Fate/Kaleid Liner Prisma Illya should really be my thing. I like to imagine that it got made because someone in the office accidentally sent in their Fate/Card Captor Sakura fusion AU instead of their work, and management went "!!!!!" It should be my thing! I like magical girls capturing cards! I like the Fate mash-up of mythologies and Pokémon battles! I like yelling at my ships and the steady inexorable knowledge that this is basically a slasher movie in terms of survival odds!
I should be the target audience for this show!... Except that someone went "Fuck, how can we get straight dudes to watch this show?" and the answer was "I dunno, ramp up the male gaze and put in a ludicrous amount of fanservice, that should get 'em."
Motherfuckers.(I actually asked Lex "Was it really that bad? I know it was bad enough that I stopped watching like three episodes in, but was it that bad?" And
even Lex was like "
Oh yeah." And my tolerance for fanservice was a lot higher back when Lex was watching
Kaleid Liner. Apparently it got better after I stopped watching, but it also got
a hell of a lot worse.)
ANYWAY, yes, it has Illya as an adorable happy magical girl trying to catch the cards of heroic spirits that Rin and her rival let loose;
Illya's rival/best friend is a magical girl called Miyu who is VERY SERIOUS. Like, full-on "There is an entire episode revolving around how she can't use magic to fly because she understands too much physics to suspend her disbelief." That part is REALLY CUTE. And they made a movie that's entirely just Miyu's backstory and pretty much no fanservice!
EXCELLENT.Disclaimer: there are spoilers for both the show, the main Fate universe (Mainly Zero, Stay/Night and Unlimited Bladeworks), and the movie here! I'm not sure how much of
Kaleid Liner Prisma Illya you need to have seen for the movie to make sense – I've only seen three episodes, but also Lex has seen all of it so whenever I was like "Wait, no, what was that about?" Lex was there to explain what the hell. So... Fair warning, I guess! The important thing to know is that this branch of the Fate multiverse revolves around the heroic spirits being embodied through cards.
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