A Certain Magical Index (light novel)
| You can watch it without seeing the side stories, but in my opinion you should really watch the spin offs too, there're very good and even better. So the main show is A Certain Magical Index (3 seasons). It has 2 spin offs, A Certain Scientific Railgun (3 seasons) and A Certain Scientific Accelerator (1 season). Personally, I watched these in this order : Railgun (Season 1) -> Railgun S (Season 2) -> Index (S1) -> Accelerator (S1) -> Railgun T (S3) -> Index II (S2) -> Reading the VN, then I'll watch Index III (S3) You can watch these in the chronological order, but I honestly recommend you to watch first Railgun S1 and Railgun S2 before Index S1, because there's an arc that's happening in Railgun S and in Index at the same time, and in Railgun it's more impactful and longer. You have to watch Accelerator after Index S1. So I recommend you the order that I did, you can interchange Index II (S2) and Railgun T (S3), it's even better I think because of a small event. Last thing, the third season of Index is rushed and not well adapted, so you should maybe read the VN before watching it, or read the summary of each episode after watching them on Reddit that helps you to understand the story. Hope it'll help ! |
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| LN reader here. My advice is DO NOT START WITH RAILGUN. If you start with Railgun, there will be some instances you don’t understand because they are explained in Index. Index is a terrible adaptation especially after Daiheisei. Still watchable. But you have to switch to LN for S3. I personally don’t recommend people who are new to LNs to read the LN as their first LN because of its complexity. >_< You can start Railgun after Index NT Vol 11, as one of the major characters background is explained in that volume. For Accelerator, you can start it after you have read Index NT Vol 1. For Dark Matter, I find it boring, my recommendation is start it after Index NT Vol 6. EDIT: Index is the main story. The rest are spin-offs. I personally like the Railgun side story. EDIT2: Railgun S can be started anytime after Index LN without NT. Start Railgun T after Index NT Vol 11 and Accelarator. |
NewestPersonHereMar 20, 2023 5:21 PM
Tomi3b said: Is it necessary to watch them, or am I okay with just these three seasons? Side-stories are never necessary to watch. However , those of Index are about extremely popular characters from the original , and present their point of view of certains events , on top of showing us more of their daily problems. Just watch the 3 Seasons of Index , and if you like Railgun or Accelerator , you can watch their Spin-Offs. |
 "Genius lives only one story above madness." – Arthur Schopenhauer. "Stupidity is a talent for misconception." – Edgar Allan Poe. "I'm tired... and hungry." – Alexioos95. |
| Usually, airing order is correct order, but not here. It's a complete mess. Chronological order does not only switch between seasons, but between arcs and sometimes two arcs from two series happen at the same time. It's really hard to follow. Here's a video explaining it: Shame, that There Is No Index 3 anime. :/ |
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