The Great Jahy Will Not Be Defeated!

Episode 10

I'll admit: sometimes, penning reviews can be… hard. It can be hard to wrangle your thoughts amidst so much anime that you might honestly just write a bad review. I suppose that's what I'm trying to attempt on a draft that you'll never see, reader. Shoutout to the editors (really, to Choo Sum Lee) for making this third iteration of my review a much more accurate series of thoughts.

That said, let's get into this week's episode of The Great Jahy Will Not Be Defeated! Episode 10, “The Magical Girl Will Not Lose”, swings us back around to everyone's favorite character by picking up the pace of the plot with our intrepid, unlucky Magical Girl dolling out some hot tips on how to safely cross the road in the cold open. Post-OP, we're with Jahy, who is less than amused to find out the Magical Girl is kicking it in her neighborhood, especially since she's after her friend Kokoro's heart. Thankfully, Jahy has a trick up her sleeve: she can transform into something magical too, which is enough to win over Kokoro. Problem is, she's once again is in over her head, and starts having to impress Kokoro because kids love magic, and kids will demand all sorts of magic until naturally, Jahy runs out of mana.

This sequence, as with quite a few in the episode, is funny because of Jahy herself continues to carry this entire series on her back. Jahy remains a genuine delight, even as we near the halfway point of the series, largely because she's just so darn full of herself in such an endearing way. The screaming Jahy of the first few episodes is thoroughly gone, leaving us with a 20-something year old demoness barely making it as the sole worker at a pub. That's the Jahy we've spent most the season with, and she makes all of the comedic beats hit so well. It still remains a very refreshing change from the premiere many, many weeks ago.

Jahy goes full tsundere by the middle, largely because she's just honestly feeling so upset about her weakened state. Naturally, this comes as she's indulging in the Magical Girl's misfortunate trip to school which does lead Jahy to a moral of sorts. At its simplest, it's “don't let life get you down” and all that. At it most empathetic and deepest, all of the lead-up in episode 10 results in Jahy getting earnest advice from Jingu on how to persevere, even when she's genuinely weary of existing and trying so hard to just get even an ounce of her abilities back. Like much of my experience with this series, it's unexpectedly sweet, though that's just the tip of the iceberg.

If I'm being honest, initially, when I wrote this review, I found myself craving that Jahy Spice™, and because I perceived it as “missing”, called this episode lacking. I think it might have been my own desires getting in the way of what is actually really good plot progression on the part of Jingu, a character that hasn't gotten a whole lot of screen time. In fact, I'd argue that my own perception got in the way of Jingu providing one of the most earnest scenes that really parallels Jahy's desire to crush her foe (in part because of obsession with her own fall from power and glory) with a high school girl just being really, really kind. It's this kind of earnest moment that isn't necessarily “blink and you'll miss it” but more of a “you have to be open to this show taking its time or you'll miss it”.

One of the things I love about the slice of life genre is that it does take its time: there's plot, but sometimes, that gets placed as foundation for moments and episodes like this, little character studies that break down certain aspects of Jahy and Jingu's fraught relationship as villainous hero and heroic villain, at least from Jahy's perspective. That's certainly what I found as I was retooling this review.

Ultimately, episode 10 looks alright on the surface, but actually is one of the most thoughtful episodes to date. It hits differently than the hilarious episode 9, providing really solid emotional beats, and hey: everyone's favorite Magical Girl comes back! It's all really good, and honestly, I'm glad that I got to really marinate my thoughts so that I could write something more earnest. I think The Great Jahy is worth that

It's like I say after nearly every review of this series, but if you're not watching The Great Jahy Will Not Be Defeated!, then you really should be. It's got excellent comedic timing, and in the case of episode 10, that comedy serves as an earnest setup for a confrontation between Jingu and Jahy that feels much more authentic than an all-out brawl ever could be. Come for the premise, stay for the earnest exploration of emotionality, obsession, and just trying to cope with the past. I promise that it's worth adding to your watchlist, even in a packed season like this fall.

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The Great Jahy Will Not Be Defeated! is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

Mercedez is a JP-EN localization editor & proofreader/QA, pop culture critic, and a journalist who also writes for Anime Feminist, where she's a staff editor, and But Why Tho?. She's also a frequent guest on the AniFem Podcast, Chatty AF. When she's not writing, you can find her on her Twitter or on her Instagram where she's always up to something.