I hate Ah! My Goddess.
Actually, I don’t. I love the Ah! My Goddess universe. And I’m pretty fond of the supporting cast. That’s what makes it so terribly painful.
But, I can’t help it: I despise Belldandy.
Every time the woman opens her mouth, I want to scream. Seriously. I need a concentrated dose of tsundere mune ni chokugeki just to calm down (god bless you, Skuld). I know anime is all about wish fulfillment, but, for the life of me, I can’t understand how anyone could find such a clueless, cloying, and compliant pushover appealing in any way, shape, or form. Honestly, if I met such a woman in real life, I’d immediately inquire as to what horrible childhood accident left her partially brain damaged. (followed by my condolences, of course)
But, you know, it takes two to tango, and Keichi’s perfectly happy to follow. Belldandy does everything but brush his teeth for him, yet, he’s not man enough to hold her hand? How does this guy manage to get out of bed in the morning? I eagerly await the chapter in which Belldandy is possessed by the Demon of Sadomasochism, First Class, Unlimited, and rides K1 leather-bound and crying into the sunset. Ah! A Burning Night in the Dungeon!
Um…
Anyhoo, even though I’m a Democrat, I can do more than just criticize. Ah! My Goddess could achieve perfection with just a few small changes:
1. Get rid of Belldandy. (see: Ah! My Goddess, The Movie)
2. Have Skuld continue to abuse Keichi in new and imaginative ways.
3. Get Urd drunk.
4. Give Megumi a mahou shoujo spin-off show all her own. (YES, MY MASTER!)
Ah! Who am I kidding? There’s no salvation to be found. What was Fujishima Kousuke thinking?
I think the main trouble is that Belldandy’s characterization is so uneven. Her cheerful kindness is the only thing that’s really static about her. She’ll be jealous sometimes (like when Shiho pays her house call), but not always. She’ll be violent sometimes (like when the Sayoko-brainwashed Tamiya and Otaki attack Keiichi), but not always. She’ll be assertive sometimes (like in that racing episode around #4 of the first season), but not always. And the things that make her assertive or jealous or violent on some occasions don’t do it all the time, only when the writer decides to make a point of it happening. Lots of women have been attracted to Keiichi without making Belldandy jealous, and he or some other mortal can be attacked without making her get violent.
The trouble is that she’s used too much for her sweetness and not enough for the amazing things she can accomplish. In the Gate arc of the manga, I was extremely impressed by the way Bell could accomplish with a smile what most people need a frown to do- assert herself without using words. She also confronted Hild very strongly during that lady’s first appearance. But unfortunately, she doesn’t always, only when the writer/writers decide she ought to. It’s poor characterization and lazy writing.
Personally, I’m just waiting for Chihiro to show up, since she works well with everyone.
Then you must have loved Ah! My Mini-Goddess.
lol…I agree with your post completely. Belldandy has a lot of fans, and whatever floats your boat I guess, but I’ve never understood what people see in her either, unless your dream woman is a maid/cook with zero sex drive. But I’m a tsundere fan and Belldandy’s about as polar opposite to tsundere as you can get. It’s a pity they didn’t give Mini-Goddess a second season instead of more regular AMG…Iwata Mitsuo was brilliant as Gan-chan…
I dunno. I never really had a problem with Kei’ichi. Yeah, he’s a dork, but at least he’s a well-meaning dork. I always had the feeling that if he never accidentally dialed the goddess hotline, sooner rather than later he’d be able to find his Ms. Right. The normal way.
I must echo JeffL’s sentiments. The biggest failing of AMG is Belldandy (though not always). It doesn’t help that her voice actor makes her sound -especially- clueless at times. Neither does it help that K1 is the biggest douche when it comes to their feelings. The manga has been running in merry little circles for years, and I’m including the fan translated most recent chapters here too. I liked AMG when I first discovered it, and I still like it, but… geez! Sometimes it makes me feel veeeery frustrated.
I’ll give K1 some credit for being a pretty decent guy. Hopeless in love or not, he gets along pretty well with folks. Unfortunately, he has a tendency to turn into a blubbering idiot when Belldandy’s around.
Well, without Belldandy i wouldn’t watch AMG. It’s true that she isn’t most exciting woman in the world. I wish she would be more like she is in the manga, they seem to have took almost all flaws Belldandy have and only show nice side. I don’t know how others see Belldandy, but i wouldn’t like her as Girlfriend. For me she is fantasy girl with fantasy personality that real world doesn’t have, after all anime is escape from the reality.
I guess it’s matter of taste also, I have problems to like any tsundere more than it’s necessary. Skuld is exception in otherwise quite boring ‘violence solve everything’ type of thinking.
They are milking the same cash cow too long. There are potential for many different stories in AMG, so they need to marry K1 and Bell and move into other things. In real life, Marriage is the beginning to everything, not the end.
Whoa, first Haruhi now Belldandy. Jeff is on a roll. I’m anxiously awaiting the “Suigintou is overrated; Hinaichigo carried the series” post.
I don’t think I’m staking out some sort of unusual position here. I suspect Belldandy has as many detractors as she does fans. And I’m not purposely trying to get a rise out of people… I’m just being honest.
Of course, I can deal with Belldandy (or similar characters) in diluted form. For example, strange as it may seem, I’m a big Ai Yori Aoshi fan. Obviously, Aoi and Belldandy are two peas in a pod - although, I’d argue Aoi has a little more personality (and backbone). What makes AiAo work for me, however, is the side characters. Those very side characters ruin the show for a lot of other people, however. We’ve all heard the “It would have been great had it been nothing but Aoi and Kaoru,” argument, but, for me, that approach would have made the show increasingly unbearable over time. I like Aoi and Kaoru, and I accept (and admire) the dynamics of their relationship, but it’s something I can only handle in small doses. That’s why I enjoy the family dynamic the side characters bring to the story. They don’t overshadow the story’s weakest link (Aoi and Kaoru) as much as they lift it up.
You sort of have the same thing going on in AMG… problem is, Belldandy still reigns supreme. She’s always there, involved in everything, solving everyone’s problems, always saying the right thing at the right time. The story insists on thrusting her out to the forefront, as if to remind us, “Belldandy is perfect! Love her, damn it! Long for her!” Obviously, if you find Belldandy annoying, you’re kind of up the creek. It’s a shame, too, as AMG has so many things going for it otherwise. Where AiAo succeeds, AMG fails.
And Hina-ichigo rocks. Not as much as Suiseiseki, though.
You must have love AiAEnishi, Jeff since it was almost entirely about the side characters than about Aoi and Kaoru. I do like Belldandy by the way but I’m not going to change your view on it since there has to be people who go against regular opinion on things. I go against popular opinion on Eureka 7 and still to this day, people still try to make me change it which I refused. Continue to fight the power.
I also believe that the manga series tries to over-glorify Belladandy. If I remember from mythologies about angels, there are angels who jokes or show some emotion without straying away into darkness. Belladandy’s personality feels like too much cream puffs; it is nice to have a half a dozen or so, but after a while, you get tired of it to the point of hating it if you had to have too much of it. AMG either has to give Belladandy and K1 some more tints to their personality, which needs to be maintained consistantly or allowed to grow inot something else, gradually, or give much, much more time to other Earthly characters who shows much more interesting aspects and twists compared to the main characters. They also need to find more techniquely competent singers to sing more difficult songs for the Belladandy and the angels, for aren’t they suppose to be singing something hard for common people to imitate? When I can claim half of my amateur choir to sing better than the singers for Belladandy, they have a problem creating the whole serene environment. A good song I would use would be ‘Nulla Pax in Mundo’ by Vivaldi, sung by my favorite soprano, Emma Kirkby, which you can easily hear from soundtrack to movie ‘Shine’, the movie about a pianist who became mentally ill and made a comeback. I had the fortune of hearing the song in live performance and was just awestruck for 5 minutes.
I’m very sympathetic towards the whole Belldandy-hate situation. I personally find the entire construct of AMG! a little bit like how Jal finds for Bell; the ultimate narrative belongs still to Bell and K1, and there’s no escape of its dark and boring influences. To use an analogy, white-chocolate covered cow dung served with strawberry on the side is still cow dung. The difference between Jal and myself is that I rather like K1 and Bell. All in all AMG is in many ways superior than its twin in Fujishima’s You’re Under Arrest, and I’ve stomached that for its characters, despite the narrative.
Alas, I can’t do that for AMG TV because it’s like paying to eat at an all-you-can-eat cow dung resturaunt. The Thing Never Ends. I’m sure I’ll enjoy eating chocolate, strawberry, beef, asparagus, and whatever else that comes with it, but there is no escaping the nasty mess. No amount of Urd or Megumi or Mamiko or Peorth or Norio or Yoko Ishida can fix that.
FYI I’d rank YUA a little higher just because Natsumi is way, way, way, way, way, way better than Bell and K1 combined. And she gets so much screen time!
I love how you clipped Belldandy out of the picture. S-grade!
I think ifyou are chinese or Jpanese you will think ah my godess is the best i am a Chinese so I think so!