Review of The Ancient Magus' Bride
Ancient Magus Bride feels like a victim of expectations. Going into the show, I was expecting a story that revolved mainly around the unlikely romance between a high-school aged girl and a strange skeleton man with some magic thrown in to give the show some spice. What I ended up getting is an episodic tour of Celtic mythology with a romance subplot happening along the edges of the narrative. While Ancient Magus Bride is far from a bad anime, it ultimately struggles to tell a compelling story regardless of its intentions. The story, to its credit, does have an interesting, if potentially problematic, premise. After being abandonedby her family and haunted by spirits, Hatori Chise decides to sell herself off to whoever is willing to buy her in a desperate attempt to escape from her dismal life of solitude.
As a powerful magical conduit known as a “Sleigh Beggy”, Chise is purchased by the mysterious ancient magus Elias Ainsworth. After taking her to his remote home in the country, Elias announces to Chise that he aims to train her in the art of magic as his apprentice and, ultimately, make her his bride.
A lot of people ended up dropping the show immediately after hearing about this premise as not everyone is going to be comfortable with a literally forced romance between an underage girl and whatever Elias is. Even though it is far from impossible to turn this premise into a compelling romance, the author stakes their entire relationship on Chise’s immense gratitude for her liberation and Elias’s infinite curiosity into human emotions.
Despite the many trials and tribulations that the couple faces towards the latter parts of the series, their relationship doesn’t seem to evolve past these two simple premises and the conclusion just felt too difficult to accept. This is especially saddening considering how much fascinating strain the author puts on the relationship of these two characters.
Most of the relationship building seems to have been relegated to the back quarter of the series, because the author decided to spend most of it building up the show’s Celtic mythology. There are simply too many supporting characters here. From humans to mythical creatures, too much time is spent lightly developing these characters instead of focusing on Chise and Elias. This leads to a bloated slog of a series, especially towards the middle.
While it’s nice to see characters like Oberon, Titania, and Leánnan Sídhe appear outside of a Shin Megami Tensei series, their contributions to the overall plot feel too minor compared to how much time is given to them. Likewise, while human characters like Stella end up being used for a major plot point, nothing interesting ever becomes of the priest, dragon priest, and several other mages that are introduced as “friends” of Elias. Sadly, even prominent characters like Ruth and Silver hardly get much development outside of their one dedicated episode.
Perhaps the author felt like she needed to focus on these side characters to distract from just how dull Chise and Elias turn out to be. For what it’s worth, Chise has every right to be dull. As a victim of familial abuse and suffering from immense depression, Chise’s discomfort and hesitation towards human interaction is entirely understandable. Everything from her baggy eyes, haggard voice, and droopy coat visually conveys this aspect of her character. Likewise, a stoic personality lends itself well to a strange looking demon mage living on the outskirts of society.
The problem comes from the fact that every piece of dialogue for these characters is delivered in the same dull and unemotional tone. This works relatively well in the beginning when the characters are just getting to know each other, but becomes a serious thorn when the viewer is expected to start buying into the friendships that Chise develops with the many supporting characters as well as her “romantic” relationship with Elias.
This dull tone also creates for some cringeworthy attempts at humor as cutesy versions of Chise and Elias try to expel some comedy with absolutely zero emotion. This is especially disappointing because, in their own right, both Chise and Elias are strong and well-developed characters with some very compelling backstories. It’s their overly sparse and awkward interactions that ultimately make them borderline unbearable.
To give credit where credit is due, the show is absolutely beautiful. A lot of attention was put into making sure that the characters are always drawn well and are never awkwardly animated. I especially really liked the designs of Chise, Silver, and Elias’s many forms. The immense size of the breasts on some of the mythical creatures felt a tad comical, however.
The score is also very helpful with giving scenes the emotional impact that was lacking from the characters themselves. I especially loved the OPs and EDs, which did a beautiful job of helping me enjoy the act of watching the episode even if its content was not always to my liking. The show even has some nice songs delivered by Chise and the aforementioned dragon priest within the show itself.
Despite my many criticisms, it is difficult to call Ancient Magus Bride a bad show. It tries really hard to deliver a unique and compelling story that differs from what you would typically get out of anime. Sometimes, especially towards the end, it even feels like it delivers on that promise. Perhaps if my expectations weren’t so geared towards the romance as opposed to the fantasy setting, I would have enjoyed the show a lot more.
Shifting these expectations would perhaps allow another viewer to get more enjoyment out of the bulk of the series and lessen the disappointing conclusion of the series’ romance. For me, however, Ancient Magus Bride turned out to be too slow-paced and too big of a slog to recommend to anyone without an immense love of fantasy and episodic story telling.