HomeAnimeA Certain Magical Index Parts 1 & 2 - Anime Review

A Certain Magical Index Parts 1 & 2 – Anime Review

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IndexS1P1 Universal Sony Pictures Home Entertainment (Australia) To Release Six Anime Titles This April

Title: A Certain Magical Index Part 1 | A Certain Magical Index Part 2
Covers: Season 1
Format: DVD
Release Date: 23rd April 2013
Published by:
Universal Sony Pictures Home Entertainment (Australia)
Funimation Entertainment (North America)

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Based on: The light novel series by Kazuma Kamachi
Audio: Hybrid Dub
Subtitles: English
Runtime: 2x 300 Minutes
Special Thanks: Universal Sony Pictures Home Entertainment Australia for kindly providing me with a review samples of this release

Kamijou Touma is a student living in Academy City and despite not having magic powers, he possesses on his right hand the Imagine Breaker, an ability to negate any power whatsoever. Touma finds a young girl named Index who is trying to run away from Necessarius, a powerful magic organization that she is member of. Blessed with the skill of memorising any sort of information, she holds 103,000 forbidden magical books within her head. As science and magic cross paths, Touma must face several dangers amid espers and magicians who appear at the exciting scientific town.

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This title will be released in two separate 12 episode instalments in April, and while I do not have a sample of them yet – will come in a collectable slipcase. Given the simultaneous release date I have decided to merge both reviews into one article in order to (hopefully) reduce the carry-through of spoilers from the first half. At this moment they will not be available as a complete collection.

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Out of all the titles announced for the first anime release slate for Universal Sony Pictures Home Entertainment (USPHA) Australia, A Certain Magical Index was quite easily the one that caught my most attention. The setting and potential storyline outcomes seemed to factor into my tastes and provided it was written well I could have envisioned it as being one of my personal favourites of the year. While I am not going to spoil my thoughts on the series just yet…. given this series was originally aired during 2008 and jumping forward to 2013 has only been released in Australia…. was the wait worthwhile to fans? Find out in my review of A Certain Magical Index .

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Storyline

Touma Kamijou resides in Academy City, a technologically advanced city known for developing students or espers with Psychic powers and of whom are ranked accordingly for it. The ranking system implemented by the city goes from 0 to 5, and due to lacking any psychic abilities our main protagonist has been classified as a 0. However, this does not mean he is completely useless due to his possession of a power known as “Imagine Breaker” – a skill which allows his right hand the ability to nullify any magic or psychic ability case upon him. While this ability has never needed to be used frequently prior to the events of the show (That we can tell), it sure comes in handy when he stumbles upon a young girl draped over the bannister of his verandah.

The girl is a nun by the name of Index, whom from the Church of English and with photographic memory has managed to memorize  103,000 magical grimoires and is currently being chased by beings whom we are initially led to believe wish to capture or otherwise take her out – especially considering the destructive capacity of even a single tome. From this point on, Kamijou’s life changes as his talents become more well known, and whom is also dragged into the stories of other people he knows or otherwise meets.

Despite being called A Certain Magical INDEX… Index is only the main heroine for the first six episodes – then another couple of episodes intermittently. This means that rather have a series with an overarching storyline, it focuses on one character arc at a time making use of generally a newly introduced / focused upon character and select elements of arcs in the past. While I did find it irritating to see supposedly main characters disappear for episodes on end, I didn’t mind the approach they took especially given some of the more detailed plot events that may not have flowed as well if dropped for a few episodes then came back to it. With Kamijou pretty much the only consistent main character in the series aside from one arc, they made decent use of him but I feel could have had his role extended a bit other than using him for the Imagine Breaker.

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While there is little that ruins a storyline more than them fleshing it out to the point where viewers are bored and eagerly awaiting a conclusion, I think the arcs of A Certain Magical Index were too short and didn’t leave much room for anything outside of the main plot of the arc to progress. While this may not be so bad in the two or three parter arcs which were developed as such – with the arcs surrounding Index and Mikoto Misaka I found myself wanting more – especially since afterwards the secondary main character moves over for the next one. Granted it is not possible to see how it would have been any other way, I think given more time they may have better harmonized the use of the series complex setting/storyline and the action which is a particular highlight of the show.

The character arcs are for the most part interesting and even if quite a few follow a notable “Damsel in Distress” scenario they are all different and offer something unique each time round – either/both from the perspective of science or the perspective of magic users. For example while Kamijou is set to face against magicians who are supposedly looking to take care of Index, in the storyline surrounding Mikoto Misaka he decides to assist a series of clones of her whom are being used in an experiment to create the first Level 6 esper.

The ideas are there, the ideas are implemented but in the end lacks harmonization of the different character arcs as well as the complex storyline and action scenes. I am interested to see what they have put into the second season as I am left feeling there is much more to explore in terms of setting and character development. More instalments in the series are headed to Australia this year thanks to Universal Sony Pictures Home Entertainment Australia!

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Design

Visual quality does vary quite a bit across the board in A Certain Magical Index, especially in scenes where there is no action or doesn’t contain anything that warrants anything fancy. On the occasions where one of the two conditions are met however the visuals jump into action and turn out pretty impressive. In these scenes, the animation and visual details combine in delivering what I would call a great battle experience – from the emotion of the characters to the special effects you would expect to accompany magic spells to just the simple body movements. When given an opportunity to shine the visuals do, but when there is not… the quality dips down to something average to above average at best. FORTUNATELY there are many action scenes in this series…. so expect to see quite a few memorable battles.

That being said, for the most part the concept behind the character designs were memorable even if they tried to tie several of the main characters to the normal school environment apparel, and the environment designs while occasionally lacking in finer detail were also appropriate.

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Music/Voice Acting

A Certain Magical Index features two opening and ending sequences. Both opening sequences PSI-missing and Masterpiece by Mami Kawada were enjoyable, with both featuring great animation and the second building even more from the first. The two ending sequences Rimless~Fuchi na Shino Sekai and Chikai Goto~Sukoshi dake mou Ichido by IKU were also appropriate and enjoyable sequences to watch. The rest of the background music compiled for the series was suitable and contributed amply to the scenes they were used in.

As with almost every Funimation Entertainment anime release, they have included both the original Japanese and their own English dub. While as always I recommend going with the dub you prefer listening, the English dub which I watched the series with was enjoyable and for the most part well suited to the individual characters. Highlights include Micah Solusod as Kamijou, Monica Rial as Index, Brittney Karbowski as Mikoto Misaka (+the  other sisters with the “Misaka Replies” carried over from the Japanese dub) and as a particular highlight, Robert McCollum as Stiyl Magnus.

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Extras

Over the two part collection, a small number of bonus goodies are spaced over the four discs total. The extra content for each is listed below:

Part 1 (Discs 1/2)

  • Textless Opening Song – PSI-missing
  • Textless Closing Song – Rimless~Fuchinashi no Sekai~
  • Episode 3 Commentary – With Monica Rial, Jad Saxton (Komoe Tsukuyomi) and Micah Solusod
  • Episode 6 Commentary – Zach Bolton (ADR Director), Robert McCollum and Cole Brown (“Dr Frog”)

Part 2 (Discs 3/4)

  • Episode 14 Commentary – Brittney Karbowski, Austin Tindle (Accelerator) and Micah Solusod
  • Episode 23 Commentary – Monica Rial, Stephanie Yong (Sherry Cromwell) and Alexis Tipton (Hyoka Kazakiri)
  • Textless Opening Songs – PSI-missing, Masterpiece

  • Textless Closing Songs – Rimless~Fuchinashi no Sekai~, Chikaigoto~Sukoshi Dake Mou Ichido~

  • U.S. Trailer

I was glad to see the inclusion of four commentaries over the two discs, and all of them made for enjoyable and interesting listens. Unfortunately aside from them there isn’t that much in terms of extra content. Universal Sony Pictures Home Entertainment Australia are however including special collectable packaging for this release (An example of the one for Shakugan no Shana Season 1 can be viewed HERE) which should also be a nice extra. Unfortunately I do not have any of the packaging to review – but if/when I do I will update this review or make a mini-review to cover it.

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Overall, while there were areas A Certain Magical Index could have improved in, especially when it came to pacing, it was an anime series that I found kept me anticipating the next episode and was built around at least an interesting concept which I hope they expand upon in further instalments. Along with Shakugan no Shana and Armitage III, A Certain Magical Index makes a solid inclusion for the companies launch into the Australian anime market.

Final Score
Storyline / Character Development: B
Design: B
Music/Voice Acting: A-
Extras: B
Personal Preference: B
Overall Score: B

Sam
Sam
Founder of The Otaku's Study. I have been exploring this labyrinth of fandom these last fifteen years, and still nowhere close to the exit yet. Probably searching for a long time to come.

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