Hello, hello. Welcome all, once again, to Entries from the Dead, where I discuss things I attempted to watch but couldn’t because I hated it—or more specifically, for reasons to be explained in the continuing post.
Today’s subject is Aa! Megami-sama, a series some consider the greatest “Romancing the angel” story in anime history. I don’t know if there are many others—I can’t think of any off-hand—but I went into it with the expectation that it wouldn’t be generic filth. I’ll say this: it certainly looked like generic filth. Yeesh, I can definitely tell this is mid-2000’s art style. Gray, gray, and more gray. That’s already one strike against whether or not I’d look forward to, well, looking at it.
Though I’m not so superficial. I’ve watched anime series before with this gray tone and have enjoyed them well enough. I’d gladly look past it if the story or characters were all that good. Here, or at least from what I recall, they’re not… really. The male lead is in college, a detail I forgot before looking up the synopsis again, though he still kind of acts like a high school harem lead who’s nervous and fidgety and indecisive. To me, it almost defeats the point of having them in college. I expect with that one note that characters at least somewhat act more mature. Hideki from Chobits is a not-entirely-accurate-but-close-enough example of this.
And the goddess herself isn’t quite as bad, but feels a little too artificial to me. She’s a pure and good angel who does her best and, that’s it. A lot about Aa! Megami-san feels very grounded in reality, which might aid its reputation as a serious romance, but it also risks it feeling boring and tiresome. I wouldn’t be writing this post with this title if it weren’t the latter. I only watched a few episodes, yeah, but within that time, I didn’t feel particularly attached to the characters or their relationship. I assume with sequels and such that their romantic tension is a little slow-going, but aside from the whole angel shtick, there isn’t really much here to look forward to, and the bland outweighed the potential… non-bland.
Being honest, I’ve considered picking this back up for another go on plenty of occasions. Back in late 2014, I was willing to watch things like Girlfriend (Kari), which was one of the most boring anime experiences I’ve ever had, so why the hell couldn’t I have watched this? Memory is foggy, of course, but according to my MAL notes, it was not only boring, which is what I remember most, but it was also “cliché” and “unfunny.” I guess the dialogues and situations were pretty run-of-the-mill for anime romance standards, which may have added to the boredom. “Unfunny” is interesting, however, as I remember next to no comedy present. I guess the boredom overrided my brain’s circuits and made me think everyone was just pleasantly mellow. I think I’ll try out the manga.
This brings this latest post to a close. What are your thoughts on Aa! Megami-sama? Am I a big idiot for dropping it only four episodes in? Do you agree or disagree with the reasons why I decided to drop this? Send in your thoughts and reactions to the corresponding P.O. box listed below [P.O. box information to be provided in the coming future]! Until the next episode, I’m whatever I am to you in your own perception of my online identity, signing off!
The Visualist's Veranda 
I have started collecting the omnibuses because I know this is a classic, but I haven’t read or seen any of the series yet.
I’ll reserve my desire to go through with it until after I read your review of the series.
I kind of love Ah My Goddess but will admit your reasons for dropping it aren’t wrong. It is what it is and while I found the overly cute and innocent couple at the centre fairly adorable there were a couple of reasons this worked for me. Firstly, it was early on in my adult anime watching days and so I hadn’t been inundated with a million other generic male leads who end up being romance interests. Also, I was falling in love myself at the time and I’m pretty sure that turned a lot of my brain cells to mush momentarily.
If I were to review it today I’d probably tear it to pieces, and yet I still really love this anime. Nostalgia is a wondrous thing sometimes.
That the entire series ends in a single kiss is further proof it just wasn’t very good. Its drawn well, but it lacks quite a lot which could have been included. It lacks character development. It lacks daily life reminders that the hero is in college and going to classes and needs to study. It lacks advancement of the relationship. It puts too much time into the angel-devil politics, which aren’t even interesting. Many fans of anime concede that AMG is “pretty but disappointing”.
I dropped it after 1 episode lol – didn’t care for the ‘look and feel’ of it, and from what I remember the scenes were rather mind-numbing to sit through.
I used to read the manga at the library. It was pretty fun back in the day , and I remember watching a few episodes on either Hulu or someother online service .