Trinity Seven – 04

Trinity Seven is the next show to fall off my review list this week and, honestly, I’m not sure it will even stay on my watching list either. The girls are varied and the bodies are good but come on T7, we can get solid hentai anywhere these days.

You’re a broadcast series that can’t show me anything more risque than censored skin. So You’ve got absolutely nothing to work with without a plot.

And you’re plot is terrible.

For my final review, T7 focuses on Yui, who lives in the dungeon under the school. She’s a sleep-mage and super powerful and if she ever wakes up we’re all screwed. Also, she’s Levi’s lover, maybe? So everyone goes down to save her and they save her. Then end.

Honestly, I think it was the guns that finally did it for me. We can debate phallic pistols and Lilith’s mega cannon that she straddles to fire — but the penis penis penis of it all isn’t even what bothers me. Well, not the biggest thing that bothers me, anyway.

I just hate shows that give us magic…then turn into the magic into gun scenarios. That whole aesthetic is dull to me and feels dumb. For goodness sakes, why make firing a gun take longer by requiring a spell to be cast? So dumb.

Trinity Seven – 03

As a rule, it’s a warning sign when a show gets spends its beach episode nickel so early in the rotation. For sexy harem shows, it’s usually the best thing they’ve got, which means the rest of the season will be drab by comparison (not worth watching) and for less harem-y shows, it usually means they don’t know what they are doing or don’t have a season’s worth of interesting content.

Truth be told, I would have dropped Trinity Seven right here…except, for some reason, episodes 3 and 4 appeared in my queue at the same time and I accidentally watched them out of order! Oops.

So? Beach Episode? Yes! With a hot spring hrown in for good measure! Arata and Arin are punished for destroying the school and forced to work the grill while all the other girls get to flaunt and swim. Everyone talks about boobs and their different sizes and agree that all boobs are good as long as they are attached to a cute girl.

I have to give Trinity Seven a tiny bit of credit: It does just come out and say it’s a harem. Literally. The characters just say that. I don’t think that’s brave or anything but at least we’re not shovel fed fake pretext. I guess that’s good?

Then we get a flash back to the end of last week where Arata was killed in a fight to stop him destroying the world but wasn’t because he was sucked away to Yui’s room and he learned more about magic.

I guess that’s what happened anyway. Trinity Seven likes to blather on about its magic systems in such a way that my brain goes into pre-stroke shutdown and, when I reawaken to whatever fanservice follows, I only have the vaguest memory of what it was saying.

Then we see Arata turn into magic mode, which maybe was explained at some point when I wasn’t listening but he looks like a goth kid with a techno trench coat now and he has a magic gun. Then his magic makes everyone naked.

Eventually we learn that Levi is a lesbian. I guess. Maybe? Then we get rape fantasies and kimonos and stuff and…you can guess why I would have dropped this show here, can’t you? There’s just nothing here but boobies, lengthy and idiotic sounding diatribes about magic and more boobies.

Trinity Seven – 02

Trinity Seven gives us another week’s serving of Demon Lord Magic High School Harem genre. This time Arin is drawing Arata way too much attention though her constant staring and following him around school. When finally asked why, she explains that she must do this. He is probably the demon lord and she will probably become the demon lord’s wife. Eventually.

Then Lilith, Levi and the blonde student reporter girl are trapped with Arata in his room and they really have to pee!

A reasonably powerful barrier prevents them from opening the door or windows and Arata’s book (the Astil Codex) wants Arata to figure it out on his own. Unfortunately, with no training yet he doesn’t know what to look for and resorts to tricking Astil into revealing her secret instead.

Yeah… and the whole pee thing is kinda weird. I appreciate that something so ignored by adventure scenarios comes up but… ick? It gets overly sexualized here. At least, it does for my taste.

Some time after escaping the barrier, Arin uses her special magic to unleash Arata at full power, which starts to destroy the world. We learn a bit too much about magic while this is happening, and way too much about magical ethics and philosophy.

Whatever the intent, it comes across as a garbled, confusing mess. Ultimately Akio Fudou and Mira Yamana show up and, since Arata is alive in next week’s preview, presumably beat him up enough during the credits to turn off his powers but not kill him.

Trinity Seven seems… aware that it’s a harem piece and so does Arata. See, Arata plays the part and actively pokes fun at his sexual situation but, given his constant frown, I get the sense he’s less amused by it than perplexed and putting on a cool-guy front.

Still, if it weren’t for Arata’s flat delivery and his role-reversal when dealing with Arin, this should would be unwatchable. (Like Invaders became last season)

That was a lot of exposition and exploitation for one afternoon! T7 threw too many names and magic terms and laws about how magic works at me all at once and none of it really felt like it mattered.

T7 did deliver a few good jokes and has a funny sense of timing (and the banter between Arin and Arata remains great) but… ugh?

I’m leaving T7 in my TBD category and NOT giving it a higher mark than a 6. Take that for what you will.

Trinity Seven – 01

Trinity Seven is not exactly an odd mashup of elements…it feels like we get a super-powered male transfer student to a magic school is identified as a demon lord with a harem angle almost every season these days. However, T7’s vibe feels just a hair different.

Maybe it’s the magic school, which reminds me of Occult Academy? Maybe it’s the absolutely bleak opening where Arata, our hero/demon lord, learns that his cousin and childhood friend Hijiri has been wiped away along with his home city by some sort of…black sun…thing?

Still, as hopeful as I am about T7’s darker spin on the Demon Lord Magic Harem genre, I’m hesitant to get invested. For one, the episode opens with boob-grabbing and continues with that level of objectification even after Arata learns about magic and remembers the not exactly death but like death of his cousin.

I mean, really? is now the time to be so self-assured and forward about liking boobs? It just disconnects me from the tension of the narrative.

Interestingly, Trinity Seven makes a reasonable explanation as to why more girls are mages than boys (and that they tend to be more powerful). Simply, magic is the study of a mage’s own mind and emotions.

Our hero finds this satisfying too and muses about being open with his true desires and feelings. Or he’s playing along, since he’s talking to a female student ninja who just implied that she’s rather good in bed.

As for the seven girls our Hero must harem…erh…defeat:

Lilith Asami, the first mage Arata meets, is you standard mild prude who’s put off by our hero’s nature but obviously already likes him. Levi Kazama is a ninja and has already implied she wants to sleep with him. We’ve only seen Akio Fudou and Mira Yamana through a window but they look like the big boobed tomboy and prickly academic, respectively.

Lastly is Arin Kannazuki… who Arata-kun meets in the boys bath. She’ll be playing the “doesn’t get it girl” archetype and also looks like Arata’s cousin Hijiri, which is weird and unexplained. Arin’s timing and interactions are the best of the bunch, as she actually takes Arata out of his comfort zone and doesn’t play into his hand.

Levi is also good, if only because her goal is more or less to tease everyone in the same way Arata does already.

On another note, Trinity Seven uses really dull and muddy colors. I’m not sure if this was due to a bad stream (it was fairly low-res, as you can see in my screen captures) but I did find it a little weird how much the characters blend into the backgrounds at school.

At the end of the day, T7 is about a teen guy who suddenly gets magical powers, who suddenly has to learn to use them to get his friend (and lover?) back from the void and the only way he can do that is to go to magic school and defeat the seven top magical students, who happen to also be girls.

As the headmaster says: “Magic allows for all possibilities.” So I’ll give it a Chance. T7 has good timing and a few charming characters but…all season long? You guys may have to give me some encouragement!