Ah! My Goddess is a difficult anime to rate honestly. The reason is that it was made primarily for fans of the manga. If you don't know the manga quite well, much of the anime will fly right over your head. On the other hand, if you do know the manga you will probably either like or loathe the anime, making an unbiased review quite tricky.

This anime is quite short, coming in at four half-hour episodes and a final episode running about 45 minutes. The manga, by contrast, ran for years, which is too much story to be contained in five-and-a-half episodes. So over the course of the anime, only about six

characters get a real introduction, a few more get thrown in without any introduction at all, and more than a dozen others get cameo appearances in the opening animation without appearing in the actual show itself. All in all, this anime is obviously little more than a huge marketing tie-in made on the assumption that the viewer already knows everything about most of the characters.

Bearing that in mind, the show really isn't bad at all. As a romantic comedy, Ah! My Goddess may seem trite and cliche by today's standards, but that is because it is the source of many of those cliches. It is a story about people with a

history together that they have all but forgotten, getting back together and trying to build a life with each other.

Of course, if you aren't familiar with the manga, much of the anime will be lost on you. And if you are a fan of the manga, you might end up disappointed by this anime for two reasons. First of all, because it is so short, of course.

Second, because the tone is completely different. While the manga is a romantic comedy by any definition, the anime is more of a "comedic romance," since the show is primarily a romance with comedic elements to it. The mood and the pacing of the anime

are quite mellow, in stark contrast to the much more frantic atmosphere of the manga. Manga fans expecting a recreation of the manga may well be underwhelmed by what they get.

All in all, while Ah! My Goddess not a bad show by any means, the manga-tie-in business is a severe mark against it. The anime is distinct from the manga, but at the same time it really can not stand on its own without the manga. Give it a shot if you want to see some classic anime romance. But unless you know the manga well, be prepared to lose your way through the story more than once.

6/10