Miraculous Ladybug!
Nov. 26th, 2015 01:04 amSo several months ago Kaze told me about an upcoming magical girl/superhero show called Miraculous Ladybug. Naturally she thought of me, since ladybugs are my mascots, and she thought I'd be interested.
I definitely was, and I've been waiting for it to come out. I was hoping it would stream on CrunchyRoll. But things have been so hectic around here (and I was so occupied re-watching Carmen) that I didn't get around to checking on the show's status until yesterday. CrunchyRoll doesn't have it, I don't think, and the U.S. dub doesn't begin for about a week and a half, so I'm not late for that, yay. Yesterday, when I thought to look, I found a few fan-subbed episodes on YouTube. If I'd been more on the ball, I could have watched each episode as it came, sigh. We have 13 now, I believe. There will be 26 for the first season and I hope they'll get renewed for more.
I've watched all the ones I can, which is about six. A seventh has the subs falling off the video, so I decided I'd better just wait for the English dub of that one. I plan to watch all the episodes in English as they come out (provided I can get Nickelodeon's website to cooperate; I assume they'll show each new episode there). I just hope the dub is good.
The show is so cute! There's a definite innocence and sweetness about it. While it uses many magical girl cliches, it also feels fresh and new.
Things I especially like:
- The characters all seem to dress very modestly. It's so nice not to see all the girls running around in midriff shirts like on Winx Club! They act more like kids instead of trying to grow up too soon and wearing revealing clothing.
- Instead of destroying the evil spirits possessing the characters and making them act out, Ladybug catches them and purifies them. They're little butterflies corrupted by the Big Bad, which then in turn corrupt the chosen victim of the day. It's really nice to see the butterflies caught and helped instead of being destroyed for possessing the people.
- Ladybug in her civilian identity has a really sweet friendship with another girl. Yay, friendship squee! And her friend is awesome; I totally love her.
- It rather amuses me that the main boy, who turns into Black Cat, oddly resembles Schrodinger from Hellsing in his wild blond hairstyle and cat ears headband. I don't really care much for the character now that Hellsing is out in full, but I am still amused.
(Truthfully, I never really liked Schrodinger that much.... I tried to like him because of being told that in some ways he was like an OC of mine, but the parallels were pretty slim overall. Then when more of the series came out and I didn't like how he was turning out, I felt too awkward to say I didn't really like him anymore after all. I think I was worried that my friend wouldn't like my reason, especially since she did like what they were doing with the character. Maybe she wouldn't have liked my reason for not liking him or maybe on the other hand I was worrying unnecessarily, but eh. I can definitely relate to that Steven Universe episode where he feels too shy/worried/awkward to tell Connie that he really likes how a book series turned out when Connie didn't like it and was ranting about it.)
- As much as I love Japanese culture, I kind of find it exciting to get a Western culture magical girl show, since I can understand and relate to that better. This one is set in Paris. The only other Western culture magical girl shows I can think of are Winx Club (which takes place on other planets for the most part, so it doesn't really feel like it counts) and W.I.T.C.H. (which I've never tried). Of course, Princess Tutu takes place in Germany, despite being made in Japan. And if we think about the superhero genre, then there's Wonder Woman and others. Amusing how I've never really thought of them as magical girls before, but technically, Wonder Woman was probably the beginning of the entire genre.
The Big Bad seems rather cartoonish, but since this is a magical girl show, I do sort of wonder if he'll get some depth later on.
I feel a little bad to be so enthusiastic about the series, though, as for months I've been trying to watch an anime that another friend recommended and over the past few months, I've advanced as far in it as I did in this show in less than 24 hours. I'm not quite sure what that says about the anime and/or me. But she did say the plot picks up right around where I am, so maybe I'll get more interested in it too.
I wonder if the problem is partially that while the anime is at a fillery spot, it's short and is supposed to have an intense overarching plot and I'm anxious to get going with unraveling the mysteries of that and not have the filler. But Miraculous Ladybug probably just is self-contained with each episode, so I don't expect anything more than that from it. They don't even have an "origin" episode as the first one, so things so far don't need to be watched in order. As much as I love arcs, I do kind of like being able to jump in anywhere with this show.
(I should note that I still love Sailor Moon filler episodes, though. I wonder if it's that I'm more invested in those characters than I am in this other anime, even though I like them.... With Sailor Moon, I guess I feel like it's similar with Miraculous Ladybug in that I expect filler from it. Plus there's a ton of episodes and somehow that makes filler seem more bearable than if it's a short anime, if that makes any sense.)
Or maybe it's just that Miraculous Ladybug is more the type of show I need right now: something light and cute without a darker plot looming somewhere, and something I can relate to better since it's the present-day. I really love this cute show and I'm so glad Kaze found out about it. I don't know if I would have learned about it otherwise.
I definitely was, and I've been waiting for it to come out. I was hoping it would stream on CrunchyRoll. But things have been so hectic around here (and I was so occupied re-watching Carmen) that I didn't get around to checking on the show's status until yesterday. CrunchyRoll doesn't have it, I don't think, and the U.S. dub doesn't begin for about a week and a half, so I'm not late for that, yay. Yesterday, when I thought to look, I found a few fan-subbed episodes on YouTube. If I'd been more on the ball, I could have watched each episode as it came, sigh. We have 13 now, I believe. There will be 26 for the first season and I hope they'll get renewed for more.
I've watched all the ones I can, which is about six. A seventh has the subs falling off the video, so I decided I'd better just wait for the English dub of that one. I plan to watch all the episodes in English as they come out (provided I can get Nickelodeon's website to cooperate; I assume they'll show each new episode there). I just hope the dub is good.
The show is so cute! There's a definite innocence and sweetness about it. While it uses many magical girl cliches, it also feels fresh and new.
Things I especially like:
- The characters all seem to dress very modestly. It's so nice not to see all the girls running around in midriff shirts like on Winx Club! They act more like kids instead of trying to grow up too soon and wearing revealing clothing.
- Instead of destroying the evil spirits possessing the characters and making them act out, Ladybug catches them and purifies them. They're little butterflies corrupted by the Big Bad, which then in turn corrupt the chosen victim of the day. It's really nice to see the butterflies caught and helped instead of being destroyed for possessing the people.
- Ladybug in her civilian identity has a really sweet friendship with another girl. Yay, friendship squee! And her friend is awesome; I totally love her.
- It rather amuses me that the main boy, who turns into Black Cat, oddly resembles Schrodinger from Hellsing in his wild blond hairstyle and cat ears headband. I don't really care much for the character now that Hellsing is out in full, but I am still amused.
(Truthfully, I never really liked Schrodinger that much.... I tried to like him because of being told that in some ways he was like an OC of mine, but the parallels were pretty slim overall. Then when more of the series came out and I didn't like how he was turning out, I felt too awkward to say I didn't really like him anymore after all. I think I was worried that my friend wouldn't like my reason, especially since she did like what they were doing with the character. Maybe she wouldn't have liked my reason for not liking him or maybe on the other hand I was worrying unnecessarily, but eh. I can definitely relate to that Steven Universe episode where he feels too shy/worried/awkward to tell Connie that he really likes how a book series turned out when Connie didn't like it and was ranting about it.)
- As much as I love Japanese culture, I kind of find it exciting to get a Western culture magical girl show, since I can understand and relate to that better. This one is set in Paris. The only other Western culture magical girl shows I can think of are Winx Club (which takes place on other planets for the most part, so it doesn't really feel like it counts) and W.I.T.C.H. (which I've never tried). Of course, Princess Tutu takes place in Germany, despite being made in Japan. And if we think about the superhero genre, then there's Wonder Woman and others. Amusing how I've never really thought of them as magical girls before, but technically, Wonder Woman was probably the beginning of the entire genre.
The Big Bad seems rather cartoonish, but since this is a magical girl show, I do sort of wonder if he'll get some depth later on.
I feel a little bad to be so enthusiastic about the series, though, as for months I've been trying to watch an anime that another friend recommended and over the past few months, I've advanced as far in it as I did in this show in less than 24 hours. I'm not quite sure what that says about the anime and/or me. But she did say the plot picks up right around where I am, so maybe I'll get more interested in it too.
I wonder if the problem is partially that while the anime is at a fillery spot, it's short and is supposed to have an intense overarching plot and I'm anxious to get going with unraveling the mysteries of that and not have the filler. But Miraculous Ladybug probably just is self-contained with each episode, so I don't expect anything more than that from it. They don't even have an "origin" episode as the first one, so things so far don't need to be watched in order. As much as I love arcs, I do kind of like being able to jump in anywhere with this show.
(I should note that I still love Sailor Moon filler episodes, though. I wonder if it's that I'm more invested in those characters than I am in this other anime, even though I like them.... With Sailor Moon, I guess I feel like it's similar with Miraculous Ladybug in that I expect filler from it. Plus there's a ton of episodes and somehow that makes filler seem more bearable than if it's a short anime, if that makes any sense.)
Or maybe it's just that Miraculous Ladybug is more the type of show I need right now: something light and cute without a darker plot looming somewhere, and something I can relate to better since it's the present-day. I really love this cute show and I'm so glad Kaze found out about it. I don't know if I would have learned about it otherwise.