29 November 2015: Amagi Brilliant Park is a warning to pay your mercenaries
Princess Latifah and her knight, I guess.
I finally finished watching Amagi Brilliant Park after putting it on hold last year because I was watching too many shows at the time. It's an all right anime, but frankly nothing to get excited about. (I did enjoy Kawasumi Ayako as Moffle; that's a different sort of character for her.) It should surprise no one that the primary plot about the theme park's flagging attendance wraps up favorably. No, the fairies don't all wither and die. However, there was a subplot I didn't anticipate. Naturally, spoilers fill the rest of this entry.
She's not quite dead.
Presumably to drum up additional excitement towards the end of the one-cour climax, Kanye also has to tackle the curse behind Latifah's Key AIDS. Latifah's own father, the king, is responsible for her condition. See, a decade ago, a powerful dragon attacked the fairy kingdom. They were getting totally worked by the dragon, so the king begged a wizard (yeah, a wizard) to fight the dragon and save the kingdom. Well, the wizard agreed, on the condition that he be given the hand of the princess in marriage (as wizards are wont to do). The king agreed, the wizard defeated the dragon, and the kingdom survived.
Maybe you can ask a wizard for help in return for some croquettes.
However, rather than honoring the bargain, the king reneged on the deal and turned his army against the wizard. Usually at this point in the story, you can expect a wizard's wrath to be considerable, but his animus-draining curse only seems to prevent Latifah from aging (making her immortal, I guess). It does cause her memory to reset each year, but aside from that it seems harmless enough providing everyone around her is having a grand ol' time. I gotta say, as far as curses go, that's pretty light, and it's the fairy kingdom's own fault for running such a shite theme park anyway. The royal family really got off easy considering the sort of thing that usually happens after people decide not to pay their mercenaries for saving a kingdom. (Note to any potentates reading my anime blog: Always pay your mercenaries! On time! And maybe a little extra!)
Who doesn't love delicious croquettes?
Now, I'm not saying its entirely moral or ethical to use a teenage girl as a bargaining chip, even if she is a princess, but she is technically 24 now, even though the wizard's curse has kept her physically and mentally 14 (as wizard curses are wont to do). I'm not familiar with how fairy law works, but I'm guessing there's a pretty good chance that marrying off princesses for political gain is an established and accepted practice. I'm also guessing it's totally uncool to attack the dude who just saved your kingdom, even if he is a wizard. True, this wizard (after he reveals himself to Kanye) does seem to be a bit of a dick, but maybe he's just bitter about the whole breach of contract and royal backstabbing business. It's probably the sort of thing that a not-child bride and some delicious croquettes could smooth over.
