The long-awaited TV anime series, The Ancient Magus’ Bride (Mahoutsukai no Yome), based on Kore Yamazaki’s manga series of the same name, will finally begin airing in October 2017. Prior to the official release, a ‘Triumphant Return’ screening event was held at Marunouchi Picadilly in Tokyo on 9 September with the following VAs as special guest speakers on stage: Atsumi Tanezaki for Chise Hatori, Ryota Takeuchi for Elias, Koki Uchiyama for Ruth, Aya Endou for Silky, and Yuhko Kaida for Angelica.

This screening event bears the title of ‘Triumphant Return’ because the first three episodes have already had successful premiere screenings abroad at Anime Expo 2017 in July in Los Angeles, USA and at Japan Expo 2017 in Paris, France. Therefore they are able to hold their heads high and make a triumphant return to Japan for the Japanese premiere. The five cast members on stage told us about their thoughts on the screening prior to the official TV release.

Tanezaki first told us that she and Takeuchi were often the only speakers on stage at previous screening events for the OVA trilogy, The Ancient Magus’ Bride: Those Awaiting a Star. ‘I’m so pleased to find more people standing behind Takeuchi-san…’, she said very excitedly, fixing her eyes on every cast member on stage with a smile. Takeuchi then talked to Tanezaki, ‘You are in a very cheerful mood today,’ and then said to the audience with a smile, ‘Since we started working on the drama CD of the series, we’re finally here to present you this and I’m so delighted.’ Uchiyama, for whom this was his first event for the series, nodded and said ‘Nothing is better [than to see Tanezaki happy],’ after seeing her grinning and letting out some bizarre ‘shi shi shi’ laughter out of joy.

Regarding the strong points of The Ancient Magus’ Bride, Kaida happily said, ‘It is beloved by all the staff and cast. I felt a profound love when I saw it at the studio, and today as I’m standing here, I can feel love from its fans too. To put simply, it’s “a series filled with love”, I’d say.’ Endo said, ‘I’m glad to see that we all share the same direction, colors, destination, focus, view and awareness. I really want to develop it together with everyone: the director, staff, cast, and fans.’ Uchida explained, ‘The visuals are incredible. I’m pretty sure you can set the bar high for it and it won’t disappoint you. It’s that good. Especially the background art is amazing, like beautiful leaves moving in the wind and the transience of nature. I bet it looks great on a large screen.’ And he added, ‘Don’t forget to look forward to great-looking food too.’

After the screening, Tanezaki, Takeuchi, and director Norihiro Naganuma appeared on stage again, and answered questions from a questionnaire filled out by the audience before the screening. Being asked about the audience’s reaction at the screenings in America and France, director Naganuma replied, ‘Americans giggled and shrieked in excitement while watching. I was surprised that this series made them laugh so much. Like, they burst into laughter when they heard this line, “my puppy.” Almost nobody left in the middle of the screening, and I think it went well.’

Takeuchi mentioned that she enjoyed the parts with the chibi characters in-between. She finds such scenes so cute, especially when it occurs before a serious story and it helps you concentrate more on the serious parts later on. As she enthusiastically talked about the chibi characters, it was announced that a short chibi anime series, called Maho-yome, would be released on Twitter from October, and a DVD would be included in the special edition of volume 9 of the manga. The first episode was shown on the screen and the audience kept screeching about how cute it was.

At the end of the event, Takeuchi said in a remorseful tone, ‘I know the TV series is finally starting soon, but I can’t help myself thinking about it ending and I’m missing it already. I wish we could continue working on the series forever, but I’ll leave such feelings aside for the time being and I’ll do my best shot acting for the 2nd cour of the series!’ as her closing comment.

Tanezaki said to the fans at the event, ‘I’m sure the rest of the series will be as great as you’d expect. We are very committed to working on it with every single image and sound. We promise that we will focus our efforts on creating a good series to the end. So, please spread the good word about it to various people and tell them how lovely it is.’

The Ancient Magus’ Bride TV anime series will begin airing in October 2017 for 2 cours! A limited special edition Blu-ray will be released too! Let’s look forward to more of its future events!