"No girl with an iota of sanity would transform into a god on her first date!"
Klutzy, underachieving sixth-grader Karin is miserable. Not only are her parents dead, but her beloved cat, Shii-chan, just died, and on top of all of that, she gets terrible grades in school. Little does she know that, thanks to a ring that was left to her by her late mother, Karin is about to transform into a goddess, and her life will never be the same. Teaming up with Kazune Kujo, she vows to protect Kazune's cousin Himeka from Kirio Karasuma, who is after her for unknown reasons. Karin also gets a crush on Kirio's twin brother Kirika Karasuma, but could he be involved with his brother's plans? And why does the New Transfer Student Michiru "Micchi" Nishikiori have a god transformation ring of his own?
Created by Koge-Donbo, Kamichama Karin was serialized in the shoujo magazine Nakayoshi from 2003 to 2005; it was supposed to be a one-shot Affectionate Parody of magical girl series, but its unexpected success caused it to be continued for seven volumes. It was later adapted to a 26-episode anime series in 2007. The manga also has a sequel, Kamichama Karin Chu, where Karin and Kazune's Kid from the Future comes back to Set Right What Once Went Wrong, and introducing new character Jin Kuga and giving the main cast new transformations.
Not to be confused with the vampire series Karin, or with Kamichu!, the other series about a girl who becomes a god.
This show provides examples of:
- Affectionate Parody: Of the magical girl genre, though it slowly turns more serious, and Chu plays things a tad straighter.
- Tokyopop's translation of the original manga comes off as poking fun at the Totally Radical style they applied to other translations of theirs.
- Art Shift: To seventies Shōjo style to tell the story of Miyon's play, and Kirio's view of a disguised Karin.
- Big Fancy House: Both the Kujos' and Karasumas', to the point where both Karin and Ami have gotten lost in them. This is lampshaded when Karin wonders why they all have such big houses. Jin's mansion is much bigger, and sparkly. It turns out to be a subversion, as Jin doesn't live in the house himself, but lives in a shack, and has never been inside the actual house.
- Blank White Eyes
- Blue with Shock
- Calling Your Attacks
- Clingy Jealous Boy: Jin. Kazune as well in retaliation. While we're at it, Micchi also fulfills the clingy part quite well.
- Dark Magical Girl: Nyx, and later Rika.
- Disney Death: Kazune at the end of the first series.
- Elevator School: Sakuragaoka Academy has elementary, middle, and high school branches.
- Everyone Hates Hades: Averted. Jin, who draws his power from Hades, is a "bad boy" type but actually a pretty cool guy, a Chivalrous Pervert at worst. Further played with once it's revealed he's actually a vessel created by Kirihiko for his eventual revival. Jin is still a completely separate person from Kirihiko, though, and 'Hiko takes his power from a different god (Zeus) anyway.
- Expy: Kirika and Kazune look an awful lot like Ten-chan.
- Family Relationship Switcheroo: A couple examples. Confusing!
- Kazune and Himeka are initially introduced as cousins with Kazuto being Kazune's father, but actually Kazune is a clone of Kazuto and Himeka is Kazuto's daughter. Karin is either a clone of or a de-aged (depending on canon) Kazuto's wife/Himeka's mother. Kazusa is said to be Kazune's twin sister but is implied to be a clone of Himeka.
- Kazune finds out Jin is (supposedly) the son of Kirihiko's relative partway through Chu, but he's actually a clone(?) of Kirihiko.
- Family Theme Naming: To the point that the Karasuma and Kujo families effectively have Tangled Family Trees of names in addition to the actual one.
- Kirihiko Karasuma has two children named Kirio and Kirika. Later another sibling by the name of Rika is introduced. She actually took part of Kirika's name as a pseudonym in-universe.
- Kazuto Kujo has two children (or clones of himself and his actual daughter, whatever) named Kazune and Kazusa.
- Karin's name is Suzuka with the kanji reversed, with one read differently.
- The two Himekas are the odd name out in their respective families, but still tied in by the fact that they share their names.
- And finally, Suzune's name is written with kanji from Kazune and Karin/Suzuka's names.
- Fangirl: in-universe example. Kazune, Micchi, and Jin all have their own respective fan clubs: the Kazune-Z, Michirians, and Jeens. Jin's fangirls can get downright violent.
- Fountain of Youth: In the backstory, Kazuto Kujo used this plus a Memory Gambit on his wife, Suzuka (better known as Karin Hanazono), to help them hide the research of the Gods' rings from Kirihiko Karasuma.
- Girlish Pigtails: Karin's twin pigtails, which Himeka put her hair into in the first episode.
- Godhood Seeker: Kirihiko Karasuma's true plan
- Gratuitous English: I AM GOD!
- Groupie Brigade: Idol Singer Kuga Jin is often surrounded by hordes of fangirls. Karin has had to fight her way through the crowd to talk to him more than once.
- Hijacked by Ganon: In Chu, new villain Rika turns out to be trying to revive old Big Bad Kirihiko, on his orders.
- Invisible to Normals: The god transformations.
- Idol Singer: Jin
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Kazune
- Joshikousei
- Karma Houdini: The Kazune-Z, Kazune's fan club, pick on Karin throughout volume 2, to the point of hurting her self-esteem, and they don't even get so much as a reprimand for it.
- Kid from the Future: Suzune
- Kissing Cousins: Himeka has a crush on her cousin, Kazune. It turns out that Kazune is actually a clone of her real father, Kazuto Kujo.
- Lethal Chef: Karin's cooking is compared to multiple blasts of her main attack in one episode
- Little Miss Almighty
- Luke, You Are My Father: Karin, you are Himeka's mother. By extension, your real name is also Suzuka Kujo.
- Meaningful Name: Michiru means "to fill with water" and is used when describing the tide rising. In Chu he gains the powers of Poseidon/Neptune. This wasn't actually a reference to a certain other "Neptune" named Michiru.
- Apparently Koge Donbo was going to list his god as Poseidon (the greek name, to match the others), but got mixed up because of the Sailor Moon character and put the Roman name instead.
- Magical Boys: Kazune, Karin's love interest, and several others
- Magical Girl
- Meido: Karin wears a maid outfit while kissing Kazune, leading Ami to call her "the scandalous maid".
- Mind Screw: Well, maybe not that much, but the story gets pretty complicated. The anime introduces a bunch of new plot threads, some of them seemingly related to Chu, but then never got continued, falling further into this unintentionally.
- Neuro-Vault: Himeka is where her father, Kazuto Kujo, had hidden his research on the Gods' Rings. Then, he separated her into two halves.
- New Transfer Student: Micchi, later Jin
- No Sense of Direction: Manga-only character Ami
- Non-Human Sidekick: Nyake
- Not What It Looks Like: In a side chapter, Karin and Kazune get their hands stuck together and have to change into their gym clothes in the storage shed. Kirio walks in on them in a... rather compromising position.
- Ominous Latin Chanting: The Ring of Zeus
- Parental Abandonment: Karin, Kazune, Himeka, Micchi, Kirio and Kirika all have dead parents. Kazune and Karin, however, are clones of Kazune's supposed parents, and the Kujos are actually Himeka's parents, though they're still quite dead.
- In the anime, only Kazune is a clone. Karin was turned into a young child/infant with no memories of her previous life.
- Pastel-Chalked Freeze Frame
- Post-Episode Trailer
- Power of Love: In full force in the sequel, where the finishing move is Love Attack, and the mid-season power-up comes from Love Evolution.
- Rain Aura: The scene when Himeka and Kazuno walk under the rain while sharing an umbrella is accompanied by dense, white fog.
- Reincarnation Romance: ... Something like that.
- School Play: Miyon writes one for the school festival. It's a bastardization of "Snow White", "Sleeping Beauty", and "Momotaro".
- Set Right What Once Went Wrong: The plot of Chu, though it's more like Set Right What Will Go Wrong.
- Shout-Out: Koboshi helps Karin out when she gets sick during the School Play.
- Slap-Slap-Kiss: Karin and Kazune
- Sophisticated as Hell: The Tokypop translation has shades of this, combining surprisingly lofty vocabulary with childish silliness."Now I get it! His sexism exists to compensate for his own personal inadequacies! Jerk."
- Spell My Name With An S: Kujo can be romanized as Kujyou or Kujou, the former being the most popular spelling. In Kazune's passport, his last name is spelled as Kujo.
- Spin-Offspring: Koge-Donbo's little-known series Doki Doki Tama Tan stars one Nishikiori Tamae who is apparently Michiru's daughter.
- Talking Animal: Nyake
- Tangled Family Tree: Age reversal and cloning make for one confusing genealogy. The initial misinformation the audience is given doesn't help matters much.
- This Loser Is You: Karin
- Time Skip: There's a one to two month time skip in the beginning of Chu!.
- Transfer Student Uniforms: Jin, but not Micchi. Rika wears her old uniform in her first few appearances but changes to Sakuragaoka's once she actually starts attending the school.
- Transformation Sequence
- Transformation Trinket: The Kamika rings.
- Two Siblings In One: An invoked inversion with Himeka. In the manga, Kazuto Kujo split her into two halves and had hidden his research in her; in the anime, she was originally one person, but Kirihiko made a copy so he could have Kazuto's research for himself.
- Unsettling Gender-Reveal: Karin to Kirika in season 1 episode 16. Made even funnier when the former notices the "Boing".
- Verbal Tic: Nyake adds "da shi" to the end of her sentences.
- "Well Done, Son" Guy: Jin's father, which is the reason he became an idol.
- Wholesome Crossdresser: Kirika
- Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Kazune is terrified of bugs. His cousin Himeka loves them.
