LogFAQs > #968921398

68. The Demon Girl Next Door
https://myanimelist.net/anime/39071/Machikado_Mazoku
Summer 2019 (12 episodes), Spring 2022 (12 episodes)
My Score: 7/10, MAL Score: 7.65/10 S1, 7.89/10 S2
Best Character: Yoshida Shamiko Yuuko

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCBdGYf06kQ

Premise: Yoshida Yuuko wakes up morning having suddenly grown horns and a tail. It turns out her family is descended from the Dark Clan, and shell need to defeat the local magical girl from the Light Clan to remove a curse on their bloodline. The only problem is, Yuuko is super weak!

The Good: The Demon Girl Next Door is a comedy about an ineffectual demon girl trying to defeat a super-powerful magic girl. Yuuko (who decides to go by Shadow Mistress Yuuko, which is shortened against her will to Shamiko) has grown horns and a tail, but otherwise her transformation didnt bring any special powers. Momo, meanwhile, was strong enough to save the world once, and now she just wants to live a normal life. A lot of scenes involve Shamiko trying to challenge Momo to a duel of some sort, even though she has zero chance of winning. Momo, taking pity on her rival/friend, usually ends up training Shamiko as an excuse for them to hang out. The two of them have a fun dynamic, but I thought this anime improved a lot once the supporting cast grew, especially in the second season. I enjoyed all the scenarios that used different combinations of fun characters like Shamikos statue with the spirit of her ancestor, her supportive younger sister Ryouko, magical girl Mikan who is cursed with bad luck, and so on.

The Bad: I thought the first season became a little repetitive. Too much of it was Shamiko trying to challenge Momo to a duel and getting tricked somehow. Like I said above, though, that became less of an issue later in the first season as the supporting cast grew. The second season was also a huge improvement that focused more on the lore of the town and Shamikos powers, so I enjoyed it a lot more. Still, that weak half of the first season held this ranking back a bit.

Overall: The Demon Girl Next Door is a fun anime about how sworn enemies wind up becoming friends. The setting has surprisingly deep lore with various fantastical people and things that happened there in the past. The best parts about this were the various comedic situations that arose with different combinations of characters. The Momo/Shamiko friendship was great too, as Ill cover in the character write-up below. The only thing holding this back was that I thought parts of the first season were repetitive and weak, but, even then, it wasnt terrible.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/7/1/3/AABz_zAADz05.jpg

CHARACTER: Yoshida Shamiko Yuuko (The Demon Girl Next Door)
https://myanimelist.net/character/170466/Yuuko_Yoshida
Voiced by: Kohara Konomi
TOP 100 RANK: 70th

SPOILERS FOR THE DEMON GIRL NEXT DOOR

VIDEO LINK: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_91veZybkA4

When Yuuko woke up one morning with demonic horns and an expressive tail (its a ton of fun watching that thing move in various scenes, its like a window into her mood), she was given a mission to end the curse that has plagued her family. All she needed to do is defeat a magical girl. Thankfully, she met one right away when Momo saved her from being hit by a truck.

Shamiko has low strength, low stamina, and somehow even less magical power. The only ability she gets early on is to change forms in a crisis, but her new clothes are a skimpy outfit seemingly meant for a succubus. They mostly just embarrass Shamiko, and any increase in power seems marginal at best. Momo, meanwhile, can transform so fast theres a timer in the corner of the screen counting the nanoseconds. She stops a speeding truck. She catches an entire tray of dropped food before any of it hits the ground. Their difference in power couldnt be greater.

Luckily, Momo takes pity on her enemy and mostly just wants to be friends. I love the dynamic between them, even if I thought too many of their early interactions were Shamiko challenging Momo to a duel only to get tricked. Shamiko plays up her demonic persona a lot. She really tries to be evil. Shes just really, really bad at it. It turns out that a lot of her demonic powers work on the subconscious. She can enter peoples dreams and wield some powerful weapons when shes in there. Shamiko mostly uses this to help people, which flabbergasts Momo when she learns of it because she can come up with dozens of evil uses for the ability without even thinking about it.

Over time, Shamiko becomes enamored with the idea of turning Momo into her vassal. Momo isnt even fully against the idea, except it would mean limiting herself to much less magical power. The two begin helping each other through various situations, even though they should be enemies. Momo temporarily falls to darkness a few times without hesitation. Shamiko pledges to help protect the town to take some of the strain off Momo. My favorite part of The Demon Girl Next Door was all the zany situations that came up with the large cast of characters. Still, the growing friendship between Shamiko and Momo was always an important core of the story.