The Adventures of Mini Goddess

Original Title: ああっ女神さまっ 小っちゃいって事は便利だねっ
Romanized: Aa, Megamisama - Chitchaitte Koto wa Benri Da ne
Literal: Oh Goddess - Being Small is Convenient, Isn't It

Plot Synopsis

When Keiichi is away during the day, to amuse themselves, the Goddesses make themselves very small and get involved in adventures with Gan-chan the rat.

Quick Review

Rating: 2.5 / 5
Reviewer: Marc
Review Date: 2005-07-05

Adventures of the Mini Goddesses is an oddball spin-off series that has essentially nothing to do with the original and about as "for fun only" as anime comes. Composed of 100% random side stories, this vaguely Tom and Jerry-esque series is basically a collection of 6-minute parodies of pretty much every genre you can think of, all enacted by the miniaturized goddesses (mostly Urd and Skuld) along with beleaguered Gan the rat as the butt of every joke. It's not very clever, it's not even all that funny most of the time, but it is random, cute, and full of spunk.

Adventures of the Mini Goddesses is the anime equivalent of unbuttered popcorn: Comes in bite sized pieces, has no nutritional value, doesn't even taste all that great, but is easy to keep snacking on. It's not a memorable series, but at 6-minutes a pop you can squeeze an episode in just about any free moment of the day.

US DVD Review

The four DVDs are basic but solid productions; each includes a dozen episodes in their entirety (which only amounts to 85 minutes of runtime, much of which is credits), including full untranslated credits. The video is bright and very clean, as are the Japanese and English stereo soundtracks. Extras include short bios of the characters, and a selection of nice pictures. The only significant problem is that the English credits at the end of the disc only translate the credits for the four main characters (we've filled in a few here). The discs are also available in a box set consisting of the four individual discs in in a clear plastic slipcase with a cover insert.

Content Guide

Rated 13-up by Pioneer, which seems overly strict--I'd call it 10-up at most.

Violence: 1 - There's lots of slapstick and parody violence, but it's all pretty silly.

Nudity: 1 - Hard to call... Urd wears her trademark risque outfits, but she's so cute and SD it's hard to notice.

Sex/Mature Themes: 0 - Essentially nothing past romance jokes.

Language: 0 - Clean as far as the subtitles go.

Notes and Trivia

Based on a manga spin off of the Oh My Goddess ("Aa! Megami-sama!") manga by Kouske Fujishima. There is also, of course, the far more serious Oh My Goddess! OAV series and movie.

SD, for those unfamiliar with the term, is an abbreviation for Super Deformed, an anime term (originated by the Japanese) referring to the parody art style involving cute miniature versions of characters with disproportionately large heads and tiny, simplified bodies. The characters in this series would probably be more accurately described as "chibi"--an English fan-term for small, cute characters.

Availability

Available in the US from Geneon (formerly Pioneer) on four bilingual DVDs, sold individually or as a box set.

Looking to buy? Try these stores: RightStuf (search) | AnimeNation | Akemi's a(nime)Store