From the pages of Nakayosi and the vivid imagination of CLAMP, comes the animated version of the popular manga series, CARD CAPTOR SAKURA. CARD CAPTOR SAKURA graced the anime scene on 9 April 1998 with much anticipation and good reviews. The wonderfully imaginative series centers on a fourth grader named Kinomoto Sakura. She attends Tomoeda Elementary School and a mysterious book called The Clow forever changes her life. Sakura has an older brother, Touya, who makes her life difficult with his constant teasing, but he really does care for her. Sakura's father, Fujitaka, works to provide for his family as an archaeologist at the local university. Touya's and Sakura's mother, Nadeshiko, died when Sakura was only three years old so their dad has been taking care of them ever since.
CLAMP (Igarashi Satsuki, Ookawa Nanase, Nekoi Mick, Apapa Mokona), the four woman manga artist group, is responsible for such popular manga series as RG VEDA, MAGIC KNIGHT RAYEARTH, X/1999, TOKYO BABYLON, CLOVER and WISH. The anime series starts out to be a very innocent story about a young girl named Sakura until her life is changed one day when she finds a magical book entitled The Clow. The day begins normally enough as Sakura attends grade school with her best friend, Daidouji Tomoyo, who has a penchant for Sakura and everything she does.
Sakura stumbles upon The Clow as if by fate and breaks the seal of the book. Within the hollowed out book, Sakura finds a deck of magical cards called the Clow Cards. Each of the Clow Cards contain a special magic and a conscience all their own. She accidentally scatters all, but one Clow Card to the winds when she utters the word "Windy" from the first card she picks off the top of the deck. Immediately after, Kerberos, or Kero-chan, rises from The Clow book as if awakening from a deep slumber. Sakura finds out that Kero-chan, a doll-sized, angel-winged lion with an Osaka-dialect, is supposed to guard the Clow Cards from doing any harm to the world. With the help of Kerberos, Sakura is magically transformed into Card Captor Sakura whose mission is to capture all the Clow Cards that have been scattered. With the help of Windy, Sakura captures her first Clow Card, Fly.
The series continues as Sakura awakes to find Kero-chan there to greet her in the morning and all that happened the night before was not a dream. Tomoyo shows Sakura a video she made last night on her new camcorder. To Sakura's surprise, Tomoyo has caught Kero-chan and herself flying though the evening sky. Tomoyo confirms her suspicions when Kero-chan bursts forth from Sakura's backpack. Sakura's secret is no longer secret, and Tomoyo joins her and Kero-chan in the search for the Clow Cards. As if this tidbit of info is not weird enough, something seems to be happening to the students' shadows as they leave for the school day. Something is amiss as the students return the next day to find their desks piled up mysteriously in the middle of their classroom. Sakura finds that no normal being is doing this and it must be the work of a Clow Card. Tomoyo, a fan of magical girl shows, is ecstatic about the fact her best friend is a real life magical girl. Much to her chagrin, Tomoyo helps Sakura out by providing her with a different costume every battle.
With the final episode in this volume, Sakura finds that all is not well on a school field trip to the aquarium. An unseen force holds a penguin and an aquarium diver underwater, but fortunately Touya saves them. Sakura figures out that this is no ordinary occurrence. After an innocent date with Yukito, Sakura finds herself battling yet again with another Clow Card. The series continues to show the double-life of Sakura through her ordinary family life and her magical Card Captor life. It is an enjoyable series for those who like magical girl series.
The author enjoys the way the story stays interesting even though it has a set formula (i.e. Sakura captures a Clow Card every episode). The mixture of fantasy and slice-of-life gives CARD CAPTOR SAKURA an appeal for those looking for something more than just your usual magical girl show. The author also enjoys the way Sakura handles herself in the situations she is subject to day after day. Sakura is a very strong girl for her age and is very admirable. The series has all of those traditional shoujo aspects: the innocent loves, the strong female lead, and, of course, the character designs. One of the fun and unique things that CARD CAPTOR SAKURA contains is the "Leave it to Kero-chan" Corners. Each Corner showcases Sakura in her many battle costumes and is a reward for CARD CAPTOR SAKURA fans.
The cast is filled with a number of veterans voice actresses and actors. Tange Sakura (Suzu from MARMALADE BOY) voices the cute Card Captor Sakura; she does a magnificent performance as the spunky fourth grader. Iwao Junko (Key from KEY THE METAL IDOL) has a more emotion-filled performance in comparison to Key as she takes on the role of Sakura's best friend, Tomoyo. Hisakawa Aya (Skuld from AA! MEGAMISAMA) performs more of a tough, boyish voice in comparison to her other roles as the brash Kerberos. Seki Tomokazu (Chichiri from FUSHIGI YUUGI) has a more subdued, caring, yet teasing role as big brother Touya and does a great job. Ogata Megumi (Shinji from NEON GENESIS EVANGELION) reprises her young boy's voice with the role of the quiet and gentle, Yukito.
CARD CAPTOR SAKURA is tentatively set for a thirty-nine episode series with its first volume containing three episodes and each of the following volumes containing four episodes. The first volume comes with a beautiful LD box, and the first pressings get a special videotape called "Suteki desu wa, Sakura-chan! Tomoyo no Card Captor Sakura Katsuyaku Video Nikki" (Wonderful, Sakura-chan! Tomoyo's Card Captor Sakura Video Diary). The author highly recommends this series not only for its cute factor, but also the character development. The fresh story will both hold interest and get viewers to want more.
