Magic Knights Rayearth By James Mah Magic Knights Rayearth is a medieval anime from Clamp, the company that brought the world the disturbingly hard to watch Clamp Campus Detectives. The plot involves three girls from different high schools visiting Tokyo Tower for a field trip who suddenly find themselves in a magic world which they are destined to save. The story may have been a little cliched, but that hasn't stopped the show's popularity, two television seasons, an OAV series, eight video games, seventeen music CD's, and a glutload of other merchandise. The show's character designs, animation quality, and manga source material probably helped the audience cope with a story that had already been explored a few hundred times before. A shójo, the show incorporated many genres into the main story, although focused mainly on the popular magic girl concept with a large dose of medieval scenery. Eventually even giant fighting robots were thrown into the mix. Like all magic girl shows there was the cute magic animal companion, represented by Mokona, a mix between a rabbit and Humpty Dumpty. And just like all other cute magical companions, Mokona was almost all-powerful, manifesting anything the girls might happen to need from thin air like a utility belt in the old Batman television show. Yes, the cheesiness factor was rather high in Magic Knights Rayearth, but no more than most anime. (And not nearly at such painful levels as the aforementioned Clamp Campus Detectives.) And yet, there is something decidedly off kilter about three girls getting to kill living things without any remorse. In one episode the girls fight a sand-worm not unlike the monster from the Kevin Bacon movie Tremors. (Hell, a lot like the monster from the Kevin Bacon movie Tremors.) The worm turns out to be the best friend of a little kid. Admittedly, it's an evil little kid who works for the main villain, but the concept of killing the kid's beloved pet is still a little disturbing. As if that weren't bad enough, in another episode they find a weird magic artifact which mutates life-forms into monsters. After killing a bunch of these monsters, the girls destroy the artifact and all the monsters revert back into flowers and other cute woodland life. So the monster they killed earlier in the episode might have been Mr. Bunny, trying to get back home to his loving bunny family. The thought never crosses the girl's minds. God forbid, they're just trying to save the land from evil and don't have time to dwell on the lesser creatures they might be hurting. See if you can figure this one out. After they've received weapons, the girls travel for a while, trying to accomplish various quests which tie into their larger goal, just as in all medieval animes. (Obviously role playing games have corrupted the minds of anyone with a trace of creativity.) Whenever they come upon a monster, unless fighting the monster is the plot for the episode, they kill it before it can attack. When they fight an evil human the girls can't seem to understand how someone could be that evil. Can you see where this is going? Yes, the three young girls destined to be Magic Knights aren't just destined to save the strange world, they are determined to live by the motto "If it's different it should die." Which brings up the question to the minds of all the guys who watch Magic Knights Rayearth, why don't they kill Mokona? The damn thing acts like Psyduck, but it lacks the pudgy little Pokemon's charm.