Ojamajo Doremi
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Ojamajo Doremi (おジャ魔女どれみ, lit. "Bothersome Witch Doremi") is a Japanese magical girl anime television series created by Toei Animation. It focuses on a group of elementary school girls, led by Doremi Harukaze, who become witch apprentices. The series aired in Japan on TV Asahi between February 1999 and January 2003, spanning four seasons and 201 episodes, and was followed by an original video animation series released between June and December 2004.
Why It Rocks
- The concept of a Magical Girl and Slice Of Life in a magic shop is very well done and is interesting.
- It shows realism and mature themes even though there are little to no action scenes despite being a Magical Girl series. One exemple would be a loss of a loved one.
- Unique and beautiful art style that fits well with the characters and usual mood, and it's had aged well and still look good by today standards, much like Kirby: Right Back at Ya! and the early 2005 Doraemon episodes.
- The voice acting is very well done, especially in the original Japanese, French and Italian dubs, with the voices fitting the characters.
- Likable characters and great development as they help others, learn what's right and wrong and knowing that the world will be difficult for them always, including:
- Doremi Harukaze
- Hazuki Fujiwara
- Aiko Senoo
- Onpu Segawa
- Momoko Asuka
- Pop Harukaze
- Hana Makihatayama
- The 1st season ending shows that the protagonists will learn that things will get in their way and there's no way to avoid that and they must always find hope and try their best.
- It's a very well done deconstruction of both the Magical Girl and Slice Of Life genres.
- It teaches children that the world will be difficult for them and they must accept that there will be obstacles and fixing their mistakes in the past.
- Instead of using magic energy as a flow in the body, the items have ammunition like spheres to limit the amount of usages which is very interesting and a unexpected great idea.
- A lot of very humorous and funny moments, mostly involving Doremi.
- The animations is very good for it's time, with the later seasons having almost no animation errors to the point that it's can almost be compared to the 2003 series of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles animation (only in term of not so much animation errors), and it's was made better by the fact that the art style is great for it's time.
- Good soundtrack with many catchy musics or even some bangers, for exemple the song Ojamajo Carnival!! is one of the best songs of the show, with it being catchy to listen.
- Despite mostly being aimed at girls, the show can still be enjoyable to the male publics, this is mostly because the show isn't too girly like other shows aimed at girls.
- It's also mostly aimed at little kids but it's can still appeal to some teens and especially the adults.
- The characters design are both amazing and cute at the same time, with the main characters being the best examples.
- The pacing of the episodes are decent, it's not too slow nor too fast, and most of the episodes are fun to watch due to that, although some of them can go way too quick, but that's not really a bad quality.
- All of the openings are very good, especially the one of the season 3, although it contains one innapropriate moment at the 54 seconds of it.
- The opening are also made even better than it's already is with the surprisingly good and catchy music that are in these opening and even in the episode.
Unlucky Qualities
- The 4Kids Entertainment English dub, Magical DoReMi, was terrible, due to having a lot of censored scenes and being overall unfaitful to the original Japanese version, it was also made way too late, being released in 2005, 6 years after the original Japanese version and most of the other dubs that aired before, it's also had a poor soundtrack in comparison to the original Japanese version of the show.
- Fortunately, not all the dubs with this name are bad and some are more faithful to the original Japanese version, such as the French dub for example, although in that one some of the names were changed, but it still works compared to the 4Kids dub.
- Some of the tie-in video games are mediocre, such as Ojamajo Doremi Dokkan: Nijiiro Paradise.
- Speaking of the tie-in games, there wasn't that much of them and most of them were only released on the PS1, with the only exception being the Sega Pico games and Ojamajo Adventure on PC.
- It's can be a bit mean-spirited to sometime, especially with Doremi in the earlier episodes or when she can't have steaks, also some of her class mates treat her badly due to them making fun of her, especially in the first episode.
- This can also be said for the Harukaze family with the parents that fight a lot.
- Despite this show being made for kids, there has some inappropriate moment for kids. Like example in the Motto! Ojamajo Doremi opening in 54 seconds, you can see the moment where Doremi and Friends are doing twerking dance.
- Some of the characters can be unlikable at times, such as Majo Ume in the earlier episodes, as she treat Doremi badly when she do something wrong with magic, she would also treat Hazuki and Aiko badly when they first trying to do magic or transformations.
- The transformation scenes, while good, can be repetitive since it's the same thing, although it isn't really a bad point due to the show not being repetitive with it's formula but still...
- Despite the animation being still good and cute, the lightning can be poor at many occasions, despite that, it's art style is still beautiful and great for it's time that still look good by today standards, like many other animes back then.
- Despite that, the OVAs had even better animation and of course better lightning.
Reception
The series received mixed reviews on IMDb, with a score of 6.8 but received positive reviews by audiences and had a small cult following over the years in the United States since the english dub by 4Kids wasn't that successful and wasn't well received.
In France though, it was very popular and is still beloved to this day.
Episodes with their own pages
- "I'm Doremi! Becoming a Witch Apprentice"
- "Majo Rika Goes to Kindergarten"
- "Hazuki Chan is Kidnapped!"
- "Raising a Baby is a lot of Trouble!"
Trivia
- The Latin Spanish dub got cancelled while the original Japanese version was celebrating 20 years of Toei Animation.
- The Ojamajo Doremi movie was originally supposed to release May 15, 2020, but was delayed due to production issues and the COVID-19 pandemic and would be released on November 13, 2020.
- The series' name comes from the combination of two words. "Ojama" usually translates to "clumsy", "hindrance", or "troublesome"; and "Majo" means witch. Doremi is the name of the main protagonist. So all together, it means "Troublesome Witch Doremi" to reference the many situations Doremi gets into.
- The series' title has been mistakenly romanized as Ojyamajyo Doremi on several occasions.
- The series has also spawned a live action series called Ojamajo Kids. It also had a radio show during the airing of the series.
- Ojamajo is a palindrome, meaning "words spelled the same both forward and backwards".
- Many assume the first season is called "Ojamajo Doremi Carnival" due to that being the name of the theme song. The first season is the only series in the anime to not have a full official name other than "Ojamajo Doremi".
- Normally, season finales tend to be about farewell and thus very emotional. The only exception was Motto! Ojamajo Doremi which ended in a somewhat more light-hearted tone.
- Doremi Harukaze name is similar to that of Dorami from Doraemon, although that was probably unintentional.
Videos
Soundtrack
Ojamajo Doremi Full OST playlist
Clips
Reviews
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