Misao Shinohara ( 篠原美紗緒 ) is a magical girl, from the spin-off series Sasami: Magical Girls Club.
She is the second member of the magical girl club and the first magical girl Sasami befriends. Misao is an introverted and timid girl who often unwillingly pushes people away because of her magic. Whenever she gets scared, she attracts worm-like creatures that envelop her body, making her scary to those around her. It is only after meeting Sasami that she becomes more outgoing.
In the magical girl Tenchi spin-offs, Misao is often both the best friend, and enemy of Sasami. This is also the case in Sasami: Magical Girls Club. During season 2, the antagonists exploited Misao's insecurities, self-doubt, and hidden jealousy of Sasami to briefly to make her switch sides against humanity. She willingly joined the side of the witches and became the leader of the "Shining Star" magical girl team, under the title of "The Maiden of the Dawn." [1] However, thanks to Sasami’s friendship she eventually redeemed herself.
Due to her introvertedness, and shyness she resembles her counterpart Misao Amano from both versions of Pretty Sammy.
Personality
Misao being bullied and excluded by other girls.
Misao Shinohara is a shy and introverted girl. She is soft-spoken and deeply insecure about herself. Although Misao is the opposite of the popular and extroverted Sasami, she is not as introverted as the emotionless Tsukasa. Unlike her, Misao longs for the company of large groups of friends, and is deeply hurt by her own loneliness. She is often, brave and kind to others once she opens up.
While Misao is naturally timid and introverted, part of her difficulty socializing and making friends is due to the fact that she was ostracized and bullied in her previous school because of her dark magic powers[2]. Although loneliness is an issue suffered all her life, as a flashback showed Misao being bullied by other girls in a playground when she was preschool age. [3]Shinohara had a negative view of herself and her own magic, and she is usually melancholic, too shy, and scared to interact with others due to her low self steem. She actively avoided other kids out of fear of being rejected, and they avoided her in return.
Ironically, while Misao has trouble socializing with normal kids, she has a much easier time making friends with other magical girls, including those in the magical girl club and especially Sasami, who was her first friend .[4] This is why the Chief Sorceress was easily able to manipulate her as magical beings offered her the kindness that regular humans often didn’t.
Misao has a dark side. She tends to bottle up her negative emotions, such as anger and jealousy, often shutting herself in a depressive mood. But, her emotions do eventually reach a breaking point, making her lash out and act impulsively.[1] [5]The Chief Sorceress exploited Misao's flaws by manipulating her to betray humanity and her friends by showering her with gifts and praise.
Misao felt unloved and unseen, unlike Sasami who was popular and liked by everyone, including her crush Monta. Previously other kids had even bluntly stated they would have preferred to do school activities with Sasami over her. [2] And even the chief sorcerers was simply manipulating Misao to get to Sasami. All of this, only increased her jealousy and her inferiority complex towards Sasami. In the magic world, and among other magic beings, Misao felt she finally had the love and appreciation that she never had in the human world which made her deeply resent Washu’s choice to have the girls cut ties with the witches. However, an incident with her crush, Monta, who showed more interest in Sasami, was the breaking point that convinced her to become a villain[1]
After joining the witches, Misao unveiled a more cruel and assertive side of herself, dramatically cutting her long hair into a short style during a duel to match her new attitude. However, Shinohara does care deeply about her friends hence the reason she got corrupted in the first place as she felt she was not loved, and appreciated like Sasami was
Misao came to regret her actions, and she redeemed herself once she came to realize that her negative feelings came in large part from a lack of love towards herself. She came to find strength thanks to the love of her friends, specially Sasami[6].
Powers and abilities
Misao Shinohara running a marathon. Unlike her Pretty Sammy counterpart, Shinohara is fairly athletic
In the Sasami: Magical Girls Club universe, magical girls are the descendants of humans and witches that are born with the natural ability to use magic. [7] As such, magic users in this universe, including magical girls, such as Misao, don’t need to transform in order to use their powers. And in fact, the magical girl outfits they use are just specialized training clothes designed to suppress their powers. They are worn like any other clothes without any transformation sequences.
However, Shinohara is, partially, an exception in that she had a transformation sequence after she got corrupted by “The Great Cauldron”. and acquired a grown adult form. This, however, was a special occasion as she lost those powers for good soon after their debut.
While all magic users seem to have magic spells they all have access to, like flight using enchanted brooms, and flower creation, they also have more unique magic types that can only be done by those that share the same specialty, with Sasami’s light magic being the rarest type of magic. Misao’s specialty are powers that are closely related to darkness that manifest as the worms that she summons.[3]
Misao Shinohara displaying her skill in armed combat
Initialy, Misao was the weakest member of the club, even disliking being born with magic at all. She became highly skilled, and talented in both magic, and physical combat, eventually becoming one of the most powerful magical girls in the series, and only second to Sasami herself in raw power.
While Misao never displayed any superhuman feats of strength, unlike her physically frail counterpart Misao Amano, Misao Shinohara is a fairly athletic girl for her age. In fact, during their grueling training for the magical girl tournament, she outperformed the other girls in the club who were exhausted long before her[5]. She had enough physical strength and stamina to run in a marathon, play sports, participate in magic tournaments, and even fighting on even terms against other magical girls during magic duels.
She is also very dexterous with her hands, showing great skill at making accessories, and crafts such a as rings.[2] Altough she is not as passionate about it as her Pretty Sammy counterpart, she is taking piano lessons.[5]
Ayane, a magical girl prodigy with a 69 winning streak in magic duels, and the favorite to claim the title of “The Maiden of the Dawn, the leader of the witches’s elite magical girl team, specifically, took great interest in Misao high potential, and considerable raw talent with magic. Ayane hoped Misao would become her own rival once Misao had overcame her mental blocks that stopped her from embracing her powers fully. Misao Shinohara far surpassed Ayane’s expectations as she was able to defeat Ayane in their first magic duel, using a combination of powerful magic and swordsmanship skills. Soon after, Misao impressed The Chief Sorceress enough to claim the title of “The Maiden of The Dawn” for herself.[8]
Darkness-based magic.
This is her magic speciality. It usually manifests in a scary way that drives people away such as insects or cocoon. Ironically, despite showing great talent with her magic, and pushing herself to surpass Sasami, her magic is, in fact, naturally countered by Sasami’s own light magic powers.
During her brief period as a villain, she was encouraged to use powerful darkness-based powers so she could match Sasami’s light-based powers. She eventually absorbs the evil magic energy from the dark cauldron, transforming into an adult version of herself, and becoming even more powerful in the process.
Magic Worm Summoning
Misao Using her powers to summon a cocoon as a shield
Her dark magic powers mainly manifest as insect-like creatures that she can summon at her command. She is also able to create protective cocoons from said creatures that shield herself from damage, but she more often uses them to hide when she feels distressed. She is also able to use her magic worms for restraining enemies, similar to binding ropes.
Transmutation
She was able to transform vines into a sword, and other objects through the use of magic. She was able to use this power just by copying Ayane during a duel.
Light-based Magic
After her redemption, Misao, and the other girls in the club were able to channel the rarest kind of magic, light magic, thanks to their deep connection with Sasami.This power was shown to have healing properties, and it's also the natural counter to darkness-based magic.
Flight
Like all magical girls and witches, she possesses the power to fly enchanting objects like brooms. She, briefly, displayed the ability of unaided flight after she absorbed the evil energies of the cauldron from Amitav.
Corrupted adult form
Misao in her dark magic empowered adult form.
After being manipulated by The Chief Sorceress, Misao absorbed evil magic from Amitav, all while drastically increasing her own powers, and gaining a new transformation that, seemingly, aged her up in an adult body and gave her a provocative black and white patterned dress.
In this from Misao was able to easily overpower the combined efforts of both Ayane’s, and Sasami’s magical girl teams, and she was able to easily command vast amounts of powerful insect like creatures.[9]
Evil Misao using her enhanced magic.
It’s also seemingly her equivalent to the Pixy Misa transformation from Pretty Sammy. In both forms, Misao gains vast amounts of power that she uses to antagonize Sasami, and she becomes far more unhinged than her usual shy self. While transformed Shinohara becomes far more aggressive and assertive than usual, all while still retaining a melancholic and serious demeanor. While using this form, Misao finally lashed out and openly shared her insecurities and fears with her friends that she had been hiding so far.
Differences and similarities with Misao Amano.
Both versions of Misao share a very similar role in the story as both are best friends with Sasami, who is also their exact opposite, and foil, as Sasami is far more outgoing, and extroverted than them. While the circumstances are vastly different, both eventually become villains, and enemies towards Sasami.
Shinohara and Amano are both physically similar, they both have long straight hair with slightly different shades of hair. However, they have different eye colors: Misao Amano has light green eyes, while Shinohara has dark blue eyes. Shinohara prefers to wear bows in her hair, while Amano prefers to wear headbands. In the early episodes of Season 2, Shinohara cut her hair short during a duel, signaling her more assertive attitude.
Regarding their powers and skills, Misao Shinohara most notably, lacks the physical weakness of her Pretty Sammy counterpart Misao Amano. While Amano had access to powerful magic, as her alter ego Pixy Misa, she was shown to be completely meek, in her normal form. In contrast, Misao Shinohara has innate powerful magical powers she can access without needing to transform, or rely on magic trinkets, and without any personality changes therefore lacking completely the Pixy Misa persona. Another related difference is that, while Shinohara was adverse at the idea of having magic as her powers made her a target of bullying because of their scary nature, Amano liked the idea of having magic, and even sought after the ability to regain her magic after she had lost it. Regarding their personalities, they’re both shy introverted girl that have had to deal with self-doubt, bullying, and difficulty with socialization. They both have expressed admiration and jealousy towards their more extroverted friend Sasami. Albeit Shinohara’s insecurities were largely caused by bullying and rejection due to her worm-based magic , and a difficulty connecting to kids her own age, save for other magical girls, as she was shown to have several magical friends. Amano’s plight was mostly caused by loneliness due to neglect from her parents and a lack of friends, except for Sasami.
While Regarding their personalities, they’re both shy introverted girl that have had to deal with self-doubt, bullying, and difficulty with socialization. They both have expressed admiration and jealousy towards their more extroverted friend Sasami. Albeit Shinohara’s insecurities were largely caused by bullying and rejection due to her worm-based magic , and a difficulty connecting to kids her own age, save for other magical girls, as she was shown to have several magical friends. Amano’s plight was mostly caused by loneliness due to neglect from her parents and a lack of friends, except for Sasami.
A key difference between the two is that Misao Amano, in all versions, suffers from severe parental neglect, whereas Misao Shinohara doesn’t. In fact Shinohara’s mother is a stay at home mother, and both of her parents are present in her life, and they keep a close eye on her as her parental guardians.
While both girls prefer to hide their negative emotions, like jealousy or anger, unlike Misao Amano who only acted on them trough her Pixy Misa persona, Shinohara was far more willing to show a darker, and more cruel side of herself to her friends without being hypnotized or being polluted evil magic. However, in Shinohara’s case it took a series of events that pushed her insecurities to a breaking point, and made her briefly switch sides against her friends.
They both share interests in playing the piano, albeit, in the case of Shinohara, she just mentioned taking lessons in passing[4] , while becoming a pianist is Misao Amano’s main dream that she takes after her dad. Amano has shown interest and talent in singing and performing, while Shinohara showed more interest in developing her own magic, and doing crafts for her friends, like jewelry and rings.
Trivia
- Her birthday is on June 12, her blood type type is " A " and her official height is 152cm.[10]
- Unlike her Pretty Sammy counterpart, Misao Shinohara doesn't suffer from parental neglect as her mother is a stay at home mother that takes active care of her. In fact , given she is responsible, the witches had to brainwash her so she would give permission to Misao to visit the world of witches. Her father wasn't named, nor shown. But given Misao refers to her "parents", in plural, it can be assumed he is too part of her life and he is simply busy working
- It is heavily implied her parents are aware of her magic powers. For one, they were never a secret given Misao was precisely bullied, in part, because of them in her previous school. And Misao was only hiding them out of fear of being shunned again in Sasami's school. Secondly, Misao's mother had to explain to Ms. Mihoshi, Misao's absence from school while her daughter was in the magic world. However, this is never outright confirmed,
- Her name's pronunciation was altered for the English version. In Japanese, it's MI-sa-o, with the emphasis on the first syllable. In English, it's Mi-SA-o, with the emphasis shifted to the second.
Gallery
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References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Episode 19 “The Invitation of the witches”. In this episode Misao willingly joins the side of the witches after an incident with Monta.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Episode 8: “Ring of friendship”
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Episode 1 “Sasami and Misao". We are introduced to both Sasami and Misao, and see a glimpse of her powers.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Episode 6: “ "Starlit Sky Dance"
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 Episode 12: “Magical Girl Tournament: The Noisy Part"
- ↑ Episode 24:”"The Blooming Flower of Smile"
- ↑ Episode 2 "Wishing on a Star"
- ↑ Episode 20 “The Maiden of the dawn”. In this episode Misao wins a magic duel against Ayane, impressing her and the chief sorceresses.
- ↑ Episode 23: "When the Dawn Breaks"
- ↑ https://dic.pixiv.net/a/篠原美紗緒