DVD Review: Good Luck Girl Complete Series

Breasts, ghosts and growing a conscience!

Good Luck girl also known as Binbogami ga! translated as “This Damn God of Poverty!” based on the comedy manga series by Yoshiaki Sukeno, originally published in Jump Square magazine between July 2008 and August 2013. The anime adaptation aired in Japan from September 26, 2012 showing its popularity before the manga ended.

The first five minutes sets the scene in a land of gods who watch earth and its inhabitants. An imbalance of luck has over flowed in an area where popular, pretty, wealthy girl Ichigo Sakura is sucking the luck from her town.

Momiji the Poverty God is given the task to set the balance straight by draining Ichigo’s luck or by any means necessary. Momiji isn’t the most motivated of Gods or practical but upon seeing Ichigo’s ‘watermelon’s she is enraged and out to destroy her.

Sure enough Momiji finds her and sets out to scare her into giving up her luck but Ichigo loves her life too much to make other people happy…or is she? Having no friends or family to take care of her she merely has the company of her Butler and self reassurance that she is awesome when actually in the words of Momiji ‘that girl be cray cray’.

With much harassment from Momiji, who enrolls at the same school and takes residence in Ichigo’s mansion she is determined to drain Ichigo’s luck. Every episode she introduces new unhappiness items to drain Ichigo which fail miserably but look cute. Somehow Ichigo begins to empathize with people and and makes sacrifices to make others happy, which in turn makes her a more genuine and likeable person. This development is natural and well needed because her character is annoying for the main protagonist and I prefer Momiji as the villain. From sacking her Butler to give him freedom to enjoy his live, she later misuses her money to insult a crush rather than sincerely accept their poverty. Such ignorance exists in the world and it is refreshing to see it being addressed so bluntly.

This anime reminds is a mix between Fruits Basket and xxxHolic wrapped into one perverse comedy. The super natural aspect is used in dark twisted ways as well as slap stick head-in-a-locker skits. The animation quality is clean and slick. Particular detail was given to the opening accompanied by the theme the catchy “Make my Day!” by Piko.

Also anime fans would be pleased to see a lot of Otaku jokes with cameo’s from Doramon, Super Saiyan Vegeta, Goku, Naruto, Jojo’s Bizarre Adventures and more.

With a total of 13 episodes I was sad to see it end as it was really engaging; anything connected with supernatural entities should be serious in time and this anime had it all down to the breast gropes by a Bobby the monk. Bobby is an interesting character being Black but not necessarily stereotypical, he is a travelling monk helping exercise demons and comes to aid Ichigo and pretty much moves in to help, and purve on, Ichigo while he’s there. He dons a great southern American accent. The anime felt more American than Japanese, apart from when they eat dinner consisting of bentos.

Being a Colleen Clinkenbeard fan, I was ecstatic and overjoyed to hear Momji and her boss voiced by her. Coleen’s Americanized script goes well with the bursts of Luffy-esque energy comes through. All the American dub cast were spot on and is a credit to the studio. The xxxHolic feels when the episode where Shapeshifter dog Momo’o Inugami is introduced voiced by xxxholic protagonist Todd Haberkorn enters.

In conclusion a great short anime to have a lot of giggles to, the anime covers all cliches: cute animals, slap stick jokes, anime tropes, fan service and friendship. Your growing animosity for Ichigo is worn down with the help of Momiji’s wit and sarcasm. It has a great cast and script, so very universal to American audiences. It’s a fast paced anime that will keep most viewers entertained and rewinding to see the jokes over and over again.

Details:

Label: Manga Entertainment

Release date: January 19th 2015

Certificate: PG-13

Running time: 30 Minutes per episode

Genre: Comedy, Supernatural

Director: Yoichi Fujita

Stars: Kana Hanazawa, Yumi Uchiyama, Haruka Tomatsu, Hiro Shimono, Kouki Uchiyama, Yoshihisa Kawahara, Asami Shimoda, Ayaka Mori

Author Profile:

Aisha Anime is a journalist who can be found wearing Lolita or Cosplay at Japanese events, conventions and tweeting live because selfies are an important part of life! When she isn’t out she is playing her Vita and 3DS hitting up all the streetpasses she can find whilst playing Disgaea or Suikoden.

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