Tag: Majokko Shimai no Yoyo to Nene

Posted on in anime, Weekly Writing Roundups

The Frontline Report [3/6/22]

The Frontline Report is a weekly column where I summarize my journey through anime, manga, and the related spheres of popular culture over the past week. Expect spoilers for covered material.

Hello folks! I’ve got two writeups for you today, one of a returning favorite and one we’ve not had in this column before. Some quick announcements before we get into things.

The first is not site-related, so I’ll lead with that: I’ve dropped a few seasonals and put some others on hold. Most notably CUE! in the former case and Ousama Ranking in the latter. While CUE! was genuinely starting to bore me, I want to be clear that my pausing Ousama Ranking is more my own issue than the show’s. I intend to, hopefully, finish it later this year and if I do so and find it worth discussing at length, I’ll write about it then. I don’t like to feel “guilty” about dropping or pausing anime if I can, I’ve mentioned before that I have various mental issues that affect my mood and can sap my motivation, and lately I have unfortunately very much been in the lazy phase. I’m under no delusion that I owe anyone these explanations, but I do feel like I should at least make an attempt to keep y’all in the loop, just so you’re not left wondering why Quasar no Blackstar or what-have-you randomly disappeared from repeat Frontline Report coverage.

On a more directly site-related level, there are two small changes coming to Magic Planet Anime. For the past few months I’ve made a habit of parenthesizing a voice actor’s name after the first time introducing a character in a writeup, and then giving some quick “you may know them from”-style fact. I’m going to still be providing the names, but I think the trivia has made me look like a bit of a know-it-all, and I don’t want to give off that impression, so I’ll be stopping that. Also, in the “Elsewhere on MPA” section, I’m now full-on embedding the article links instead of simply posting text links. I genuinely just didn’t know you could do that, and it seems like a much better and cleaner way to link other articles in this column.

Let me know what you think of these changes in the comments! But enough yapping about the site itself, on to the stuff you actually care about.

Seasonal Anime

Miss KUROITSU from the Monster Development Department

Often, some time after a season begins, I will end up picking up an extra show or two. Usually just something to watch on my “downtime” with friends between anime I’ve actually committed to writing about. Rarely do I mention these anime on this site; they’re often not exactly the best shows of a given season, they’re often pretty obscure, and they rarely have much to discuss about them. Once in a great while one will contort into strange and compelling enough shapes that it demands my full attention in spite of my own plans–last year, that happened to Blue Reflection Ray–but it’s rare.

Occasionally though, I’ll feel compelled to pen a bit about them just to give them whatever due I may feel they’re owed regardless. (And to fill in some blank space left by my dropping of CUE! a few weeks back.) So it is with Miss KUROITSU from the Monster Development Department, a quirky comedy anime that’s been quietly chugging along for the past eight weeks to the notice of, evidently, rather few people, going by its social media numbers.

The series’ premise is not difficult to get your head around. Here it is, in full, straight from Anilist’s database.

Kuroitsu is an assistant researcher in the superhuman research & development department of Agastya, a villainous secret organization that battles with heroes who try to save the world. Kuroitsu lives a busy life in Agastya, caught between the absurd requests of her bosses; making presentations; implementing new features into superhumans; and getting results within the allotted time, budget, and spec requests; all without vacation.

We follow a lab researcher who works for a toku show-style evil organization. Nothing complicated there. The series blends the genre with the style of an office comedy, and the results can be pretty damn funny when correctly dialed in. I’m particularly fond of the managerial Megistus (Tetsu Inada), who is a combination surprisingly responsible and levelheaded boss and also a Huge Powerful Guy in Metal Armor.

The show’s main roadblock to being more recommendable is that sometimes that humor also wildly misses. One of the main characters is Wolf Bete (Sahomi Amano), who was a monster intended to be a wolfman but, due to the interference of Agastya’s evil leader Akashic (Mao Ichimichi), ended up as a girl with wolf ears and claws instead. He still considers himself male (and to the translators’ credit, they respect that), and so do most of his coworkers, but the show sometimes leans into mildly transphobic humor regardless. Also, the character’s very premise just feels a bit…weird. In a way that’s going to be familiar to anyone who’s read or watched a lot of gender-bender stories over the years.

One of the two magical girls (!) who’re present in the show, Yuto (Yui Horie), also gets this treatment, since they’re “actually” a boy. (I’m not terribly clear on how the character in question views themselves in an in-universe sort of sense. I get the vague impression they may be, as we’d say, gender-questioning.) It’s just enough to not make Miss Kuroitsu the obvious recommend that I want it to be, and that does kinda suck even if the show is otherwise pretty good.

Take the most recent episode, the eighth. Its middle segment contains an absolutely incredible scene where the magical girls, infiltrating Agastya on the orders of their boss, participate in a shockingly normal interview, where the wilier of them, Reo (Yukari Tamura) just spins a whole fabricated sympathetic backstory out of thin air. The whole thing only falls apart when Megistus takes note of their age.

Despite its issues, Miss Kuroitsu is worth a watch if you can look past them. Screwball office comedies aren’t as common as they could be in anime, and this is a solid one underneath it all.

Princess Connect! Re:Dive Season 2

The main plot of last week’s episode of Princess Connect! Re:Dive could not be simpler. Kokkoro, and two minor characters we meet for the first time here–Misaki (Misaki Kuno) and Suzuna (Sumire Uesaka)–are sending out a bunch of letters at the post office. For whatever reason, a bunch of bandits raid the post office while they’re there, and steal the letters along with several other things. Thus, Kokkoro and her two new acquaintances must go on a (short) quest to get them all back.

This A-plot is decent fun. We get a lot of Kokkoro’s signature “x” face and in general the other two provide solid foils for her. Misaki is the weirder (and therefore funnier) of the two, and seems to think she’s some kind of alluring temptress despite being….not that.

I’m normally, to say the least, pretty mixed on this sort of humor. But the fact that the two are also demons ratchets it back to “funny,” at least for me, on sheer audacity. There is an utterly bizarre sequence where Misaki tries to do a stripper pole routine–animated in a decidedly goofy fashion and set to comical club music–on her staff to the complete bafflement of the bandits she’s trying to “seduce.” Kokkoro and Suzuna end up having to break her out when this inevitably leads to her capture.

Although it does make their own motivation for sending letters clash a bit oddly against their actual appearances. The both of them are students at a local school that is threatened with closure in part because of their own poor grades. We’re not given exact ages, but they seem pretty young, given that Suzuna (hilariously) calls the 7’s the “final boss of multiplication tables.” Despite their somewhat showy outfits, and Misaki’s behavior, the characters aren’t actually sexualized enough to make this come across as gross. It’s just strange. They feel a bit like actors performing a play that they’re not properly costumed for. It’s a minor qualm, but such things are noticeable in the context of Princess Connect, which is otherwise very well put-together. Obviously, the three eventually recover the letters. Suzuna also gets a very short highlight of her skill as an archer (presumably also true in the game), which is nice.

Cut with all this are brief spotlights on our other three main characters, which collectively form the B-side of the episode. Presumably, this is setup for Princess Connect‘s season finale. A solid idea, since there are just four episodes left. Karyl again finds herself mesmerized by the mercurial, wicked Kaiser Insight (Shouta Aoi, doing his Cagliostro from Symphogear voice), whose control over her seems to run far deeper than any simple evil overlord / minion relationship.

At the same time, Pecorine dreams of her former self warning her that she’ll be left alone again once her true identity comes out. Yuki, meanwhile, works out his distress over last week’s developments with Labyrista (Akira Mosakuji), who delivers one of the most stunningly profound lines of the whole season when Yuki despairs over forgetting (or more likely, being forced to forget) his previous companions.

She’s right, and Princess Connect‘s ability to casually drop things like this in the midst of what is otherwise a fairly silly episode really nails down its place as the season’s best show. Nothing else is working in this space this well right now.

At episode’s end, after Kokkoro, Suzuna, and Misaki have recovered the letters, the Gourmet Guild set out to harvest a rice crop. With just the four of them, it’d take forever. So, it’s naturally here where we learn what Kokkoro was sending so many letters for; they were sent to all of the Gourmet Guild’s friends and allies, asking them to pitch in. And I do mean all of them.

This veritable parade of cameos, some of which are from characters we haven’t seen since season one (remember the huge llama girl? What about the ghost who turned Yuki into flan?) is one of the episode’s highlights. And more than anything, it makes me dead certain that Princess Connect is gearing up for this season’s final arc. In its last minutes, we see the Gourmet Guild transform the rice harvest into a massive feast for everyone, and it’s a huge, well-earned capital M Moment of emotion. Pecorine can’t help but tear up, and I doubt she’s alone.

She resolves, just before the credits roll, to tell Yuki and Karyl of her true identity as Princess Eustania. Time will tell how that goes, but no matter what happens, this wonderful memory, preserved in amber, will stick with us, the audience, the whole way. PriConne has a way of hitting you in the heart.

Elsewhere on MPA

Magic Planet Monthly Movies: The Magic was Inside You All Along in MAJOKKO SHIMAI NO YOYO TO NENE

One of the reasons I like doing commissions is because I’m occasionally handed some fun little thing I’d never even heard of before. Such is the case with Yoyo to Nene, a largely forgotten magical girl / isekai film from the early ’10s. It’s not perfect, but I still really enjoyed it and highly recommend it, especially if you’re a fan of ufotable‘s visual work. Especially especially if you also wish they adapted more interesting material.

Let’s Watch MY DRESS-UP DARLING Episode 9 – “A Lot Happened After I Saw That Photo”

My Dress-Up Darling manages to produce two good episodes in a row! Astounding! This wasn’t as much of a knockout as last week’s and there’s still definitely more fanservice than I’d like, but there are only so many ways I can say that and not feel like I’m repeating myself. I enjoyed Gojo helping Shinju fulfill her cosplay dreams.

Let’s Watch SABIKUI BISCO Episode 8 – “Fiendish Trap”

Equivalent exchange at work, perhaps. As Dress-Up Darling improves, Sabikui Bisco, my other weekly, gets markedly worse. This episode was honestly a real blow to my enthusiasm for this series, it makes the previous week’s look like a masterpiece. We’ll know by tomorrow if the downward trend continues or not.

And that about covers it for this week. So, with little left to say, until then, anime fans.

Like what you’re reading? Consider following Magic Planet Anime to get notified when new articles go live. If you’d like to talk to other Magic Planet Anime readers, consider joining my Discord server! Also consider following me on Twitter and supporting me on Ko-Fi or Patreon. If you want to read more of my work, consider heading over to the Directory to browse by category.

All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text, excepting direct quotations, is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.

Posted on in anime, Monthly Movies, Reviews

Magic Planet Monthly Movies: The Magic was Inside You All Along in MAJOKKO SHIMAI NO YOYO TO NENE

This review contains spoilers for the reviewed material. This is your only warning.

This review was commissioned. That means I was paid to watch and review the series in question. You can learn about my commission policies and how to buy commissions of your own here. This review was commissioned by Josh, from The Mugcord Discord Server. Thank you for your support.

“Hoi!”

-Yoyo, too many times to count.

Just off the cuff, there are a number of interesting things about 2013’s Majokko Shimai no Yoyo to Nene. It was directed by Takayuki Hirao. If that name sounds familiar, it may be because he also directed the last film I was commissioned to review. This was during his time at ufotable, a powerhouse of a studio both then and now. Also notably, Yoyo to Nene is an isekai, dating from the period when the genre was just in the process of resurging and conquering the anime landscape. But conversely, it’s miles away from the modern isekai zeitgeist, being more reminiscent of the fantasy fairy tales that birthed the genre in the first place. (Or much more distantly, 90s iterations like The Vision of Escaflowne.)

You could also argue that it’s a magical girl story (the term is, in fact, used here.) Though if so, it’s based on a much older version of the “mahou shoujo” idea than what we usually see today, which tends to directly stem from the “magical warrior” archetype that was also seeing a resurgence around this time. All this, contrasted with its distinctly modern look and feel, makes Yoyo to Nene seem like a film unstuck in time. A fact that, along with its general defiance of easy genre labels, may contribute to its relative obscurity in the Anglosphere. But if so, it’s a shame, because while the film falls short of being truly essential, it is quite good, and it’s definitely worth watching.

But perhaps I’m getting ahead of myself. Before delving into goods and bads it’s helpful to know what the film actually is. The very short version of the plot is thus; after a routine day on the job of battling giant monsters, our titular protagonist Yoyo (Sumire Morohoshi, who has kept busy in the years since. In 2020 she was Michiru in Brand New Animal.) and her sister Nene (Ai Kakuma, also still in the industry. She’s even worked with Hirao again since, playing Mystia in Pompo: The Cinéphile.) are called upon to investigate the sudden emergence of a curious structure in the magical forest where they make their home. (To our eyes, it’s quite obviously a modern high-rise apartment building.) Inside, Yoyo becomes stuck in an elevator, which as it turns out, is secretly a portal to other worlds. As such, she’s promptly spirited away to another universe. Namely, our own. Also tagging along is her adorable….cat? Bihaku (Shouko Nakagawa, an idol and second-generation celebrity who seems to occasionally do roles like this. She’d later play Diana in Sailor Moon Crystal.)

In this apartment building, she meets Takahiro (Miyuki Sawashiro, who we’ve met in this column before. You may know her as the modern Fujiko Mine.), his largely unimportant-to-the-plot brother Takeo (Takahiro Sakurai, who this very season is playing Despa in Ousama Ranking and the protagonist, Burton, in Ninjala. And that’s just shows I’ve personally seen!), and their young cousin, the downright adorable–and much more plot-relevant, she gets a nice turn near the finale–Aki (Rio Sasaki, whose brief seiyuu career started here and never got much farther. As of last year, she’s only ever played two other named roles, with Emery Almond in Fafner Exodus being the more prominent of them.) She learns that Takahiro and Takeo’s parents are under the effects of a curse that’s turned them into grotesque slime monsters. Yoyo, as a proud curse-breaker and general magic problem-solver, is determined to uncover what’s hexed the Tak Twins’ parents, and in the process, free them from perpetual oozedom.

We eventually learn it’s because of a magic gacha game that grants wishes, of all things, but the real meat of Yoyo to Nene comes mostly from Yoyo herself. She’s an enrapturing little ball of pixie dust who brightens up the screen every second she’s on it. Making her the focal point of the film was a very wise choice indeed. (I’m not sure if she’s equally important in the manga that Yoyo to Nene is loosely based on, it’s never been available in English in any capacity.) Yoyo’s magic translates directly to movie magic; she’s the source, directly or indirectly, of many of the film’s visual highlights, and has a cute habit of capping her spells with a small exclamation of “Hoi!”

Much of the film’s emotional thrust comes from her interactions with other characters. She and Takahiro eventually develop a close bond (which the movie is smart enough to never explicitly frame as romantic) but getting there is another story entirely. She’s initially quite dismissive of him, and it’s only through the power of Anime Bonding Moments such as learning how to make instant yakisoba with no magic allowed that they come to understand each other.

She gets along more readily with Aki, who she charms with the film’s sole musical number about a third of the way through its runtime.

But in addition to these bonds, Yoyo has a more flawed and slightly darker side, which intuitively fits with her “witch” characterization and makes her more compelling than if she were wholly innocent.

Later in the film, the curse begins affecting more than just individual people, and assaults whole buildings and even whole parts of cities. When it bears down on a festival the three are attending, Yoyo is shown to be a bit callous toward the idea of Aki possibly being injured. There is an idea here that Yoyo–and perhaps residents of her native Magic Kingdom in general–do not truly understand the value of life and death. When Takahiro gets angry with her for not protecting Aki–noting that she got hurt, and far worse could’ve happened–Yoyo doesn’t really seem to get why he’s mad, suggesting that as long as the body’s intact, even raising her from the dead wouldn’t be a big deal. Indeed, earlier on, we’re shown a scene where exactly that happens to minor character Nils back in the Magic Kingdom, establishing this as being as much a societal flaw as a personal one.

Yoyo changes her tune when Bihaku is injured later that same night, and in easily the scene’s darkest film it seems like he might pass away entirely. Thankfully he eventually turns out to be fine, but the shock is enough to impart the lesson to Yoyo.

There is a question that’s natural to raise here, though. What, exactly, is Yoyo to Nene trying to say with scenes like this? There are a few in the film, although that’s the most prominent. The whole magic gacha game plot raises similar questions. Its resolution is fairly convoluted and involves both Aki’s father, the game’s lead developer, and her departed mother, who turns out to also have been an isekai’d transplant from the Magic Kingdom. On this level, Yoyo to Nene does break down; it seems to reach for a universal applicability, but doesn’t properly grasp it, leaving it feeling thematically confused.

There’s a sliver of light commentary in near the film’s very end, about how Aki’s mother wanted to use her magic for the good of the world, but people are selfish, so it’s become corrupt. There’s enough of a coherent thought there that when Yoyo finishes out the movie by absorbing magic from people making selfless wishes, it makes some internal logical sense, but all in all, the film, especially in the latter half, only just stays on the right side of “coherent.” Most of this is fairly broad “power of human connection” stuff, a thing many other anime have done better and more compellingly. But of course, many others have done it far worse as well. (You could also read some environmentalist messaging in here somewhere, perhaps, but you’d really have to squint.)

So, thematically it’s a bit broad and wishy-washy. And the film convolves and convolutes its own rules often enough to only just barely make sense. This is enough to raise the question of if it’s even a “good movie” at all, but I’d argue it still very much is. For whatever else it may misfire on, Yoyo to Nene succeeds on an emotional gut-check level, arguably the most important facet for any anime to nail, especially one that’s not even two hours long. It is, of course, also quite the spectacle, which certainly helps. It’s possible that if the movie looked and sounded worse, I’d be less forgiving, but–and I rarely mention this in positive reviews, though it’s true here as well–you review the art you have in front of you, not one that you can imagine existing.

On its own terms, Yoyo to Nene is an entirely worthy film. Most involved have gone on to do more notable things, but I do think the movie’s comparative obscurity in the West is a shame. By the end, in spite of any issues, I found myself happily grinning. More than any of its actual stabs at a theme, the film’s real strength is the sheer warmth it radiates. And in that sense, I think its closest cousins may less be any other isekai, and more work that centers on that same feeling of simple joy. Little Witch Academia and Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken! spring to mind as somewhat more recent examples.

At the end of the day, the “sell” on Yoyo to Nene is very simple. If magic makes people smile, well, that’s all that really matters, isn’t it? Yoyo to Nene brings smiles by the dozen, what else can you ask for?

Like what you’re reading? Consider following Magic Planet Anime to get notified when new articles go live. If you’d like to talk to other Magic Planet Anime readers, consider joining my Discord server! Also consider following me on Twitter and supporting me on Ko-Fi or Patreon. If you want to read more of my work, consider heading over to the Directory to browse by category.

All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text, excepting direct quotations, is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.