Magilumiere Magical Girls Inc.

Episode 9

"Collaboration" is an invaluable aspect of any job well done. It's one of my favorite aspects of the work I do outside of my anime writing, and even my current key contribution here at ANN is co-producing a co-op column. You have a better time at your job when you get on well with your colleagues and work together—coming up with ideas and iterations you wouldn't achieve alone. Niko struggled to shoulder the burden of emergency magical programming in last week's episode of Magilumiere, and that started a story arc that hadn't properly landed yet. This week, the cute little computer nerd has to take it upon himself to ask for help, and the show rights itself as a result. Truly, I never really doubted it.

The lead-in properly lays out Niko's backstory, which is both nice on its own, and also great because it loops in more of Magilumiere's brilliant world-building that I love so much. The existence of fictionalized magical girl anime in this universe where they are also a real-world element justifies itself further. It turns out that the magical programmers of this world, like Niko, often get their start as hobbyists recreationally recreating the spells from their favorite cartoons. That's a cool idea that makes perfect sense in this context, and ties into the concept of passion for the aesthetics of magical girls fueling the best in its industry.

It also comes up against the argument that passion doesn't always pay the bills. It doesn't help that Niko was also even more of a nebbish nerd in his past life, to the point that he worries his work being criticized will rob him of his love for magical programming. It takes a chance job interview with Magilumiere and Shigemoto for Niko to learn the difference between "criticism" and "feedback" and how the latter leads to collaboration that can only increase the quality of your work, and resultant love for it. This bit also confirms that Shigemoto's fashion game was just as on-point in the past, which is important.

Attention to detail on aesthetics is the key for Magilumiere as a company. Kana has it, which is how she got hired, and now it's confirmed that Niko has it. Unlocking this core memory motivates Niko to come out of his shell and ask his fellow magical tech nerds for assistance. Thankfully, it turns out that earnest passion for the craft isn't exclusive to Magilumiere. The result can only be described as a magical girl spell-coding jam, and I love this show for letting me type that. Yes, you can question the denser real-world technicalities of how and why the programming needed to all be done this way after Niko had already whipped up the spell and just needed some extra juice to transmit it. But the sheer fun of the scene let me just roll with it. It's magic, after all.

The coda to all this coding is to tackle more of the business side of Magilumiere's world while setting up for an upcoming bigger, overarching plot. Koga continues to be an ignoble dick, smugly delivering backhanded compliments to Magilumiere as a company and trying to poach their magical girls. It's to the point where even the characters in the show can tell that this once-respected pillar of the industry is coming off like a total tool, which is honestly nice to see in a writing situation like this. Though Koga does raise a bit of a dramatic point with his aside questioning that Magilumiere may arguably be exploiting its laborers' passions, as so many real-world companies do. There are misgivings, even though I don't doubt that Shigemoto's love of the game is anything but genuine. Still, it lands as a "the worst person you know just made a great point" moment to keep the show conceptually compelling.

The Magical Technology EXPO storyline of Magilumiere worked well. The rebound with Niko's story is strong, even as the accompanying animation still has janky moments—there's a key shot of Koga where his facial expression simply does not look right. But as this episode shows, it's the collaboration of all elements that come together to make real magic, and make it work this episode does.

Rating:

Magilumiere Magical Girls Inc. is currently streaming on Amazon Prime.

Chris would 200% work for a magical girl company if they were real, but he'll settle for writing reviews and ad copy instead. You can peruse more of his views over on his blog , or catch him reskeeting art of anime girls (magical and otherwise) on his BlueSky.