From left to right: Celcia old-self, Celcia current-self, Airi, Junpei and Ritsuko. (Mihke is missing)
Ready, set... strip
- American cover for the first DVD
Three unlike characters: Junpei (a thick-headed martial artist), Ritsuko (a tomboy and gun Otaku) and Airi (an award winning actress) are transported from their homes in Japan to a High Fantasyparallel world. Enlisting the aid of Celcia, the most powerful elven sorceress in the land, they try— and fail —to cast a spell that will return them home. The result? The spell is made manifest as fragments on the bodies of five elven women throughout the land and Celcia gets turned to a dog-like creature. To return home and return celcia to her old-self, the four have to collect the fragments of the spell and join them into a working spell.The catch? They don't know precisely which female elves have fragments of the spell on them. The solution?Find every elf woman in the land and rip-off their clothes.That's basically it. Their search for the spell fragments takes them across a strange fantasy land, where they earn renown for their amazing accomplishments as well as a healthy dose of infamy for their indecent behavior toward the land's elven women.Have in mind that it's actually Better Than It Sounds, with a great script, excellent characters design and not as many senseless Fanservice as the plot seems to imply.They also have a tank which eventually gets possessed by the spirit of a Cat called Mihke. It behaves exactly like any cat would, except it has all the firepower from a Tank. Mega Neko in it weirdest incarnation.There is a Manga and Anime series. Even if it sounds familiar, it has nothing to do with He Who Fights Monsters.You can find a playlist of the series here.
This series has examples of:
Anachronism Stew: Justified in that Celcia's spell summons objects from our world to hers (so having a tank makes perfect sense and is awesome), but also played straight in the pop culture references and the many religious profanities used. And Elf Mc Burger. You cannot escape Mc Donalds.
This eventually becomes a plot point.
Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: Creative use of an enlargement potion in an absence of Magic Pants makes for instant nudity. It also makes for an angry giantess who punches out a dragon that is threatening her town.
Badass Crew: For better or for worse, Junpei, Airi, and Ritsuko and later Celcia are a team.
Can Not Spit It Out: Seriously, people. "Hey, my friends and I are looking for the fragments of a very powerful and important spell that has imprinted on five random elf women. You don't happen to have any odd marks that popped up recently, do you?" IS THAT REALLY SO HARD?!
To be fair, when they do ask for permission the elves usually refuse. I mean, would you want to strip for a random stranger with a crazy story? It also doesn't help that Junpei usually comes off as a pervert when he asks elves if they will take off their clothes in front of him.
Breaking the Fourth Wall: Sometimes it happens during episodes. A good example is the first 5 minutes in episode 8:
Junpei: Wait a minute. Something's not right. It's only been thirty seconds since the episode title and we've already found an elf.
Later during the explanation:
Junpei: Weren't you afraid of ghosts in the last episode?
Ritsuko: Then was then. Now is now.
Junpei: Boy, I hate fantasy stories!
Junpei's catch phrase:
Junpei: "This is why I hate fantasy stories!"
Episode 9:
Junpei: Man this series sure uses a lot of screwball comedies.
Celicia: Fantasy series Junpei, fantasy series.
Catch Phrase: At least in the dub, Junpei says, "This is why I hate fantasy stories!"
In the original manga, and it's "Freaking fantasy world!".
"Forgive me for stripping you!"
Censor Steam: Even during the initial fantastic tearing of clothes, the camera rarely catches inappropriate elf bits.
The Chick: Airi. Not that she's ineffectual. She just doesn't do a lot of the fighting.
Clingy Costume: Episode 10, season one. An elf kight comes to the group and asks for help removing it.
Cool Tank: The Type 74 tank, practically a character in its own right. Later on, it actually does become a character, when the cat spirit Mike (mee-kay) possesses it.
Critical Failure: Celcia, a lot. She screws up the spell to send the trio home not once, but twice. Not only that, but she's the one who cast the spell that summoned Junpei, Ritsuko, and Airi to her world in the first place! Despite exemplifying this trope for the sake of the plot, she's reasonably competent when the stakes aren't returning the heroes home.
To be fair, it was mostly Junpei's fault. The idiot got the wrong impression that Celcia needed to be naked to complete the spell, and Celcia made it damn clear that she needed silence so she could get as much concentration as possible on the spell.
Then one has to wonder why her stupid old guards/men/whatever they are were hanging about. She pretty much only needed Ritsuko, Junpei, and Airi there, right? Though Junpei probably would have messed it up regardless.
Played very straight in the christmas episode. Junpei kicks Satan up a chimmeny when he offers the group a deal.
Dirty Old Man: Celcia's advisors are perhaps a little too eager to help the Elf Hunters in their quest to return home. And Millia's grandfather having a potion that makes elves take off their clothes?
Fanservice: Comparatively little, considering the plot.
So little in fact that we Yanks got away with slapping it with a PG rating because of the violence. Even though the plot involves people stripping Elves down to their birthday suits!
Guile Hero: In addition to being a Master of Disguise, Airi is skilled at reading people and controlling them. She can often do more with a few words than the others can do with magic, bullets or fists.
Magic Misfire: Celcia disguises herself as a doglike creature to try to help them find the spell fragments without being recognized. However, when they find the first fragment and she transfers it to herself, it causesShapeshifter Mode Lock until they have all the fragments. Her increasingly ridiculous appearance as the spell fragments transfer to her become a Running Gag.
Paper Fan of Doom: the women in the main cast, usually directed at Junpei (or any male too obsessed with the Elf Hunters quest), although Junpei himself uses it to prevent an uncomfortable old man homoerotic moment.
Playboy Bunny: Junpei accidentally bursts into a room where girls are dressing into them.
Potty Dance / Potty Emergency: Junpei, Season 2 Episode 2, complete with a graph and flashing alarm showing his current state. His dilemma leads to some uncomfortable images. Ends with the discovery of a teddy bear that can excrete toilet paper, in perfect rolls, complete with cardboard tube.
Save Both Worlds: Brought up explicitly near the end of the first season is the idea that both Earth and the magical world to which the cast has been sent are fundamentally connected and in danger of some sort of magical cataclysm if the cast are not sent back to Earth. Then averted, or maybe just forgotten by the writers, because it's never mentioned again.
It's possible that the worlds' combining only happens to a limited degree when one casts the summoning spell, and the additional combination witnessed during the first season was a combination of our heroes Walking the Earth and Annette's use of the summoning spell.
Schizo Tech: There isn't really much of a difference from the real world other than that everything runs on magic instead of technology. Yet for some reason police and guards still use swords when there should logically be some kind of magical firearms technology.
The whole point of the series is to poke fun at pop cultures and conventional fantasy tropes.
In Episode 1 Airi disguised as an Elf, gives a Cutey Honey Speech and even coins the phrase Lovely Warrior.
Slap-Slap-Kiss: Junpei and Celcia, believe it or not. Junpei sure doesn't. As in, he's completely oblivious even when Celcia confesses to him. Which leads to Epic Fail number two.
The Smart Girl: Airi, lacking muscles, magic, and guns, relies solely on her brain and her acting skills to support the group.
Spanner in the Works: The elf hunters become this when an evil sorceress holds the entire world hostage as her magic, which can burn anyone at whim, does not work on those from the outside world.
Spiritual Successor: Those Who Hunt The Butterfly, aka Ageha O Ou Monotachi, which is basically Junpei as an ex-prison guard trying to hunt down Airi while she hides in plain sight (IN SPACE!...), by simply stripping everyone naked he can and checking for a tattoo. Unlike Elves, though, Junpei tends to end up arrested/beat up/etc for his trouble.
Stable Time Loop: It turns out that the Big Bad whom Celcia casts a protagonists-summoning spell to defeat is amnesiac Celcia from the future.
Summon Everyman Hero: The back-plot of the story: to defeat the Big Bad, Celcia casts a spell which summons the protagonists. Less than a minute later, the Big Bad is only mostly dead, thanks to Ritsuko blasting it with the armored tank that the spell also brought along.
Voluntary Shapeshifting: Celcia can transform into whatever she wants with her ring. However, played with in that she always ends up transforming into animals (hence she is considered Team Pet) and cannot transform back once she absorbs any one of the spell fragments. She can only change back once she gains all fragments or lose them all. The fact that the spell fragments, which manifest visibly in her body as she gains them, make her look ridiculous◊ does not help. For those who don't understand the image, the dark lines on the big bird are the spell fragments that manifest on Celcia's body. And that big bird is only one of the forms that she ends up not so willingly taking throughout the whole comic.
Wrong Genre Savvy: In one chapter of the manga, Junpei states that "you can't go by in a fantasy world without knowing a spell or two", and thus sets out to train in the arcane arts in his very own way. Hilarity Ensues.
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