The series follows a girl named Coco, who dreams of being a witch, but in her world only those born with magical abilities are able to become witches. However, after meeting a witch named Qifrey, Coco’s dream begins to come true. —IMDB

This is a delightful anime. I actually own all of the manga up to volume 14, but I haven’t actually gotten around to reading it yet. I bought it based on the recommendation of YouTuber Elliot Brooks, and when I found out Crunchyroll was debuting the anime, I decided I wanted to watch it first instead of reading it. I can’t afford Crunchyroll, but they were running a $2.99/month promotion for AniMay where you could lock in that price for three months. So, tada! I watched it and will cancel my membership before the price goes up. When I get back to work in the fall I will likely resubscribe.

I watched the first three episodes in Japanese first, mostly because I like Natsuki Hanae, who voices Kaneki Ken in Tokyo Ghoul and Tanjiro in Demon Slayer. In Witch Hat Atelier, he plays Qifrey.

However, I saw an Instagram reel about American VA Joshua Waters and it praised their versatility, so I decided to switch over to the English dub, and kept at it all the way through season one.

For the dub, they decided to mix American accents with English, Scottish, and Irish (if they did Welsh I had no idea) accents, too. The character of Olruggio in the dub trailer is speaking with his American accent, but in the final version of the dub, he has a Yorkshire one!

In this world, no one can do magic except for witches, and you must be born a witch–our endearing heroine Coco wasn’t. But she’s dreamed for years of being able to do magic. One day, the witch Qifrey visits Coco’s home for some fabric, and a flying carriage falls over. Qifrey will fix it, if everyone promises not to look at him while he does the spell. Coco hides out and watches, and learns that all magic is done by drawing a seal, and that means anybody who can draw can do it. She hides the fact that she learned this from everyone, and in the night, pulls out a magic book she was given as a young child, and starts drawing the seals inside the book, making fire appear, and water…until she finds an elaborate seal that’s so complicated she has to trace it. It envelops the house (including Coco’s mother) in a crystal or ice (I could never tell what it was) and Qifrey returns based on his gut instinct that something was going to go wrong, and he saves Coco.

It turns out Coco used dark magic, forbidden magic–magic meant to cause harm to people. Qifrey is about to erase her memories but sees an opportunity in Coco if he takes her on as an apprentice witch. She agrees to go with him, and they fly off to his Atelier.

There are three other students at the Atelier–Agott, a snob and perfectionist, Tetia, a bubbly girl who loves getting thanks, and Rocheh, a sleepy girl who speaks quietly and carefully. (You can look at a handy character guide here). Also at the Atelier, but not all the time is Olruggio, who is the Watchful Eye of the Atelier–he makes sure everything is properly followed and that everyone is safe.

Coco throws herself into learning magic but word has spread pretty much all over the witchdom that she is an outsider, so she’s treated with caution at first, and Agott really bullies Coco and tries to get her to compete and learn magic before she’s ready. However, Coco rises to the task and completes the magical challenges Agott traps her into doing.

Amid all of this magical learning is the main villain, Iguin, a mysterious witch with a freaky voice who ended up giving Coco the ink wand and magic book when she was a young child. This suggests Coco was chosen for greater things, but terrible things, as Iguin follows Coco and interferes with her life and magical study to try to get her to do forbidden magic. Iguin also appears to her in nightmares.

There are a multitude of adventures and characters in this anime, but I went over all the important ones. And there’s a lot going on, but I don’t want to write anymore so I don’t get into spoiler territory. Plus, this is a complex series!

…My favorite character is Qifrey. He appears as someone who is very kind and fatherly to his students–a great mentor–but he clearly has his own agenda and is portrayed like someone who shouldn’t entirely be trusted. That makes him an absolutely engaging character to me.

This show runs the gamut of every emotion, as anime often does. There are freaky moments, fun and happy moments, touching moments, and tragic moments. This makes for a thoroughly engaging anime where you want to keep watching so you can find out more.

I think the magic system–drawing sigils–is really creative but makes sense, as there is historic precedent for drawing sigils for magical purposes. It just happens to be real in the show. I like the challenges of trying to hide the drawing process, because the witches absolutely cannot reveal how they do magic, or else they get in serious trouble and the witnesses have to have their memories erased. The rules of the world–like The Pact made after the forbidden magic was made, well, forbidden–are very compelling, too.

This one is in between a four and a five star for me; it’s quite good and I highly recommend it. If you’re looking for a great show that the entire family can watch, I’d say give Witch Hat Atelier a go. It’s a near-perfect fantasy series.