Saihate no Paladin

vampirevore

~~~

the faraway paladin is another isekai series with a minor twist, that our protagonist essentially has to restart life from being a child in another world. the main character here - named will - is under the care of three strange and mysterious undead beings at the very start of the story and in that phase the core of the show is the bond that develops between this new family as well as the mysteries behind each of them and how will ended up in their care. i wasn't very big on how the anime went about all this though, for one thing we were rushed through 15 years of life in just about the first three episodes and that left precious little time to develop or meaningfully explore the relationship will had with his undead family of gus, blood and mary. as a consequence the moments that seemed like they were meant to be most significant just felt completely flat. it was clear that will cared a lot for them, but the audience wasn't given much reason to care and there hadn't been enough time devoted to them to make what happened feel like an especially big deal, especially considering how thoroughly any stakes or tension got killed off when spoiler-kun (stagnate) made his appearance in the 4th episode. unfortunately, like many african countries the story continues to be plagued by underdevelopment throughout and moment after moment passes by without feeling especially impactful from the more emotional moments where will is at his lowest to the moments meant to feel like great triumphs and even the resolution to the "mysteries" i mentioned before.

for a while i actually thought that watching this through to the end would turn out to be a complete waste of time, but things did pick up and mostly stay up around the halfway point with the introduction of best boy menel and the real start of will's adventures. menel and a number of the other supporting characters really did breathe life into this anime and helped balance out will's own relatively bland persona in a way that genuinely felt fun to watch at points. there were entire episodes that were carried by how will and menel bounced off each other whenever they shared a scene and that includes the final episode of this first season which was otherwise not anything spectacular, though we did get the show's only passable fight scene to my recollection in that episode. even the bishop was a surprisingly enjoyable character and i did appreciate how they decided to make him a little more complex instead of just someone stubborn for the sake of being stubborn, he's a person with his own convictions and reasons for being the way he is even if he's only a minor character. of course, there were problems with the character writing here, and will in particular came across a bit too shallow, with a sharp turn in character towards the end and a backstory that got glossed over at the beginning - though in at least one respect that could be a good thing for the show overall, seeing how well more blank protagonists lend themselves to the wish fulfilment aspect that's kinda inherent to at least the post-sao isekai genre.

now, when i call it wish fulfilment or even power fantasy, i don't at all mean that to be a negative comment since the popularity of the isekai genre always felt to me like a result of escapism, and mistaken or not that's how i've approached a few of these stories in the past and it's not something i'm immune to. will has the air of a character ideal for that, with his vague sense of regret for failings in his past, his desire for a better life and to be a better person, and eventual sense of loss over something he can't regain. it's an outline easy enough for the audience to trace their own experiences and thoughts onto and that would probably make each of will's successes all the more enjoyable and fulfilling to watch. it's a lot more fun to watch when you go into every fight expecting but also genuinely wanting the protagonist to come out on top, even though on a technical level the fight scenes themselves usually felt really stilted, and didn't carry a whole lot of weight. i've seen people say the original author of the faraway paladin created it for writing practice, and truthfully speaking it felt a little like the anime adaptation too was put together as practice for an inexperienced team a lot of the time. the art was good, the music and sound design didn't stand out as bad or great, but the animation and timing for various scenes as well as the dialogue and pacing really left a lot to be desired on a weekly basis. the industry being what it is though, it's probably just that they didn't get enough time or resources and since it's far from the worst anime that came out even just in 2021 [*[ex-arm](https://anilist.co/anime/106503/EXARM/) noises*] i don't wanna complain too much about this stuff.

it's a fairly standard isekai just without any of the ecchi harem stuff, which i guess is a godsend for some people. i mean you have your op protag and his still growing party, demonic forces at play, a medieval european setting, it doesn't really do anything to stand out from the crowd and honestly that's okay. if you're into crazier or more subversive stories within that genre then this isn't gonna be the story for you, but if you've ever enjoyed an isekai then you'll probably find Something about it to appreciate and that was very much my experience as it aired. 60/100 is by no means a negative score, if i hated it or didn't like it at all it'd be 50 or below, the fact it's just barely above that mark is just reflective of the fact it's almost like __the new poster child for 6/10 anime__ in my mind because it had a few downsides and most of its positives were just "okay" like the art and supporting characters. not worth going out of your way to watch, but it won't be an altogether bad experience if you do, that's what this anime is and what the score i gave it means img(https://files.catbox.moe/afsqmm.gif) that's the end of this review, it's even shorter than [my last review](https://anilist.co/review/14684) which you could check out if you liked this one btw, and if you didn't like it then send tomato gifs my way or something idk~~~

ThyMrMan

Generic and rushed are the two words I would use to describe this show. And the majority of issues I have with this show come from that second term, rushed. Because man this show did not know how it wanted to pace itself at all. We start off with 6 incredibly long and detailed episodes. Just completely teaching us everything about Will’s childhood and his parents, a rather colorful and different group of 3 people. So much backstory and build up, episode after episode. While at the same time asking a friend, who reads the source, to explain things they somehow never mentioned or explained. Nothing was moving at a pace I felt satisfied with, I never felt like the story or even characters were progressing all that much at all. It also started my moment of worry. Worry for the last 6 episodes of this show, and after those 6 that worry has been justified. What do you do after spending 6 episodes not building any sort of larger story or goal or other characters. It leads to 6 incredibly rushed episodes in which they need to introduce an entire new cast of characters, a new city, a new region, and just general backstory for everything. Along with figuring out how to fit in an actual ending for the season, something to end it on so it has a definite end. After it is all done, I can confidently say it didn’t do it. In those final 6 episodes we have 3 mini arcs. First of those is our introduction to Meneldor and the forest and those who live in it. Than an introduction to the city, more cast members, and also fighting a wyvern. Finally ending it on a trip through the forest again killing demon beasts and setting up whatever comes next. This is a lot of content, and any one of these could have been a 4 or 5 episode arc if they wanted, but instead they shoved it all into 6 episodes. Which meant none of them felt complete and well done, so much felt cut and rushed and thrown into voice-over so they didn’t have to animate it. Voice-overs are another issue altogether, the issue with visuals. It does have a unique style, and I do think it looks pretty good at times. The art really stands out when it is done well. But a unique style can’t save lack of budget, which appears constantly. Fights are dull and lack any real impact, characters end up incredibly simplistic whenever they pull back the camera, and entire scenes just lack any animation at all. They will just have a single still image that they pan around in while a voice-over plays, pretty much the cheapest and least interesting method of animation possible. Now that generic part, this isn’t necessarily a sin. Sure it isn’t super exciting or new, but I love many things I would call generic. But it also doesn’t inspire me to recommend the show, or invest time reading the source. Nobody feels like they are special characters outside of the normal tropes, and the story they tell isn’t really interesting. I do wonder how much better I would rate and think of this show if I knew they had a 2nd season planned early on, episode 3ish. And if they had built the entire first season along the idea that the 2nd season would be there. You could keep your long intro of 6 episodes and I wouldn’t be worried. You could expand the forest arc, expand the lore and backstory and the fighting and general character building with Meneldor. And finish the season maybe on a cliffhanger as Will and Meneldor walk into the city for the first time, with the expectation being the second season opens up this whole new world. Pacing would have worked much better, and I wouldn’t be worried about how they would end the season if I knew it wasn’t the end. But in the end, they didn’t do any of that. They gave us a rather rushed show with terrible pacing, mediocre visuals and sound, and generic characters and story. And after it all I just can’t give it a good score, it just fails on too many ways for me. Heck, I didn’t even enjoy my time watching in any real way.

FenrirBlack22

I wanted to like this show. I really wanted to but that didn't seem to happen for a number of reasons and finishing all the episodes became a obligation rather than something I actively wanted to do. To put it simply, the characters were dull. There is no other way to put this. Each one was the equivalent of white bread with about about as much personality with the except of one or two. The main character of William was the most guilty of this white bread personality flaw. He was responsible to a fault and so strait-laced mature that he came off as robotic. If you had a conversation with him it would go like this Q: "What is your goal?" A: "To spread the word of the goddess Gracefeel." Q: "What are your interests?" A: "Speading the teachings of the goddess Gracefeel." Q: "What do you do in your free time?" A: "Train so I can become strong like my parents who died and defeat demons in the name of Gracefeel" To say the least William's entire being revolved around the memory of his parents and Gracefeel to the point of being cult-like. The pacing story itself was dreadfully slow. It took forever to do even the most minor task because of the endless verbosity of the characters dialogue and explanation that went into every scene to the point everything slowed to a halt including the fights. Given it makes sense to take time to explore and set-up the world of the characters and train them up to a realistic level but somehow they made everything incredibly tedious and one reason was because the characters themselves weren't engaging and neither was the mundane training scenarios. Even after the first part of the season, things barely improved with more tedious fantasy activities that have been repeatedly done since the day Lord of the Rings was first published. To say the least the plot was severely lacking in originality as well as charisma. One thing I will give the show credit for is the level of world-building that went into the show. The religion systems in place in this world were well-crafted and someone put a lot of thought into the gods and how they affect the world. The setting was the most redeeming part of the show because it was the part that the most thought and care went into. But even then the world itself, like the villages and towns, was still mediocre when you take into consideration the sheer endless series and stories that have done the exact same thing. If this show was a person walking through a bog, they would drown from walking too slow and incapable of making a decision fast enough because they would spend too much time going over each step it would take to escape.

oliveirafre

Let me preface this review with this short note : A friend of mine recommended this anime to me, and as I discussed it with her, I realized that she had forgotten pretty much everything that happens after episode 5 outside of the broad lines of the story. That is basically what this review comes down to. After episode 5, the story (if you can even call it that) does nothing interesting. So the show starts off pretty good. It has a really boring and generic Isekai setup about a guy who lived a boring forgettable life (so much so that that fact is never brought up in any relevant way really!), but after that point, it seems like a generic, slow, cozy (but good!) story about Will being brought up by 3 undead warriors from hundreds of years ago, which I think is a very cool premise. The characters were also honestly very interesting (Blood, Mary and Augustus are by far the 3 best characters of the entire show), it had a somewhat interesting world, with a cool history (though the author just won't stop bringing up the idea of telling us more about it just to have everyone shut up for a second and not do it), Mary's relationship to the gods is cool, the magic system is very cool with how words are just strong up together, a cool location for it all to take place in (the city of the dead and temple), it had fine voice acting and fine animation. It was looking to be an average anime with some plot holes (the actions of some of the characters early on make very little sense and cause problems that could very easily be solved by talking honestly for 5 minutes), some odd music choices, but it wasn't looking bad by any means. Then... It happened. Oh god. Once you get to episode 5, things just start to happen constantly and I mean "things just start to happen constantly" literally. There's no downtime, no set up, no anything, [THING A] gets introduced and resolved by means of [SOLUTION A]. There is basically no overlap between story beats or world building to speak of. Thing gets introduced, thing gets explained (if needed), thing gets solved. This structure makes for a forgettable, uninteresting and extremely predictable story. The author apparently never heard of foreshadowing or buildups outside of a single joke about money being stronger than any magic. This isn't helped by the fact that every character from this point onward has a severe case of "plot device syndrome", meaning that each and every one of them has only one purpose : to push the MC around. Characters have the depth of cardboard cutouts : Menel knows how things works, takes calculated actions but also cares for Will; Will is brain dead (allowing everyone to just tell him what to do without ever even considering the possibility of questioning any of it); the bard is a bard; the merchant does absolutely nothing of value; the prince doesn't have a personality, he just makes a death threat to the person who saved his city for having dared to ask for something after having told him that he was allowed to; the bishop is nice but acts as if he wants to be publicly hung for acting in the most despicable way possible; the list goes on. There are only 3 types of characters : the ones with 1 trait; the ones with 2 opposing traits (like Menel or the bishop); the ones that do incoherent things to create drama. Oh also you remember a second ago when I wrote about how I find the setup of having Will be taught by 200 years old heroes interesting? Well that's never touched upon again, it's only brought up a few times as Will not wanting to talk about his past and of course Will is able to fit in perfectly with society outside of being strong, even with the 200 year old culture and knowledge gap (it's only really brought up a single time with the Bishop and never developed). So that's also ruined. Honestly, that sums it up. It's a show with a good premise which is followed by high school levels of writing, there's no thought put into anything, things just simply happen one after the other. There are a few good jokes like money being the strongest magic there is, but honestly, they are so few and far between it doesn't even come close to redeeming the show. Oh also gods function in absolutely incoherent ways, for instance the god of moving on with life allows people to keep living... more than once... then she keeps doing it... including with fucking undead people. High 3. Nothing happens outside the designated 10 meter range around MC (oh also sometimes Will's main characteristic, being overwhelming strong, is just revoked sometimes *cough cough episode 11 cough cough*), the world has no thought put into it (if demons are such a serious threat, how is it that villages aren't fortified), characters are all either stupid or made to be hateable, the story doesn't commit to any single thing and just flip flops between ideas constantly. Watch something else, seriously.