Fall 2018 Anime: A Certain Magical Index III

Synopsis

Academy City is a high-tech sovereign city in Japan built to research and develop students with esper abilities and advanced technologies. Touma Kamijou is one of the students in Academy City who, although does not seem to exhibit any esper abilities, instead possess a unique ability to negate supernatural powers called “Imagine Breaker.” A chance encounter with the young nun Index, who possess knowledge from 103,000 magical grimoires, changed the course of Touma’s life, leading him to a series of events that increasingly brought the science side and the magic side to collission.

Comments

Halimun Muhammad (The Indonesian Anime Times)

With a gap of seven years since the second season aired, the third season of A Certain Magical Index begins by propping the audience to keep up with the situation from the end of the second season. That is to say, the first episode does not go straight into action, but presents a brief recap the incidents that Touma has went through, and setting up the mood that resulted from clashes with Roman Catholic Church operatives throughout the second season, and indicates the course of the story going forward. Shadows of war looms over brief moments of everyday-ness through dialogues, and Academy City’s display of strength, imparting the sense that despite some characters’ effort to allay it, a major open conflict is a given inevitability and the two sides ae just making sure they’re ready to fight it.

As indicated at the end of the episode and from the next episode preview, the action will begin from the second episode, as Touma and Tsuchimikado infiltrate Avignon, the French city that for some period was the seat of the Roman Catholic papacy, to deal with the latest plot of the Church’s secret organization God’s Right Seat, involving a magical artifact known as the Document of Constantine. The Document of Constantine arc will also put one of fan favourite characters, Itsuwa, in the spotlight after merely having brief appearances in the second season, along with the proper appearance of God’s Right Seat member Terra of the Left. Their unique magics should offer opportunities for interesting fight scenes in this arc.

The third season will be a rather busy one, with the first opening sequence seems to indicate that at least the first half of the season will cover the story up to the British Royal Family arc. And although the overarching conflict is the one between Academy City and the Roman Catholic Church, battles between espers in the science side will also be featured with the Battle Royale arc. So there’s variety to be expected from the action.

Facts and Figures

Screenshots and Trailer

The Indonesian Anime Times