First Look: Fall 2024 Anime Overview: Magilumiere Magical Girls Inc. (Patreon)

Fall 2024 Anime Overview: Magilumiere Magical Girls Inc.

Premise: Monsters called Kai are threatening ordinary people, and only magical girls can stop them. However, being a magical girl is no longer the domain of teenagers, and has evolved into an actual career dominated by adult women. Companies employ magical girls and send them out to exterminate Kai. Kana is having a hard time getting her first job. But when she ends up helping out a magical girl, she’s invited to become one for a small, scrappy company. There’s a lot for Kana to learn…

This was my favorite magical girl show of the season- and how amazing is it we had three new ones for once! There's a lot to love about Magilumiere! For one it gave me something I always crave: Adult magical girls (or magical women, though they’re called magical girls in this show). Much like how classic mahou shoujo often explores the struggles adolescence and growing up, this show uses mahou shoujo as a way to explore what it’s like to be a young woman entering the working world. Kana struggles to grow her confidence and adjust to her new job, bu with the encouragement of her boss and co-workers, she discovers her own talents.

All of the magical ladies are pretty fun, with my favorite being Hitomi Koshigaya, Kana’s senpai in the work place. She’s a brash and raucous woman who loves kicking ass with shit-eating grin, she only ever wears tracksuits when she’s not on the job, she talks like a delinquent, bursts with confidence, and she’s very protective and sweet towards Kana. Basically, she’s goals, everything I love about soft hearted delinquent girls only she’s actually a grown woman this time! Wow!

But we also get introductions to plenty of other cool magical ladies, all who approach their jobs in a different way where they can learn from each other.And the women are always treated respectfully, visually and by the narrative. No jarring objectification or anything like that.

The show has a bit more of a focus on men than you’d expect, since while the magical girls fight on the front lines, Magilumiere’s engineer/tech support team are men, and the boss and his mysterious backstory is a big part of the show. However, they’re all good characters! And the show does still put a big focus on women, exploring their relationships, their development, and all the cool magical girl fights they can get into. It is so nice to see some hype magical lady fights, and rather than the unfortunate animation poor Acro Trip got, this show does pretty well with its visuals and fight scenes. The story especially lot of fun with the transformation sequences, and I love to see it.

The show also has a lot to say about corporate world, and it feels like it’s only getting started on that. From the beginning, it makes sure to contrast the way Magilumiere operates from the more cutthroat business of larger companies. The company’s boss, Kouji Shigemoto, was previously a partner in a much larger business, but seems to have left because how they were doing things didn’t jive with his ideals, and now he’s in charge of start-up where he's very focused on the best possible experience for both his employees and customers. He’s contrasted to his previous partner, who’s gone on to grow a big company that only cares about efficiency and the bottom line. His old friend doesn’t care about property damage, just getting it done quickly and going on to the next job. He fires his employees casually, and doesn’t seem to care about them.

Meanwhile, Shigemoto is a very encouraging presence in his company, who checks in with his employees, talks to them, support  them, and really respects their input. Magilumiere makes a point of avoiding property damage and finding ways to help the customer, even if it’s a lot more trouble. He describes himself as wanting to “protect” peaceful moments where they can just hang out and have fun. It may come off as being a little too worshipful of start ups, but I don’t think it’s trying to say all startups are like this. Shigemoto started his with the specific goal of being kinder to his employees and being true to his ideals, and that’s not a thing that applies to all startups. 

It's not saying anything groundbreaking so far, like it’s definitely not questioning the hellscape of capitalism much right now, but the message is nice, and I’m interested in seeing where it goes. The fact magical girls are privatized despite providing a life saving service is interesting, and I wonder if the show’s going to touch on this too, since it’s been implied there’s a grim origin involved. And then there's lots of a little jokes about tech companies too. The fact the magical women suck monsters up into flash drives after defeating them is honestly so funny.

The story also gives some brief shout outs to struggles real women face in the workplace—it’s mentioned there’s people on not-Twitter who mock magical girls for being “old” and just seem to want to harass and criticize them—but they haven’t really been explored in depth so far, which I’d like to see from the show. It would also be nice to see exploration of gender on the tech side of things--- like in the real world, it’s really notably male dominated. We’ve gotten some focus on one woman CEO and one girl engineer, but the gender imbalance is very much there. 

 The show disappointed very slightly by briefly throwing out that men’s magic is “too aggressive” (whatever that means?) and that’s why it’s all magical girls, which is a too-common gender essentialist explanation for women dominating a fantasy action story (see: Claymore) that has weird implications. Why can’t a lot of girls just be really good at magic? Why can’t it just happen to be a female dominated career but there are some magical boys? (And the fact it the explanation is like, guys are just TOO strong, TOO cool, TOO manly is like. lmao okay.) But it is a throwaway line that doesn’t ever come up again (and it does at least frame it as a ‘mystery’ they might figure out someday).

That brings me to an issue that may be uncomfortable for some viewers- Shigemoto wears a magical girl outfit while he’s working, and when he’s introduced the angle and vibe is intimidating and Kana reacts in shock and possibly fear, playing into transphobic stereotypes. The next episode, however, makes it clear she’s specifically be shocked that it’s a middle aged man wearing “cosplay” rather than ever saying it’s the dress, the other employees are chill about it, Kana gets used to it, and the narrative moves on pretty quickly.

However it comes up in a minor way a couple more times, with Kana questioning to herself why he’s dressed like that, and saying she’s surprised Koshigaya worked there after seeing the boss dressed like that (Koshigaya’s response being ‘hey you decided to too! People in this company are interesting, aren’t they?’). Another magical girl doesn’t seem put off by it at all, but immediately assumes it’s business related. It is implied there’s some sort of work related origin for his cosplay and it's possibly tragic, but he does definitely enjoys the clothing (and has a nice skincare routine) and the male characters are always 100% supportive, with one of them particular often discussing fashion with him, if there should be more ribbons etc.

So yeah, YMMV over whether it crosses over into transphobia (or edges into it) but I’ve definitely seen way worse, and the I feel the series is mostly supportive even if it’s like “hahaha it’s a little weird right!” it’s not outright mean to him about it (imo).

The pacing may be a little slow sometimes, really wanting to cover every moment of the manga, but it’s always a good time, and there’s plenty of hype moments. The concept is so interesting and has so much potential, and I feel like the show is running with it.

The show has been unfortunately been confined to Amazon Prime, where a lot of people probably missed it, but it seems to be doing well in Japan and a second seasons already been announced, to m.

Over all, if you’re a magical girl fan or are just interested in a good show that explores magi-tech, working adult issues, and has some cool ladies fighting and bonding, I really recommend this one. It has been unfortunately been confined to Amazon Prime, where a lot of people probably missed it, but it seems to be doing well in Japan and a second seasons already been announced, to m.