Back in my youth, little me was totally in love with princesses and glittery things. Of course this meant that the Magical Girl genre was made for me! And it was!!! And it still is to this day! But when it came to actual magical girl anime, it started back in 2010, while scrolling through Youtube. I came past a certain AMV with a cute pink girl on the thumbnail, which definitely intrigued me.
That's where this all began.
Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch
What a mouthful of a name. 😰
I found this show on youtube back in 2013.
After just having finished Tokyo Mew Mew, this one was in my youtube recommendations!
Me, who just started watching anime, gave it a try of course!
This music anime aired back in April, 2003!!
Some older anime really hold up, even during the modern standards.
However, this show does have its moments where you, indeed, realise that it was made almost 20 years ago.
But still… It was so enjoyable!
Mermaid Melody, as you’d expect, is about mermaids!
The show is mostly about the Princess of the North Pacific Sea, Lucia, who serves as our main character.
Each princess is entrusted with a magical pearl. Giving them singing powers.
However, Lucia entrusted hers to a boy who fell overboard from a ship.
Lucia must travel back to the human world and reclaim the pearl that once was hers.
Using the power of music, Lucia is able to protect herself and other mermaid kingdoms from the evil villains that come to kidnap the mermaid princesses.
The animation could be a little bit on the rough side, with repeated motions and characters going off model.
But the fun banter and drama between the characters will most likely keep you pulled in.
If not that, the very good and memorable songs will make you come back for more!
The show is based on a 7 volume manga (sadly out of print) and has a second season waiting for you!
Kirakira☆Precure A La Mode
Now it's time for a Magical Girl anime with an animal and cafe theme!
Precure is an ongoing magical girl show with many different seasons, spanning from Princesses to Wizards, Aliens to Vets and even more settings.
This particular season stars Usami Ichika, a 13 year old girl with a passion for baking. One day while she is baking a strawberry shortcake for her mother who is supposed to return home that evening after a long trip, a mysterious figure shows up and eats her failed cakes, mistaking them for cookies.
As soon as Ichika succeeds, her mother called her with the bad news that she couldn't make it home.
Right after the call, out of nowhere a big monster appeared and steals said strawberry shortcake, upsetting our main character.
The mysterious figure from earlier comes over and introduces herself as Pekorin. She explains it's after the KiraKiraru in the cake, which is filled with love.
The girl transforms into a legendary Precure and a lot of adventures ensue.
This season has a Spinoff movie Precure Dream Stars! Movie starring Precures from earlier seasons and movie only characters, and a stand alone movie Kirakira☆Precure A La Mode Movie: Paritto! Omoide no Mille-Feuille!.
A new Precure season has started airing, Delicious Party♡Precure, as of writing this, only 13 episodes are out!
Cardcaptor Sakura
For the third show, I want to talk about Cardcaptor Sakura!
I found this show years ago and gave it a try, since I loved the whole genre of course!
This show felt different compared the previous ones.
No mascot mysteriously giving you a transformation device to fight monsters. No!
Cardcaptor Sakura has no transformation sequences, nothing close to that! Her best friend Tomoyo sews all of her cute outfits and records her during fights!
Fights? Yea that's right.
This whole adventure started because Sakura accidentally released magic cards, called Clow cards, from it's book.
Now on a mission to find them all back, she needs more than a cute outfit to save the day!
This anime appealed me, seeing that not all magical girls need a flashy and sparkly minute of changing clothes, to still be badass.
The show got a sequel back in 2018! Hopefully they'll adapt the other volumes as well!
I'm trying to tell more people about magical girl anime, as it's still kind of niche besides Sailor Moon.
Do you have any other picks you'd love to share?
Please let me know!
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