Freaky Monday
(This review contains
spoilers!)
Have I mentioned that I love spending
my Monday mornings watching this show enough? Because Little Witch is magical enough that it can turn even the lousiest
early hours into fun ones.
This week was no exception, as we saw
the introduction to the next arc, the Samhain Festival, as well as the
continuation of what we first saw last week. We’re quickly approaching the
halfway mark for the series, and the Festival seems like the prime opportunity
to really shake things up the same was Studio Trigger’s own Kill la Kill used the School Tournament
arc midway through the series to change the status quo and introduce Nui.
While we didn’t see the Festival
itself this week, we got the lead-up to it, as well as a bit more character
development for both Akko and Diana. The students have all split into teams of
three (convenient, considering the characters all come in trios) to perform
different tasks in preparation. Diana’s in charge of the whole operation,
Amanda and her gang are on cleaning duty, and Akko and friends have been given
the great honour of being sacrifices to the Samhain Ghost. Since he’s a ghost
they won’t die, but they’ll still get slimed with ectoplasm.
Of course, Akko is none too happy
about getting the short end of the stick, wanting to be the star of the
Festival like Chariot was back in her day. She follows Diana, accidentally
wandering in a room with an enchanted prankster mirror in it. Sensing her
jealousy, the mirror turns her into Diana, leaving her pretending to be her
while trying to turn back to normal.
One of the best parts of the episode
is Diana’s voice actress mimicking Akko’s mannerisms. I’m glad they didn’t go
for the cheap “body swap but the voices stay the same” trick you see so often
in animation (in my opinion that trick is only justifiable if you’re having
several people be body swapped and you need to reduce confusion on who’s who),
instead making it more fun to hear Diana attempt to sound like Akko. She did a
fantastic job, at times even making it sound more like Akko doing a Diana
impression than the reverse.
It was also great to see what a day in
Diana’s life is like from Akko’s perspective. I’ve been kind of disappointed
that we haven’t seen much from Diana in the series thus far, with them playing
up that she’s Akko’s polar opposite more than giving her her own character. It’s
almost guaranteed we’ll be seeing her more later on, but I do wish we’d have
had more time with her before now.
Anyways, it’s fun seeing Akko deal
with the benefits and disadvantages of being trapped in the form of the school’s
top ranking student. She finally gives Diana’s cronies a taste of their own
medicine unwittingly, but is also in high demand with the rest of the school
preparing for the festival. The transformation doesn’t last long, but it works
well to further both the skill and personality gap between Akko and Diana.
The ending is, as expected from this
show, the absolute best part of the episode. Ursula visits Akko while she’s
reminiscing on how she isn’t as skilled as Diana, pointing her to visit the
Polaris fountain again and telling her to stop trying to be Diana or Chariot
and start being Akko. We end on a cliffhanger in the fountain, with Akko
declaring she knows what to do.
With next week being the halfway
point, I’m expecting big things from the Samhain Festival (maybe a twist on the
Enchanted Parade movie?). This
episode was an excellent lead-up to next week, with lots of great character
moments and even some setup for what’s coming next.
FINAL SCORE
9/10
Amazing
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