Category: Shoujo

Summary:
Young Mikan runs away to Tokyo to follow her best friend, Hotaru, who has been enrolled in an exclusive, secretive private school for geniuses. But it turns out that Alice Academy is a lot more than meets the eye. If Mikan wants to stay by Hotaru’s side, she has to both pass the strange “entrance exam” and face the even greater challenge of befriending her very odd new classmates. Whether it’s Hotaru’s gift for inventing gadgets, the cranky Natsume’s fire-casting ability, or Professor Narumi’s control of human pheromones, everyone at the school has some sort of special talent. But what ability, if any, does Mikan possess? Mikan is going to have to rely on her courage and spunk if she’s going to stay in school, or even stay alive!

Author: Higuchi Tachibana

This manga was the reason I started with anime & related stuff.
And now, being nostalgic, I finished the anime and right after, reading it.
I’ll try not to make spoilers ~

Story: 9/10
It starts really simple, Mikan (the main character) only wants to follow her best friend (Hotaru) that leaves from her town to go to an elite academy and discovers that if she wants to assist the same school as Hotaru she needs to have an “Alice” (special power) like her.
However, there’s much more behind this. The teachers, the students and even the academy itself has a big secret and darkness inside.
Between the arcs, they are very many plot points that’ll make you surprise, sad or any other emotion. And Mikan’s past/ future story (well, all character in general) has an emotive development until the end. I’m sure that if you aren’t a non-sensitive person, you will feel one with the story.
What I kind of dislike a bit is that it’s an open plot, the end makes you feel that there is more, but it isn’t.

Art: 8.5/10
The art is simple, too. I’ve seen very bad drawings in other anime/manga, but this one is quite nice. I must admit that the facial expressions and actions, in general, are perfectly drawn, you really get to know how the characters are feeling. And like they said before, every detail in the background is well drawn (for example in the Christmas event or sports festival), too.
… Sorry but the character design are not my taste in general — okay, when I discovered it for the first time I found it awesome~ how obvious was that I never saw other drawings 😀

Character and development: 10/10
And this one is very obvious. The four main characters (Mikan, Hotaru, Natsume, and Luca-pyon), each of them has their own story. Not only these four but every single character that appears also has a function there. They’re people who at first you will hate but, at the final arc, you will love them.
I don’t wanna say so much about this because spoilers, I can only say that Tachibana did a great job with the development of every character.

Enjoyment: 9/10
I laughed, cried, was angry when things don’t go well.
This anime starts with a lot of comedy, although when the story goes on, comedy is less, it’s still there. The more I continued reading, the most I wanted to read more, I’ve finished it in three days I think, lol.
Still, I enjoyed it so much, every arc was interesting and a clue to the final arc.

General: 9/10
If it wouldn’t be because of the art and the final, I’m sure it’d be a masterpiece.
I really recommend to read this, the anime is too short compared to how much deeper it is.