Goblin Slayer: Goblin's Crown

The first 20 or so min is just a full recap of season one entirely, seemed like a lot of wasted time if you asked me but they went with that non the less.

When the movie actually begins almost half way in to the film, it was really awesome to watch! I did enjoy this movie. The show takes you to a remote town being threaten by goblins and the goblin slayer and his team have to come in and save them all. I was still surprised to find out that there was some character development in the story. You get to learn more ... about the goblin slayer as well as the goblins.

I do believe this movie was executed well but felt really short due to the huge prologue explains season 1.... Other then that there was a story told and the story was good and we saw some actual character development. They do check off all the things for it to be a good movie, its worth a watch.

Goblin's Crown is a 25 minute recap followed by an hour long movie. The movie can best be compared to a small goblin slayer arc that spans multiple normal episodes like when they went to water village in season 1.

The movie starts with a recap that you can skip if you just watched the first season. After that the story continues around where the first season left off and the goblins slayer squad sets out to rescue a noble girl that accepted a quest to slay goblins that hasn't been heard from in a while. It's a pretty mediocre story that feels slightly rushed ... and lacks explanation at some points. The eventual solution to dealing with the goblins does make sense and was clearly set up in hindsight but not knowing what the characters were going to do for 40 minutes wasn't enjoyable.

The characters are the same as the party in the first season with the addition of the noble girl. The supporting character's attitude towards goblin slayer does seem to change though and it feels like they act as if he's way more capable than he actually is which is a suboptimal development.

The animation wasn't great with lots of cgi and some really dark scenes that required me to sit at a weird angle compared to the screen just to make out the details properly. The voice acting was good enough, the high elf archer sounds cute and the music was okay.

Overall this wasn't the best story and may not be worth watching. If you liked the first season a lot then this may be acceptable but if you didn't enjoy the first season very much then it is likely that you'll enjoy this even less.

This movie is basically evidence that people were wrong about Season 1, and hated on it for no good reason. This movie? This is the one where all of people's criticism is actually on point. Pointless rape, complete dissonance between "dumb fun" and "brooding melancholy", Goblin Slayer being a self-insert. This time: yes, yes, and yes. And I'm so glad it exists, because I already thought I was the one in the wrong for liking S1.

There's simply something missing in it. The characters parrot the exact same phrases and things you've heard before, making it filler in every sense of the word. It's to the ... point I genuinely felt as though the entire story was AI generated (as in you fed the AI information about how dwarves hate elves and Lizardman likes cheese, and now every conversation of every character boils down to those three things) and any potentially new information is skipped (the only interesting memory the 2000 year old elf can muster to remember is following a pebble down the river). Blond girl's flashbacks are probably the only thing that was well-done in the movie, yet it feels so demeaning and sad to watch. We never find out anything about her, which felt like the POINT of the movie. As it turns out, this movie has no point. Every scene of her crying, every scene of her friends being brutally murdered, every scene of her second-guessing herself, every scene of her having an emotional breakdown just become obsolete. Those breakdowns, as justified and sad as they are, are simply annoying to watch because there's no pay-off, they exist solely to make Goblin Slayer look cool (and yes, I think Slayer's character is more than just an edgy self-insert created for the women in this universe to drool on).

What actually, genuinely remains is probably like the ~5 minutes of info dumps about Gods and goblins evolving which can be summarised in a single sentence and is revealed really out of tact, and the admittedly fun, chaotic last act. There's lots of "fun, chaotic" action sequences throughout the movie, but I didn't like any of them cause they neither made sense, nor were fun (and Goblin Slayer is usually at least one of those things). By didn't make sense, I mean both wondering why are they even doing the thing they're doing currently (other than "well, the show's called Goblin Slayer, so, we must throw in some goblins getting slain so that things don't get boring") and that the scenes themselves sometimes were so unrealistic they actually took me out of the story (which says a lot if it happens in a 1. fantasy show, and 2. fucking Goblin Slayer out of all things). The least spoiler-y one I can think of is that at the very end of the movie, Slayer fights against the Goblin Lord, 1v1. Except this time (unlike in S1 where getting him alone required cunning), the Lord literally has his entire army at the ready, but he CHOOSES (yes, the race whose only trait is being cowardly and raping) to fight this dude 1 on 1, despite his army being able to swarm Slayer's party. Now, is the fight cool? Yes. Does it take you out of the story? Yeah. It boils down to whether or not you care. There's also multiple scenes where either side-characters or goblins are dumbed down just for an action scene to happen, which was annoying.

So, it really depends on what you're looking for in this show. If you want fun, pointless action - it's probably your cup of tea. If you're like me and liked S1 for some other indescribable reason, this one isn't for you. But maybe it's worth watching just to see which one you are.