The time: Pseudo-Victorian Steampunk Age.
The place: The Kingdom of Albion (England).
The situation: The realm has been torn by civil war, and a big wall has been build to separate the Kingdom (mostly around London) and the Republic. (Maid-chan will not include a picture of the wall, to prevent a certain person getting bad ideas when seeing this really huge wall.)
The power of the kingdom is based on Cavorite, a mineral that can negate gravity and such allows flying fortresses. (Maid-chan no Info: Cavorite is a fictional material that was introduced by the great H.G. Wells and used by several authors.)
The main protagonist is a 17 year old girl named Ange, who works as a spy for the Republic. She always hides her feelings and opinions and is able to play any character she wishes.
Her latest mission is “Operation Changeling”, in which Ange is ordered to replace the Princess Charlotte of Albion, number four to the throne.
To do this Ange enters the same lady’s school as the princess where she poses as a naive “commoner girl from the countryside that got a stipend”.
Humans are so gullible! Maid-chan is always surprised how easy people can be deceived if you just play with their preformed opinions. Or how their prejudices can change their perceptions. Just because someone seems to be naive does not mean that person is harmless. Ange certainly is not harmless!
Anyway, Ange is not alone, there is another spy already there.
Dorothy is already twenty but still poses as a student, which earns her some tease from Ange, who probably means this as “I am happy that you are here”.
Dorothy likes to drink and is always ready to use her two impressive female weapons if the need for a diversion arises.
But before the two spies can do their real job (Operation Changeling), they have to do an emergency mission. Coincidentally this happens at a ball where their target, the Princess, is also attending.
Because of the troubles there, Ange decides to catch two flies with one glass of fake wine. She approaches the princess, who stands at the ball with her only friend, the small Bea, and naively asks to be friends with the high Lady.
To the immense surprise of Bea and Dorothy the princess says yes.
Maid-chan suggest you closely watch this conversation. You will be able to understand later in the series.
Being a princess can be dangerous. Being a spy certainly is. But being a spying princess is one of the most dangerous professions ever.
Still, a bit later, the Princess asks what two spies of the Republic are doing here and if she can join.
Dorothy nearly gets a heart attack when she hears that. Why the hell knows the princess that she and Ange are spies?
But there is not much time to think, because of the other case. There is only one chance to be successful with the other mission, and that involves using the princess, so they team up.
Of course Dorothy and her superiors are suspicious. They cannot know what the reason is why the princess found out about the spies or how the information leaked. Because that is probably the biggest secret of the kingdom…
Maid-chan would like to tell you more, but that spoiler would spoil all the fun.
Later on the two pairs are joined by a young “transfer student” from a primitive country in the far East.
First there are some differences between Chise and the rest, because nobody knows if they can trust each other. And of course there are the strange customs of the foreigner girl, which are not always easy to deal with.
But in the end they get together and form a well balanced team, ready for every spy action!
And when Maid-chan says “every”, she means every. In one mission the princess spy team has to literally clean a lot of dirty laundry, and they do an impressive job there!
Arts
Equally impressive is the art of Princess Principal. Music is from Kajiura Yuki, and you get what you expect from her, albeit less bombastic this time than in most other animes.
Spies should be unobtrusive, Maid-chan guesses.
As the scenario plays in “Albion” about 100 years ago, the buildings, uniforms etc. are greatly inspired by this historical time. The steampunk elements are done much more believable than it is often the case, where they don’t make any technical sense.
There is even a special real-existing bridge that appears several times in the anime.
This bridge was build so that the capital’s gentry does not have to cross the street where the lower classes are and instead can go about their business above the heads of the stinking masses. Even today that building with entrances on two levels to two streets can confuse post and packet services.
(Maid-chan no history lesson: check!)
Compared to other animes, the CGIs are integrated smoothly and the general feel of the anime is that of a very detailed world.
Especially striking is the difference between the dark, blurred colors of the poor London and the beautiful countryside or the school, where the royal spy drinks tea with her spy friends.
Timeline
One special point, that Maid-chan needs to mention, is that the series does not go chronologically. The first episode puts you right in the middle of a full-team action mission that also explains to you the whole setting.
It is only after that, that you are shown how it comes that a princess is a spy and how the team was formed. And the big background story is only revealed step by step, too.
This is a hard job to do, but the anime does it very good. Maid-chan thinks it is just suitable that not all is visible from the start in a spy story. So keep your ears and eyes open, or you may miss some important information!
Conclusion
There aren’t many spy animes. That alone should give Princess Principal a bonus. But the anime does not need it.
An atmospheric world with detailed graphics, interesting characters, spies with lies, action, comedy and cuteness in a nearly perfect mix create an anime you can easily watch several times and still find new things.
The slowly revealing of the backgrounds of the characters creates many “Aha!” moments and makes you understand their actions better afterwards.
The only thing Maid-chan wants to criticize is that the spy team and the world are a bit too harmonic for the setting they play in. If it isn’t relevant for the moment’s plot, everything “dark” is put aside and ignored.
This is likely a design decision to keep the anime more in the funny/comedic mood, and this mood is done well, but Maid-chan would have preferred a bit more severeness and sense of danger. As it is, the lighthearted mood makes the world feel less real than it could be.
Because of this Maid-chan can “only” give 9/10 points to Princess Principal on the completely objective Maid-chan scale.
It was one of the pleasant surprises that 2017 has given, wonder if it did well financially tho because I would like to see more of the series. The twists and revelations are well done, something I wouldn't have expected based on the characters' designs alone, but I guess that was intended to increase the surprise element.
And the fight between chise and jubei is pleasing to watch, just good ol sword fight without beams and lasers in turn highlighting the good choreography and fluidness of the scene.
Yes, generally the series had a very fluid feeling most of the times, Maid-chan agrees.
What a good analysis, keep it up I like your work. you can follow me and support me @michitosao