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Patience Pays Off
During the Hundred Years’ War between France and England, the French witch Maria uses her powerful magic to forcibly stop any battles around her. She hates any kind of fighting and summons mythical beasts and elemental powers to make both sides retreat, time after time. One day, Heaven decides that it has had enough of her meddling in human affairs and sends the Archangel Michael to handle her. She suddenly finds herself cursed — if she loses her virginity she will lose her magic. At first, this simple premise of Maria the Virgin Witch is treated with juvenile sexual humor and a meandering start that seems to go nowhere. However, once the story picks up around halfway through, it becomes enriched with interesting moral decisions and philosophical themes. If you can get past the off-putting early episodes, Maria the Virgin Witch eventually becomes an enjoyable anime when it takes its plot and characters seriously.
Episodes 1-3 Review
Maria the Virgin Witch opens up by establishing Maria’s idealistic yet naive nature. She wants to help people in any way she can, but seems to turn a blind eye to the reality of the world around her. This is emphasized by the contrasting personality of her succubus, Artemis, who is brazenly sexual, dressed in leather straps and literally servicing soldiers on the battlefield (which to be fair is her job). She constantly teases Maria with her lewd actions and sexual innuendos, like saying how tired her jaws and hips are. Also, when Maria creates her incubus Priapus, the majority of dialogue centers around how Maria has no experience with male private parts. While establishing Maria’s innocence seems to be the purpose, the frequent sexual jabs can become overbearing during some scenes.
Another detractor is the slow and scattered start to the story, with no overall narrative arc presented. The anime doesn’t establish the witches’ society or their roles in the war, and the motivations of characters are unclear, making them difficult to relate to. Maria repeatedly says she intervenes in battles because she simply doesn’t like them. The local village boy, Joseph, declares his love for Maria without any establishment of why he feels affection for her.
The historical accuracy is impressively spot on.
There are exciting moments during these early episodes though. The medieval battles are some of the most realistically portrayed in any medium. The brutal skirmishes have a lot of punch when no one can perform superhuman martial arts and acrobatics. A lot of the war tactics used are also pulled from research of the era, so the historical accuracy is impressively spot on.
As for the fantasy elements, Maria the Virgin Witch showcases some quality visual effects and animation when the Archangel Michael confronts Maria for her meddling. Explosions of magic and meteor-like impacts feel even more powerful when compared to the melees between the French and English. In the end, Michael overwhelms Maria with his superior heavenly strength, and threatens to punish her severely if she continues her ways. He also curses her — she will lose her magic if she loses her virginity, setting up the rest of the show.
Episodes 4-6 Review
Unfortunately, the anime’s issues from the previous episodes persist. The continued overuse of Maria’s virginity for humor is distracting. The pacing is still slow and the narrative is still lacking an overarching goal for Maria to achieve. And even with Michael’s blunt warning, Maria still continues to do exactly what she did before. There is no conflict for her to overcome, so her character journey doesn’t progress anywhere.
But overall, Maria the Virgin Witch has grown up a little. The sexual references are toned down a notch, becoming less of the focus of entire scenes. There’s also a hint of a grand scheme by the monk Bernard to use Maria to elevate the church’s influence. This plotline isn’t developed very far, but it at least sows the seeds for something to anticipate.
The main highlight of this section of the anime is the mercenary Galfa, whose ambitions lead him to rise through the ranks of the French army. Watching him struggle to be more than just a lowly sword-for-hire is exciting as he engages in duels and makes shifty alliances.
Episodes 7-9 Review
Maria the Virgin Witch improves a great deal starting from these episodes. It explores human nature and war more deeply, treating its characters and plot with maturity. The anime finally shows what happens when Maria makes a mistake and unintentionally prolongs a battle that would have ended without her interference. Even when given the chance to stop fighting and return home safely, each side can’t resist the urge to defeat the other. It’s a bloody scene full of death and loss, and Maria questions her ideals about pacifism and her role in the world.
Galfa’s character journey also takes a dramatic turn. Succumbing to dark thoughts, he lets his ambition and anger control him. He starts to do cruel and unforgivable acts for his own selfish reasons, turning against former friends. Eventually he makes an alliance with another enemy to get rid of Maria. Finally the anime creates a major threat for the protagonists to overcome, and there’s tension and anticipation for the plot to unfold.
Maria is finally forced to progress as a character as well, no longer free to continue to do as she pleases. She faces consequences for her actions from both the church of Heaven and the church of Man, making her doubt her purpose. As she wrestles with her thoughts, she’s forced into a situation where she becomes weak and no longer able to use her magic. Seeing her powerless against the humans that wish her harm is intense and nerve-wracking — for the first time she can’t rely on her powers to help her.
Episodes 10-12 Review
With Maria indisposed, the other characters are given a chance to step into the forefront of the plot. They each start to show more depth to their personalities, which helps to round out the cast instead of keeping them as simple caricatures. Artemis actively engages in strategizing with the team instead of constantly throwing sexual innuendoes around. Priapus becomes a loyal sidekick and messenger. Everyone plays an active part in driving the anime towards its final climax.
The pacing in the final episodes never lets up until the dust settles.
When that climax hits, it’s a wondrous spectacle with multiple set pieces and varied action. Exciting battles of magic, metal, and minds collide — sometimes all at once — as fighting breaks out on every front. The witches against heaven, the church against heretics, and even simply man against man — every conflict brings into question differing beliefs that are never clearly painted in black and white. Maria the Virgin Witch has a great pace in the final episodes that never lets up until the dust settles.
Unfortunately, the ending is disappointingly weak. Previous episodes highlighted the ambiguous nature of war, and how Maria’s overly idealistic pacifism can sometimes do more harm than good. The ending scenes dilute this message with a cliche shounen-style showdown and one-sided rally for Maria’s beliefs. There’s a lack of weight to the decisions and ideologies that were well-presented just a few episodes ago. But Maria does seem to realize, just a little, that she needs to accept the reality around her before she can make the changes she wants.
Maria the Virgin Witch is overall an enjoyable anime with a lot going for it. It has a detailed historical setting, mature themes, and some memorable characters. It just takes awhile for the anime to finally open up and show the audience everything that it has to offer. Some viewers may be turned off by the beginning’s incoherent plotlines and annoyingly frequent sexual references. But just like Maria, the anime does eventually grows up to treat its world with more respect and understanding.
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