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REVIEW: The Irregular at Magic High School Sub.Blu-Ray 2

Big problem for me was magic. Magic in Mahouka is more interesting and in depth than in most other shows where magic is just throwing fireballs and shooting lighting bolts though I do think that the magic is more complicated than it needs to be. Problem was I couldn't ever really get a full grasp of how magic works in Mahouka. Maybe it was explained in depth at the beginning however I often found the exposition dialogue kind of hard to follow. It tends to get very technical and sometimes includes in-universe terminology. I want to enjoy a show and not feel like I'm listening to a lecture.

Usually I'd just shrug stuff like that off. Like hey it's magic, no need to explain it any further. But with Mahouka I felt like the in depth stuff was part of the appeal of the show and I felt like I was missing out a lot by not fully understanding all of it.

Well, that's what this is for.

Well, that's what this is for.

Well, that's what this is for.

Problem with the mahouka anime is that its just an advertisement of the light novel and leaves out all of the depth. If the writers and directors aimed for the anime to be a standalone, then I feel the anime would have been a lot better.

The anime stands alone just fine. I read the LN afterwards, and yes they go into a lot more detail about magic and include some extra scenes. However none of those scenes are really important nor would they have made the anime stand alone any better. Nothing in the LNs really adds more depth either unless you count listening to twice the amount of info dumps to be more depth.

The anime included about as much info on magic as it could without ruining the series. It really explained enough that you could get by which I think is all you can ask. The Mahouka anime is already heavily criticized for massive info dumps. Doubling the screen time spent info dumping magic wouldn't make the series stand alone better. It would just ruin the pacing and cause everything else to be rushed more. More elaborate explanations of every single magic used in the series isn't more depth; it is just more cumbersome because you're trying to force a story telling technique into another medium where it just doesn't work that well.

The only way that the anime is an advertisement is in that the story continues past where the anime ends. It isn't like the LN actually offers a conclusion yet either though so even adapting all existing LN wouldn't make the series stand alone any better. The anime also only covers arcs that completely stand alone. You don't need LN information to see the conclusion of those arcs.

There are a lot of valid complaints about this anime, but it not standing alone without the LN is just baseless bull shit.

The source novels could get very technical, with extremely detailed discussions of how the magitech worked. Commenters say the novel was like "reading a school textbook" at times. The anime was trying to be as faithful to the books as possible by adapting the magitech explanations, but had to shorten it for time constraints.

A good stand alone anime shouldn't leave audiences confused and asking questions like "how did that work?" and "how can he do that?". Just look at the blu-ray releases Q & A booklets. The reviewer complemented that they were very informative, however those booklets shouldn't be needed in order to fully understand things in the story.

@bold: You've got to be kidding me? -_-. The novels offer far more depth in every single category such as world building and characters, if you can't notice that, your a lost cause.

That's not the problem, the problem is how they neglected the characters. The characters are basically cardboard cut-out versions of themselves in the anime and you can't deny this. The anime cut out too many monologues and tidbits of backstories, which erases the depth and understanding of the characters. Only Light Novel readers can truly understand and see the characters for who they are, while the anime basically makes them shells of their former self.

Arcs that stand alone? They are all intertwined, so idk what you are talking about. Yeah, but you need the LN information to fully understand the story the anime provides itself.

How is it baseless? When an anime requires knowledge from the original source material to fully understand the characters and story, then its not a very good standalone anime, its that simple.