Fancy Lala: Bits and Pieces

In the shadow of Cardcaptor Sakura lies a maho-shoujo series called "Fancy Lala" [1]. Unless you've had a strong dose of shoujo in the past, I recommend staying away from this series. Otherwise, please read on.

The TV series opens in the neolithic era where a young girl meets a strange middle aged man and then escapes an attack from a pair of towering saurian monsters. The attack becomes dream for a dreamy third grader named Shinohara Miho. She draws manga and dreams of fame. In an early scene, Miho buys screen tone, which is cut out and glued to a drawing as shading. The young protagonist also bears an uncanny resemblance to Fukuzawa Yumi from "Maria-sama ga Miteru" or Mihama Chiyo from "Azumanga Daioh".

Miho & Lala

Miho meets the strange man from the neolithic era again and receives a pair of plush toys as a gift. Once home the plushies come to life and give the girl a magical board that can create clothes for her and transform her into her older alter ego Fancy Lala. Lala is discovered in a fashionable sector of Tokyo by a talent agency and begins her adventures in the world of show business.

My first, second, and third reason for watching this series were (ranked in order of importance)

1. TAKADA AKEMI
Lala again

2. TAKADA AKEMI
Ayukawa Madoka from "Kimagure Orange Road"

3. TAKADA AKEMI
Painting called Moon on her Pierrot website

Her character designs captured a following during the eighties with "KOR" and "Maison Ikkoku". Her depictions of women are often beautiful, sometimes sensual [2], but always evocative. In "Patlabor", her designs brought the misfits of the SVII to life.

As for the series itself, the first episodes are spent setting up the series. While they look quite good, the plot and dialogue do not stand out. The end is open and leaves the audience with a sense of loss. The middle episodes have some gold nuggets.

During a publicity shoot, Lala's gay make-up artist [3] tells her that adolescents on the cusp of growing-up can become sensitive to what they loose by leaving childhood behind. A later episode explores this idea when she remembers a teddy bear that she discarded as a child. These scenes are directed at the adults and contrasts Miho the child and Lala the grown-up. They remind me of the theme of growing-up in Pokemon, when Ash let Pikachu choose whether he wants to evolve to his next stage or not. There are other instances when Ash bucks the conventional wisdom other trainers and let his Pokemon grows-up the way that they wanted, which is a metaphor for children growing-up. In both series, the moments were sparse, but welcome.

The clock episode, the student teacher, and some of the other episodes display noteworthy animation with creative camera angles and direction. However, the overall series does not rise much beyond have good scenes and episodes to appeal to a larger audience. If you want to see old school character designs and animation, this is a good one to check out. Give this one a pass otherwise.

As a side note, the Italian opening [4] is ridiculously good.

[1] summary http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fancy_Lala
[2] As opposed to the loli trends that are in demand these days.
[3] I am not making Komi-san up.
[4] The Italian versions are sung by Christina Avena.