Thursday 20 May 2004

Pic of the day: Yuuri and his unexpected fiancee, prince Wolfram, in a less than glorious moment. Things get weirder than this, though, in the magic fantasy/comedy anime ...

Kyou Kara Maou

This anime is also spelled "Kyoukara Mao". A tentative English name is "Demon King". It is a somewhat subtle parody on a stereotype fantasy story, and pretty good in its own right. At least if you can tolerate some implied indecency. (Stress on implied ... even in the bath you won't see any secret parts.)

Slight spoilers for the first episodes can be found in this review.

***

The first hint of parody can be found in the way Yuuri (our ordinary teenage boy) crosses over to the magical fantasy world. There are several such plot devices in use already: In Stephen Donaldson's Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the main character falls and hits his head, and his entire stay in The Land takes place while he lies unconscious. Other popular entrances are deep caves. The hero of the game series Ultima goes through a shimmering portal in the air, certainly an ideal way to recruit heroes with more courage than brains. But never before have I seen someone be flushed down the girls' toilet to another world. I guess there's some deep symbolism in that ... But actually it makes a bit more sense when we learn that his inherent magic is connected to water. Even so, it's pretty far out.

Other crazy things continue to happen as our hero is unfamiliar with the local customs and accidentally proposes marriage to a pretty young prince. The local nobles don't really mind. Gay relationships are not all that uncommon. After all, the ruling class are demons, and he is the long lost heir to the throne .... King of Demons!

These are all pretty demons, no horns or tails. I have to say I agree more with this than medieval Christian paintings, incidentally. In the book of Genesis it is written that the fallen angels took human wives, whoever they pleased. This meshes well with them being beautiful. I am sure some women would marry a monster with horns and tail, but I think most would run screaming! (Of course, the real problem with marrying monsters is exactly that they don't look the part.)

In the anime, fantasy cliches are made fun of, but not in a harsh and scornful way. You can tell this is made by people who love role playing games. But there are details, especially as concerns gender roles. In fantasy worlds, beautiful women are supposed to be scantily clad. In the anime, it is the young boy who has to wear a black thong, causing his adviser to nosebleed and run off to cool his head... ^_^*

I've already mentioned the legally binding betrothal to a pretty (but arrogant) young prince. The prince takes this very seriously and follows him everywhere, much to the embarrassment of our hero who is straight, barely legal and very much still a virgin. The prince's mother also shows an interest in the new king that seems to go beyond the professional, such as trying to share his bath.

***

Despite the indecent humor at times, this fantasy story is generally good: Sometimes dramatic, sometimes funny, sometimes heartwarming. The main character is believable and remains himself despite all that happens to him.

All in all, a magic fantasy story that doesn't take itself too seriously, even though it has some deep spots in between the humor. Recommended for slightly immature adults.

And there's this awesome intro song. More about that in an upcoming entry, I hope.