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The magic-for-hire company “Astral” has hit hard times, no thanks to being dumped into the hands of the president’s not-very-competent son. But he has talents of his own which could prove to be Astral’s salvation, or its destruction.

An enjoyable show, but far from a groundbreaking or surprising one, Rental Magica scavenges ideas from many other anime currently in vogue to create something which offers diversion but little beyond that.

Pros

• An enjoyable romp, which involves not just one system of magic but a whole slew of them in competition.

Cons

• Much of the show feels strongly derived from other, better anime.

• Director: Itsuro Kawasaki
• Animation Studio: ZEXCS
• Released By: Kadokawa Pictures
• Released Domestically By: Nozomi Entertainment.
• Audio: English / Japanese w/English subtitles
• Age Rating: TV-14 (action violence)
• List Price: $39.99 (DVD)

Anime Genres:

• Comedy
• Science Fiction
• Action

Related Titles:

• Black Butler
• Fullmetal Alchemist
• Occult Academy
• Zakuro

Who's minding the (magic) store?

After his father went missing, young Itsuki Iba found himself saddled with the complexities of running the family business. He doesn’t want the job—after all, he’s still in school!—and he feels particularly unqualified for the position. The employees there have far more immediate competency in their line of work than he does, not to mention more spine. His sole motive for sticking around, apart from his reflexive loyalty to his workers, is a specific natural talent that comes in great handy every once in a while … although it comes at a cost great enough to make the others worry it might be too much to ask of him.

Notice how I’ve left many crucial details out of the above paragraph? That’s deliberate, because it’s my way of hinting at how many of those pieces of this story seem like interchangeable details phoned in from other shows. Rental Magica isn’t a bad anime and it’s enjoyable to watch, but so much of it is a by-the-numbers riff on other shows that it never manages to evolve much of a flavor of its own. It began, and still exists, as a long-running series of light novels—twenty-two published since 2004, with this anime adaptation commissioned in 2007. The novels aren’t in English, but all evidence suggests the anime follows them quite closely, including the limitations of the original material.

This wand's for hire

Let me now go back and fill in the missing pieces. Itsuki’s family business is “Astral,” a rent-a-mage company which allows you to purchase the services of a number of different styles of magicians: Shinto (courtesy of perky shrine maiden Mikan), onmyodo (the smooth-talking, cat-loving Nekoyashiki), Celtic/Western magic (the broom-riding Honami, who also doubles as Itsuki’s secretary and Number Two), and even a resident ghost (Kuroha). Despite their impressive array of powers, business is bad—in big part because sizeable and lucrative chunks of it keep getting poached by a sorceress from a rival concern, the snooty Adelicia Lenn Mathers.

What Itsuki has to bring to the table is the “Glam Sight”—a power concealed in his right eye which allows him unprecedented insight into the magic being used around him, and allows him to command his cronies in battle with great effectiveness. Unfortunately, using it costs him his health—via Honami explains for us is “spell-wave contamination,” the magical equivalent of radiation poisoning. This puts Itsuki in a bit of a bind: he can feel useless, or he can be enormously powerful but put himself at great risk.

Itsuki’s powers become all the more urgently needed when a former Astral member, the automaton Judaix Tholoide, shows up with his homunculus familiar Lapis in tow. Their mission is to take possession of the grimoire Itsuki’s father compiled—which forces both Itsuki and his comrades to band together all the more closely. And the appearance of Adelicia’s father—who’s transformed himself into a being of pure magic—makes things even more complicated.

Good enough, but hardly great

Nothing in Rental Magica ever falls short of being entertaining: it’s briskly plotted, sports enjoyable animation, and packs in a fairly complex storyline as well as some arcane magical technology. The problem is, again, how all the pieces feel like they’re cousins of other and more satisfying shows: Fullmetal Alchemist for the magic systems; Black Butler for the young reluctant hero (complete with his eyepatch that conceals great power); Fairy Tail for the magically-fueled battles between wizards and various diabolical baddies (and sometimes between wizards, period); and plenty of others in different measure (Occult Academy, Zakuro, Soul Eater, etc.)

The fact that an anime has elements derived from elsewhere isn’t by itself a bad thing. It’s how those pieces are put together, and what sort of larger whole that they’re made into. Rental Magica combines its pieces into a show that’s amiable and entertaining, but which so far falls short of really standing out from the pack.



Disclosure: A review copy was provided by the publisher. For more information, please see our Ethics Policy.