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Now in Japan
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Thursday, 22 February 2007 00:00 |
 When it comes to special powers, the Japanese sure do pick unusual names. Not that long ago we had Gakuen Alice, featuring Alice users at their own special Alice Academy. Now, Mamoru-kun ni Megami no Shukufuku wo! brings us Beatrice users at their own special Beatrice Academy. They also seem to share a preference for daft slapstick humour. Next year, no doubt, we'll get something beginning with 'C'...
1 - Loving Beatrice
On Mamoru Yoshimura's first day at his new school (a special academy for kids who possess "Beatrice" abilities), he's barely through the school gate when Ayako Takasu, a beautiful but usually cold girl, asks him to be her boyfriend. Ayako's Beatrice abilities are the stuff of legend, so the school's attention immediately turns to finding out what she sees in the diminutive and apparently unremarkable new guy. The Student Council take a particular interest, while Mamoru quickly finds out his new woman is a walking bundle of trouble...
2 - Astral Fire Recovery Strategy!
Mamoru's called back to the school in the middle of the night - the Student Council president won't tell him why, just that it's a "world crisis" of some sort. "World crisis" turns out to be Ayako in one of her fouler moods, and Mamoru's just what they need to calm her down. There's also the small metter of the theft of the Astral Fire - apparently by another Beatrice user - and Mamoru's been tasked to go with Ayako on her mission to retrieve it. But while Ayako's preparing herself for her date.. er, mission, Mamoru finds the culprit a little closer to the school: Yuuka...
Within about 30 seconds of starting Mamoru-kun, I was already beginning to mentally count the reasons why it was going on to the "Pass" pile - the setup reminded me a little too much of Gakuen Alice, which was a series I was never really able to warm to (although it seems to have a fairly dedicated fanbase). Special abilities with a daft name, a romance aspect, and a school where "wacky" is normal and "normal" is unheard of: check, check, check, and "Warning, Will Robinson!"
The two series quickly began to diverge, though, and that's when my interest began to pick up again. Mamoru-kun is aimed at a slightly older audience, for a start - the healthy doses of fanservice, violence and - gasp! - blood are evidence of that, while the humour, even though it's still very much in the slapstick vein, is actually funny, and not just something to be tolerated. Think of the sort of physical humour in Hand Maid May or SHUFFLE! and you won't be too far from the mark - it's simple, but appealing.
The only real issue is just what Ayako sees in Mamoru - "love at first sight" isn't anything unusual in anime, but you're usually given at least a flimsy reason why it happens, whereas here there's no clue as yet: Ayako's just completely smitten, and no-one knows why. Ayako's a great character, though - a lot like Full Metal Panic's Kaname Chidori, just with her violent and sweet sides at more extreme ends of the scale. She's a real sweetie one moment, a one-woman wrecking machine the next - and entirely lovable the whole time.
Mamoru's less interesting. He's bland and dull (some more reasons why you wonder what Ayako sees in him), but his powers seem to be particularly useful, so maybe he'll be developed over the course of the series. On the fringes are the rest of the Student Council, all introduced in episode one (so you've no chance of remembering who they all are) and all playing to the various ojousama / shy / photo-happy stereotypes that anime always seems to produce. So far only the council president and Yuuka have had much of a part to play, but they're an interesting enough bunch - even if they seem to be more there to bounce the comedy off than anything else.
There are signs of an underlying serious plot surrounding Ayako and events from a few years previously - episode two touches on it but doesn't add too much detail, but I'd expect that to come more to the fore as the series progresses, and it should offset the humour nicely.
The end result, then, is that I'm a lot more impressed with Mamoru-kun that I thought I would be, and it gets added to the ever-growing "keep" pile. Funny in places, sweet in others, and definitely worth a look if you're after something light and easy to watch. |
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