Anime Review: Occult Academy

Occult Academy is an enjoyable series about the supernatural, nothing more and nothing less. The solid writing, fantastic animation and interesting main cast makes it a joy to watch at times, the experience often brimming with creativity. Unfortunately, the shallow supporting cast, disjointed narrative and unsatisfying ending stop this anime from reaching its full potential, resulting in a show that while still decent, can be pretty frustrating at times.

The plot of Occult Academy takes place in 1999, following Maya Kumashiro, the daughter of the recently deceased principal of a Japanese academy dedicated to the study of the occult. She becomes the principal of this school shortly after his death in an effort to shut it down due to her father’s obsession with the occult and the creation of the school harming their relationship. However, before Maya can even begin destroying the school, a time traveler from 2012 named Fumiaki Uchida appears before her, revealing that an alien invasion foretold by Nostradamus’s Prophecy will occur in that same year, resulting in the apocalypse. The rest of the show has the duo trying to stop the apocalypse.

The pacing starts off well in the first two episodes, introducing the main cast members and setting up the premise. Unfortunately, episodes 3 to 10 consists of two episode arcs that develop the characters, but forget to move the plot forward, resulting in a middle portion that feels very disconnected from the main story, resulting in a disjointed narrative. That isn’t to say that the arcs are bad though, as while they aren’t as interesting as the main story, they are still very entertaining episodes. This is mostly due to the show’s solid writing, which gives it the ability to be a pretty funny and entertaining show while still being able to give its characters lots of emotional depth. However, the development of the characters will probably be the main reason why these arcs are so interesting. Each arc, minus the final one, does an excellent job of making you care for the main cast, giving them compelling back story and showing the internal conflicts that each have. However, this treatment is only limited to the main characters.

This leads me to another problem with Occult Academy, the shallow supporting cast. While the show does center some of the arcs on the side characters, it doesn’t succeed in giving the majority of them enough depth for the viewer to actually care about them. A great example of this would have to be JK and Smile, two employees at the academy, who are pretty entertaining to watch at times, but don’t have enough back story or involvement in the story for the viewer to actually feel for those characters. This problem is further amplified by the fact that some of these characters can be pretty annoying at times. Another example being Mikaze and Kozue, two characters that are annoying despite having some importance to the story, meaning that watching some of the episodes can be a daunting chore.

However, while Occult Academy may be a mess story-wise, it is by no means a disappointment animation-wise. This is probably the only show of the Summer season that manages to look consistently good with its polished character models and detailed backgrounds. Fight scenes are also intense, with characters utilizing crossbows and melee weapons in the majority of the episodes, magic spells being used in the final episodes, allowing for some really colorful battles. However, the parts where the animation shines the most has to be the second arc (episodes 5 and 6), which has a dream sequence that is visually spectacular, utilizing many colors and being very creative.

Overall, Occult Academy is an experience that has the components to be an excellent show, but the shallow side characters, poorly executed narrative and the mediocre ending stop it from being the satisfying experience it could be. Despite its flaws however, I still recommend this to fans of the supernatural or science fiction genre, as it’s still well written with a lively and developed main cast. Just don’t expect it to be a particularly memorable experience, as the messy storytelling does a lot to drag it down.

Occult Academy is available on Crunchyroll

ENJOYMENT
While it has an enjoyable story, the narrative feels disjointed

RECOMMENDATION VALUE
For fans of the supernatural and science fiction genre

REWATCH VALUE
A few fight scenes and episodes are re-watchable