Mahoromatic: Automatic Maiden (season 1)
One of the earlier entries in the super-powered maid genre, this action rom-com is still pretty entertaining. It sits right in the middle of that transitional era for Gainax circa 2000 where their work was starting to take on an increasingly goofy look and tone in what would eventually become Trigger's signature style. As an early digital anime it suffers common problems from that time, such as lazy backgrounds and an oversaturated colour palette, but plenty of that Gainax charm shines through. Action scenes are decent, though it's the comedy episodes that carry this first season. It relies a bit too heavily on characters who just have one joke that they repeat ad nauseum though.
There's a more serious side to the show. Mahoro is a combat android who now serves as a maid to the son of her former commander. This is her idea of penance for having been forced to kill him, and all the while the series reminds us that Mahoro is using up her final year before she stops functioning. Meanwhile she keeps being drawn back into battles with the aliens that her secret organisation has been fighting for years, though unleashing her full power would drastically reduce her remaining lifespan. This side of the series works fine, though it doesn't always mesh well with its comedy side. It feels like two different shows bolted together at times.
The first season hovers between a 6 and 7 for me, but the comedy episodes just about tip it to the higher mark.
7/10
Mahoromatic: Something More Beautiful (season 2)
After an entertaining first season, the show goes downhill in this follow-up. Apparently two secret organisations weren't enough because suddenly there's a third, along with a second combat maid. This season has all the hallmarks of a story that has prematurely run out of ideas, and just throws a pile of new characters in to paper over the cracks. Despite covering the remaining months before Mahoro is due to stop functioning, the story loses interest in her for almost the entire season, instead shifting the focus to this new cyborg maid Minawa (whose primary trait is that she falls over a lot) and her faltering romance with a character who manages to be even more devoid of personality than the protagonist. Those characters then vanish from the story altogether for most of the final few episodes, which hastily try to course correct the focus back to Mahoro as we find out what ultimately becomes of her. It's all too rushed and so its attempts to tug at the heartstrings fall flat. All this culminates in a thoroughly miserable final episode that tries to pivot to an uplifting ending at the last minute, but without having done anything to foreshadow its final twist it feels nonsensical. I'm still not entirely sure what the hell happened at the end.
Sadly the production values take a nosedive this season too, with only a scant handful of shots in the action scenes showing any of that trademark Gainax flair. There are a few decent comedy moments scattered through the season, but that side feels tired by this point too as it continues to repeat the same beats over and over. Even though this gives a definite ending to the story, season 2 is a tedious mess for the most part.
5/10
