Bewitched

Introduction

During the mid-2000s, several great anime series made their way onto the western scene, leading to a Japanese renaissance among the millennials. Tite Kubo was the artist and writer of the weekly anime, Bleach, on the Shonen Jump. After its anime debut in 2004, Bleach rose to popularity so quickly, it stood as one of the top three anime, alongside One Piece and Naruto. By their powers combined, they were known as the Big Three.

As the years went on, Kubo drifted away from Bleach but still experimented within that universe, and eventually wrote a successor manga called Burn the Witch. Burn the Witch eventually became its own film, or three-part miniseries if you happened to have watched it on Crunchyroll.

Plot and Setting

Burn the Witch follows the adventures of two young witches named Ninny Spancole and Noel Niihashi as they go about their day-to-day routine of protecting Londoners from rampaging dragons. Specifically, they are from the Pipers or Conservationists Division, whose duties are to train and domesticate the beasts. They also have the additional job of apprehending illegally-reared Dragons.

In this world, dragons are the fiery equivalent of having the neighbour’s dog leave a turd on your bed. In this case, the bed is the city of London. Dragons are more nuisances than actual threats and can either be domesticated for their magic uses or straight up killed if they are too much of a threat. Only Wing Bind, an organisation of wizards and witches can contain these flying monstrosities.

Kubo manages to split London into two sections. One half of the city is called Front London, which is just the regular old city, but the residents in that part of town cannot see flying lizards of doom swarming over their heads. Then there is Reverse London, another side of the city where everyone can visibly see the dragons, and these locals become wizards to hunt down the foul beasts.

Burn the Witch takes its modern fantasy inspiration from literature such as J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter, but Kubo adds his own flair to this world, with characters soaring around on tiny dragons while blasting spells with flint-lock pistol-horns as wands.

Burn the Witch has plenty of hidden references to Tite Kubo’s previous work, Bleach. While Bleach fans will probably rejoice in the second coming of their anime, newcomers would probably be unfazed by any of these references. The anime even takes a page from Bleach’s Kido magic, giving spells numbers before their names. As a fan, I couldn’t help comparing everything in Reverse London to Soul Society, making it difficult to see this anime as its own thing.

While the first third of Burn the Witch introduces its world and characters, the second part is where the film really sparkles. This part onwards has our heroines investigate an illegal dragon tamer on the west side of Reverse London, where they are assigned to rescue the dragon and take it out to pasture.

Now, it is time to talk about the walking plot-magnet that is Balgo. Balgo Parks is a Dragon Clad, a wild card that attracts dragons to his location. Our heroines also have the extra work of keeping Balgo out of harm’s way, a task that it is easier said than done as dragons swoop down on him without warning.

Burn the Witch sadly leaves out several details, which makes the plot difficult to follow at times. Outside of their passive ability to attract dragons like moths to a flame, Dragon Clads don’t get much of an explanation. It is the same for Wing Bind and its divisions, which all felt meaningless to me, as I could not understand their functions within society without reading from a wiki.

Characters and Performances

I like the contrasting personalities between the two leads, as they share similar traits to other characters designed by Kubo. Asami Tano, who portrays Ninny Spangcole, is my favourite of the two, the typical hotheaded tsundere who disobeys mission parameters for the sake of clout. Her swagger brings her character to life and it is on full display throughout the movie.

Noel Niihashi, portrayed by Yuina Yamada, is a lot more disciplined and quieter than her partner. While Yamada does an excellent job with the character, Noel’s silent nature makes it very difficult for her to shine around her more colourful castmates.

Then we have Balgo Park, portrayed by Shimba Tsuchiya and his talking dragon doggo, Osushi. He is a curious and lovable fellow with a mind as sharp as a potato, who has a knack for getting himself in trouble, mainly with dragons. He is quite the perverted character, rivalling characters, such as Sanji from One Piece, which is not a compliment. Thankfully, Noel, the target of Balgo’s affection, often calls him out on his behaviour.

Then there is the movie’s antagonist Bruno Bangyfe, portrayed by Chikahiro Kobayashi. He is a director who forms part of a Wing Bind division called the Inks, whose objective is to hunt Dark Dragons. He is a cunning fellow who views Balgo’s Dragon Clad status as a threat and wants to have him eliminated.

Bruno’s personality is all over the place. He is probably one of the most rip-roaring characters to watch in action, as he spray-paints summoning portals on his dragon’s wings to give him an edge in combat. However, his plans sound overly complicated to the point of coming off as foolish, making me question his position as a director and who in their right mind would have agreed to this in the process.

Animations and Action

Burn the Witch was animated by Studio Colorido, best known for their other 2020 anime movie, A Whisker Away. The line art is a lot smoother and more simplified than what Kubo is known for, but the ferocity of character expressions is the same as ever.

For the most part, the animation looked crisp throughout Burn the Witch’s entire run time. Outside of spell and particle effects, there wasn’t much CGI that I could visibly see, and it rarely broke the immersion with the anime. However, with the volume of high-quality (Sakuga) action sequences scattered across the movie, I can imagine the animators sneaking some 3D animation in there to save time.

Conclusion

If you are a fan of Kubo’s mangas and characters or even just typical shonen anime, then you will get a kick from watching Burn the Witch. While bears many similarities to Bleach, as they share the same universe, newcomers to Kubo’s work can still enjoy this anime just the same. Outside of a final wink towards the end of the film, most of the references are pretty subtle.

The anime opens up with a lot of questions but leads to no significant answers for them. Yet, the overall experience was so exhilarating I did not care about the narrative problems. I felt like I was a teenager again watching one of the Big Three, but with dragons. My friend who watched the film with me is even considering picking up the manga for it.