Audience reviews
20 · Sample from the first available page, separate from the total number of ratings.
LegionIscariot
Magical Index is a romcom harem disguised as a shounen.
Alot of the conflict is forced.
Characters act like villains when they first show up but then twist turns out they are not evil.
A character always seemingly dies, only to show up 100% ok in the same episode.
Alot of fakeouts in this anime.
The main character is always giving a cliche speech about friendship.
Most of the girls fall for him. The female characters are always blushing around the hero. You have many of the archetypes. The tsundere Misaka, very powerful and who is meant to be the best girl. The lolita Komoe the teacher. The mayadere Kaori who wields a sword and was first introduced as a villain. The bakadere Index a holy sister. The himedere Himegami. And more.
Its entertaining though. You dont even need to actually…
Read at the sourceMrLebowski
Solid Urban Fantasy Mix of Science and Magic
A Certain Magical Index Season 1 is set in Academy City, a huge place full of students with esper powers, and follows Touma Kamijou as he gets dragged into conflicts between the scientific and magical sides of the world.
The concept is really fun the clash between technology/esper abilities and hidden magic creates an interesting backdrop. Action scenes have good energy, the world feels big and layered, and the main cast has solid chemistry with plenty of entertaining banter. It balances lighter school moments with higher-stakes stuff without feeling too whiplashy.
On the weaker side, the pacing is a bit uneven in places and some episodes drag more than others. The animation is decent for its era but shows its age now, and a few characters or…
Read at the sourceScanerior
The series A Certain Magical Index, Accelerator and Railgun form one world and are closely connected, so I'll take the liberty of writing a joint review. This entire anime world operates on the idea of a technological city, saints and people with "supernatural abilities" - this may seem at first glance like a rather wild combination that will only result in strange chaos, but the opposite is true. The series builds its world on characters that you will immediately like, invents great plots, builds a world with a glimpse of the future, but keeps its aces up its sleeve and works best of all with small jokes, often mainly with "running jokes", which, however, do not become boring or annoying. Index is a more fragmented series with many plots, which goes through everything quickly and the qu…
Read at the sourceAshParth
Ah, the To Aru series. Back in the late 2000s, I was curious to give this a watch, and I was hooked instantly for what the premise was. An anime where science and magic cross paths? Yes, please. This, along with Sakugan no Shana and Food Wars, is one of the most known works done by J.C. Staff. The older I get, the more I realize that the franchise is more about guilty pleasure in my perspective. I mean, I understand the problems that this series has, whether I find it through videos, through reviews, and good old fashion getting old and a little more wiser. I know, the way I ended that sentence didn't sound right, but I was throwing my hat at what I would say about the franchise. I will look into every anime series as a whole one at a time to see if the franchise still had it, improved, or…
Read at the sourceNomaed
A railgun operates by passing a high electric current through two parallel conductive rails, generating a magnetic field that exerts a Lorentz force on a conductive projectile, propelling it at high velocity. Misaka Mikoto is an esper, whose ability called "Electromaster" allows her to manipulate electricity, yet somehow she is able to create an effect of a railgun without any rails. That's very representative not only of how much the author is familiar with physics, but just as how much sense this whole anime makes.
This anime is flashy and vibrant, but it comes at the price of common sense. More than half of the conflicts happen for absolutely no reason other than having a fight, because fights are cool.
The anime opens with a fight between Touma, who can nullify esper abilities, and af…
Read at the sourceBacotmuMas
I like the character named Index, she is cute and funny.
Overall, this anime is just so-so, not very good, but not bad to watch either.
The storyline is quite interesting, but there are a few flaws that make me hesitant to recommend this.
First, there is too much drama, or nonsense that the characters do, for example when Touma tries to save Index, Touma talks too much, what was that about, a lecture? Advise the enemy on his actions? And many more!
This makes me quite sick, because this conversation takes up almost half of the episode, imagine half an episode just being filled with boasting from just one character.
This also does not escape several other episodes which contain characters talking too much! So I skipped the part by skipping in time because I was too lazy to listen to his…
Read at the sourceBabineaux
NOTE: My verdict is to watch Railgun first (stick with it, it gets really good by the time it gets to Railgun S and T) and then come back and watch this as supplemental bonus material, as Railgun is simply the superior series by far, and by then you'll be invested enough that you can put up with this show's flaws. Either that, or watch Railgun up until the end of S, and then go back, before finishing with Railgun T so that you have full context.
I watched all of "A Certain Scientific Railgun" up to T, before going back and starting this, and I consider myself a fan of the Railgun series. Therefore, I have certain biases present that are very difficult for me to overlook when I came into this.
I won't get into any specifics about the Railgun shows here, and I won't give any actual spoiler…
Read at the sourceMaxTheYukoner
#2
A Certain Magical Index Season 1 started off strong with cool concepts and awesome themes like magicians and vampirism, but quickly fell off after its first half. The show has better characters than it does a plot, which does lead to some emotion here and there, but eventually gets stale after not having a good enough story to follow. It's pretty humorous at some parts, and that's a few positives for the anime I could give it. The animation was pretty good, and especially for the fight scenes, they were quiet enjoyable. But, as I mentioned, the show goes off the rails in its second half and became almost impossible to get what was going on for a few episodes. This show is great for someone who is starting to get into anime, or as a first 5 anime, but not for someone who has already see…
Read at the sourceTovape
I love this show and it's underrated. The music is god tier, llisten to all the albums published on youtube, they are amazing. Art is a masterpiece, the background scenarios are really well made, the effects etc. Dub is 10/10, I mean you got Solusod Micah for Touma and Karbowski Brittney for Misaka, what else do you want? Story is great, I haven't read the light novel or graphic novel so I might be wrong but I just like it a lot, you got some fillers but it's no big deal, overall like the characters and all. I have probably rewatched about 6 times, Index I, II, III, Railgun, S, T, Movie and Accelerator. It feels like watching the MCU but with anime
The only bad points I give are for random sexual scenes that give nothing to the story, but it's anime and the producers know their audiences…
Read at the sourceunknownanimename
Let's watse my time BOIZ! A review to A CERTAIN MAGICAL PEAKDEX.
First of all, I want to say to clueless people who thinks Index is generic/badly written or the characters are trash, that you are indeed CLUELESS.
AND SECOND OF ALL, ALL CAPITAL LETTERS HERE TO PREVENT READING COMPREHENSION, INDEX, IS PEAK FICTION THAT GOT COMPLETELY BUTCHERED BY OUR FELLOW FRIEND JC STAFF, THOUGH SAYING JC STAFF AS A WHOLE IS NOT ACCURATE, IT'S WHOEVER DECIDED TO NOT GIVE INDEX THE FATE TREATMENT, THINK AGAIN ABOUT YOUR LIFE CHOICE.
Now to calm down, I'll explain to you all, why Index, supposed to be peak fiction on screen, turned to be mid af that no one cares about, I'm snapped.
Characters
"The main character/ all the characters are not interesting blablabla"
Now Damn, JC STAFF! KNOW WHAT A CHARACTER…
Read at the sourceLwhru
A Certain Magical Index is quite an admirable concept based on Scientific Fiction and Magical Fantasy collaborated together to create an exceptional blend of ideas, stories and characters and thus achieving the highest level of popularity. The Light Novels are what creates this Universe. The Manga creates an air of generic fans and the Animated Version creates it into a Live Format and is the Best Light Novel (if not Anime) in the World. The depth of realism and personalities of various characters and places are what makes a person come back each time to review the story all over again.
PSDT. You should watch the 'TOARU' Project thoroughly.
Read at the sourceThatAnimeSnobRE
SCRIPT
The Toaru franchise is more known for its complex terminology and elaborate world building than for its plot. In the story, magic and science are at war all over the world, but the viewer spends the series in a city where most people are teenagers with superpowers who get to have generic adventures. The story sounds great on paper because the author put a lot of work in explaining the various magical and scientific powers that many characters possess. The plot however is as typical as it gets when it comes to light novels. Despite the variety in themes and special abilities the protagonist is a seemingly normal teenager who is evaluated as level zero (at the bottom), yet with his power he defeats everybody with a punch and makes his harem bigger by the day. Level zero indeed; so muc…
Read at the sourceInter_anime
To Aru Majutsu no Index is a decent but not overly notable Shonen action anime. It is worth noting that I have only seen the first season and have not read the light novels or watched the railgun spinoff at the time of writing this review.
One of the things that initially interested me about the show was how it positions itself to be a commentary on the conflict between Science and Magic as well as Religion and Superstition. While there is a great deal of scientific, religious, philosophical, and magical terms tossed around (such as "electromagnetic energy" "Gregorian chants" "Schrödinger's cat" etc) most of this is surface level, and the show really does not have anything to say about any of these topics. The whole "science vs magic" commentary falls flat as the magical based power syste…
Read at the sourceMrYandereFan26
I have been wanting to start the index/railgun series for some time now have been reluctant to start due to its length, but I saw it was nominated in the last rotation so I decided now was a good time to start it. So I gave Index a go.
I still haven’t started railgun yet or season 3 of index. Most people seem to say railgun is better and I’m hoping I will too. I like it when I agree with the majority. Lol
I must say I have enjoyed a certain magical index far. I haven’t absolutely loved it or been blown away but it is a decent series.
The world building is really good and the story is pretty entertaining. Some of the characters are good. I really like Misaka and Last Order is adorable. The main guy is pretty boring and like a typical harem protagonist but I’m used to that by now so it d…
Read at the sourceAquaTheGoddess
You are probably looking at this review and asking yourself the big million dollar question of is Index worth watching first? My answer would be a resounding NO and let me get to the review.
To Aru Index hails from a time where being 15 and edgy was a relatively acceptable concept compared to now, after all it was 2008. Peoples views were quite a bit different and so were peoples tastes. Am I being biased here? Maybe.
You were probably told to watch Index first because you get to know the lore that way. But trust me it is not really worth torturing yourself with to get it. Touma is an insufferably annoying gary stu mc who never loses and the series tries so hard to play up as a badass, hes not sorry. Then there's the endless monologuing, would it kill the characters to stfu and fight i…
Read at the sourceFlexySpagoot
The best phrase I can use to describe Toaru Majutsu no Index is "painfully average." While I personally consider a score of 7 to be an "average" quality show, I feel that Index was just so unremarkable to me that I think its more deserving of a 6. I don't personally have too much to say about the show itself, other than some good characters and a few minor plot holes or general plot weirdness I don't really think there is anything that noteworthy about the show. I decided to watch Toaru Majutsu no Index after watching the first season of Railgun a few months ago and finding it similarly average. I decided to give the series a second chance by watching the next season in the series, and was honestly pretty disappointed. I've heard from multiple sources that this franchise is really good, bu…
Read at the sourceLionzero
The year is... I forgot.
The world is... Earth. Modern day. For 2008.
There are 3 types of people. People. Espers. and Sorcerers. Espers and Sorcerers live in two different societies. One believing in Science and one Religion. Until on man with a legendary right arm and Pornhub premium will rise up to the challenge of... uh... Solving random cases he just happens to find himself in. Yeah. Pretty much it. This show is face paced with each arc being about several episodes. The characters are developed enough but the plot...
OK! So we got Touma Kamijou who meets a young nun called Index. Together they will-
Complain about having no food and money while being hunted by sorcerers, protected by sorcerers and will fight... you guessed it... An experimental esper who is being focused trained int…
Read at the sourcerobert788
Toaru Majutsu no Index (2008)
For a 2008 show, this is superbly done and honestly, I wish I hadn't put it off for so long due to the size of the series.
The story is pretty fast-paced and even episode 1 wastes no time at all getting you straight into the action. I think it is greatly paced and covers various arcs quite quickly but substantially enough to enjoy it. I know there is a huge amount of content to cover if you did everything.
The art is superb for its age, being serious and funny at the same time. It has great-looking effects and is great to watch.
The OP and ED are pretty average and nothing special. The OP is better than the ED, The ED has a slight Black Lagoon feeling to it which was nice, especially by looks though.
The characters are all pretty well developed and im…
Read at the sourceViel_Serezo
A Certain Magical Index
I love Index, I really do. It's hella entertaining. There is really no boring moment here... in this city.
It's because I love Index, that's why I will write a honest review. I will start arc to arc and write what I think about that arc and rate them.
Index Arc : I think this is a bad start for Index. I have two complaints. First is about Stiyl and Kanzaki.
Stiyl and Kanzaki told everything about Index's condition to Touma which is an outsider and doesn't known anything regarding magics.
It resulted in Touma getting dragged into the Magic World. Because of that, many assassinations were carried out to finish Touma.
Well, it was Touma's decision to get involved with it, but Stiyl and Kanzaki had the choice to not drag him in the Magic World.
Because of all these…
Read at the sourceShadowTasos
TLDR: Toaru Majutsu no Index is a confused mess of a show that suffers from an exceptionally jumbled story and too many uninteresting and undeveloped characters.
I don't usually write reviews, and I don't usually give bad scores, but Toaru Majutsu no Index was such a truly bizarre experience that I felt I had to write about it.
General
I had originally watched all 3 seasons of Railgun and loved it. The first season started off very slow, but eventually it ramped up to something very interesting, with great pacing and well fleshed-out characters that for the most part felt like they contributed to the show.
Then I decided to watch Index in order to get some more context on Touma's power, and after the first 2 episodes I was hooked. It felt strange that apparently this massive plot was t…
Read at the source
