First impression: Youjo Senki

Blonde ten year old flying loli-wizard kills for the Reich.

Last season we had Izetta the Last Witch her home country from invasion by not-nazi Germany, this season we have ten year old second lieutenant Tanya Degurechaff defending not-quite Wilhelmine fantasy Germany from invasion from not-really France. Not quite World War I — there’s a Scandinavian front frex — but not quite World War II either. There are wizards flying around, but no planes so far, nor tanks either. Most of the fighting depicted fits the trenc warfare of the Great War better and the episode isn’t shy in showing the bloody consequences.

We see Tanya mainly through the eyes of her subordinate, corporal Serebryakov who hero worships her. She sees Tanya as a symbol of strength, gruff and no nonsense, but who comes through for her soldiers when the chips are down. Early in the episode two of them disobey her orders and she punishes them by relieving them from duty and sending them somewhere safe. Or so she thinks.

In reality Tanya sent them to their deaths, as on of the first targets of the not-French bombardment was the very bunker she had sent them to… There’s more to Tanya Degurechaff than meets the eye, but we only see her through other people’s eyes. Some, like corporal Serebryakov at first, see her as an Angel, the perfect hero to defend the fatherland, but it’s not just the Reich’s enemies that fear and loathe her.

it’s not surprising. Tanya doesn’t behave like a ten year old girl, is composed and serious way beyond her years, speaks with little emotional affection and only when it’s needed or to affirm her faith in God und Vaterland. Not to mention she’s more than a head shorter even than her corporal, who herself is at leat a head shorter than the other soldiers. It makes Tanya stand out and alien even if she wears the same uniform. (And how rare and great is it, to have the women in the same uniform as the men?)