Mahou Shoujo Magical Destroyers is an interesting one. It’s an experimental anime that attempts to make an appeal to its broader otaku-orientated audiences while also composing a social commentary about the otakus and its culture. Siding mostly with sympathy for otakus and the cruelty of being ostracized for liking anime and its subcultures, Magical Destryers desperately wanted to convey a guilt-driven fantasy for the unfairness of being misrepresented and illy treated by a larger, ambitiously as well as ambiguously presented “societal”’ forces that want to eradicate them from the face of Japan.

Set in a fictional timeline of the year 2008, the Japanese Government, for unknown reasons, decided to crack down on its otakus and the culture within the country. Fast forward to the year 2011, the suppression has brought the masses to the brink of extinction, pushing the last group of remaining otaku rebel forces to a secluded area within Akihabara. This particular group of rebels, led by a famed figure known as the “Otaku Hero” along with his magical girls have long lost their strongholds elsewhere in Japan. With only one of the three magical girls remaining and the other two gone either missing or captured, the rebels’ ultimate goal was to rescue and recruit the magical girls once again to even have a slim chance of fighting back against the forces of suppression.

With an already intriguing setup such as this, Magical Destroyers still found itself lost in its own directional ideas and tonal inconsistencies that were scattered throughout. Going beyond its debut episodes, Magical Destoyers’ unwillingness of sticking to its core premise for more than a couple of episodes at a time was the ultimate detrimental fallout in its place.

From the get-go, the initial impression of its premise can be served for the entirety of the runtime as the plot point involve finding, rescuing, and recruiting the two crucially absent magical girls could take time and effort, as well as the difficulties due to their limited remaining forces, and the endeavors that come with a governmental crackdown that is three year into its operation. In theory, with the exploration of its concepts such as why the Japanese Government has decided to take on its own deeply ingrained culture, and, by extension, the economically successful industries that derive from it, could be utilized between its supposed key plot points and conceive a show more than just a surface-level presentation.

The basic premise of Magical Destroyers derives solely from the notion of ostracization of Otakus and Otaku Culture and how media such as Magical Destroyers anime utilizes it for commentary purposes as a form of entertainment. Shows like this are intended to make a larger social commentary about the state of its broad social sphere. In Japan, like anywhere else in the world that has been exposed to anime and its otaku culture, there’s no secret that there’s still a feeling of disdain and belittling among the larger societal forces towards anime and its sub-cultures—especially within the populations that aren’t too familiar with the subcultures and its appeal. Conveniently, Magical Destroyers takes those elements of feeling looked down upon and took to the extreme with its presentation of ostracization by the literal display of outright prohibition of typical otaku activities and hobbies: anime figurines are seized from existence, cosplays are forbidden, otaku people in cages, the extreme tight surveillance within Akihabara, the ongoing war between factions and the government, and the constant destruction of cities and civilizations that are centered around otaku culture. Its extreme presentation within the anime is meant to invoke a feeling of despair and despondency that otakus ought to be felt as if it’s a real possibility.

The fundamental message that Magical Destroyers wanted to convey throughout its entire run but struggled to do so is that it’s okay to be an otaku and one should be proud of the hobbies that they enjoy performing and indulge in. The friends and foes of the rebels and their hero encounter serve this single narrative message. This is also deliberately spelled out through Anarchy’s actions and her occasional emotional pleas and outcries. For instance, in the early stages of the anime, when there was a seemingly clear narrative objective, the psychological-dream battle between Pink and Anarchy that resulted in Pink being the eventual third and final magical girl to be recruited aided in this primary idea of the anime. The gist of the fight was for Pink to embrace her existence and what she represents in the larger context of otaku culture despite the vulgar tendencies that come with it. That, in the eyes of disgust, one’s own actions can bring about the appreciation of their hobbies to light in a positive manner. That, the perception of others on things that are known to be confined within the otaku culture can be shaped by the very people who are knowledgeable and wields them with good intentions. That, it’s all about the person who’s behind it all dictates the perceptions of otakus and its culture. This fundamental idea is significant as it shows that there was something to be taken from this anime.

However, the issue lies in the tonal inconsistencies that significantly diminish the urgency that the anime wants to make the viewers feel and empathize. In one episode, the anime could focus much on the core elements of the show by presenting the harsh and bleak environment that Otaku Hero and his rebel forces are suffering through but then in the next episode, out of nowhere, a random faction from another desolated town could be having a sewage-pool party with the Otaku Hero Group and his magical girls join in—everybody joins in and have a good time. Even in an episodic structured anime, while the narrative may not have progressed, the tone in which that was instilled in the first episode should always be kept consistent. Otherwise, in a combination of a lack of meaningful progress and tonal inconsistencies, the content in which it’s presented feels pointless. Oftentimes, when a series presents absolutely meaningless content on screen, one has to make contrivances to tie in whatever bizarre crap was on display to an aspect of the show superficially. And this superficiality is often used to disguise the sheer mess that a series is in.

The anime’s journey it took to present and deliver this core idea was futile in the end because of its indecisiveness in its direction that which become quite evident later on. Instead of maybe focusing on crafting a few more purposeful events that serve in the grander narrative message, the show resorts to confusing and pointless, and dumb entertainment to fill in the time before tying it all together with an ill-planned plot twist to instate its presence.

When crafting a fiction such as Magical Destroyers that attempts to make a larger societal commentary, one should approach the topics on hand with a heart, clear and purposeful direction. Along with it, one might also incorporate some philosophical concepts and interpretations to facilitate the grander scheme of such work. The ideas that Magical Destroyers had is arguably a common guilt-driven sentimental projection that some might have held; it’s a view that shouldn’t be laughed off of let alone making a wishy-washy show with no further explorations of its concepts.

What you’re watching isn’t a coherent narrative that’s brimmed with ideas that it wants to explore and present. Instead, on a basic level, you’re witnessing a very common feeling that’s born from the sentiment that a certain subculture has been unfairly ostracized by the public and that it’s in dire need of resistance and protection—like that of Magical Destroyers urges represent. But the very child-like inner fantasies that it likes to project is the lethal tumor of itself. Just like any gibberish, incoherent, and rudimentary fantasies that a child would make up in their heads before going to sleep, one forgets them the very next day. Magical Destroyers is that anime.

I want to underline that despite my sheer disappointment with Magical Destroyers’ delivery of its initial captivating ideas, I still had a fun time with the anime. Magical Destroyers is that anime that brings about absurdities and nonsensical ideas onto the screen while making it entertaining to watch. What the anime presents is never the cause of boredom, rather, it’s the failure in sticking to its initial core ideas that the series had.