NieAFinished up my Fancy Lala rewatch today; another series I hadn’t watched in so long that while I remembered the overall story, I had forgotten many of the details. It was as good, if not better, than I remembered it. Charming and cute without being saccharine sweet, with a great story and characters, and excellent writing. I forgot how good the final episode was; it’s surely one of my favorite anime series finales.
Do tell, Akiru. Do tell. 
(For those unfamiliar with Fancy Lala, this is a joke breaking the fourth wall. What Akiru is saying to Miho is the premise for series, and Akiru is not aware that Miho does exactly what she’s describing.)
A cameo I never would have noticed the first few times I watched Fancy Lala all those years ago, since Tokusatsu wasn’t even in my vocabulary yet. I definitely noticed it this time, though!
Well, my long awaited (and much enjoyed so far) rewatch of Fancy Lala may be coming to an abrupt end nearly halfway through…
One of the very few downsides to physical media is that some forms of it can wear out over time. My Fancy Lala DVDs are more than twenty years old. Disc three is no longer recognized by my player as a video disc, but as a data disc with some of the content missing when it does finally read it (after a lot of churning and scanning). I wonder if one of the layers went bad. I see no evidence of disc rot (the data side is still shiny and silver with no signs of flaking or decay) , but I do see evidence that I tried to polish the surface some time in the past, probably the last time I tried watching the series again. My computer disc drive won’t read the disc either, so ripping the episodes with HandBrake also isn’t an option.
Being an old and relatively obscure series (and therefore long out of print), finding the episodes by other means may not be easy either. The English dub is on youtube and some free streaming services, but I watch anime in Japanese with English subtitles. That might work as a last resort if I don’t want to give up on my rewatch… Maybe this is why it’s been so long since I last watched it...
How long has Fancy Lala been in my anime collection? Since Ye Olden Times when a 26 episode anime series was released three to five episodes at a time, on up to eight DVDs in total, over the course of six months to a year. Complete series collections were unheard of in the early 2000s. You had to wait quite a long time to watch a series from start to finish when adding it to your collection.
The one advantage to that release strategy is all the cover art you get to have in your collection. In Fancy Lala’s case, that means six gorgeous pieces of artwork by Akemi Takada.
Time to begin two more anime series, and this time I’m treating myself to a couple of rewatches.
Up first is Fancy Lala, which might have a funny sounding name, but is one of the most charming shows in my collection, combining the magical girl and idol genres. Nine year old aspiring manga artist Miho finds a magical pen and sketchpad one day. The pen and pad allow her to draw things (clothes, usually) which then pop out and become real, and the pen also allows Miho to transform into… a fifteen year old girl. Miho gives her fifteen year old self the name Lala, and then gets scouted as an idol. There are no evil villains plotting to take over the world in this magical girl show, just a girl trying to balance her school life and her secret second life as an idol. It’s been well over ten years since I last watched Fancy Lala, so I’m looking forward to discovering it again.
Next up is Gundam Build Fighters, which I can’t believe is eleven years old now! It does not seem like that long ago, but that means it’s been about a decade since I last watched it! It’s probably one of the main things responsible for the renewed interest in gunpla over the past decade, which is fine with me, since I got ensnared into that hobby as well as in indirect result of this series! My other reason for rewatching Gundam Build Fighters is that somehow, the sequel Gundam Build Fighters Try slipped through my viewing rotation, and I still haven’t seen it yet! So I am watching the first series again to refresh my memory on the events and characters there to prepare myself for Try.
RozzychanA child uses magic to become 16 and have a singing career, and everything works out fine.
Sometimes you gotta be uncynical when you have dreams.
#anime
Fancy lala transparence full
Dylan-149 [moved]@[email protected] Yeah, I haven't seen the OVA, but it doesn't sound like it's got any real connection to the entertainment industry and is more an updated version of Cinderella
#FancyLala is streaming on Tubi, at least in the US and Canada
Like one of 9-year-old Miho (who turns into 15-year-old Lala with the help of tiny, cute dinosaurs)'s friends states she wants to be an actor, and contemplates what she'd do if she was asked to take her clothes off to do a scene as an adult; she decides it would depend on the script. #FancyLala
Lala makes her acting debut in episode 3 of #FancyLala, and even though it's no where near the level of Perfect Blue, there's still an air of skeeviness that even elementary schoolers are aware of in the Japanese entertainment industry.