. Needless to say, being able to actually care about these characters is a good thing for an anime like this. Its setup is primitive in nature but that gets saved by the capable execution. Antagonist-wise, MahoIku plays some genuinely interesting cards as well yet overall leaves behind a bit of a lacking aftertaste though: - First we have Calamity Mary who fares really well - you're not supposed to like her but she manages to impress nonetheless. Her fight against Hardgore Alice is the smartest in the series and she gets incredibly thorough with it. She's clearly established as a strong threat from the very beginning on but is also level-headed to a certain degree or else she wouldn't have accepted Magicaloid or played GTA: Real Life Edition to get Top Speed and Ripple back on track. There's a bit of a system to her madness and that's a good thing. With all that said though, her getting offed by ninja stars just like that was quite a low point of the show. - Cranberry initially succeeds as the character we know nothing about other than her being a whole lot of trouble but her involvement with the other characters is so non-existent, it sure makes one wonder. She was passive enough with Winterprison to not get anything out of it, never even considered fighting Mary and her faux backstory gave us nothing on her before she left this world behind. - Swim Swim is a fascinating concept taken to the logical extreme and established a coup d'etat we didn't really see coming but she gets stale after a while. She admittedly got some really good killings out of the show but practically offed six characters with the motivation of "That one dead character once said this and that". She's an unconventional villain no doubt but at some point, was only there to kill your favorite character (she got all three of mine, so there's that) and that felt rather lacklustre. It also severely limits the variancy among match-ups which became noticable every now and then. At the end of the day, I'd still like to applaud MahoIku for being generally unconventional with its figures as that's a good thing. As MahoIku also features a good chunk of action, I'd also like to mention that one's writing at least once as it positively stands out most of the time. Admittedly, there are some fights that felt like a grind (Mary vs Ripple) but in general, there is some creative use of …

This is the worst magical girl anime I have ever seen. Atrocious voice acting in the English dub from fake British accent girl to fake US cowgirl and others. Immature, obnoxious, aimed at a very young audience writing. Cringe-inducing names for the magical girls with such gems as "Swim Swim", "Top Speed" and "Hardgore Alice" (NOT a typo for "hardcore"). The show, as a whole, is a blatant ripoff of Madoka Magica top to bottom (cute unassuming mascot that actually has devious intentions that grants the girls the ability to be magical girls but doesn't tell them the full extent of what that entails or what the consequences are, "dark" plot hidden behind lighthearted and cutesy, innocent and pure-hearted main character, etc) only very much dumbed down and made for a younger audience. I'd say the target demographic here is teen and preteen girls, which is a demographic I'm not remotely close to. Being a newer anime, the visuals were nice and I guess the soundtrack was okay? The girls are kind of cute and have nice designs. Even if the presentation had been absolutely mindblowing, however, which it was not, that wouldn't save this anime from being the juvenile, obnoxious, unoriginal slop that it is. Like I said, this is the kind of thing I'd expect a 12 to 15 year old girl to be watching, not me, and even if they were to love it it's certainly not because this is actually any good- it'd be because they don't know any better. If you consider yourself anything remotely close to a proper adult, pass on this. Not even worth a rental. OBJECTIVE RATING- 4.5-5 PERSONAL ENJOYMENT RATING- 4

To be brief, this was a very enjoyable watch if you want a thrilling death game with cute characters.Surprisingly, the story doesn't fall into the trap of being too edgy and some actual tension was built and the ending very satisfying. But about halfway through the characters do faulter and the editing was all over the place. i do appreciate the gore and the intensity yet at the same time there was some sense of a facade that the show had with its overall cute tone and art style. Its like Mirai Nikki, but not AS trash and its waaaaaay better than Magical Fucking Girl Site. Overall-7 (A pretty low 7,but a 7 nonetheless)

The basic recipe for this anime: Ingredients: - Basic elements of the Madoka series - Some Danganronpa - Cliché characters that are somehow reletable - M A G I C - A lot of unnecesseary violence and death Directions: 1. Be sure to mix both mascots first! 2. Give a recent device (as in most Mahou Shoujo/in this case a smart phone/) some magical power and add a tiny evi twist 3. Overcook the character but decor them neatly! 4. Pour over drama, violence and brutality as much as you can! (Also some unnecesseary death because it'll make it spicier) Final tip: Don't try to wait until the characters are neatly developed especially the protagonist!

This anime is NOT Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica. While they both have pink haired protagonist, the story and plot are different. I would consider Mahou Shoujo Ikusei Keikaku to be darker than Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magical. Magical girls actively try to kill each other for their own sake. It is a very good anime with lots of blood. There is one big downfall to this anime. The protagonist. Each magical girl has their own segment in the show. Most of them do something important. What does the main character do? Absolutely nothing. Besides making strong friendships with two magical girls, saving civilians, and racking up the highest amount of candy in the shortest time, she does nothing. She doesn't ask for peace or ever defends herself. She didn't even defeat one antagonist. She does nothing and the should have made her more pro-peace or have her fight. The only time she was significant was at the very end. Ripple would have made a better protagonist. Each magical girl has their own unique backstory and besides the protagonist doing nothing this is a great anime.

It pains me to type this I REALLY was hoping for something to come out of this show, but alas I was let down. This show sets up for the coolest thing. Think about it as the hunger games for magical girls, sounds cool right? Well they bombed it on the execution of this. The plot of this is as you think it is, but every death that comes, YOU CAN TELL ITS GOING TO HAPPEN. They aren't settle about it either, it goes really slowly, and takes all the suspense element out. Not to mention that to build up for a characters death you need them to develop first are that doesn't happen here. Speaking of characters, the main is boring and literally the plot could go on without them. Why not make Ripple the main or just anybody else. We go actually several episodes without even seeing her. The pacing in this show is not all that great either. I believe in one episode 4 deaths happened and I didn't even care. Some of them killed others which was completely out of character for them, but plot amirite. There were things I liked about this show its art,op, and ending were beautiful. overall I give it 6.

Magical Girl Raising Project (2016) Mostly Spoiler Free Review: I checked this out after suggestions from friends in response to looking for a new death game anime to watch. I have not read the manga or novels. Ultimately I have mixed feelings. I went into this without high hopes as I usually am pretty eh about the magical girl genre, however this anime deconstructed the genre pretty fast (similar to Madoka in a way but less trippy). The good: The show managed to have some pretty unpredictable moments. The premise was pretty interesting, starting off as one kind of show before quickly transforming into something very dark and disturbing. There were quite a few interesting kills and some of the abilities of the girls and how they were utilized was very cool. There is a trans character (tho they were too cowardly to come right out and say she was, I personally think it's what they had in mind) among other LGBTQ+ representation in their characters. It wrapped up pretty neatly too. It also had a pretty decent dub. The bad: Most of the characters were extremely one dimensional, this isn't uncommon in anime, especially Death game animes but for a very character focused show, some of the characters who stuck around for longer could have benefited from being fleshed out a bit more. The constant back and forth with flashbacks also made it a bit confusing at times and some of the kills were very predictable based on the show revealing their backstories in the previous episode, tho not always. There were also a fair amount of plot holes. Furthermore I disliked that the "winner" won by pretty much doing nothing the entire game. The ugly: Snow White, who was the closest thing we had to a main character, was UNBEARABLE, and had literally no character development throughout the entire show. The kills were also heavily censored, this isn't surprising but it's always super annoying. 6 out of 10 stars. I'd recommend it if you're running low on things to watch and really enjoy the death game genre. For what it's worth I enjoyed more than I didn't.

Honestly this is one of my favorite magical girl series I've seen so far. It's very unique and different than usual magical concepts. This anime started like a normal magical story would look like then it went to a battle to the death type story. It's not like Puella Magi Madoka Magica at all, so please stop comparing them with each other. I loved how Each character magical girl had their own personalities and their outfits were just beautiful. If you are fragile about death, blood and suicide. I recommend not watching this then. but if you aren't please watch this.

Magical Girl Raising Project looks at Madoka for inspiration, and then strips all the nuance and subtlety and imagination, leaving nothing but bloodshed behind. It's little more than the Hunger Games with magical girls. That's it. That's the show. While the plot itself is somewhat an interesting premise, and the connection between Fav and a certain magical girl (which ends up becoming a somewhat significant plot reveal) is fascinating, it's all too little, too late. At the end of the day, the only interest in this show is seeing who will be the last one (or ones) standing, and wondering if the most despicable characters will get their comeuppance. Learning the various girls' powers and how they interact or battle against each other does a somewhat good job to maintain interest, but it's not enough when the overall plot lacks depth. For the most part, the characters are completely flat. Part of this comes with the nature of the territory because for some of the magic girls, their magical transformed selves look nothing like their real selves. And because the show quickly devolved into a deathmatch, there are prudent measures in trying to hide your real self, because to let everyone know you're "Clark Kent" (so to speak) is to make yourself vulnerable. On the plus side, this brings in some interesting psychology in terms of what these characters will do for self-preservation. At the same time, this backed the writers into a corner, because there's far too many characters and most of them feel cruel and two-dimensional. Many of the "evil" characters feel cut from same cloth. The only pleasure is watching some of the worst ones die. Similarly, some of the more likeable characters' deaths let me feeling completely unmoved because the show did nothing to earn an emotional reaction. It relies on brutality and shock value where there should have been character development. The best example, without trying to give away a spoiler, is the 'baby' moment, if you know what I'm talking about. It just left me numb, like the writers were trying to outdo each other with awfulness. The soundtrack wasn't especially memorable, and the art was fine. The varied costume designs are interesting. But how I feel about most anime in general, even the best sound and art can't make up for a subpar story. The only value I can see in watching this is if you enjoy bloodbaths and killing games. The only other value is making it a drinking game with your friends and placing bets on who you think will survive the show. I'm giving this show a very generous 5.5 out of 10.

WARNING: CONTAINS HEAVY SPOILERS! Oh Magical Girl Raising Project, you had a ton of potential, but I can't really say I'm surprised with the end result. In my experience, I've found that a ton of survival game or battle royale series really fail to make a huge impression on me, which is a shame, because the genre itself is pretty entertaining. This series really isn't any different. If you've watched Puella Magi Madoka Magica and Juuni Taisen, then you've already watched this anime. It's essentially nothing more than a combination of those two shows (with a little Danganronpa added in the mix). It tries to be a another new subversion to the magical girl genre, but fails to do anything meaningful. Before I address the characters and the story, I want to briefly mention the animation and the sound, which were actually two pretty strong aspects of this show. The OST is pretty nice, although I really can't pick out a point that I liked aside from whenever Hardgore Alice was with Budget Madoka. The creepy undertones were a great tonal touch to the scene. The opening and ending were also executed extremely well. The animation isn't anything particularly special, but works pretty well for the show. It's not horrible, but it isn't exactly Violet Evergarden either. The character designs were also appealing to look at. They weren't necessarily creative, but they were very well executed. Of course, if Charlotte and Btooom! have taught me anything, it's never to judge an anime solely on the production value. MagiPro no doubt looks pretty, but in this case, that's all it has going for it. The characters were atrociously handled, however. You know how I said that this show was like Juuni Taisen? Not only was MagiPro a survival game, but the tried and failed method of giving a soon-to-die character a backstory became really irritating. I didn't have time to get invested in the characters because they had such a small window of time to convey any meaningful history to the audience. I'm fully aware that survival games involve killing; that's sort of the entire point of the show. However, this show frustrated me by killing off a good chunk of any characters that had potential to be interesting. La Pucelle, Ruler, and Magicaloid 44 had far more potential to be interesting characters than many of the girls that ended up surviving the majority of the game. Say what you will about Ruler, but at least she had some iota of intrigue. No doubt she was pompous and condescending, but she had more of a presence than many of the other girls. Then you also have your classic tsundere who suspiciously looked way too much like Akatsuki from Log Horizon. You have the bubbly and kind girl who loves everyone, but you really don't get to know more about her since she's the first one to meet her end. Both of the angels were obnoxiously annoying, when they really had no reason to. I also really couldn't be bothered to care about Winterprison or Sister Nana either. I thought their relationship was sweet, but that was pretty much it. Also I wanted to reach through the screen and smack Tama. Her incessant whining and subservient attitude got really old after a while. The antagonists were pretty weak too. Mainly because after watching this series, I still have no clue what any of their primary motives were. Cranberry, wanted to fight strong people. That's about it to her. I couldn't get a clue on what Calamity Mary wanted, aside from maybe wanting to cause mayhem. Don't even get me started on Swim Swim. If I remember correctly, then her goal was to be like Ruler. If I'm wrong, then I have absolutely no idea what the purpose behind her bloodlust was. (Being "crazy" is not an excuse). Oh, and I almost forgot, the starter of the entire game, Fav, or as I like to call him, Monokyumey. If I'm being honest here, I still don't know what his purpose served. It's almost like the writers took Kyubey, and tried to make the same concept work for this knock off. There's no reason behind the bloodshed or the death in this game. At least with Madoka, Kyubey was tricking the magical girls into signing contracts with him so he could benefit his race with the deaths of them. With Fav, it seems that the only motive is to satisfy his own desire for blood. Now normally, this approach for a character isn't necessarily bad. I still think that Tatsumi from Shiki fueled the actions of the other vampires with his nihilistic lust for violence. His sadism makes sense in the context of his respective story. However, with Fav, there really seems to be no motive behind him, other than seeing cute girls die. He mentions the magical world, and the Magical Girl Raising Project, but nowhere do we get any indication that there's someone behind the scenes pulling his strings. Sure we find out that Cranberry was the mastermind behind this game, but there's really nothing more than that. They were just cruddy and uninspired villains. And finally, we have our protagonist, if you can even call her that, Snow White, or Budget Madoka. Of all of the anime I've seen so far, she may be one of the worst protagonists I've ever seen. Not because she's a bad person, she's just a horrible character. You rarely see her throughout the entire run of the show, and when she's in camera shot, she does practically nothing. Fav literally states in the last episode that Budget Madoka never even had to get her hands dirty. I've made my distaste for Future Diary and its main character (among others) known, but at least Yuki had some semblance of a personality or drive. Yes, I'm actually using Yuki as a POSITIVE example here. I know that I have to suspend my disbelief whenever I watch fiction, but MagiPro made it really difficult for me to keep that suspension. There's just no realistic way Snow White would have ever survived this game. The only character that didn't bother me was Top Speed, but again she got such a small amount of history that even then, I find it hard to connect to her character. The story ultimately becomes extremely convoluted. The first episode had promise, but after finishing, I'm left with more questions than when I started. What exactly is the magic world? The only thing we know about it is that it exists. We don't know if it's an alternate dimension or a separate planet, we don't know about who lives there, we don't know the purpose behind the Magical Girl Raising Project at all. Since if there's a world inhabited by magical girls, then what would be the purpose behind the project? How are the magical girls chosen? Is it at random? I find that relatively hard to believe considering a pair of twin sisters were chosen. Is it based on merit? Well then that would rule out Calamity Mary, who was nothing more than a drunkard who abused her daughter. The method on how they're chosen is never really specified. Also, what was the entire purpose behind the deaths? Kyubeykuma mentioned that other magical girls were chosen by defeating a monster or doing good deeds, so why did it suddenly change to a death game? I refuse to accept that there aren't other forces beyond Cranberry and Fav that determine how the games play out. Something had to have created Fav, and that something or someone had to have access to other worlds. It just makes no realistic sense for someone to change from pacifistic methods to ones that end in bloodshed. Fav mentions that if he doesn't find another master, that he'll be in trouble. Why is this the case? Hell if I know, and it looks like we won't be receiving another season any time soon. I could be wrong since the manga is still in production, but as of recent news, this is all we have. I really wanted to like MagiPro, I really did. The show definitely has its merits, but the numerous plotholes and shallow characters overshadow them significantly.

Magical Girl Raising Project brings the gore and intense action but other aspects of the show leave a lot to be desired. This anime may not be the best overall show but I am still glad I watched it because it succeeded in packing in some awesome and intense gory action sequences. The storyline is pretty basic but the overall theme of magical girls fighting each other to the death through brutal action sequences and twisted super powers was pretty entertaining at times. One of the reasons these actions sequences were so much fun is because the powers of the magical girls are smartly varied. There are girls with gun skills, speed skills, melee skills, and interesting other super powers. This keeps the action and suspense interesting throughout the show because it is hard to predict which girls would win which matches. The extreme gore and all out horror themed settings/backdrops also added to the action because it created a “no strings attached” exploitative feel to the series and as a fan of horror this kept me looking forward to each episode so if anything this anime definitely isn’t boring. The action was well paced and well-crafted consistently throughout the show and the sleek and modern animation style added an incredible amount of detail during these bloody sequences. The animation also elevated the fear and intensity of the character expressions adding to the horror action elements of the show. Unfortunately while this anime’s horror action is fun to watch the rest of the show is pretty shallow. The first disappointing aspect of this show is the characters. The main character Snow White is supposedly the moral compass of the show. However, she is incredibly flandarized as an overly cutesy and naïve person. Because of this, I never connected to her as a character because she was not multi-dimensional. This was made worse by the fact that her character never changes from the beginning of the show to the end. The rest of the side cast is annoyingly underdeveloped as well as the show tries to develop every member of the side cast but fails because there are over 16 other magical girls besides Snow White and there are only 12 episodes in the series. Therefore, we learn about the backstories of every girl but besides their backstories there is hardly any time to connect with any of them emotionally. The other way in which this affects the show is that some of the magical girls are clearly more interesting and unique then others so certain characters feel annoyingly sidelined. Personally, I wanted to learn a lot more about Hardgore Alice and Calamity but we never got the chance. Overall, there were no bad characters but no characters who I felt a connection to either. Another problem with this show is the overall storyline. It is a very standard “fight to the death” storyline. It is tightly wound and entertaining. However, it is nothing new or unique in today’s current times and it does feel like wasted potential as the writing often alludes to greater ideas but it never takes that leap to become something amazing. On top of that there are certain “aspects” that are clearly “inspired” by Madoka Magica. I won’t go into them in detail to avoid spoilers but it was something that held the show back from becoming its own unique experience. Overall, the story isn’t particularly bad but it is very linear and standard. I am still glad I watched Magical Girl Raising Project because of the fighting sequences and as a fan of horror it was fun at times. However, the rest of the experience was to lackluster for me to recommend this to those just getting into anime or those searching for a memorable experience. If you like lots of bloody action and horror elements you will probably enjoy this but for anyone else I’m not so sure.

Mahou Shoujo Ikusei Keikaku was. So not good that it's spurred me to write a review. Some little masochistic part of me decided to stick with this stuff past episode 3, so I plowed through all 12 terrible episodes and now I'm here I guess!! I'm going to do my best not to drop spoilers, and if you liked this thing you're entitled to your opinion, but god. Just christ almighty. Story: 2/10 I'm going to say this as someone who enjoyed DanganRonpa, marginally enjoyed Mirai Nikki, and is always looking for interesting Deadly Game type stories. This story was... garbage. All the twists were clearly visibly from a mile away, characters didn't get background until they either a) Died or b) were about to die. The story itself just felt like it was checking boxes. Heartbreaking friend death, innocent child's death, etc. The plot has a nasty habit of jumping to one character, focusing solely on them for episodes, then completely ignoring them. You'll spend episodes with a character or three, watch a few die, then never learn that they had prior obligations or anything until 3 episodes later. I know that they only had 12 episodes to get this barely-a-story across, but honestly, I don't think they would've benefited from any extra episodes. A lot of this stuff felt gore-porn-y and torture-porn-y, and relying too heavily on those tropes destroyed any interest this could've had for me. It failed to deliver on the premise that made it so promising. In other words, it was trying so hard to be edgy while also collecting tropes and attempting weird character skips that the plot essentially evaporated. Art: 2/10 I'm sorry, I know a lot of the reasons people picked up this thing was because of the cute art, and I will agree that sometimes it has its moments! But the mascot looked, sounded, and acted like some combination of Monokuma and Kyuubey, to the point I could've just switched one for either of the others and the plot would've been the same. Also, and this is more of a personal thing here, I absolutely hated how every girl looked like she was 12. We have characters in their late teens, 20's, and early 30's and possibly 40's here and they all look like they aren't a day out of elementary school. It's especially bothering considering they were capable of drawing adult looking characters, clearly pointed out by the amount of civilians who look normal! And god, the magical girl outfits. I absolutely hated almost every single one. They were clunky, boring, too busy, all sex appeal or just plain bland. Out of 16 magical girls I think I only liked about 2 or 3 of the outfits (Magicaloid is a robot, and therefore I'm not sure if she counts as an "outfit" but she was one of the designs I found interesting.) The artists clearly struggled with making good color palettes here, because the colors too were either so pastel the character looked washed out or clashy and uncoordinated. This might sound like too much time to spend griping about character outfits, but a lot of magical girl anime's charm is the cute outfits, and as that feels like it falls under art, I wanted to critique it here. MSKI didn't even fall short within my expectations. It fell 1000 feet away from my expectations. In shorter terms, everyone regardless of age looks like a middle schooler, making this uncomfortably like a child gore show. Also outfits were ugly. Sound: 4/10 Not a lot to say here. Pretty standard magical girl soundtrack. Wasn't terrible, wasn't jaw dropping good, generally fit whatever mood the story was struggling to convey. Character: 1/10 I'm prefacing this with, usually, if a character's personality/writing is good I can ignore lazy writing. But they were not good at all. It was impossible to care about any of these characters whatsoever, because all the background we got on them was seconds before they died. I can't miss a character if there's nothing to be missed. Haphazardly throwing in things like "oh she's pregnant!" or "oh they're dating!" moments before death or episodes after isn't development. There's no meat to the characters, there's nothing to actually hold onto and fall in love with. They're all basically just bloodbags for the plot to rip open so it can deliver on the "Ohh uwu edgy" that it keeps trying to tell you it'll deliver. A character who gets exposition and expanded on moments before or after their death is not a round, fleshed out character. They're just a flat character with something tragic pinned on them to try and get audiences to care. Backgrounds aside, the personalities were bland and trope-y. We've got the god-complex girl, the crazy girl, the naive girl, the stupid girl, the NEET girl, on and on. Everyone fits a trope. It wouldn't be bad if they had tried to subvert the tropes, but they didn't try at all. And that's not bad either. Unless you're trying to market a diverse group of magical girls. Shorter: Boring characters with shoddy "development." And while I'm under characters, I'd like to take a moment to talk about Snow White. Despite being the headliner character, she's almost completely absent, only showing up to cry to whoever is going to die for her this time about how little she wants to kill and how oh so cruel it is that they're in a killing game. It gets annoying. She never toughens up, she never tries to protect anyone, all she does it watch while her friends go down for her one by one, give up their lives so she can live another day, then she just cries about it. Now, arguably, she also has one of the weakest magics, but come on. She's a magical girl! She can still punch and kick, and for over half the crew that's all you really needed to do to get them to step off. I found myself actually feeling nauseous every time I saw her face, because all she did was whine and complain and cry and every time she did I knew whatever magical girl was with her at the time was definitely toast. She's like a banshee, if you hear her start to cry about how cruel whats-it's-face the mascot is, or how she didn't want being a magical girl to turn out like this, you know any other character within earshot of her is completely boned. She's a boring and bland protagonist that only serves as a red flag that someone in the scene with her is gonna die. Enjoyment: 1/10 I think the paragraphs above accurately portray how I felt about this show. I took a 5 minute break from this show and ended up having a 4 minute existential crisis, so take that how you will. Overall: 2/10 The extra point here is from sound. Overall, this was a godawful experience for me, and I write this in the hope it's a warning akin to my head on a pike in front of the wasteland of this anime. I can't believe this got me to write a review. I *never* write reviews. I sat through all of Special A and Vampire Knight and didn't write a review. In conclusion, I don't care if anyone else enjoyed this, I'm not one to judge tastes, and if you enjoyed it, good for you! Congrats on being able to find something good where I couldn't. But please, please, please, if you're thinking of watching this, think critically about whether or not you want to watch this. If you want magical girls, watch any season of Precure, or Sailor Moon, or Madoka Magica or any other thousands of magical girl anime out there. If you want deadly games watch DanganRonpa or Mirai Nikki. If you want something gore-y watch Neon Genesis Evangelion. Just, please reconsider, and hit that little masochistic part of you with a broom like I should've done.

Yep, don't let the cover art fool you this isn't sailor moon or some other cutesy mahou shoujo. This turns dark, very dark which is what some people complain about. I believe a lot of the people who watched this especially with the cover art were not wanting an original story but some mindless drivel. However, I like stories that don't fall into the same model. The darker the better for me. The art is pretty and makes a great cognitive dissonance from the story. Both the OP song and the ED songs are wonderful and worth watching an episode just to hear them each time. The characters are likable and easy to get attached to. And it is something I can see power watching again. Solid ten from me.

(This review has been adapted from my blog/reddit thread. Spoilers ahead!) I was raised in a good home, a loving home. I had my wants and my needs like any other kid, but, looking back on what my parents provided me, there’s absolutely no way I could complain about my upbringing. The family get-togethers. Trips to the ice-cream parlor and the video-game store. Support in my endeavors, schooling, and milestones. I don’t tell my father and my mother every day, but I thank them, with all my heart, for giving me a childhood that led me to a worthwhile adulthood. Truth be told, my parents never did raise me as a magical girl. And, after watching Mahou Shoujo Ikusei Keikaku, I’m gladder than ever that they didn’t. STORY Ikusei Keikaku follows Koyuki Himekawa, a sweet middle-school girl who dreams of becoming one of the very magical girls that she so often fantasizes about. To her surprise, the mobile-phone game she was playing grants her wish, giving her the chance to help as many people as she can. However, something sinister lurks in the nearby shadows. Those shadows are light at first. New rules are enforced where the lowest-candy-getting girl of the week loses her magic. Then the shadows get darker when the loser has a coincidental heart attack in her sleep. And they get at their darkest (and stay this way) after the girls escalate their plans to thievery, violence, and eventually straight-up murder. Much of Ikusei Keikaku’s content is quite demented. For example, Cranberry forces La Pucelle to walk out into oncoming traffic, mangling his body so profusely that his parents couldn’t even provide an open casket at his funeral. Some of it is morbid, like when Sister Nana commits suicide by hanging herself with her beloved Winter Prison’s scarf (which she received from Sister Nana) following her death. But no matter the case, each encounter is inhumane in some way. And that’s the biggest reason (arguably the only reason) to watch Ikusei Keikau: witness a bunch of cute girls eviscerate each other in cruel ways. Smashing their heads, slicing their necks, and burning their disintegrated bodies are just a few of the actions made by the girls and women as they go about attacking one another. It gets a little strange when the audience is reminded that half the “candidates” are in middle school or younger, but this contrast between the innocent portrayals and the brutal betrayals makes for an entertaining time. Oddly, some of the deaths and kills are anticlimactic, or, at the minimum, they occur in a way or at a time that doesn’t seem like the best point to off the cast. Calamity Mary is a wildcard psychopath, but she dies to just one of Ripple’s shuriken. Cranberry, despite reigning as the mastermind behind the whole murder-fest and being the (in some sense) final boss, has the top half of her body completely obliterated by Tama in a sudden turn of events. These two are the most extreme examples in terms of oddness, but many of the magical girls, once death is imminent, find themselves out of the match per se. Arguably, these unexpected outcomes are a positive. Not only do they keep audience members on their toes as they watch the story play out, but also these outcomes give Ikusei Keikaku a realistic edge. The anime doesn’t setup any unfair scenarios based on the contexts created, simply removing the next unfortunate soul in the plot’s path. Looking more closely at the narrative structure of the anime, though, it’s about as pretty as Ruler’s bloodied corpse. The show sometimes tries way too hard at appealing to the audience’s emotions for many of its revelations. Top Speed was more than three months pregnant when she was killed by Swim Swim. Indicated by her holding her bigger belly in her death pose and dropping her maternal notebook on the ground next to her. And Ripple’s new “dad,” courtesy of her lascivious mother, is so beyond creepy that it’s a miracle he has been able to hide his sick behavior his whole life. These scenes are meant to influence the audience, get them understanding bluntly the messed-up world a lot of these girls come from and the untimely deaths they experience. Instead, they only deliver a hefty case of the eyerolls. Ikusei Keikau also falls prey to the depict-personal-backstory-right-before-it’s-needed syndrome. Often times, it kicks in immediately before a character dies, like when Winter Prison remembers Sister Nana or when Tama explains her entire past (since she was intentionally a useless character up until her demise). Where the bluntness from before tries too hard, these last-second scenes don’t try enough, making it hard to care for some of the proceedings since the anime likewise didn’t seem to care about them to begin with. There’s also a very lazy attempt at making the plot even more dire with the introduction of purchasable special items. Energy medicine and a rabbit’s foot literally shave off years of the buyers’ lifespans – but only supposedly because this life-shortening deal has no impact on the events therein. These items even call into question whether the anime did enough with the girls’ own powers. The invisibility cloak and the giant halberd are practically required to spice the events up because the show failed to have many of the characters interact with one another, and, subsequently, their abilities were not combined in intriguing ways. Ikusei Keikaku does contain a couple of nice story beats. The girl that Snow White helps later comes back as Hardgore Alice, a magical girl. And Nemurin’s death, despite being the first, isn’t at all pointless since it is her words that (accidentally) spur Swim Swim to take over Ruler’s role and (indirectly) cause most of the chaos. But more pitfalls exist. The behind-the-scenes magical-girl society is barely touched on, and the show’s shoddy attempts at exploring strength, idealism, goodness, and purpose are jammed into the plot without grace. In the end, if one is only looking for violence and nothing more, then the story delivers on that front. Otherwise, the narrative needed to earn a few more candies to come out unscathed. ANIMATION Ikusei Keikaku puts a ton of stock into its character designs, demonstrating finesse and care in the looks they bring. For instance, Snow White’s design is quite involved. She dons many muted colors – light pinks, whites, greys – that match her soft personality. The darker colors, like the brownish headband and the black scarf, starkly contrast with this softness, giving her design an aesthetically pleasing balance. Her frilly dress, her flowers, and her golden eyes not only up her cuteness levels but also contribute to her sense of innocence and purity and goodness. Not every design is as nuanced as Snow White’s, but they bring their own flavor nonetheless. Yunaelle and Minaelle are twins, so their designs are nearly identical save for the mirroring, single wing they wear upon their backs. Tama, a dog in design, wears a spiked collar that dangles a bone. La Pucelle’s blue-and-gold armor, antennae, and long dragon tail allude easily to her knightly nature while concealing her true gender. Simply the sheer variety of looks that are easily discernable at a glance is commendable. Ripple is a ninja. Top Speed is a witch. Calamity Mary is a cowboy. Magicaloid 44 is a robot. Sister Nana is a nun. On top of the detail and the variety, their designs also often coincide with their abilities. Swim Swim dresses like a swimmer (one-piece bathing suit, goggles) for her phase-through-anything power, and Nemurin (clouds, pillows) invite sleepiness, and thus dreams, just by looking at her. The character designs are arguably Ikusei Keikau’s strongest trait, so it’s unfortunate that the rest of the artistry misses the same appeal. The constant nighttime period and refusal to move away from anywhere but the city and a couple of forests drag the locales towards blandness. Cinematography and shot composition don’t try for anything fancy …

"What does it mean to be a magical girl?" I'll try to refrain from spoiling too much, however, there's some things I will have to mention (without specifics) in order to give an accurate review. Mahou Shoujo Ikusei Keikaku caught my eye in Youtube clips because I thought it would deal with serious topics. Without looking much up, I went for the show, and just downed it in one go. While it did manage to keep me up overnight, and I was certainly not wrong about the serious topic issue, it just.. took too many of them off the shelf to the point of becoming both melodramatic and extremely predictable. Story - 2 The story went just a slippery slope downhill and it felt incredibly forced in the direction it was going. I feel like the creator was really trying to imitate Madoka Magica, but failed miserably. as the story lacked thrill due to its predictability, frequent nonsensicalness, and just flat out melodrama. The premise and initial information gets quickly derailed into something that initially wasn't there, resulting in more plot holes than swiss cheese. I can't give it higher than a 2. The only thing that was good was the initial premise and the idea behind it. Too many shows these days do that - fantastic concept, horrible flow. Art - 7 Nothing special, but the art was quite gorgeous at points. It didn't delve deep into aesthetic and atmosphere, but I liked its looks. Sound - 5 It wasn't... memorable? There was nothing ear-catching nor off-putting about the sound. I liked the ending theme, but the opening theme was very run-of-the-mill. Medioce rating for that. Character - 3 While the characters could've been the strongest aspect of the show, and one of them was a reason why I finished the series in the first place, more often than not they were shallow and underdeveloped and some of them were very confusing. The show merely didn't let the characters grow as people, or grow in attachment to us. This was because the show was very rushed, or well... yeah the characters got killed too fast. Another big problem there was is that very often the characters' objectives became nonsensical or questionable. It's almost as if a simple story got the better of them and made them just be slaves of the story, rather than players in the story. Finally, a big flaw is the story's main character. She isn't even important for half of the series, just happens to be there at the end. Props for not making her overpowered as shit I guess though??? Enjoyment - 4 [completely personal section for me] Surprisingly, the show was decently enjoyable. Mainly because of the few characters I liked some of the characters, and because it was 5AM. It doesn't make you cringe on every centimeter, that's for sure, but it does look back on critical hindsight. The plotholes and nonsense were annoying at worst, not frustrating as I feel with some shows after a few episodes. It's watchable, but not something I would talk about for longer than a day. Overall - 3 - Poor [4 - Bad] Had the show fleshed out the characters more before parting them, kept more of them in the game - or had fewer to begin with, it would make the show far more enjoyable and exciting. Clarifiying some characters' objectives, and not making them slaves of the story, would also help this show greatly. I recommend for: If you are flat out looking for downhill drama, I guess? Other than that, I can't, sorry...