Toaru Majutsu no Indekkusu

Toaru Majutsu no Indekkusu

(A Certain Magical Index)

Seasons one and two of the popular action anime taken from the light novel series.

OVERVIEW -Set in a alternate world where "Supernatural powers" used by people known as "Espers" exist alongside magical abilities, with the two sides in an effective state of balance, The story follows a young man from the "Science side", rated as a "Level 0" Esper, as in, having no real esper powers. By sheer chance he becomes involved with a small, silver-haired girl in a nun outfit, and from there becomes more and more involved in the power struggles between the two sides. 

REVIEW - Touma Kamijo is the central protagonist of the series, described as "a misfortunate man" he himself notes, and often curses, his phenomenal bad luck. Rated as a "level 0" esper, he does have one ability no-one else does. His right hand can cancel any kind of supernatural ability, something which has probably helped keep him in one piece so far. At the start of the series we're introduced to two other characters who are also fairly central, the first being Index, a young girl with silver hair and a nun outfit, whom Touma finds flopped out across his balcony, and to Mikoto Misaka, one of only 7 "level 5" (level 5 is the highest the rankings go) Espers and ranked 3rd most powerful out of those 7. with whom Touma has an "altercation" with right at the start. 

The first arc of the story introduces those three main characters, and the people around them. It also introduces the main concepts of the series. Academy City where Touma lives is the center of the science "side", filled with schools, universities and research labs, along with espers of all power levels and the research done into their abilities. Index struggles to prove the existance of "Magic" to Touma, resulting in a fairly embarressing but funny turn of events. Index herself is effectively a tool of the "Church", her having memorised 103,000 banned magical tomes, or "Grimiores" but is unable to use magic herself, yet can recall any information on them, or anything else due to her perfect memorisation and recall. Mikoto's ability is the manipulation of electromagnetic waves, her signiature move of flicking a coin at supersonice speeds using this ability giving rise to her nickname of "Railgun", though Touma calls her "Biribiri" (japanese onamatapoeia for the sound of someone being electricuted) to her great annoyance. 

The third character considered a "Main Character" is introduced in the third arc, called "Accelerator" his power is to alter the "Vector" of anything he comes into contact with, changing its speed, direction or any of its variables in effect. Ranked the most powerful Level 5 in the city his entrance involves an experiment to raise him to the previously unknown "Level 6" by fighting with and killing 2,000 clones of Mikoto, known as the MISAKA sisters. Initially presented as a real nasty piece of work, taking pleasure from killing, his defeat by Touma ends the experiment, freeing the sisters and Accelerator from the experiment. As the story progresses through to the end of the second season, Accelerator's past is revealed a little, and a softer, though still harsh and sometimes cruel, side to his personality is revealed. 

The story arcs themselves tend to do two things, the first one is reveal some big plot, event or incident centered around the struggles for power by one of the sides, which by chance or design Touma and Index get dragged into, the second being the fact that Touma's "help anyone/everyone" attitude and reactions tend to land him with another female admirer, much to the annoyance of all the others. In Touma's defence, he's always completely unaware of this, and it can be seen as an extension of his "bad luck" that all he wants to do is protect people, yet ends up attracting powerful, quick-tempered "Tsundere" women constantly. Its also a fairly regular thing for Touma to end up in hospital, with almost every arc ending with someone at his hospital bed explaining how everything wrapped up, then Index getting angry at him for being hurt again. 

While each arc can be taken as a complete story in itself, behind the events there is a deeper connection. The struggles between the various "Churches" of the world controlling the magic side of things, and the atagonism of the Roman Catholic Church against the science side, and to a lesser degree all other churches. The head of Academy City is seen to be plotting something, and seems very aware of the truth behind Touma's right hand, called "Imagine Breaker" after the first arc, as it is something that almost every opponant he faces fears for its unyielding ability to cancel everything they can do. Index even notes that Touma's misfortune may stem from the fact that simply by being in contact with the air, his right hand cancels out "god's blessings" such as luck. The light novel series has delved deeper into this, but in the two seasons presented in the anime the potential and truth behind Touma's ability is left pretty much as a mystery. 

Often light-hearted and funny, with plenty of silly moments, severe over-reactions to Touma's blunders (Index is a master of the bite/head-chew attack) it tackles the serious moments very well too. Huge fight scenes, strange science and occult all mixed in together in a way thats explained in-series very well, with the only real mystery of the various powers on display being Touma's Imagine Breaker. The behind-the-scenes politics manipulating the events play a subtle but definate role in the entire series. very much a series to watch, and would benefit greatly from a third season at the very least.

Of note is the side-series "A Certain Scientific Railgun" which goes into the life of Mikoto Misaka and her friends, and is set across the same time-frame as the two index series.

SUMMARY - 

Story -  Very well realised and developed characters, coupled with a good story telling method of building a larger story across several shorter tales. While some of the actions of the characters can be a little stereotypical in places, such as Touma's tendancy to "talk heroic" in the middle of a fight or Mikoto's "Tsundere" approach to everything relating to Touma, it doesnt feel like the characters are being forced into the stereotype, rather just good examples of why such stereotypes exist. The overal arc feels cut short in just two seasons, as it feels like its building into something much, much bigger, a problem of following the light novels so closely possibly. Really needs a third season to wrap up the larger story at the very least. 8/10

Production - Done well, obviously a mid-to-high budget production, it has only a few small flaws. Season one's CG is a lot more obvious than season two's, however its easy to spot all vehicles are produced in this manner, as well as many other "moving parts" in the city. Voice acting is good for the main characters but less so with minor or bit-part characters, the further out from the main people you get, the less unique or stand-out the voice acting becomes, leading to some overlap in places (Touma's mother and Orsola for example). With little "distortion/blur" in the combat and action scenes, and almost no repeated animation-on-a-new-background issues, my only major "irk" at the series is the noise used to show Imagine Breaker working.. seriously annoying after a while! 8/10

Music - Opting for a dance-y upbeat feel to most music, the score and soundtrack are very energetic. With the series having a light-hearted but serious feel to it, its hard to say if the openers and ending themes are well suited, as they both are and are not. Nothing really jumps out for me personally but I can see the appeal to some for the themes. 7/10

Accessability - SO..VERY..JAPANESE... is about the only way I can describe it. While comments regarding the difference in culture between the church Index belongs to (The Church of England) and Academy City in Japan are made, it still seems that the story is exclusively set in the Japanese culture. Tons of japanese cultural referances through out the two seasons, many made by characters who are not Japanese. While its possible to follow most of the series while overlooking this, a lot of the humour, actions and even an arc are tricky to make sense of without foreknowledge. 1/10

Overall Impression - One thing I love about this series is the whole merging of science and magic, with magic mentioned as being developed by normal people jealous of those with supernatural powers, and with the reasoning behind esper abilities using quantum uncertainty in a very unique way. its funny moments are really very funny, and you cant help but feel sorry for Touma and his "misfortune" in most places, especially when he realises it himself. ("it wasnt until i'd already opened the door that I realised I could have prevented any problems simply by knocking and asking...") The mystery of Touma's right hand and the way the various powers in the world are reacting to it really needs to be revealed, and I constantly await news of a third season being released. 9/10

Final Score - 33/50