[Skuld-chan]

What exactly is this anime about?  I'm interested in it based solely on it's theme song, Happy Material.  Then I looked up the opening animation, it has me intrigued!  Is it about magic and ... LOTS of romance?  Looks like it could be a harem.

[Tenchi Ryu]

Never actually watched the anime or read the manga, but I know a decent amount about it from the internet 

Its basically the story of an 11 year old boy named Negi who comes to a school as a Teacher to classroom full of girls. All of these girls are around 14, and most are attracted to Negi. Negi is a very powerful wizard, and there are contracts that wizards make with someone making that person embedded with power and they become the wizards protector. The bond is sealed with a kiss, so most of these contracts that have been made turn into full blown out marriages sooner or later. So as you should be able to guess, the girls are fighting for Negi's attention to become that partner. He's actually made contracts with some of the girls, but of course thats not enough, cause he has to choose one girl The creator of the series originally wanted to make a Shounen type series, but the execs forced him to make a romantic comedy. So he would squeeze in small DBZ type situations every now and then. Because of the popularity of the series, he has a lot more control now, which means if you would read a chapter of the manga now, you would think Harry potter has fused with DBZ 

Two anime series were made, Negima! and Negima!?

Negima! was the first one made, and followed the manga to a certain point, then completely started making original material. The second series, Negima!? re-boots the series to make the show follow the manga more closely, but no characters are properly introduced at all in this series because they expected you to have watched the first show and or read the manga, so the first episode gets straight into the adventures with all the characters part of the story.

[susano]

The Negima! Magister Magi  series is written by Ken Akamatsu.   Since Ken Akamatsu was the creator of the harem series "Love Hina",  Negima can be consider a Harem series. Yet, Negima is a fanasty series which includes the Harem subgenre as part of its main plot.  Negima is about a ten-year-old boy who wants to become a Magister Magi.  The boy's name is Negi  Springfield.  Negi's search for his father  is the second part for the plot of Negima! Magister Magi. 

The reason for the Harem sub-genre is focus on the class which Negi is teaching.  It has a total of thirty-one female students. As usual, the main female protagonist and three other female characters have develop serious feelings for Negi Sprinngfield.  Rest of Negi's students do have some degree of feelings for their Teacher.

When compare to other series which include the Harem Sub-genre, Negima! Magi Magister can be a nightmare for any male who wants to be in a Harem series.  As you continue to read the series, you will find which of Negi's thirty-one students who have develop serious feelings for him.

I have thought that Negima was a parody of the Harry Potter series.  Over time, I  had noticed that Ken Akamatsu was writing an unque series.  Negima is a challenage for anyone who wants to read the series.

     

[Tenchi Ryu]

Susano has a better description than me
I plan on watching it sooner or later, I just usually tend to stay away from the younger than 15 romantic plots, cause they usually don't go anywhere 

[Skuld-chan]

Hmm, so then I'll have to figure out which series I have downloaded. LOL  Thanks for the info guys! 

[rumiya]

Hmm, so then I'll have to figure out which series I have downloaded. LOL  Thanks for the info guys! 

yes ther are 2 series out on dvds.the first is master megina and the second is negima!?
i feel the second is better and inline with the manga,i have bouth.now there is also negima ala babba series to and alt world to .not yet here .i have some of the fansubbs. will have to upload the english versions i got... 

[Skuld-chan]

Rumiya, you are a god!  Have I ever told you that?

[SimmyChoy]

Haven't read the series beyond the first manga chapter. Though from what I heard...

The manga started off as a kind of Love Hina harem type series (not surprising since the person behind it was Ken Akamatsu), with fanservice, misunderstandings, and whatnot you would expect from Love Hina (other than the fact that the MC is currently 10 and his 'potential' love interest are like at least 4-5 years older. Maybe more. And has magical powers ala Harry Potter). But what's funny is, the series changed focus from those kind of antics, to a more shonen type series. From what I have heard of the recent chapters, it's battles and powerups now. Oh the harem elements are still there. But now the series is closer to Naruto, Bleach, One Piece, etc. than Love Hina.

And in either case, the manga is better than the animes (and is obviously way past either anime too). It's like they decided to go in one direction with the first anime, realize that didn't work and made a new anime series that is unrelated to the first. And AFAIK, no new anime is in the works.

[Skuld-chan]

O.M.G.


I cried.


Wow, I just got done doing a Negima marathon.  I have to say that towards the end...there are quite a few tear jerker moments!

[AdmiralTigerclaw]

Do not watch Negima!

...Well, too late.  But the first animated series stayed kind of in line to thing until around the Kyoto arc.  Then, it ran out of material because Ken had not progressed past it.  So they made up that whole tearjerker, mood whiplash finale.  Which was an incredibly stupid move.

Negima!?  Has a plot that's passable, but half the episodes act like they're on LSD and written by the same people who do MAD TV skits.  That, along with the time constraints of TV series, ruin any chance at a good strong story.

There are some OVAs out now, but they kind of exist in the middle of the timeline.  Which makes zero sense to me.

Your best bet is to go right to square one and follow the story of the Manga.
http://www.mangafox.com/manga/mahou_sensei_negima/v01/c001/1.html

We are in the 300s at this point, and Ken has a rate of about one chapter per week, with a few break weeks here and there.

[Skuld-chan]

Hmm, that's interesting to note.  All in all, since I'm not judging the series based on the manga, I think they did a good job considering they ran out of material.  Now I wonder how Ken thought as he saw his unconcluded work drafted on the fly?

[AdmiralTigerclaw]

You don't want to know.

But let's put it this way.  The first anime covered about 11 volumes.

There are currently over thirty volumes, and it doesn't look to be over yet.