No can do, sweetheart! This is just what isekai protagonists do!
As a Reincarnated Aristocrat, I’ll Use My Appraisal Skill to Rise in the World Season Ep. 30
So how do you follow up a massive war? Apparently, we have bandits who can go invisible. But first, we suddenly have Japanese people. “Travelers” from the Yoh Kingdom have arrived, but they’re actually recently deposed royals. It’s weird to me that Ars merely comments on them being “oriental.” I almost forget that this is technically an isekai. Hell, does Ars even think about his previous life anymore? In fact, why even bother making this an isekai? This should’ve just been a generic fantasy anime.
Using his powers, Ars can tell that these Yoh folks are highly talented, so he wants to recruit them or at least form an alliance. Unfortunately, the invisible bandits strike and even manage to take the group as prisoners. This, however, gives Licia the opportunity to go on a rampage. Sure, I guess. Is there a male equivalent for the word “damsel?” Bah, it doesn’t matter. Time for the girl to rescue her gentleman in distress.
Full Clearing Another World under a Goddess with Zero Believers Ep. 4
For now, Makoto is still quite weak, so he has to rely on others. Surprising, huh? Most isekai protagonists would be pretty strong by now. Makoto, however, can only conjure up tiny shards of glass. Yeah, he can murder scores of goblins, but they’re low level mobs in most RPGs. So how does he deal with the griffon? At the end of the day, Makoto is still an isekai protagonist, and they always have a gimmick or two — an “I win” button, if you will. For Makoto, it’s his ability to synchronize with other party members. By joining up with Lucy, he can channel her massive mana reserves into a flaming tornado that leaves the griffon charred to a crisp.
The rest of the episode merely sets things up for the next big plot beat. Namely, Makoto has now received Noah’s blessing, so he can become an elementalist? We then see him studying up on Elementali, which is… I guess a language for elementalists. He then formally invites Michio to join his party. Nina, some bunny girl, is also tagging along. Together, they plan to hit up a dungeon. Yeah, pretty ho hum stuff. The griffon fight was pretty much the big event, and everything else was a bore.
From Far Away Ep. 5
I feel like I’m missing something. All of a sudden, Izark leaves Noriko behind. So the girl is slowly learning the common language. As a result, she starts asking questions about the Awakening and the forest where they first met. This kinda freaks Izark out, so he decides to leave her in the care of someone he trusts. It looks like he didn’t even try to discuss this with Noriko. He just came to the conclusion that it’s better for them to separate. More importantly, it feels like we just crammed a bunch of chapters into one half of an episode. Welp, that sucks. We’re now in the separation arc that every romantic anime couple seemingly goes through.
But then a local duke gets deposed? Bad guys come looking for him, so the kind woman has to hide Noriko in her underground crawl space? Ultimately, Noriko isn’t safe with her either, so Izark really blundered. Apparently, Noriko has a telepathic link with him. If she calls out for help, he can hear it. Considering how people keep talking about the Awakening bringing forth the Sky Demon, then… I suppose he has to be the Sky Demon. All the evidence seems to be pointing in that direction.
Unfortunately, Izark doesn’t get to save Noriko. Some jackass really wants Izark to fight for his amusement, so Izark is the one who gets captured. Noriko runs into the father-daughter duo instead, and the father then helps her out. What makes this tricky is that the father is under Rachef’s orders to find the Awakening. As a result, he might turn her over to the big bad. But he has a cute daughter! He can’t be evil, right?!
Reborn as a Space Mercenary: I Woke Up Piloting the Strongest Spaceship! Ep. 5
Like he promised last week, Hiro takes on the enemy fleet all by himself, but he has a trick up his sleeve: something called a singing crystal. With it, he can summon forth crystal organisms, aliens that seem to attack any other living being on sight. Huh. Here’s a better shot of them. For some reason, they are also shaped like starships. Other than our resident space elf, this is the first time we’ve seen any evidence of alien lifeforms in this setting. We never visit exotic planets. We never meet exotic aliens. So far, it has just been Hiro sleeping around and killing space pirates. Well, add the Belbellum Federation to that list, I suppose. All I’m saying is that space and everything that makes it cool have been wasted on this show. The “universe-building,” as opposed to world-building, is sorely lacking.
In the aftermath, the trio are rewarded with millions from the empire. Unfortunately, Serena is hellbent on recruiting Hiro. She acts like she accepts his answer — an obvious no — but she then spreads rumors that he’ll become an imperial knight. My first thought, of course, is so what? Rumors are rumors. They can’t compel him to serve, right? Nevertheless, Hiro decides that the best course of action is to just bail and leave for another star system. Maybe we’ll finally get to visit some cool planets for once. But Serena is equally hellbent on chasing HIro across the galaxy. Considering how Hiro had to save Mimi from rapists in broad daylight, I feel like Serena has more important things to fix at home. But no, I suppose no anime waifu can resist the allure of the bog standard isekai protagonist.
Right before the credits roll, Mimi asks Elma a peculiar question: “What kind of person do you think Mr. Hiro is?” Oh sweet summer child, are you really asking this now? You’re not only dependent on him, you and Elma have a rotating schedule to determine who gets to sleep with him on any given night. It’s a little too late to be asking such questions, don’t you think? Shouldn’t you have addressed this before hitching yourself to him for life? Good lord…
So What’s Wrong with Getting Reborn as a Goblin Ep. 6
Echigoya, the goblin that makes all the fancy clothes, was attacked by one of the adventurers that Akira had punished with a humiliating tattoo. And unfortunately, hurting a goblin isn’t technically against the law. This episode makes a big deal out of how Akira could’ve gone down a dark path, but Karen manages to pull him back from the brink. I just think it’s weird how the show has positioned all the women to be reasonable, and all the men to be unreasonable. The prince and the margrave continue to act nice around Akira even though they’re scheming to portray him as the next Archfiend. The adventurer who attacked Echigoya is male. Even the guildmaster who initially refused to punish the adventurer is also male. So it’s up to the women to fix all the problems. One of the elves has to scare the prince off. Like I said up top, Karen prevents Akira from taking any action that would drive a bigger wedge between goblins and humans. The women in the city, especially the guildmaster’s wife, are the ones who take umbrage with Echigoya’s mistreatment. Their desire for fancy clothes somehow manages to improve race relations.
Anyway, it looks like the prince was hunting a dragon, but the beast luckily takes refuge in goblin territory. As a result, the prince isn’t inclined to pursue the dragon any further. In other words, the village will be getting a new friend soon. No males, though. Only females or animals. Sad thing is, humans like the prince will probably just see this as Akira becoming a bigger threat, i.e., “Now he has a dragon on his side!”
Reincarnated as a Sword S2 Ep. 6
We’re in a new arc, which happens to occur in a city with a beach. Unfortunately, the ocean is not what it’s cracked up to be. But this was to be expected; most cats don’t like water. There’s also a festival coming up to celebrate all seven full moons. I want to geek out about how seven moons would fuck an earth-sized planet up, buuuuuuut… it’s off-topic. And finally, curry on the beach? I dunno, seems a little heavy for the setting.
But the fun and games are quickly over when our party runs into a bunch of child traffickers. They also happen to be blue cats, so Fran is more than happy to torture them. Yeah, I dunno… on the one hand, I am anti-torture, but on the other hand, these people abduct and sell children. Gods only know what happens to the children afterward.
This then leads to Fran raiding the slavers’ hideout, and by raiding, I really mean murdering every single person there. No mercy, too. Fran doesn’t hesitate, which almost led her to kill someone who actually came to help the children.
Finally, she saves the munchkins behind bars. A prince and princess were unlucky enough to get captured as well. Somehow, they slipped away from their bodyguard to attend the festival and nearly got themselves trafficked. Sounds like the bodyguard should lose his job, and they need to assign more bodyguards. Just one for two kids? C’mon.
As a reward for saving a pair of royals, Fran gets good food and a much-needed bath. She hangs around with a sword and a dog all the time, so the poor cat doesn’t even realize she reeks. Anyway, she better enjoy it for now, because it looks like someone is still gunning for the royals. This show can be pretty brutal at times. After all, we did just watch a bunch of slavers get wrecked. But this anime wouldn’t dare do anything bad to actual children, right? I dunno, Fran’s life was pretty messed up before she met Teacher…
Magic Knight Rayearth Ep. 5
Very video gamey, but in a way that… although it’s tropey, you can sorta appreciate it? The problem with a lot of modern isekai anime is that they often just take the laziest way out. If a protagonist wants to know what they can do, they just literally pull up a status screen full of stats and various RPG-related info. The majority of modern isekai doesn’t try to obfuscate the fact that it’s a video game ass setting.
With this show, we learn that the monsters are born from people’s fears and anxieties. Eh, common RPG trope. There’s a pretty good chance FFXIV‘s Ishikawa was a fan of this show growing up. The girls eventually encounter the sacred spring where they will be tested. Only by passing the test can they acquire the legendary escudo ore. When they enter the spring, each girl encounters a figment of their loved ones. Hikaru sees her pet dog. Umi sees her parents. Fuu sees… uh, herself. This reminds me of Cecil climbing Mt. Ordeals and facing an image of himself. Pierce through the illusion and grasp the truth! Only then can you become the legendary hero! Look, it doesn’t matter who did this first. The point is, these are video game ass tropes, but there are no status screens. There is no intrusion of the video game artifice. It’s just very familiar storytelling. And I can appreciate that a little. It takes a tiny bit more effort than what we usually get.
The Exiled Heavy Knight Knows How to Game the System Ep. 19
Somehow, clown waifu manages to find a clown-themed fishing outfit for herself. Unfortunately for Ruche, Elymas probably doesn’t have a single romantic bone in his body, so this fishing excursion is literally just for fishing:
“We’re going on a date?!”
“We’re going fishing.”
“We’re going on a fishing date?!”
“…”
It’s what I’ve been harping on for weeks. These two do not have a close relationship, so why would they date? The thing is, this fishing trip could’ve been the perfect way to reverse course on that. They could’ve taken the time to fish and chat. Fishing has a ton of downtime. We could’ve used this episode to let the characters get to know each other. This was what Ruche really wanted, too. But no, Elymas nerds out on fishing, not realizing that Ruche just wants to spend time with him. Then he gets roped into a fishing contest against a random pirate lady, so clown waifu gets pretty much tossed to the side.
As it turns out, all of Elymas’s knowledge doesn’t matter. All he can do is catch a lot of generic fish. The pirate lady’s love of the game doesn’t matter either, with her top-tier rod and runes — even her class grants her a boost to fishing — none of that shit matters. Yes, she catches a rare fish, but only once. Instead, all you simply need is pure luck — pure, clown waifu luck. The beginner with the cheapest rod catches the rarest, most expensive fish, and she keeps catching them. Good. Elymas is an idiot for passing up an opportunity to get to know a party member better.
Anyway, it looks like Elymas will have to fight for his newly forged mythril sword, because a munchkin wants it for herself.
A Wild Last Boss Appeared! Ep. 18
We have two parallel storylines to track this week. First, Virgo and Sei are assigned a video game ass quest to retrieve an elixir from a mountain. The beastfolk need it to heal their guardian dragon. This is, again, the perfect opportunity for Virgo to boost her confidence, because she’s so much stronger than Sei and his companions. I’m not really sure what our hero is there for other than to make eyes at Virgo. He might have a crush on her or something. Eh, why not? Who doesn’t like a strong waifu? Plus, she has wings so you can save on gas, which is ridiculously expensive nowadays.
Anyway, the only obstacle standing between Virgo and the elixir is a devil by the name of Mercurius. He’s an expert in water magic, apparently. Hmm, I would’ve assigned that to Neptune, but we only have seven Luminaries. Plus, two of them are taken up by Sol and Luna, so… I guess Neptune just doesn’t exist. But I digress. I think Virgo will beat Mercurius, but just in case she fails, Aries is secretly there as support.
Meanwhile, Libra is going after Sagittarius, and she amusingly uses Karkinos as nothing more than a shield against the latter’s attacks. Unfortunately, horse guy doesn’t want to return to Lufas’s side. He would rather fight for demi-human equality, which honestly seems like a good cause. In theory, anyway. Unfortunately, if Libra is right, it sounds like Sagittarius’s leader is a real shithead. Still, horse guy refuses to listen. Oh well, can’t win them all.
Magical Explorer Ep. 6
In the first half of the episode, Kousuke and the girls have to undergo a series of increasingly ridiculous challenges in order to clear a dungeon. I’m just surprised Kousuke is the only one who ends up naked. We also get a Terminator 2 reference out of it. I wonder how many Japanese people have seen that classic action movie.
In the second half of the episode, Kousuke makes himself scarce, because Ludie’s fanclub stares daggers at him wherever he goes. Sounds like a win-win for me, but of course, the haremettes are sad by his absence. Marino even sends her own daughter to comfort Kousuke in bed. Despite this isekai being based on an eroge, however, nothing ero happens.