In Japanese, magan 魔眼, "magic eye," or "demon eye," also called "evil eye," jagan 邪眼, or satirically jakigan 邪気眼, is an eye that has some sort of magical power or ability. Sometimes a cursed, evil, demonic one.
Anime: The Garden of Sinners: Overlooking View, Kara no Kyoukai: Fukan Fuukei 空の境界『俯瞰風景』 (Movie)
Meaning
In general, magan, or jagan, tend to refer to:
- Eyes that can see something normal eyes can't. For example, eyes that can see the future.
- Eyes that affect the things they're looking at. For example, Medusa's, which turn people into stone.
- Eyes that are the physical manifestation of some sort of curse or power. The eye itself doesn't do anything optical, but it being there means its owner has some sort of ability.
Although it would make perfect sense for magical eyes to have a single optical ability, it's often the case that the magical eye is absolutely loaded with all sorts of random powers, each having less and less to do with eyesight.
The eye-power creep is real.
In general, magan tend to grant its bearer improved vision. Like, just seeing better than normal, average human eyes.
Examples
Pair
The simplest magan comes in pairs. After all, you have two eyes, so it's only natural both eyes become magical.
Anime: The Garden of Sinners: Overlooking View, Kara no Kyoukai: Fukan Fuukei 空の境界『俯瞰風景』 (Movie)
- chokushi no magan
直死の魔眼
Magic eyes of direct death. Known in English as the "Mystic Eyes of Death Perception." - Allows the bearer to see the "lines of death," which subsequently allows the bearer to kill virtually anything.
Anime: Blood Blockade Battlefront, Kekkai Sensen 血界戦線 (Episode 2)
- kamigami no gigan
神々の義眼
Prosthetic eyes of the gods. Artificial eyes of the gods. Known in English as the All-Seeing Eyes of the Gods. - Allows the bearer to see through illusions. Can see extremely small things. Can project what they see into other people's sight. Can do a whole lot of things, to be honest.
Anime: Sekai Saikou no Ansatsusha, Isekai Kizoku ni Tensei suru 世界最高の暗殺者、異世界貴族に転生する (Episode 2)
- Touahaa De no Magan
トウアハーデの魔眼
The Mystic Eyes of Tuatha Dé. - Allows the owner to see mana, improves eyesight: long distance vision, dynamic visual acuity, depth perception, low-light vision.
- Origin: surgery. The technique to grant these eyes have been passed down the assassin family of Tuatha Dé for generations. It was perfected after experiments on death row criminals.
Single
Some magan manifest as a single eye. Usually, it's because the bearer wasn't born with magical eyes, and acquired a single one of them somehow. Consequently, the magan tends to be a different color from their natural eye, and the character ends up with different-colored eyes.
Anime: Code Geass: Hangyaku no Lelouch, コードギアス 反逆のルルーシュ (Episode 3)
- zettai junshu no giasu
絶対遵守のギアス
Geass of absolute obedience. - The target must obey any order the bearer gives them.
- Origin: suddenly gains the power of the Geass from a character called C.C., which manifests as a magan.
Anime: Gekijouban Naruto: Dai Koufun! Mikazuki-jima no Animaru Panikku Datte ba yo!, 劇場版 NARUTO -ナルト- 大興奮！みかづき島のアニマル騒動だってばよ (Movie)
- sharingan
写輪眼
Copy-wheel eye. - A wheel-shaped eye that allows the bearer to copy the jutsu 術 the target uses, and use genjutsu 幻術, illusory techniques.
- Origin: only members of the Uchiha うちは clan, which Kakashi isn't a member of, are born with the sharingan, and both eyes are sharingan, which means Kakashi's single sharingan is implanted (which is pretty obvious from the scar), and the original owner was a Uchiha member.
Anime: Mushoku Tensei: Isekai Ittara Honki Dasu 無職転生 ～異世界行ったら本気だす～ (Episode 8)
- Context: Ghislaine's right eye, which is normally hidden under an eye-patch, appears to be capable of seeing mana.
- Origin: not revealed.
Anime: Nanatsu no Bitoku 七つの美徳 (Episode 7)
- Context: Sariel's right eye is a jagan that brings upon destruction when activated.
- Origin: not revealed. Given Sariel is an angel, she was probably born with it.
As Third Eye
Some eyes manifest as an extra, third eye, instead of replacing the owner's natural two ones.
Anime: Yū☆Yū☆Hakusho 幽☆遊☆白書 (Episode 8)
- Hiei's jagan grants him several abilities, for example: telekinesis.
Fake
Infatuated with characters that have special eyes, chuunibyou 中二病 characters will sometimes pretend to have special eyes, too.
In fact, the term jakigan 邪気眼, although meaning "evil-feeling eye," normally refers to the sort of chuunibyou that pretends to have dark, demonic powers, demonic eyes, demons sealed in their arms, and all that sort of edgy stuff.
Anime: Chuunibyou demo Koi ga Shitai! 中二病でも恋がしたい！ (Episode 1)
Exceptionally, there's a case of an isekai protagonist who ended up with a real magan and went full chuunibyou about it:
Anime: Kumo Desu ga, Nani ka? 蜘蛛ですが、なにか？ (Episode 7)
- Context: as a spider, Kumoko has eight eyes, which means she can have up to 8 different magan.
Imaginary
In Steins;Gate, Okabe Rintarou 岡部倫太郎, an extreme chuunibyou, claims to have a magan called "Reading Steiner," which allows him to observe certain things normal people can't. Although he does have that ability, his eyes are utterly normal.
Swappable
Extraordinarily, some characters can swap from one magan to another, since they only have two eyes and each magan has a different power, this is necessary to use more than two powers.
Anime: Mushoku Tensei: Isekai Ittara Honki Dasu 無職転生 ～異世界行ったら本気だす～ (Episode 12)
- Context: The Great Emperor of The Demon World, Kishirika Kishirisu, has 12 demon eyes inside her body, allowing her to see through everything, which she swaps by spinning them like a slot machine.
- In this episode, she grants another character a demon eye, by brutally gouging out their normal eye and shoving a new one into the eye socket.
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