Aya to Majo

With large windows adorning its spick-and-span halls, St. Morwald's Home for Children serves as a warm refuge for displaced orphans. For 10-year-old Aya, she is perfectly content living without a normal family, especially since she has everyone at the orphanage wrapped around her finger. However, to her dismay, she is one day selected by a peculiar couple, Bella Yaga and the Mandrake.

Aya soon learns that she has, in fact, been adopted by a real witch who wanted her solely as an assistant and had not even considered being her foster mother. As if that was not enough, Aya is told the one rule she must obey at all times—never disturb the Mandrake. To win the hearts of this seemingly heartless witch and the grumpy Mandrake is no easy task; but unlike other children, Aya accepts this challenge without hesitation.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Aya Main

Hirasawa, Kokoro Japanese

Mandrake Supporting

Toyokawa, Etsushi Japanese

Yaga, Bella Supporting

Terashima, Shinobu Japanese

Thomas Supporting

Hamada, Gaku Japanese

Sally Supporting

Suzuki, Toshio Producer

Morishita, Kentarou Producer

Miyazaki, Gorou Director, Theme Song Lyrics

Kasamatsu, Kouji Sound Director

Reviews

Jan 5, 2024

Tanikaze

Recommended

General review: 9/10
I have read all the negative reviews and watched so many YouTube videos about why the story is disappointing and the animation is terrible. In my opinion this movie was great! I laughed so much. I loved the direction Ghibli took with this movie's animation it looks incredibly detailed very heartwarming, clean and pure. I can feel the texture of everything and also the smell. I will never understand the harsh criticism. Please consider the hard work which is going into these type of things. I think this was amazing. I enjoyed so much.

Art: 10/10
Call me mad for this but one of the ... things I admired was this beautiful art style. Everything was so good. It's hard to describe but very in between a full house CGI neither a cartoony like. It's so good. Looked like a Ghibli movie but from a different lens. Also looked like real life too and I loved it. I think this is an amazing new direction in terms of art.
Story: 7/10
I think the story was very unique and the ending was predictable but I loved the feeling of being a girl like Aya and discovering the house as a recently adopted kid.
Character: 7/10
Aya was a lovable character and I love how she gets under people's skin with her words. She is the true magical witch. Character designs were amazing.

Reviewer’s Rating: 10

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Apr 23, 2024

Lorenzz_zo

Mixed Feelings

This was honestly not as bad as people said it was. If you compare it to the other works of studio Ghibli such as Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke etc. then it obviously falls short, but as a whole the story was decent. For once, I prefered the dub as I felt it matched the story's setting in England more, but maybe that's just me. If you've not seen many Ghibli movies then this is probably not the best place to start as it is very different to the rest of them (animation included) but if so, you will probably enjoy at least some part of ... this movie.

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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May 22, 2021

Morpheus935

Not Recommended

This film is an embarrassment and a hideous stain on Studio Ghibli's mostly immaculate track record, the same way Cars 2 is for Pixar. Goro Miyazaki isn't anywhere near his father in talent but I at least enjoyed From Up on Poppy Hills and somewhat enjoyed Tales From Earthsea but this is just too much. I am genuinely astonished at how awful this film was and couldn't wait for it to end. The characters are bland and uninteresting, with the Mandrake having the most potential but he barely gets any screentime. The animation is absolutely putrid to watch and I was dearly wishing it was ... simply hand drawn like the animation in the ending credits. There is no real plot which by itself is fine since My Neighbor Totoro didn't really have one either but this film is also incredibly boring (even more than the tear inducingly boring Ocean Waves) and lacks any kind of charm or sense of wonder. I truly struggled to stay awake even with its short runtime. Sound is mostly fine I guess. Don't remember the soundtrack at all though, but the voice acting was decent (but then again, I've yet to watch an anime with bad voice acting).

Reviewer’s Rating: 1

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	Poll: Aya to Majo Episode 1 Discussion tsubasalover - Dec 30, 2020	44 replies	by Titadou »» Mar 9, 11:43 AM
	Is this coming to Netflix? MrYandereFan26 - Feb 5, 2021	2 replies	by bluefire35 »» Oct 14, 2021 3:29 AM
	Why is duration 1 minute? Zestiria - Jan 23, 2021	1 replies	by Supercuecaaa »» Jan 26, 2021 9:31 AM
	New information about the movie azertz99 - Jun 18, 2020	14 replies	by MichaelJackson »» Dec 27, 2020 9:22 PM