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Episodes: 13
Genres: Love-Romance, Mahou Shoujo
Studio: Artland
OP: “Happiness!” by Ayumi Murata
ED: “Magical Generation” by Yui Sakakibara
Official Site: http://www.happiness-anime.com/

Impressions:

There’s magic? That was the first thought I had when I watched the first episode of ‘Happiness!’, as I didn’t really pay that much attention to exactly what each new fall show is about. At first, I was like, ‘Aww, wtf? They’ve just totally ruined it now…’ And oh boy was I wrong. I began thinking that when the magic I saw was just plain lame (no special sound effects or anything), but then I realised the focus of the story is not magic but the romance between Kamisaki Haruhi and Kohinata Yuuma. There we go – now it all makes sense! Another thing to note is that Jun is a BOY dressed up as a girl with a girly voice. Now I think it’s a really good first episode as the pace was pretty quick – character introductions, some magic display, magic academy burning down then the magic students transferring to the non-magic school…right? Sorry, I watched the raw so I’m not sure of the exact events. Anyway, if I have to watch the raw I will as this is too good to wait.

Character design – didn’t like that much it at first but I grew used it soon enough. The OP and ED – totally awesome (nooo! Don’t say they’re childish or whatever!) They are both are very energetic and fast and perfectly fit the title of ‘Happiness!’, though for some reason I don’t think it fits the animation sequences very well. Never mind that, I usually skip both the OP and ED when watching anyway. Now to wait for the full version to be released…if it does get released. Hmm…this is bad – it seems like I’m taking a little too many shows to blog than I can handle, but I have to do this show; it’s really good. If I had to drop a series it would be Super Robot Wars…don’t know why I did the first episode in the first place. After that would have to be Negima!? unless the next few episodes can change my mind.

Now let’s see: story’s good; character design is good; character personalities above average; music’s good, though there wasn’t any accompanying music; animation quality below average. Aww, the last part – the animation – was a bit of a disappointment. I’m not sure if it was the recording or the actual episode, but a lot of scenes felt very jagged – seemed like the producers used something like 8 frames per second for most of the episode instead of the standard 16 to 24. Apart from that though, I thoroughly enjoyed the show…now wait, how can I say that when I could only understand maybe a third of everything that was said? Ah well, the dialogue isn’t that important and I’d be able to catch on to important parts like confessions and stuff pretty easily. Plus, hopefully there’ll be a blog or two that will go by the raws and provide summaries so I can affirm everything I interpret.

Opening Sequence:
OP: [Happiness!] by Ayumi Murata
Download *right click – save target as* (TV size mp3 – 2.06mb)

Screencaps:

Ending Sequence:
OP: [Magical Generation] by Yui Sakakibara
Download *right click – save target as* (TV size mp3 – 2.06mb)

Story:

Er…please look elsewhere for a summary. My Jap’s very bad so I don’t want to accidentally misinform people. Try this link.

Preview:

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