Haha, sure. Whatever you say, buddy.
The World’s Strongest Rearguard Ep. 10
Another party hasn’t returned from their promotion exam, so Atobe is expecting a fight. He wants to rescue his pal, after all. For once, we actually get a somewhat low nonsense episode. Low does not mean zero, unfortunately. So even though the party eventually finds itself in the middle of a dangerous forest “labyrinth,” we still get an utterly pointless scene in which the lizard girl peels and dices an apple, then feeds it to Atobe by hand. Talk about a sense of urgency.
Eventually, the group finds the rest of Polaris’s party, but they’re being mind-controlled by some plant monster. A battle ensues, but we eventually run outta time. So that’s it. That’s the dreadfully boring episode.
Skeleton Knight in Another World S2 Ep. 10
Even though Ariane said she could sense the taint of death on Sasuke, Chiyome chases after him anyway and nearly dies for it. But Arc can heal almost any wound, so she’s back to being fighting fit after a night’s rest. This show pretty much shoots itself in the foot. There are just no stakes or consequences. The only people who ever die are nameless, faceless NPCs.
Anyway, the Holy Hilk Kingdom attacks a human city next, but all we hear from the pope is that he wants to spread chaos. There’s gotta be a more compelling reason than that, right? Eh, don’t put your money on it. Why am I so pessimistic? Because this show hasn’t done anything with its premise. We’re near the end of the second season, but our heroes have yet to effect any meaningful change in the world around them. It’s nonstop racism everywhere they go. And fine, that’s just the ugliness of human nature staring at us right in the face. You can’t change it. You should, however, at least be able to change yourself. But we don’t get that either! Arc is the same dude we met at the start of the series. So is Ariane! It’s just one of those mindless shows where stuff happens but none of it really has any substance. It’s the classic time-waster. You watch, then you forget.
Trapped in a Dating Sim: The World of Otome Games is Tough for Mobs Season 2 Ep. 10
Have you ever asked yourself, “Why don’t we just let women run the world?” If yes, then boy, does this show have an answer for you! Basically, the kingdom was racked by constant war and conflicts between nobles. To curtail their destructive behavior, the royals instituted a system in which women would dominate men. The logic was that if men had to waste their time and money pleasing their women, they’d stop fighting each other. But of course, this led to men becoming second-class citizens. Furthermore, subservience rendered them cowards, so they are now sitting ducks to foreign invasion. I dunno, man, this just feels like “We need to inject our pussy-ass soldiers with testosterone” type energy. It’s basically a straw man, y’know? This sort of governance has never occurred before in the history of mankind, and no serious person would ever propose it. What we did have were matrilineal societies, and they all had their varying degrees of success.
Anyway, Olivia’s magic pacifies almost everyone along with the Principality’s guardians, which means Hertrauda has to die. The worst part is how Hertrude can’t even be sad or mad about it. That’s quite messed up. Peace is great and all, but we shouldn’t be able to basically brainwash people or even police their thoughts. But we’ll just sweep this under the rug, because Hertrude soon has a bigger problem to worry about: Gelatt randomly reveals that his faction had the sisters’ parents killed because they were opposed to the war. Oh noooooo, she and Hertrauda have been manipulated all along! I don’t think this makes the story better, though. This just makes the Principality the clear-cut villains. Not only that, a grief-stricken Hertrude summons yet another guardian to kill everyone. C’mon, we’re not going to forgive her this time, right? How many more people does she need to kill before she gets taken out?
From Overshadowed to Overpowered Ep. 12
Eftal defeats Seiryu, but you always knew he would. That part isn’t interesting. In fact, it would’ve been very odd for the show to end there, because it would feel like there was no point to the show. I mean, what is it even about? Eftal doing research on his own magical aptitude? That’s not very compelling. At the same time, however, we’re on the last episode, so we don’t exactly have time to finally introduce the main story.
“Hold my beer,” says the slop anime. A good chunk of the final episode proceeds to dump exposition on the audience regarding a massive revelation. That phenomenon that resulted in everyone’s magics weakening? It was likely caused by the Flame Emperor, i.e., one of Eftal’s former companions. Not only that, he probably murdered the Ice Emperor. The Earth Emperor? Just disappeared off the face of the planet. How very odd… but I feel nothing.
We know so little about Eftal’s previous life, especially regarding his relationships with his former companions. Hearing that one of them murdered the other should’ve been an earth-shattering plot twist, but it elicits nothing more than a shrug. Seriously, my only reaction was like, “Oh damn, that sucks…” After all, who are these people and why should we care? Why should any of this matter to the audience at all? And that’s ultimately this show’s biggest failure. It wasted so much time being a prologue. We spent episodes on Eftal’s youth and his sword-training. We spent episodes on freeing Anastasia from her slave crest. Meanwhile, there was this looming conspiracy about the Flame Emperor this whole time! Why even make Anastasia a former slave? What does this add to the story? Also, all this critical infodumping is happening, but I can’t help but be distracted by Merlin’s ridiculous bodily proportions.
Anyway, Anastasia is being dumb again, so she asks if she even has the right to be free. What’s the alternative? Go back to being a sex slave? Give me a break. Nevertheless, Eftal replies with some typical anime protagonist bullshit, so she falls for him even harder. She thus plants a kiss on his lips, which would normally trigger the start of a romantic relationship. But haha, we’ll just pretend nothing happened.
The Exiled Heavy Knight Knows How to Game the System Ep. 11
Elymas’s father automatically assumes that he must be using the family name to bribe his way to success, because there’s just no way a heavy knight could climb the ranks so quickly. Yeah, it’s not a very interesting conflict, ’cause it’s just the old man being a hot-headed idiot. Malice, however, sees an opportunity to clash swords with, well, apparently someone whom she used to look up to. She keeps blushing throughout the fight as well. There’s probably love for Elymas somewhere in that cold, twisted heart; it’s just overwhelmed by an even greater amount of hate. I’m sure the show will fill us in on her backstory eventually. But with this show’s pacing, we’ll probably have to wait another ten episodes or whatever. In the meantime, they fight and fight. Nothing interesting to say here. Eventually, Malice unleashes an attack that draws blood, so the anime quickly seizes the opportunity to end on that cliffhanger. This is the type of show that would benefit from having no previews, because immediately after the credits, not only do we see that the fight continues, but Elymas will use his newly acquired skill that he and Ruche just spent 30 million gold on. So what is even the point of the cliffhanger?
As you might have guessed, clown waifu is relegated to the sidelines, because this is a family affair. All she can really do is react to the fight in front of her. Sometimes in JRPGs, certain characters can confer passive buffs to the rest of the party just by simply existing. It would be funny if luck somehow plays a factor in the duel between Elymas and Malice. Just a thought. At this point, clown waifu is like… 80% of my motivation to keep watching this show.
Hell Mode S2 Ep. 10
Just more war scenes. These episodes are starting to feel really monotonous. At one point, the elf princess tells the story about how her people once clashed with dark elves before finally exiling them from the continent. But then that’s it. Maybe this will come back later or whatever, but it felt like a strange place to get a lore dump.
Eventually, three demons finally get up off their asses to fight the kids. Clearly, they are vastly superior to the regular mobs in their army. Nevertheless, Allen and his friends manage to take out two of them before the third runs off to warn their master. Okay, well, why didn’t you guys fight alongside your army in the first place? Plus, why is your master just sitting in a bunch of ruins all by himself? Yeah, yeah, hubris, arrogance, pride, etc.
I dunno, there’s just nothing here to talk about. One of the demons wonders if Allen might be a “Liberated,” but he doesn’t elaborate further. Cool. Knowing isekai anime, it probably just means someone who was reincarnated.