Hello Everyone, Welcome to another long awaited Redgame's Super Sexy Anime Review Hour, with your lovable host Redgame. Today I will be reviewing the anime.......
Mai-Hime (My Hime in the english dub)
Synopsis
The anime series Mai-Hime, created by the studio Sunrise is a story about Mai Tokiha, a normal girl on a trip to her new school Fuka Gakuen (Fuka Academy in the English dub) With her sickly younger brother Takumi, where a multitude of odd events happen, soon driving her into becoming a HiMe (Highly-Advanced Materializing Equipment). HiMes being a group of girls with the power to summon mechas for battle against rouge monsters known as orphans. Later on, she and the rest of the girls discover a horrifying rule with being a HiMe.
Main Characters
Mai Tokiha: A first year high school transfer student to
Fuka Gakuen. After some rather odd events involving two girls she
encountered on a ferry she soon accepts the role of a
HiMe. This basically being a girl with powers to summon a
mecha to fight off rogue monsters known as orphans. Mai herself is the motherly type and a very hard worker, always looking over her sickly younger bother
Takumi and her younger friend
Mikoto Minagi.
Mikoto Minagi: A third year middle school student to
Fuka and another one of the
HiMe.
Mikoto was found half drowned in a sea by some members of the crew on a ferry that Mai and her younger brother
Takumi were traveling on. An
incident on the ferry reveals her and another girl that was chasing her to both be
HiMes.
Mikoto is a rather energetic girl, who really enjoys being friends with Mai. It is revealed early on that she is on a quest to find her brother.
Natsuki Kuga: A first year high school student at
Fuka and another
HiMe.
Natsuki climbed aboard the ferry mentioned earlier in pursuit of
Mikoto. There along with
Mikoto, she is revealed to be
HiMe.
Natsuki is a mysterious girl with a sad past. Shes often serious about most of the situations she faces. Later on it is revealed she is trying to destroy a company who were involved with the death of her mother.
Yuuichi Tate: A first year male high school student at
Fuka Gakuen who along with his younger "sister"
Shiho Munakata both meet Mai and
Takumi aboard the ferry during
Mikoto's first
appearance.
Yuuichi is your normal high school student, who after an accident in the
Kendo club at
Fuka, mostly keeps to himself. Him and Mai don't start out on a very steady relationship, with Mai accusing him of sexual
assault, but it improves later on. He is constantly followed by his younger friend
Shiho who he considers his younger sister due to the fact that they have known
each other since they were little and that he finds her very annoying.
Shiho Munakata: Yuuichi's "little sister" and a second year middle school student at
Fuka. As mentioned before, she is almost always following
yuuichi around. Yet she has more deeper feelings for him than he does for her
Reito Kanzaki: A third year high school student at
fuka and the vice-president of the school council. To put rather simply without giving away any major spoilers he is a very important character towards the end of the
anime. He develops a close relationship with Mai at one point.
There is many more important characters in the anime, but this was just to list off a few.
ThoughtsPlot/Characters
The first couple episodes are rather iffy at first glance but the story gets better later on. What seems to be filler episodes in the anime is actually to build up relationships with the characters which, believe me, is huge to the plot. Overall the plot was pretty good and original. It gets very emotional and action packed towards the end of the series so be prepared for that. The only thing I didn't really like about the plot was that the ending was really anticlimactic, but other than that, like I said, its a good plot. The characters themselves are rather interesting, especially since you get to look into most of their pasts and get a feeling for them. Very good.
Ratings based on R.A.S (Redgame Approval Stars)
Plot: 4/5 R.A.S
Characters: 5/5 R.A.S
Art/Visuals
Well considering the genre and story of this anime the art/visuals aren't really relaxing but are really awesome and action packed. Actually I lied, the action packed part only applies for the battle scenes. The everyday scenes involving the relationships and personal problems of the characters are refreshing and the scenery is beautiful to put simply. As far as the animation goes, it is well done.
4.8/5 R.A.S (basically 5 R.A.S, whatever)
Voice Acting
Fantastic job for both the Japanese and the English cast. I really enjoyed how the emotional scenes were handled by both casts. Some of the English dub voices take a couple minutes to get used to, even if your watching the dub first but like I said before, Awesome job all of you.
Both Casts: 4/5 R.A.S
Overall
Overall Mai-Hime is a very enjoyable series with a wonderful plot and cast of characters to go with it. I recommend that you anime fans out there go give this one a shot.
8/10 R.A.S.
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