Picking up a slice of life show, especially when doing so largely on the grounds of genre, meant an expectation that the world presented would grow on me. Having something slow and easy to watch is nice, but there has to be some feel to pervade those pleasant 25 minutes. So what does this series offer beyond distinctive looks and soothing inaction? For me, it’s a mildly conservative cosmopolitanism, a smiling look at modern life. While the focus is entirely on the characters, the form that magic takes is genuinely significant to the tone of the show.

Madeeners piece on magic in anime advocates the Le Guin school vision of magic as neutral, as a “facet of nature”, a means of interaction with the world. In Somedays Dreamers magic is more like a facet of a character than a tool. In episode 5 we gather that it is something learned from parents, a natural talent to be nurtured. It’s still got that neutrality – just with the emphasis on the caster rather than the world.

Magic does not define the setting here, and therefore does not exist as an externally active concept. Such a stubbornly unmagical world means that the magic is entirely part of the characters. Rather than a charismatic presence it’s firmly in the role of (arbitrarily owned) individual capability.

Though the setting is unmagical, the prettiness of the world is relevant. Somedays Dreamers gives us a not very urban Tokyo, where spontaneous pop songs float around the streets, emanating from the sweet lips of a young lady who appears to be some other-worldly mimic of the hairy-pungent-tuneless traditionalist buskers I know and love.

As well as the environment being treasured in much more detail than the sometimes hastily drawn population, the spaciousness is emphasised by the panoramic framing of shots. It’s not so much a city of infinite opportunity as a big place to hang around and do your thing in. So be cool and meet up at the bar, or be stroppy and sit at your desk, or go to school, or just do your job for people, whatever. It’s a settled individualists city, full of life and charm, not an overbearing metropolis.

This connects to that idea of magic as an individual human capability. Often held in chains by society, capable of cool stuff but imperfect – never absolute. Our mages just try to get by. You can’t do everything with your magic tricks, so you do what the client asks. The link between the magic and the story seems to be primarily in Gouta overcoming himself and opening up to others, despite shame at his lack of ability. You fulfil your social role and try not to get carried away with it all. It’s the role of any individuals talents and abilities, just made magic-y. But then, why magic? Why not tell the tale of a group of baseball players, schoolkids, doctors?

Magic unifies a disparate cast, the show letting us believe the impossible rather than finding some artificial way to combine an unlikely selection of individuals. The really distinctive thing that magic offers as a unifying vocation is a sort of vagueness in its functioning which allows the writers to connect it to Sora’s joie de vivre. More so than in a regular show about people with a task to do, the ability to use talents in order to make your mark is tied to self-actualisation.

It’s telling that the best dialogue tends to involve the mages themselves – with the client meetings too short and Sora-centric to convince or enthral in the manner of (for an unforgiving comparison) Mushishi. The rest of the city is largely a collection of hastily drawn archetypes, the mages have all the agency. By imbuing these capabilities with a sense of mysticism we then get dragged into questions of the affect of this selective fantasy on day to day life.

Anti-mage sentiment has only really turned up in Gouta’s episode so far. Were it more predominant I’d say we’d be talking about some good old individual power vs the masses themes. But in practise mage discrimination is presented more as fear/misunderstanding of different people. Which is to say that discrimination is presented in a realistic way – as a mechanism for immersion. As a reflection of what magic would really be like, rather than in a way which seeks to create and explore a division between empowered and mundane.

The spells are not pyrotechnic, the only showy one was the snowfall – which had served a visual purpose anyway. They are presented as requests, as quick actions. Sora flexes an arm and something happens – so it really is a part of her, an expression of her will. It’s never made quite clear where her limits lie (although they do exist), she just can will certain things. Magic is something slightly beyond the quantifiable, it’s loosely defined, which means that it functions easily as a general representative for human talent.

Sora’s high power level is implicitly connected to her emotional approach, her naivete, her honesty. That connection seems to make magic into something which parallels a sense of spirit/endeavour (though not so much Pierce the Heavens as Nose to the Grindstone). But since other mages with their own personalities seem to profit by different means it’s really not a concrete link. Magic as a mysticised version of individual capability is clearly open to variant approaches.

Magic is seen in lots of ways. Whether through Sora’s faith in it, her classmate who puts it all down to parents, the disciplinarian schoolmistress, the guy who claims it’s just natural talent, or Gouta desperately staring at his books. The show backs off definitive stylings, away from magic which exists beyond the will of the caster. This is a dramatised presentation of individuals ability to impact on the world. One which can bring together a sunny schoolgirl, a morose teenager, a middle-aged hipster, etc. etc. Because true individualism means diversity, and in superpowering our individuals, magic is made the ultimate cosmopolitan skill.

Magic is also quite cool.