Like Goblin Slayer the season before it, The Rising of the Shield Hero arrived this season accompanied by controversy. But three episodes in, Shield Hero seems to be about more than shocking or upsetting its audience. In fact, it’s not the false accusation of rape that’s most interesting about the show—it’s how our hero reacts to it. Join Team FtK (David, Peter, and Holly) as they dive into the show and ask, WWSHD? Also, the team debuts a new segment, “Anime or Anime-Made Up?” with David and Peter trying to guess if anime synopses given by Holly are real or just imagined!
And we want your feedback as well! Each week we’ll ask a question on the podcast and feature your answers the next time that team rolls around. Here’s this week’s CQ (Cast Question): What was one anime that was surprisingly better than you expected?
And check out these articles related to today’s podcast:
- We had not one, but two first impressions posts for Shield Hero this season—from Dr. Steve and stardf29!
- The article Tyler referenced as writing for us in his response
- The convention we’ll be attending this year is A-Kon—Holly and TWWK attended last year.
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I guess I’ll be the one to mention Madoka. I was a little late joining the game, starting to watch about halfway through the season, so I already knew from bloggers and Twitter that the show was not what it portrayed itself to be. But I was still shocked at the events of episode three…and I should say, too, that I was surprised by how the series ended, on a note that I never would have predicted at the end of episode three.
This was a really enjoyable podcast to listen to, FTK. Thanks for covering Shield Hero. My wife and I have been watching that, and we feel pretty similarly to your opinions you all have expressed here.
One anime that I really thought I wouldn’t like as much as I did would be Vatican Miracle Examiners. I figured it might be some kind of slice of life anime or something off the wall with minimal ties to Christianity like a Blue Exorcist. In reality though it’s actually pretty sound on theology and not even specifically catholic theology. The characters are ardent and pious and pretty clever detectives.
Our pleasure, Tyler! I’m David from team FtK. Vatican Miracle Examiners…interesting! I’ve never even seen that before. I didn’t watch too much anime in 2017 though. Basically, if it doesn’t get about a 8.0 or above on MAL, I usually skip past it, haha. I’ve heard some negative things about it, but it seems you enjoyed it. Is it a show you would recommend for people to watch?
Twitter responses—
Joshua (@khakibluesocks) MUTUAL: Assassination Classroom hands DOWN. I mean, I already knew that this show was pretty good, and I knew about the hype, but only when I sat down and watched it EPISODE BY EPISODE did I realize just how prodigious this anime is!
Matthew (@MDMRN) STAFF member: I had no expectations for The Nameko Families and now it’s one of my favorite anime series of all time.
Michelle (@thathilomgirl) STAFF member: Pretty Rhythm: Rainbow Live
Rich (@redcar_tenken) MUTUAL: Knights of Sidonia and Ajin: Demi-Human
Facebook responses—
Kyle: The rising of the shield heri and that one time I reincarnated into a slime
Cassandra: Rising of the shield hero and Rurouni Kenshin
George PATRON: Grimgar of Fantasy and Ash. Based on comments and reviews, I thought it would be a pretty mediocre isekai, but it was actually quite lovely. Very slow, very quiet, not much happens – but the animation was beautiful, and I grew fond of the cast. Overall, a really pleasant experience, if you’re not looking for a thrill a minute.
Kenneth: Naoki Urasawa’s Monster. It was so overhyped that I thought it wouldn’t live up. Boy howdy did it surpass the hype lol.
Instagram responses—
@recon.gs MUTUAL: MHA
@kagome_the_weeb: Inuyasha! And now it’s my favourite anime!
@celtic.nerd MUTUAL: That Time I Go Reincarnated as a Slime
@justinsayana: Hmm… Hyouka?
@kail_luisse: Charlotte
@_alexotaku: Kimi no na wa!!!
@jorgem.cucalon: Devilman Crybaby
@tiredmagician MUTUAL: Princess TuTu!!
Paris, Taylor and Paige (@pocketsize_cosplay) MUTUAL: Saiki K. I told myself if there wasn’t a plot by episode 3 I would stop watching…but then it was so ridiculous [ran out of space]
@argo_odm MUTUAL: Sao season 3
@waifuak: Your lie in april
Cory (@kokoradaki) MUTUAL: Children of the Whales. I’d never heard of it before, and it didn’t look that good at first, but I quite liked it.
@jm_yoda: Quite a few actually: DxD, Girls und Panzer, World Break, Eureka Seven
Chrissy (cookiescr33d) MUTUAL: The Morose Mononokoean
Matthew (@top_gunn1) STAFF, Team Anchester lead: Rurouni Kenshin and HunterxHunter
@treyrobinson_____ MUTUAL: Mirai Nikki
@craftyfox39 MUTUAL: My Hero Academia!
@anand_nightray: A lull in the sea (actually thought it would be awesome but it went over and beyond that)
@jennifermcelroy!: K
@half_shade_ MUTUAL: Naruto
@lil._.lychee: Seven deadly sins
Re: surprising anime, the first one to spring to mind is Fate/Apocrypha. My expectations were set by watching F/sn Unlimited Bladeworks (enjoyed it, but it was about as bleak and cynical as I could stomach) and reading about Fate/Zero (it sounded like a mega grimdark horrorfest that I’ll never watch). Reading https://beneaththetangles.com/2018/08/28/fate-apocrypha-the-holy-maiden-and-what-it-means-to-be-a-saint/ ( #BlameBtT ) piqued my curiosity about F/A. It didn’t sound as disturbing as F/Z, but I still expected it to skew toward nightmarish, and thus was completely shocked that like 2/3 (3/4?) of the (very large!) cast turned out to be relatively good, noble people (or grew toward such over time).
Also, guessing the titles of anime? Seriously? A genre full of sensible titles like “Rascal Does Not Dream of Bunny Girl Senpai” and “That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime?” 😛
I only watched the initial episode of Fate/Apocrypha—I’m glad to hear your assessment of it. Although I’m a big fan of the creativity in Fate/zero, and ultimately where it leads to, it’s not an easy series to watch and perhaps (most probably) could be categorized as disturbing in many ways. It’s good to see or hear about, well, “good” in other Fate series.
Hey JeskaiAngel! David from team FtK here. I actually lost interest in the Fate Series. For me, Fate/Zero was by far my favorite of the series and I didn’t really like Unlimited Blade Works. I think I’d rather have the main character be someone closer to my age and not a high school kid, haha. But interesting! Maybe I’ll have to check out Apocrypha.
The big “so much better than I expected” anime for me is Invaders of the Rokujouma!?. It started out as a silly harem show that I figured would be little more than meaningless hijinks, but it then became a really heartfelt story about how these people that started off as enemies came to care about and support each other. It went from “eh, I guess I can waste some time with this” to “this anime is healing my soul”, especially from episode 5 onwards.
And that’s not even getting into the *really* good stuff in the original light novels that the anime didn’t reach. Thankfully, J-Novel Club licensed the light novels and has even made several volumes (currently up to vol. 19) completely free to read on their site!