Ten-year-old Negi Springfield is a wizard who wants to become a Magister Magi. The task of teaching him is given to 31 students at an all-girl school. At school he gains new friends and learns new things, whether he wants to or not.
Negi endures tiresome training for both his wizarding skills and his physical strength. He is given difficult tasks that forces him against a dragon, other wizards, mad-scientists and an evil vampire... and they just keep getting more tougher!
Written by super-anime-fan
Story & Characters
Typical of Ken Akamatsu, this is another series full of fanservice and near-naked girls, but in a totally different
direction - school and magic. I think that it is unrealistic to have a 10-year-old be a professor of modern English
teaching to a group of girls all older than him by at least 3 years, but whatever, I'm not going to argue with the
author of Love Hina, greatest manga of all time. Other than that, the story is pretty original with Negi Springfield
trying his hardest to help everyone, searching for his father, and trying to be a magister all at the same time. This
anime faithfully follows the first 6 volumes of Negima! Magister Negi Magi with some elements from later volumes like
the time machine and the meaning of Asuna's magic-nulling ability. The last 4-5 episodes called the
"Asuna's death" story arc was highly original if anything. Fights, chaos, love, death, and magic are
perhaps equally shown throughout the series; explained more in detail later. Our hero Negi seems to be the stereotypical
little kid who tries his best to face against all odds with magic at his disposal. As typical of harem anime, there are
31 girls with their own personalities to boot. The girls include Kagurazaka Asuna, the fiery hot-head and lead female
protagonist with a mysterious past, Konoe Konoka, best friend of Asuna and Setsuna and a powerful healer in her own
right, Sakurazaki Setsuna, Shinmei swordswoman and the silent boydguard, Yukihiro Ayaka, the class-rep and mortal
enemies with Asuna, Evangline A.K. Mcdowell and Chachamaru, evil vampire and robot turn good, etc. Along with the
supporting cast and magical elements, Mahou Sensei Negi is fairly interesting and original. (However, it does not stand
up to the manga as you will see later.)
Rating: 7
Art
This is where the anime falls flat on its face. Regrettably, I felt that the producers/directors spent too much of the
bugdet on the music and not enough on the art. There was not enough shading on the characters, the lines were blurry,
and the characters looked funny and not proportional. Sometimes there was good animation and most of the time none.
There was a lot of flat colors with no shades or nuances added to it... crappy. On top of that, if you look closely, all
the spells that Negi casts looks all the same with not much variation = laziness. If anyone was to make anime, one
cannot be lazy, and I felt that the people behind the anime project were lazy or had budget constraints, I don't
know. Whatever the case is, the art had to be improved and it pained me everytime I saw an episode at the bad animation
quality that the anime was offering to me compared to the manga.
Rating: 2
Sound
Now here is where the anime shines. As aforementioned, I felt they spent too much of the budget and time into the
music/sound and the anime did astound me with its music. The openning song is techno and fast-paced and awesome
sounding, "Happy Material Go", and they used various versions throughout the series with different girls
singing it. Then episode 24's opening song to commerate Asuna's death was perfect, sad, slow, and melancholic
- absolutely great and I even know how to play the tune on flute. The ending songs including "Kagayaku Kimi
e", "Oshiete Hoshii zoh Shisho", and "Happy Material Go acoustic version" for eps 23. They were
pretty good as well and gave the anime a nice touch. The best part of the music was in between the series, such as in
episode 24 where Negi finds Asuna's remains and the piano/techno in the background blows me away. Later on, in
episode 26, the entire fight scene with the Demon King had totally crazy music that made it the perfect fighting scene,
aside from the animation quality. Other than that, the young seiyuus voicing the 31 girls were excellent and I
couldn't ask for any better performance, except that Setsuna's should have been a bit higher and Konoka's
a bit lower. Together, all 31 girls have produced the OST and numerous other soundtracks, again proving the awesome
music quality and the much spent budget/time.
Rating: 10
Presentation
Here is the other major downfall. The bad things included many and I will elaborate. One major pain was the fact that
the anime tried to follow manga but also tried their own twists; it just made the episodes drag out longer and end up as
fillers. For the most part, I felt that the series was a major filler up until the Kyoto trip story arc and the
Asuna's death story arc... even then they butchered it up. Some examples of filler episodes and killing the manga
storyline was the episode where Negi enters some kind of contest and other girls try to get him. That was a waste of an
episode and it was told better in the manga with actual kissing and the ogre teacher Nita... quite unfortunate. Another
thing the anime butchered was the Kyoto trip arc; what in the world happened? They left so many minor plots out and
characters that it left me highly disappointed. What happened to Kotaro, the acting village? To try to cram 3 volumes
worth of manga into 3-5 something episodes doesn't cut it. Akamatsu's stuff is better than that. The things
that makes up for the series was the brilliant acting and the Asuna's death story arc which is completely original
in my eyes. That story arc gives Negima a sadder and more serious aspect to Negima and implements the right music and
acting that makes up for the entire series. On top of that, episode 23 was delayed for a long time, and fans eagerly
waiting for only found out that it was mostly dialogue and a filler episode to lead to Asuna's death. As a whole,
the Negima series disappointed me with some redeeming qualities.
Rating: 4
Final Verdict
5.6667 (average)
Reviewed by g-money, Dec 19, 2005
