Negima! Magister Negi Magi

Negima!: Magister Negi Magi, known in Japan as is a manga and anime series by Ken Akamatsu (known for his best selling title Love Hina) which contains a large amount of fan service/ecchi scenes. The manga is currently being published by Kodansha and serialized in Shonen Magazine in Japan. Del Rey Manga is publishing the English translated version. The anime, produced by XEBEC, aired in the first half of 2005 and is being released in the US by FUNimation Entertainment. Additionally, two OVAs have been released, produced by Shaft and GANSIS, who had also produced an alternate retelling of the series, Negima!?.

Overview
Negi Springfield is a ten year old wizard from Wales who dreams of becoming a, special wizards who use their powers to help normal people using covers such as working for. Negi's reason for becoming a Magister Magi is to find his father, Nagi Springfield, the legendary mage also known as the "Thousand Master" who many believe to be dead.

After graduating from the Merdiana Magic Academy in Wales, he is given a duty as a cover in the real world, and training, before he actually becomes a Magister Magi. That duty is to become an English teacher at Mahora Academy in Japan. The task will not be easy, however, as Negi will become a teacher to a middle school class of 31 older girls, each very special in her own way. The series details his time and adventures in Japan as he gains acceptance and respect from his students, helps them in their problems, and faces magical threats from inside and outside Mahora Academy. His main relationship is with Asuna Kagurazaka, his student and roommate, who dislikes him initially but later accepts him as a friend and becomes his guardian, helping find clues about his father and his life.

The series, while initially appearing to be another bishōjo work like Love Hina, has progressed into a mix of bishōjo, shōnen action, fantasy, horror, romance and comedy. This coupled with the initial comments of Akamatsu that he specifically wanted to do something "different" than Love Hina has fueled fan speculation. Some feel the current turn in mood for the manga reflects Akamatsu's "real" vision of the series, and the initial setup was just a ruse to placate the publishers expecting a bishōjo series. Similarly, Love Hina took a turn for the surreal during its later run. Others point to the set up of the series making the classic "shipping" tendencies within such manga moot. Negi himself is prepubescent, and many of his scenes with Asuna are specific subversions of the "awkward romantic scene" tendency of bishōjo manga, quickly diffused and only played for laughs. In addition, many of the girls are able to fawn over him in a childish sense without any romantic expectations from the reader.

In keeping with this style, Negi himself is seen as a contrast to Love Hina's Keitaro and other typical male leads of bishōjo manga. He is hardworking, capable, and treated kindly, but due to his appearance and age (well below most of his students), he feels completely non-threatening and finds it difficult to be taken seriously as a teacher; many of his students treat him as a cute little kid.

Characters
Negima includes a wide array of characters, including the 31 students from Class 2/3A. Like many classes, Negi's students have your typical array of smart students, idiots, bookworms, athletes and cheerleaders. However, Negi's class also includes several martial artists and ninjas, a vampire, a robot, a ghost, at least one demon, a web idol and even a time traveler. Many of these girls are immediately drawn into Negi's world of magic, some of whom teach him things he never learned in schools, others who are much closer to him than even Negi realizes at first. But not all of Negi's problems are found within the classroom: living in a world with many styles of rival magic, demons and other sorts of chaos, he and his students eventually find themselves drawn in to one after another incidents and situations. But ultimately, Negi's magic and training connects him to his father Nagi and his courageous warriors, whom he hopes to follow in the footsteps of someday.

Introduction OVAs
Before the beginning of the series, three OVAs were produced for the sole purpose of introducing the characters. The first two were released on DVD bundled with two drama CDs, with the third being sold separately. It is unknown if these will ever be released outside of Japan.

The first OAV is a re-enactment of the first chapter, where Negi first learns of his job as a teacher and is introduced to the students of Mahora Academy 2-A. It ends with profiles of the Baka Rangers (Asuna, Makie, Yue, Ku Fei and Kaede) as well as Ayaka. Asuna is the only girl in the class that doesn't dig Negi.

The second OAV is a re-enactment of the "love potion" incident of chapter 2, with profiles at the end of Nodoka, Konoka, the cheerleaders (Misa, Madoka, Sakurako) as well as Kazumi.

The third OAV is a re-enactment of chapter 13: Negi's Mahora tour with the Narutaki twins. The tour shows Negi to several of the students (Yuna, Akira, Chao, Satsuki, Haruna, Chizuru, Natsumi, Zazie) as well as others that he ends up missing (Sayo, Evangeline, Chachamaru, Chisame, Misora, Ako) After being chewed out by Haruna for completely skipping her, a final scene introduces Setsuna and Mana, keeping watch from something on campus.

First television series
The anime began airing in Japan on January 6, 2005 and ended June 29, 2005. The anime showed certain events of manga volumes 1-6 but mostly in a different manner. The anime also created its own reasons for certain events happening, which differs from the manga. It currently airs as part of the FUNimation programming block on CoLours TV.

Color changes

The conversion from manga to anime has left several characters' hair colors changed. The changes are as follows: Chisame's hair color (Bright orange hair in the manga, but has dark green hair in the anime), Shizuna-sensei,(blond or yellow-colored hair in the manga, blue hair in the anime.), Misa (light brown hair in the manga, but purple hair in the anime) and Yuna's hair color (black hair in manga, bright brown in the anime), along with the Narutaki twins (orange hair in the manga, pink in the anime-Fumika's hair covers are also yellow instead of white). It is thought by some fans that the color changes may reflect a need of the animators to identify characters. It was officially noted that Misa is meant to have purple hair, as the hair color is carried on to the games and related materials. She is the only character whose hair color change was made permanent.

Storyline changes

In order to bring a true ending to the series, starting approximately halfway through episode XXII and continuing until the end of the series, original work was created for the series. The content is extremely controversial, as it involved "killing off" one of the main characters, in an otherwise light-hearted series.

Anime revisions

Due to protests against the animation in Mahōu Sensei Negima!, the DVD release has been revised from the TV version. Various episodes have redrawn characters, expressions, scenes, and even a few episodes have been redrawn completely. The redraws are minor, and fix errors like in episode 16 Makie has six fingers in a scene. Despite early rumors, there are no dialog or storyline changes. FUNimation used this version for their English release of the series.

Spring and Summer OVAs
Two OVAs directed by Akiyuki Shinbo and produced by Studio Shaft have been released, a Spring OVA and a Summer OVA.

The Spring OVA called Negima Haru! was shown to a private audience in Japan in April 2006 and was released for the public in DVD in October 25, 2006. It is based on the trip to the Southern Islands in volume 7 of the manga. The story is about how Negi makes up to Asuna after saying to Asuna that she shouldn't mind his business.

It's a running gag throughout the special in which Setsuna keeps ending up right behind Konoka when she's bent over and Setsuna gets a front row view of her backside. She continues to react to it in such a manner that might lead one to question her sexuality.

The Summer Negima!?Natsu OVA was also shown to a private audience in September 2006, and the DVD was released in November 22, 2006. The beginning is about Nodoka and Yue practicing casting a spell. While training, Yue convinces Nodoka that they cast a spell of the ../red string of fate/ on Nodoka. A spell which shows them who her future partner will be. One end connects to Nodoka and the other end connects to Negi. Unfortunately, this spell isn’t a fate connection, but just a tie-up. The rest of the OVA is about how Nodoka and Negi spend the rest of the day trying to take their bath while their hands are tied together. The bath house depicted in this OVA is a parody to the one depicted in Spirited Away although the "creatures" are working on treadmills.

Both OVAs see various changes in hair and eye color of some of the students, changes that are also used for Negima!?

Second television series
A second series was announced on May 9, 2006 by Shaft and directed by Akiyuki Shinbo, the director of Pani Poni Dash! and Tsukuyomi - Moon Phase. It started airing in Japan on October 4, 2006, and works more like an alternate retelling of the original story with different character designs and an all new storyline. The shows also focuses more action and comedy references and has less ecchi. The last show was aired March 28, 2007, ranking 34th out of the 40 animes shown for the fall 2006 season, way below expectations.

Official

 * Official Magister Negi Magi website
 * Del Rey's Negima manga (U.S. manga publisher)
 * Funimation's Negima anime (U.S. anime licensee)
 * TV Tokyo's Negima anime website
 * Konami Japan's PS2 Negima game
 * Marvelous Interactive's Negima GBA game
 * Marvelous Interactive's Negima GBA game

Fan Sites

 * A Negima Forum
 * Love Hina & Negima Forum

From Animepedia, a Wikia wiki.