Kaze no Stigma (anime TV series), via Hulu

(I'm trying something a little new, and including an official trailer for the series, since I don't use images with my Hulu posts. Although the trailer features the English dub, I watched the entire show in Japanese with English subtitles.)

This is a 24 episode series.

Aside from a spoiler in my commentary in which I say how things turn out between Ayano (who I kept wanting to call Asuna - I think I caught all of them, but if I mention someone named Asuna, assume I meant Ayano) and Kazuma, this post is spoiler-free.

Synopsis:

Four years ago, Kazuma failed a test of his fire magic powers and was kicked out of the Kannagi family. Hot-headed Ayano took his place as the next head of the Kannagi family.

Now, Kazuma is back. Instead of being a failed fire magic user, he's a powerful wind magic user - in fact, he's a Contractor, someone who has made a contract with the spirit of the wind. Although this makes him more powerful than any member of the Kannagi family, his use of wind magic rather than fire magic means he still can't be accepted back into the family. Fortunately, Kazuma doesn't want to be part of the family again. What he wants is to prove to himself and his former family that he's stronger than any of them. First, though, Kazuma and the Kannagi family have to deal with a mysterious wind magic user who's trying to frame Kazuma for the killings of several Kannagi family members.

Kazuma refuses to help the Kannagi family for free, but he sticks around after the head of the family, Ayano's father, agrees to pay him for his services. Kazuma bonds with Ren, his little brother, deals with his unresolved issues with his father by battling him, and acts as Ayano's bodyguard. Hoping that Kazuma and Ayano will fall in love with each other, or at least have an "accident," Ayano's father arranges for the two of them to be together as often as possible. Ayano and Kazuma battle demons and spirits and occasionally cross paths with other element magic user families (there's a fairly substantial story arc dealing with a prominent earth magic user family, and Catherine McDonald, from the most powerful American fire magic user family, becomes a fixture in the second half of the series).

Kazuma's past eventually catches up to him, and he finds himself having to deal with an evil magic user who enjoys taunting him with a girl who's the spitting image of the girl Kazuma fell in love with during his four years away from the Kannagi family. Somehow, Kazuma has to move beyond the past, and Kazuma, Ayano, and Ren have to defeat the evil magic user before he destroys all of Tokyo.

Commentary:

After Dance in the Vampire Bund, I needed something that I figured probably wouldn't cause me to recoil in horror. I had wanted to see this series for quite a long time, and there were a few times I even almost broke down and bought it. The somewhat high price tag, even when it was on sale at Right Stuf, caused me to put off buying it.

Now that I've finally watched the show, I've taken it off my "to buy" list. It's not that it's a bad show - compared to a crappy show like Devil May Cry, or even a mediocre show like Dance in the Vampire Bund, it's not that bad. I'd say I enjoyed it about as much as I enjoyed Xxxholic. Kaze no Stigma has pretty visuals, decent animation (with some shortcuts taken here and there), consistent character designs, a nice premise, and a few really good moments. The problem is, it could have been a much better show than it was.