Munto

caption-width: 296: Yumemi, Munto, and Yumemi's childhood friend Ichiko in the upper left. Call me Lord Munto.

Just your standard gender-balanced Magical Girl anime.

Except the primary Magical Girl is powerless on her own, it's set in a world where magic is running out (which would kill everyone), the protagonist's goal is to destroy the seal keeping the ancient enemies away, and contrary to expectations going off to a different world does not mean your mundane origin stops caring.

Munto was Kyoto Animation's first original project, and has spawned two OVAs in the past. Those are now being expanded to a full series; the OVAs are covered in the first five and a half episodes, but with some updates, so whether you've seen them or not there's not excuse for not watching.

Of recent animation, it may have most in common with Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha; both deliberately subvert expectations of the genre, though not necessarily always the same ones, you will still find interesting, well-animated combat and deep character development in both.

This show provides examples of:
 * Ambiguously Brown: Gass seems to be vaguely Arabian.
 * Ambiguously Gay: Ichiko.
 * Takashi even says, "Whenever you talk about Yumemi, it's like you're a different person!" And Ichiko blushes and denies it.
 * Art Evolution: The battle scenes are always intricate, but the characters seem to become more defined (in terms of design) as the series goes on. Just look at their eyes!
 * Authority Equals Asskicking: Justified, as the celestials were originally created by their kings as playthings, and it may be impossible to create a celestial with more power than you have yourself.
 * Badass: Any commanding character-- Munto, Munto's commanders, Leica, and any time Gass shows up.
 * Bare Your Midriff: One of Munto's outfit. He also has a Badass Cape.
 * Barrier Warrior: Jill, one of Commander Leica's top soldiers seems to specialize in this ability.
 * Because Destiny Says So: Yumemi, Munto, and their plot.
 * Big Damn Heroes:
 * Blue Eyes: Toche and Leica.
 * Break the Cutie: Ep. 8 poor Yumemi.
 * Clap Your Hands If You Believe:
 * Cloudcuckoolander: Yumemi spends half her day looking up. She's actually quite sane and has no problem keeping her mind on reality; it's just that her reality doesn't quite match with everyone else's.
 * Conveniently Timed Attack From Behind:
 * Critical Existence Failure: Celestial beings running out of magic do this.
 * Crowning Moment of Awesome:
 * Curtains Match the Window: Yumemi's two best friends Ichiko and Suzume.
 * Gass and Lady Ryuely.
 * Dark-Skinned Redhead: Munto.
 * Disappears Into Light: What almost happened to Munto after his battle with the Akuto automaton weapon in the first OVA.
 * Dynamic Entry: At the beginning, whenever Munto appears to Yumemi he does so in a bigass flash of technicolored light and clouds of smoke.
 * Eye Scream: What Lady Ryuely had to do for Munto to go to the Lower World.
 * Functional Magic: Everything in the upper world runs on magic. Even if you think it doesn't, it does.
 * Genki Girl: Suzume, big time!
 * Green Eyes: Yumemi.
 * Eyes of Gold: Munto.
 * Hair of Gold: Yumemi and Toche.
 * Ho Yay: Munto and Gass.
 * Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: Gass and Irita.
 * Kazuya and Suzume as well, though interestingly inverted in that Suzume is the one protecting Kazuya, in a way.
 * AND Munto and Yumemi, though you don't really notice until Ep.7 when they're both standing side to side.
 * I Just Want to Be Normal: Yumemi is self conscious of her gift to see the floating island and wishes she was like everyone else. When Munto comes to ask for her help she at first refuses, just wanting to live a normal life.
 * Immortality: The celestials apparently have Type II to type III immortality depending on power, or at least live extremely long. They seem to be perfectly fine with this. They do mature at the normal rate, which would explain the dearth of children even if there weren't other considerations.
 * They also don't need to eat-- celestials only need to take in Akuto, like plants take in sunshine.
 * Invisible to Normals: Literally. An entire planet, that just happens to share our orbit, very closely.
 * Instant Runes: Gass only.
 * Made of Magic: All Celestial beings.
 * Magitek: There's plenty of technology in evidence in the upper world, but it's all magic-based. The better examples are also regenerating,
 * Masquerade (Averted): Though science makes half-hearted attempts at explaining the events away, the celestials appear not to care, and it quickly becomes futile.
 * Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Yumemi yells "STOP IT!" to Munto's celestial being right when it's about to blast Gntarl... and it listens to her. So Gntarl takes that chance to hack at it again with his sword and grabs Ichiko and Suzume. NICE ONE.
 * Noodle People: especially in the later episodes. Look at those legs...
 * One-Man Army: Gass. There are several battles in which he takes on entire armies by himself.
 * Only Child Syndrome: In the upper world. Actually, there are only two children period - three, if Munto counts.
 * Pet the Dog: Kazuya is a delinquent, but he has many Pet the Dog moments with Suzume.
 * Pillar of Light:
 * Regeneration: The celestial beings are very hard to kill indeed, especially the more powerful ones.
 * Planet Eater: Essentially what the Visitors-- the gods-- were doing to gain more Akuto, though they were crossing space-time barriers instead of the universe.
 * Razor Wind: One of Leica's attacks in her fight with Gass is a shower of hundreds and hundreds of blades.
 * Tail, one of Munto's commanders, has a magic that he seems to form into gigantic "sharp winds".
 * Redheaded Hero: Munto.
 * Royals Who Actually Do Something: Munto and everything he's doing.
 * Sealed Evil in A Can:
 * Shut UP, Hannibal: When Gridori has Munto under his grasp while gloating, Munto smirks. Gridori snaps, "What are you laughing at--" and Munto punches his face off!
 * The Captain: Munto to Louie, Tail, Marty and Harka.
 * The Power of Friendship: Yumemi wants to save her friends and breaks out of crystals with her own strength! Her voice also magically becomes more mature.
 * Those Two Guys: Ichiko and Suzume.
 * Tranquil Fury: Whenever there's a battle scene with Gass. And later on Commander Leica calmly walking up to the robot firing a hail of bullets at her before chopping it neatly in half.
 * What Do You Mean Its Not Symbolic: Raping other worlds for their energy to create our own world, where we have ultimate control, wiping out the life on the victim world in the process...
 * White-Haired Pretty Girl: Leica.
 * Zettai Ryouiki: For no obvious reason (except maybe the most obvious there is), the three girls get to wear a grade-A-zettai ryouiki Sailor Fuku for about one minute.
 * Tranquil Fury: Whenever there's a battle scene with Gass. And later on Commander Leica calmly walking up to the robot firing a hail of bullets at her before chopping it neatly in half.
 * What Do You Mean Its Not Symbolic: Raping other worlds for their energy to create our own world, where we have ultimate control, wiping out the life on the victim world in the process...
 * White-Haired Pretty Girl: Leica.
 * Zettai Ryouiki: For no obvious reason (except maybe the most obvious there is), the three girls get to wear a grade-A-zettai ryouiki Sailor Fuku for about one minute.

Episodes of this series provide examples of:
 * Refusal of the Call: Yumemi is not very happy about Munto's intrusion in her perfectly fine life, at least at first.