The Series (3.5/5)

     Blade Dance of the Elementalers skirts the edges of the magical academy genre of anime. The series rather than be about straight magic users is about young pure maidens learning how to utilize spirit contracts for both powerful weapons, and yes, magic.  The series is set in and around Areisha Spirit Academy. This academy as previously mentioned accepts the tasks of helping young, pure maidens to understand their abilities and enter into spirit contracts to utilize elemental weapon powers and magic. The academy is limited to female students, because the first male student to come to the school, and enter into a spirit contract did so with dark results.

      Into the academy comes Kamito, a young man who has been invited by the headmistress of the academy to learn at the school while undertaking a mission as a bodyguard. His mere presence throws things into upheaval, as the school is not used to male students, and his power is immediately apparent as he almost right away enters into his first spirit contract.  He, however, begins to accumulate followers around him as his skills develop, and gets deeper into the goings on around the academy

    Blade Dance off the Elementalers is an adaptation of a light novel series. I have watched a few such adaptations before, but this one felt different. It is my understanding that this particular series has gone on much longer, and thus accumulated a deeper mythology and depth to it.  That is felt pretty strongly when watching the anime series. The show itself is entertaining enough with some solid drama, nice characters moments, and action. The animation itself present throughout is nicely polished and interesting to look at. It just feels like it covers a lot of ground that similar anime series have covered. That being said I might have enjoyed it much more had I been familiar with the light novel series on which it was based.

Audio/Video (4/5)

    Section 23/Sentai Filmworks presents Blade Dance of the Elementalers on Blu-ray in a very nice 1:78:1 1080p AVC encoded transfer that has excellent colors that seem to accurately reflect the original look of the show, and also excellent detail throughout. The audio is presented with a DTS-HD MA 2.0 track in Japanese.  The audio present here is quite suitable for the show as dialogue, score, and effects come through nicely, and I did not detect any issues.

Extras (2.5/5)

    There is a little bit more on this one than usual in the extras department. We do get the usual clean opening/closing and trailers. But we also get some promos for the series, and some mini OVAs. These are quite light fare, and quite a bit on the fanservice-y side of things, but it definitely adds more bang (I maybe shouldn't have used that) for your buck.

Overall

    An interesting adaptation of a magical academy light novel series Blade Dance of the Elementalers is a solid 12 episode anime that seems to be a springboard into it's novel counterpart. The Blu-ray looks and sounds excellent and has a surprising few extra features. RECOMMENDED.