So today we’re dissecting an anime titled Vermeil in Gold: The Strongest Magician Passes Through the Magical World with the Greatest Disaster. Breathe, beavers. Also known as Kinsou no Vermeil in Japan and Vermeil in Gold in the West, the series is based on Amana Kota’s manga with illustrations by Umezu Yoko, which grew to six volumes in five years with the support of Square Enix. The original, alas, is not even published in English, except for the version with a misunderstanding called Manga UP! for connoisseurs of black rectangles and other forms of censorship.
The manga, by the way, has a cool drawing, so I also recommend it. The adaptation was entrusted to the little-known Staple Entertainment (“After 3 seconds, he turned into a beast,” if that tells you anything), which clearly did not let us down. Director Takashi Naoya (A Certain Scientific Railgun), his assistant Asami Matsuo (Gintama), screenwriter Takahashi Tatsuya (Eromanga Sensei), and character designer and animator Tateishi Kiyoshi (Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood), are working on the project. Ghost in the Shell: The New Movie). Let’s finish with the facts and get to the point.
The main character’s name is Alto Goldfield and he is a freshman Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry Royal Academy of Magic Ortigia, and goes to excellent students. True, the guy still runs the risk of staying for a second year, because his Achilles’ heel was the call, and without his own familiar, local sorcerers do not take it in any way. Luckily, at the last moment, our boy gets hit with an ancient grimoire about summonings, fails to be careful, casts a spell that he sees for the first time, and ends up under a succubus. At first glance, something vulgar and stupid, albeit pretty, loomed. In practice, the product well exceeded all expectations.
What do we have? Studying at the school of magic, although not much attention is paid to the lessons and in general the topic is disclosed only in general terms. Graters with the local student council. A conflict with the strongest sorcerers of the world, who stir up something and for some reason, not embarrassed to mow down their own kind, and even more so muggles mimocrocodiles. All this is intertwined quite successfully, the plot does not strike with depth, but it develops briskly, and the groundwork for the future is promising. True, Alto, as usual, is just like that The Boy Who Lived special and bends everyone, okay, at least our Marty Sue was besieged a little during the first season. On the other hand, it was possible to come up with at least a couple of spells for the protagonist, even if from the same school of magic: well, not a hero, but a walking freezer.
At the same time, some drama about the difficult past of Vermeil is organically woven into the story, and all sorts of indecencies – quite innocent, if you think about it – suddenly turn into quite a decent and even touching romance. Oh, yes, the demon needs sweet buns for the soul, but to maintain its vital activity, it needs the owner’s mana through this very thing. At worst, kisses will do. Remember “The Strongest Hero Trained in the Secret Dungeon”? Something in the same spirit, but the eternal theme is revealed much better. Comedy elements are also in place, even if they usually come down to this very thing again. Everyone is mixed into Vermeil in Gold, while everything is put in its place in order to weave a single canvas that imperceptibly, step by step, catches the viewer. In fact, this is one of the best anime not only of the season, but also of the year, which may well close the top ten. Although partly the situation is due to the banal lack of competitors.
The visual part absorbed all the best from the manga, the character design and music did not let us down either. By the way, the opening for the song “Abracada-Boo” performed by Ishihara Kaori describes the work very concisely and accurately. Funny, heartfelt and touching in places, with the right angles at the right moments and good action – instead of a series for killing time, the anime “Vermeil in Gold” turned into a very pleasant spectacle that does not pretend to be strained intellectuality, without cruelty and debauchery with or without reason. From the category of “relax and have fun.”
No, all this, of course, is very banal: good heroes, evil villains, the redemption of evil and love rules the world. The point is how these extremely hackneyed clichés are implemented, connected and presented, forming an integral picture that successfully distracts the viewer from the fact that everything in this life has already been in The Simpsons. Etty, oddly enough, is served in doses strictly prescribed by the doctor, which does not allow this aspect to crush the plot under itself – so, the cherry on the cake. The anime’s ratings are mediocre, so let me remind you once again that we have here not a work from a famous mangaka and the first real work for the studio. Yes, this is not the S-rank of the “Mushoku Tensei: Reincarnation of the Unemployed” level, but on the aggregators “Vermeil in Gold” has clearly collected a little less than it deserves: there is something to complain about, but the disadvantages are more than offset by the merits. Sometimes you just need to watch and enjoy, turning a blind eye to small shoals instead of their deep and comprehensive analysis, since the series does not particularly pretend to anything, but allows it.
An attempt to combine a lot of light ecchi – so far only with a love triangle, without a harem – with a more or less serious fantasy turned out to be quite curious. Fantasy is, of course, the level of Rowling, not Tolkien, and yet. The question is where the story will go now. I would like to see an emphasis on the world, its laws and magical things, as well as the development of not only relations between the characters, but also themselves. Not to mention a certain understatement regarding the features of Alto and the motives of the antagonists. Which is supposed to be handled by the local Dumbledore, not the first year, but the Dumbledores are like that. Here, however, there is an unpleasant moment: you still have to live to continue because the source material has come to an end. The option with a full-length filler disappears, because the bird is on the wrong flight.
If you read the comments on specialized resources, then the haters are on the alert, and in some ways they are right, however, “Vermeil in Gold” is a cheerful and cheerful anime with elements of drama, comedy and romance that are well-fitted, which, in fact, is much deeper and more entertaining than may seem at first glance.
