Passing Judgement: Ahh Megami Sama TV

Once again I arise in order to blather insipidly on an anime subject of my choosing. Phe4r!

Thanks to a gift package from a friend I find myself with a continuing surplus of things to watch. That and a deep fondness for the manga brought me to view all ... oh 50 episodes of AMS TV.

Given what it is, the show is odd. It's episodes are basically rehashes of manga material already done, but the order is deeply out of whack, with a few new bit players added to the mix. The end result is a mixed bag. Series pacing, and larger arc of story is almost nonexistant. Episodes go from slow moving, to more action oriented without much warning. All in all, it just ends up feeling rather picaresque.

What hurts it more than anything, probably, is the surplus of characters who are introduced for a single episode, and then vanish, never to appear again. Over the course of the manga's life, this made more sense, as characters would be around for several months, then vanish with the beginning of a new arc. Somewhere in the back of your mind you'd think, "Oh, well they'll be back again, in a while." They never are of course, but the once a week snippets you're fed space it out enough you don't really notice.

As for art, music, and voices, I can't complain I guess. I sort of feel that it could have been better animated, and bell in particular often just looks ... I dunno, sort of half finished. Still, yay for animated Hild, even if they do tend to forget that most of the time she should appear as a child. In my humble opinion, one of the series best original stories is Hild "stealing" Keichi's affections. She does this by travelling back in time and inserting herself into his life, long before he met bell, long before he even left Okinawa.

There's a great deal wrong with every aspect of this premise, such as why the continuity change didn't affect K1's current situation, why Keima didn't notice, why Bell and company don't remember any of their new past, etc. It does set up a sort of predestination paradox concerning K1's wish, but I think this was almost entirely unintentional on the part of the story tellers.

Given that I normally savage this kind of nonsense, it may suprise you that I liked it. Honestly, I just thought it was interesting diversion, that I'd rather like to see played out in the manga. The episode arc itself was extremely short (2? 3?), and they could have squeezed an entire 12 ep ova out of it, if they'd really wanted to.

What bothered me most about the entire thing though, more than anything else, shoddy temporal physics included, was the climax. K1 see's bell trying to confess, and just brushes Hild off. His comment is, "Well, you don't really love me." Hild confirms this. That being the case, in the altered present, why didn't he immediately shake off Hild as soon as he woke up in the brave new world of the altered future?

I mean, I understand "needed it to happen for story purposes BS, whatever", but still. Hild's admission that she doesn't care is what compounds the issue. To carry off her little scheme, she spends at least 5 years with K1, and it's implied probably a great deal more in line with 10 to 20 years. That's a long time to fake a relationship with someone. Yes, she is the ruler of hell, but there have to more time efficient ways of ...welll ... passing the time. Moreover, K1 has proven himself to be an extremely lovable fellow to high order spirits, attracting as he has the open affection of two goddesses, temporary affection of at least 3 others, etc. etc. It just seems ...odd.

Again, I can understand that it was necessary for story purposes, but quite frankly, that's some trully shitty narrative there. I guess what draws me to the arc though, is the desire for a more well planned treatment of it. Who knows.

In other news, anyone ever watched the lord of terror arc and then the AMS movie back to back? Does your brain hurt yet? Also, Pop Quiz, since when can K1 fly under his own power?