YMMV / The Asterisk War

• Anvilicious: The anti-big business political themes in the series are not subtle: the integrated enterprise foundations are viewed as the source of nearly all the world's ills, especially rampant poverty such that the orphanage had to sell Ophelia to an IEF to pay down some of its debt (whereupon she was used as a guinea pig by Hilda Jane Rowlands). Julis's goal in the Gryps arc is to force the IEFs to give some actual power back to her government so it can start fighting back.
• Awesome Music:
  • The anime opening theme, Brand New World. Also the ending song to the anime, "Waiting for the Rain".
  • Then there's the second opening theme, simply titled "The Asterisk War".
  • The second ending theme "Ai no Uta (Words of Love)", was a major breakthrough for Haruka Chisuga's career.
• Base-Breaking Character:
  • Julis. Some dislike her for being a generic Tsundere that steals screentime from the other girls, others like her for actually treating Ayato like an equal instead of putting him on a pedestal and want her to win Ayato's heart in the end.
  • Ayato, too. He can either be hated for being another bland, generic, invincible, or even totally perfect, sword-wielding hero from a Harem light novel adaptation, or liked BECAUSE of said invincibility.
• Better on DVD: Unless you have an exceptional memory, watching the show in a single go will make it easier on you to keep track of the story.
• Cliché Storm: There are many people that view Asterisk War as a completely unoriginal series that doesn't use tropes familiar to its demographic in an interesting way.
• Complete Monster: Gustave Malraux is a former member of a terrorist organization of Asterisk that in the past carried out the "Jade Twilight" plan. Hired by Nicolas Enfield to stop his daughter, Claudia, from participating in a tournament known as Gryps Festa, Gustave wasted no time attacking Claudia's best friends, Ayato and Julis, with his chimera when they visited the capital city of Julis's home country, Lieseltania, resulting in Julis tighten up the security. Returning in Volume 6—episode 24 of the anime—Gustave sends his chimera to attack the capital city in order to distract the police forces, and plans to attack the orphanage in order to lure the heroes out. After he successfully lures them out, he then attacks them with his hydra, leaving the hydra to cause destruction in the poor district of Lieseltania's capital city.
• Fan Nickname: On /a/, Julis is referred to as Pink Houki.
• Harsher in Hindsight: Koichiro's behavior towards Kirin becomes worse when you realize that he deeply resented his Genestella brother Seijiro for being the heir to the Toudou clan. His inner bitterness over it and potentially losing his promotion at Galaxy reflects all the hard work he had to do to make his way to the top.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • Ayato is very similar to a certain hero from another, rather similar, anime from A-1 Pictures. With the dub of this anime out, Ayato is now the rival of Kirito (although the latter only spoke in a different installment in which his rival sounds different).
  • The fandom rivalry with Chivalry of a Failed Knight becomes even funnier when you consider that both TV series respectively feature the voices of Nao Tōyama, Chinatsu Akasaki, Yuu Kobayashi and Shintarō Asanuma. Bonus points for the series airing around the same time in Japan.
  • Atsushi Tamaru (Ayato) went on to voice the Master Swordsman protagonist of another Wizarding School Light Novel adaptation who walks in a partially clothed Love Interest in the first episode, namely Oliver Horn from Reign of the Seven Spellblades. Amusingly, Julis's voice actress Ai Kakuma plays the Starter Villain, who once makes a pass at Oliver in the original novels (the anime leaves this out). Also like Asterisk War, Spellblades prominently features a Tragic Villain named Ophelia.
• Iron Woobie: Kirin, Kirin, Kirin. Her father Seijiro goes to jail, she goes to live with her Evil Uncle Koichiro, who is using her as a pawn to increase his political influence, and that doesn't stop her from enjoying life with her friends.
• Jerkass Woobie: Let's face it, Irene can be a real bitch to anyone who isn't her sister; but considering the horrors she had to endure to protect said sister, it's hard not to feel sorry for her.
• Narm:
  • The first episode has students forming to watch the fight between Ayato and Julis except that they're all horribly animated and in obvious CGI. It's just outright hilariously bad.
  • Any scene involving Flora in Japanese can come off as this, due to the fact that she sounds like she has a cold.
• So Bad, It's Good: The Off-Model scenes are just hilarious to watch.
• So Okay, It's Average: General consensus is that the series is not anything special but it's not a disaster either. It all depends whether the series' merits outweigh its flaws or vice versa.
• Stoic Woobie: Orphelia, Julis' friend, was just a sweet and kind-hearted girl who loved gardening until Hilda Jane Rowlands kidnapped her and used her in her experiments to create an artificial Strega. What Orphelia gained in power, she lost in emotion. Now, Orphelia constantly puts up a sad face and has become a fatalist.
• Unexpected Character: Koichiro Toudou makes a surprise appearance in the 11th volume after being absent for 9 previous volumes. This time around, he's working for his own family after leaving the IEF.
• Values Dissonance: In Volume 7, Sylvia Lynneheym's musical and fighting circuit rivals, the Girl Group Rusalka, plot to ruin her by starting the rumor that she has a boyfriend. While the plan is not exactly intended to be sensible in context (Rusalka's Only Sane Woman objects to it as a waste of time), why this could seem like a worthwhile plan to anyone is potentially incomprehensible to Western viewers. It has to do with the extreme Contractual Purity culture around Japanese Idol Singers: talent agencies exercise very tight control over their lives to produce a particular sound and image, to say nothing of the behavior of idol otaku if there's ever the slightest hint that their favorite idol might be in a relationship with someone. However, author Yuu Miyazaki seems to have inferred Japanese mores for (apparently) non-Japanese singers who have a worldwide fanbase: if anything, relationship rumors would make Sylvia more popular in the West, since Western media outlets and fans love celebrity relationship drama.

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