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Midnight Occult Civil Servants (2019, Lidenfilms)

Anime Reviews

Midnight Occult Civil Servants (2019, Lidenfilms)

真夜中のオカルト公務員
Mayonaka no Occult Koumuin

Worth A Watch

Arata Miyako had just signed up his new role with the Midnight Civil Servants but it doesn't quite turn out what he had expected. It was a team of people that dealt with various supernatural beings you would usually see or read about in folklore and myths, otherwise known as "Anothers" in the team. Their job was to keep them troubling humans during their everyday life. As his new colleagues bring him to his first encounter, not only is he not afraid of them but he discovers he could also communicate with them using the "Ears of Sand" no other member has ever possessed. As Arata continues his job and re-unites with an old friend from the past, the "God of Disaster", his mysterious lineage of Omyouji begins to catch up with him. Will ability help bring humans one step closer to co-existing with the Anothers?

Being a fan of the class Gegege no Kitaro and Natsume Book of Friends, I just had to give this show a go when I read the Youkai, supernatural beings from Japanese folklore were involved. The Manga it's based on by Yoko Tomotsu is serialised in the Anime NewType magazine and you'll immediately see it's aimed at the ladies with its full cast of bishounen, "pretty boy" cast and hints of gay men relationships. So, the Youkai themselves aren't scary looking either (with the odd creepy moments. It's mostly cute, comedy and love. A bit cliche really until mid way when stories spread multiple episodes then it really picks up with its scenarios.

Other than that there's little to be impressed by. Art is average and sometimes characters look off proportions. Arata just happens to be voiced by Jun Fukuyama best known for his role as Lelouch from Code Geass. It's got a good OST composed by Evan Call who also did the soundtrack for KyoAni's Violet Evergarden. The first episode was pretty entertaining even though the scenario's been seen over and over before. On the other hand, the theme songs and art isn't so great. The colours are really flat and animation rough.

There are also 2 special "unaired" OVA episodes that got exclusively shown on Hikari TV too which are officially numbered as 14 and 15, oddly skipping the number 13. The two episodes focus on Theo which kind of rounds up the series better since he was the only one out of the trio that didn't get any back story.

As a short series, it gets quite good but for the long run, I would recommend watching Natsume Book of Friends which has both Youkai and similar themes but overall better direction, tales and cast of characters.

Midnight Occult Civil Servants

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