#flip_flappers

A/N: hello, i rediscovered my passwords

I recently thought of this as I was watching the first episode of the new Little Witch Academia series. Where, in the opening 10 minutes or so, the audience is treated to several exposition dumps, framed within the context of the series, in order for the anime to introduce the world and its mechanics to the audience. In-universe, Akko is a new student to Luna Nova, and thus, like the viewer, is unfamiliar to the world of magic and its rules. However, this manner of providing exposition can be seen countless times in many other anime that, at this point, I'm fairly tired of. Hell, there was one minor scene in particular where Sucy describes both the Acrturus Forest and the cocktraise's petrification power, just moments before we actually see them ourselves, rendering the point of her speech pointless.

The instance that stood out to me most were the girls in front of the Leyline Highway, where they talk about the nature of the highway itself, and how the school operates and such and such, and Akko just happened to be there to listen in on their conversations and eventually be the target of their conversations as they explain just about everything about the world to Akko. Heck, even if Akko wasn't there, they'd still be talking to an unseen audience on how magic operates in the universe.

Now, last year I watched Flip Flappers, a show I never intended to watch and one that consistently wowed me through the end and one show that I hold dearly in my heart. If you look at the first episode, the anime actually makes an effort to show you how its world and its mechanics operate simply by having the characters just interacting with the world. In the first episode, you know Pure Illusion is a magical dreamlike place which is lethal to outsiders, they contain shards of Mimi which let the protagonists transform into a more powerful form. Many mysteries and hooks are established, such as those pertaining to the nature of the Amorphous shards the girls are collecting, and the nature of the organization Papika is working for. Unlike many other anime, all we get in terms of explaining stuff to the viewer is "This is Pure Illusion. Welcome to Pure Illusion!" and "Is this a dream? I've heard of lucid dreams before...". The anime actually expects the audience to think and interpret events and the world without spoonfeeding them. And that is one rare quality I find missing so dearly from most anime. You would expect Papika or anyone from Flip Flap to spoonfeed you information about the world, but they don't, and what you get is a magical fun-filled adventure in the snow and coming to your own conclusion on what Pure Illusion is and how it works.

Not to say FliFla doesn't have moments where the scene slows to a crawl to provide exposition, but those moments are limited to only 3 : Welwitchia telling Cocona she's empty, Hidaka explaining what Pure Illusion is, and Yayaka explaining Asclepius and its motivations. Aside from that, the anime is relatively exposition free, and important details are foreshadowed properly or showcased properly, and these help contribute to the overall narrative of the anime. For instance, Yayaka's allegiance to Asclepius can be seen in Episode 2 as she grabs onto Cocona's arm to feel for the tracker from Episode 1. If FliFla was any less competant, there would be a scene or flashback where the tracker was explained, Yayaka's reasoning for doing so would be given out, and everything would be clumsier and precious precious screentime would be wasted. Or Salt's relationship to Cocona, the show never explicitly tells the audience he's Cocona's father, but his relationship with Mimi makes it very obvious that he is, or the fact that he grins mysteriously when meeting Cocona for the first time hints at this being the case. Again,  the show didn't stoop to the levels of having Salt call Cocona his daughter or something similar.

The show doesn’t even explain to you what a Thomasson is or what the symbols mean. It’s up to the audience’s initiative to look up on what’s a Thomasson or to look up the symbolism used. Again, no scene of Hidaka giving the definition of a Thomasson, just him saying “Get in the Thomasson”. Shows like this are hard to come by, ones that respect the audience’s intelligence and don’t spoonfeed them every opportunity they get.

Flip Flappers does so many things right, I'm probably gonna write more on this in the future. It is ultimately my favorite anime of all time, and I miss it dearly. Thursdays just aren't the same anymore.

as you?>.