If you’re wondering why I’ve started with episode four when it comes to reactions to The Ancient Magus Bride, then I have two reasons. 1) I’ve been busy with school still, and 2) I have already detailed my thoughts on the shows initial episodes in an older post, which you can read here. With that Out of the way, here’s my reaction.

As someone who hasn’t read the manga in any capacity, I have gone into to this series completely blind, so I definitely was not expecting episode four. The show picks up from where episode three ended, with Chise having passed out after a ride with one of the elder dragons. She wakes up on Elias’ lap and sees that they’re on a train, where she meets a talking cat and discovers what their next mission is. Already I was both taken by surprised and extremely intrigued, and this was only the first three or four minutes of the episode.

The group finds themselves in a village Ulthar, a small village which is known as the Cat Kingdom. This is because even though humans live there, a huge population of cats is concentrated in the area. Elias and Chise meet with the King of the Cat Kingdom, Molly, who asks for there help with a particular task: getting rid of an evil.

Molly tells Chise the story of a couple that lived in the village long before she had been alive. The husband of that couple was a maniac who would kill cats and go on a rampage. This is when the cats decided to come together and fight back. This addition to the lore of Ancient Magus Bride was an interesting but also fun one. The show opens with what a cute and funny set of new furry characters, but as we learn is much more serious. A lot of this seriousness comes from learning more about the differences between a sorcerer and a mage.

The middle part of the episode shows Chise with the Molly and the other cats looking at the problem that the cats created when they decided to kill the cat murdering maniac named Matthew. Out of nowhere a mysterious woman comes and drops Chise in the water before leaving, attempting to drown her.

At the end of the episode, we get an even clearer picture of who the sorcerers are, when they appear while Chise is attempting to rid the village of Matthew and his wife. The sorcerers tell Chise that Elias is only using her as a toy and that she will die soon.

Overall, this was a good episode. It is established that the two sorcerers we meet are people that Elias knows from somewhere before, and are likely to be the series’ main villains. It also seems as though the original doubts that Chise had about Elias are likely to resurface, and it doesn’t seem like Chise is the type of person now who would take her questions being brushed off. Next episode will likely be a revealing one.