Episode 2:
From technical perspective, it's well made: nice art, good animation, good (if not outstanding) soundtrack. I only disliked the dance in the 2nd episode, that felt somehow... Different from the rest. Was that CGI? Or something else? Can't put my finger on it.
The show also suggested some interesting concepts: magic with whistling, ranking system, mana gathering from citizens. Some how the first one is entirely forgotten in the 2nd episode, the 2nd one is just barely touched upon, even though it should be one of the focuses of the story instead (they get expelled otherwise, right?). And the 3rd... I predict, that it will be used as McGuffin element ti save the girls from actual studying and polishing their skills.
And that just break it for me after all. This simply implies that the show is trying to be cute for the sake of being cute and will be promoting "friendship" as the only solution for conflict (and we did get a hint of conflict here, which also got forgotten for a time in 2nd episode).
The anime reminded me of Release The Spyce somehow, but that one, besides being cute and having great soundtrack, had weight to its story as well. It was meaningful and consistent through out the series. I do not remember it forgetting its own concepts, at least.
Here it's like authors are trying to attract different audiences and throw a lot into the mix, losing their identity. I mean, some moment if the duck chase we so... Unnecessary, at least. The whole plot of the episode could work if it was a filler inba long series, but not here, where you have not established anything yet. Even Princess Principal with it's disjointed order managed way better.
So overall, the world they've shown is interesting and they could build a great story in it, but it seems like it's not the intention. Plan is to force waifus on us and I am not sure we need that. I surely don't.
