A troll is farming with some strange creatures around him when suddenly the sky darkens and a flaming phoenix shape brings about the apocalypse. Fade to black. And then we’re back immediately the next day? There’s something strange in the sky. Fade to black. A cheerful rock anthem reminiscent of 90s teen dramas plays over an OP that is mostly sunny freeze frames of happy children and MCs farming. And, we’re back to farming. Ten is trying to grow his very own monster buddy, while his friends laugh at his ineptitude, stress-eat random weeds, and act like this is episode 182 of a long-standing shonen series. Then Ankar arrives—the refined friend who squints—and conveniently finds some children to quiz about the history of the land and the worldbuilding so that we don’t notice the info-dumping. (Mages farm monster buddies who help them do stuff.) One thing is clear, the leadership of the nation lives for a very long time, so there won’t be any promotions for any aspiring local leaders/mages anytime soon. Two minutes later, the leader of the nation dies off-screen and a new one takes his place and immediately unleashes the apocalypse! (This may or may not be the same apocalypse we’ve already seen, it’s hard to tell.) The good guys turn bad and are destroying everything! Ten and his friends flail about, but Ten says the kind of big bold things that you say in the midst of war. Then a good guy turned bad heads for the farm fields where the unborn veggie monsters are growing. Ten is determined to stop him! But he fails. As he cradles some especially fluffy ears of corn, they are suddenly birthed into CGI fox-dog-wolves! Now they’re ready to fight!
Ok, so I’ll never get those 24 minutes of my life back. Please, dear reader, do not let my sacrifice go to waste: abstain from viewing this trainwreck of an episode, I implore you. First off, who is this even for? It starts out basically like a children’s cartoon with loud, OTT genki boys shouting catchphrases at the top of their lungs as they pummel each other affectionately and weird little creatures bob around. But then the girls appear, and more of them is showing than would be appropriate for the Saturday morning funnies, so maybe this is not for kids after all. When the wizard who raised all the friends becomes irate and singes the boys with his fury, the girls’ clothing is blasted off completely and inexplicably, while the supposedly capable regional female leader makes Xena look Amish. Then some random cussing sets in. It’s a real dog’s breakfast. There’s meant to be an emotional payoff when a) the field is under fire and then b) monsters finally hatch for Ten, but instead I just found myself checking constantly to see how much longer was remaining. The animation is fine, but the designs are pretty dull and the characters themselves, inane. I don’t care a whit about any of them and frankly, don’t want to ever see Ten get a monster buddy of his own because he’s certain never to shut up about it. Normally, I enjoy a bit of bad anime with a laugh and a few wisecracks, but this was just exasperating. Hard pass.
Farmagia is streaming on Crunchyroll.
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