First Glance: Energy of Hope ~Precure Complete Bloom~
Premise
As members of the magical girl team Precure 5, Nozomi Yumehara and her classmates back in middle school worked to save the world. Even though they are now adults dealing with adult challenges, a new evil is just starting to emerge from the shadows.
Zigg’s verdict: All Growed Up
Although doing adult sequels to magical girl tales is not unheard of, it is famously difficult to execute properly because the genre is essentially an escape fantasy for young children. When your primary problems are otherwise boys and homework, it is much simpler to rationalize rescuing the planet. Maintaining a justifiable suspension of disbelief in a sugar-coated girls-own adventure can be a little more challenging once jobs, taxes, and all the other accoutrements of adult life enter the scene.
Precure Full Bloom, to its credit, doesn’t try to sidestep the more mature concerns of its freshly grown cast—quite the reverse, in fact. It frequently seems as though the program is really attempting to ladle on the mature themes to explain its own existence and preemptively dispel criticism of it as a pure nostalgia exercise during these opening 22 minutes, during which there is an almost comic amount of trauma. To be fair, the major plotline in this story—involving Nozomi’s student Rumi and her trauma at having to leave her familiar life and friends—has some emotional impact and seems like a fittingly poignant problem for a former Precure to be involved in. There are several excellent character moments as well, such as Rin’s quick observation that Nozomi acts happier when she is agitated. I do wish we had learned more about Nozomi’s life outside of work and about the other Precures, but to be fair, such information might be covered in later episodes.
