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| Overall | Art | Animation | Character Design | Music | Series Story | Episode Story | Reviewer | |
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| Rent | 8 | 7 | 8 | 6 | 6 | 6 |
 Ggultra2764
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[series:3149#1552] |
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Where Re: Zero serves as a deconstruction of the "trapped in another world" adventure style of anime, it would seem Konosuba goes the parody route in poking fun of it with Kazuma having to put up with his oddball companions for his fantasy-style adventures. Much of the comedy comes from Kazuma's expectations for his adventures not always going his way in ridiculous fashion and the companions he gains to aid in his adventures having their oddball quirks that include Megumin's fanatical obsession with explosion spells and Darkness being a masochistic and highly inaccurate crusader. The comedy is a bit hit or miss for me, as such where I did get giddy for some of the rather ridiculous outcomes that come out of Kazuma's adventures and did gradually start to get irked with the milked character quirks that Kazuma puts up from his party since they get hammered to death throughout the series at varying points. While far from being the best comedy anime I've seen, Konosuba is still a decent entry in the genre with its ripping apart of the "trapped in another world" story premise of recent anime titles, though I'm not sure if I would like it enough to want to sample its recently completed second season as of yet.
Last updated Saturday, April 15 2017. Created Saturday, April 15 2017. | ||||||||
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 Stretch
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[series:3149#628] | ||||||
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(Ten (All?) episodes watched): As I watched episode one of Konosuba, I quickly got the impression that I sort of liked this show. It is silly, the characters have some personality, and, perhaps best of all, it seems that an actual story is being told. The fact that Kazuma and Aqua have a clearly defined goal which they must accomplish suggested that an interesting story would come about. Very few shows are funny enough for the humor alone to carry them forward, no, most need a halfway decent plot as well, and Konosuba seemed to have just that. There are varying degrees of plausibility in people getting caught in MMORPG-like situations; here, the bizarre premise that a Goddess is behind it and it is a form of resurrection actual makes more sense than some other shows. When Gods and Goddesses are involved, anything is possible. And the silly tone of the show indicates that we don't have to take it all that seriously. One thing I didn't like was Aqua being rated as a person of 'low intelligence'; she seems as smart as Kazuma to me, and he was evaluated as being highly intelligent. But Kazuma isn't a pervert, which is a frequent cop-out which writers make for the sake of a few cheap laughs. Maybe one thing I liked was that he's a respectable otaku. Episode one left me pleased and looking forward to episode two. Episode two was silly like episode one, and the new characters who round out the team seem like fun as well. The three-girls-and-one-guy makeup of the team initially made me a little wary, because it suggested that a harem might develop, and there seems to be a rule that the more characters there are, the less development individual ones will get, since developing them seems to be seen as a nuisance by most anime script writers. But Konosuba thankfully didn't devolve into a harem, and each of the four principal characters gets a fairly well-rounded personality: the straight man, the lazy Goddess, the awesomely powerful but careless girl, and the chivalrous but masochistic one. This is a laughable team of second-rate but nevertheless likeable adventurers that the viewer can root for. They're underdogs. In a way, it's much like Grimgar, except that while that show takes a serious tack this one takes a humorous one. It's sort of a parody of the 'teens trapped in virtual reality' genre. fanservice isn't all that blatant (other than a good number of bouncing boobs). There was a scene in episode three where one of the girls came close to losing her clothes, but the show didn't go that far. No, this is a more-or-less honest show which is trying to be genuinely funny rather than taking the easy way out and just appealing to base instincts. I appreciate that, since it is so rare. As I have said before, just be funny, and all other sins are forgiven. That great truth of anime (and any other form of entertainment) applies here. Konosuba somehow manages to be a genuinely funny show; not ROFLMAO funny, but funny nevertheless. Not a whole lot of supposed anime comedies even manage to reach this modest goal--many only pretend to be funny while clearly relying on fanservice or even violence to attract viewers. But this is a show which took a little pride in itself, and whose makers wanted to turn out a quality product. At the end of episode four I mentally took stock of the 23 or so minutes, and summarized the episode by laughing once more. While many anime action series are fight-of-the-week shows, more than a few anime comedies could be described as joke-of-the-week ones, where there is little ongoing plot, just shallow, forgettable jokes. In Konosuba I detect at least a trace of an ongoing plot, namely whether the ultimate goal of defeating the Demon King will ever be accomplished. In many joke-of-the-week shows the basic premise would be largely forgotten after episode one, but here it hasn't. That is good, because even though Konosuba is funnier than average, an ongoing story which serves as a bonus to the humor can't hurt. Some episodes are better than others; it's a silly show which often only makes me smile, but that's still something. The final episode, in which the four adventurers take on a hideous, gigantic, spider-like mecha called a 'Destroyer', was great fun. Solving one problem only seems to lead to another, which is indicative of the care which the people making the show took. I was surprised when the series apparently wrapped up abruptly after only ten episodes--although there was a promise that a second season was on the way. Kazuma and Aqua's quest is far from over but it ends (for now) on a high note and I will gladly watch season two. This was a fun show which I would say was either the best or second best comedy of the Winter 2016 season. Last updated Friday, April 01 2016. Created Monday, January 18 2016. | ||||||||
