Kumo Desu ga, Nani ka? Episode 23 Discussion

curvedtree said:
Bad episode, bad CGI, bad plot, I love kumoko, but this present part is really stupid.

BtheBeast said:


Someone that agrees with me. I'm happy to hear that. without Kumoko there, it's just another isekai. Kumoko is the most entertaining part of the show, plus she has the best story.

They're not bothering to explain anything really oh, and we're almost at the end of the season. If you're going to continue, I don't mind not knowing the secrets of the world or whatever. But, I would love to know why everyone hates Potimas. They could have shortened everyone else's story to like 5 minutes and episode so we get more Kumoko, hopefully further in the story since we're not going anywhere fast, and how about we get things from the demon perspective. right now we only really see The Human Side of the war and not the demon side. And a demon side I feel like would complete the story more

kazuma-sama said:
This anime is about Spider-chan or those pesky humans? Fuck another episode where she doesn't even appear u.u

BtheBeast said:


Someone that agrees with me. I'm happy to hear that. without Kumoko there, it's just another isekai. Kumoko is the most entertaining part of the show, plus she has the best story.

They're not bothering to explain anything really oh, and we're almost at the end of the season. If you're going to continue, I don't mind not knowing the secrets of the world or whatever. But, I would love to know why everyone hates Potimas. They could have shortened everyone else's story to like 5 minutes and episode so we get more Kumoko, hopefully further in the story since we're not going anywhere fast, and how about we get things from the demon perspective. right now we only really see The Human Side of the war and not the demon side. And a demon side I feel like would complete the story more

Vyudali said:
God, I wouldn't mind the bad animation in this series if the framing of everything wasn't so jarring. Whoever storyboarded this needs to go back to basics because they failed miserably, imo. The fights and back and forth dialogue is framed so weirdly that it's distracting, and the timing of the animation itself stutters in places that only accentuates the issue.

it's not the viewers job to to piece together information that isn't provided within the context of an adaptation to fill in important gaps.

groudonvert said:


I hope you don't watch The Lord of the Ring for the Lord of the Ring, you would be very disappointed ;)

BtheBeast said:
But, I would love to know why everyone hates Potimas. They could have shortened everyone else's story to like 5 minutes and episode so we get more Kumoko, hopefully further in the story since we're not going anywhere fast, and how about we get things from the demon perspective. right now we only really see The Human Side of the war and not the demon side. And a demon side I feel like would complete the story more

Primo_Itoko said:
@Abredon @groudonvert

Oh come on people. I'm already saying that we would need a season 2 regardless and you are telling me that stoping after the war starts is better than before it? If they needed a war they could have finished Kumoko's one. But you're really saying that if this anime has only one season the best decision is to start both wars and not ending any? Like come on, please. The anime has 24 episodes and we need to fit everything into it, even thinking about a second season you can't just end it like it would continue in the next cour. If it did, sure, I wouldn't have any issue with it.

Again, I love this story and I'm an avid WN reader, but the script choices are not the best. I know that they're going for some sort of closure with Shun's side while introducing everything that needs to be introduced, but I do no think this was the best move.

Shimura27 said:
I wonder if everyone think just like you think. The blue haired one you mentioned, he's Merazophis.

groudonvert said:
First thing, I don't like Shun. Now that I said that, I can answer you :)



Before the elves arrive, the last person to say (more like think) something is Shun : "What's the actual truth ?"

Maybe he wants to know the truth because he doesn't want to believe his friend is evil ?



Hard to say, when he learns that the Demon Lord is in the Elves village, the first thing he thinks is not the elves, but his fellow reincarnations (quick images of them).

8igfan said:

who knows? Ya, I saw his name above but couldn't remember it lol. There is so much info not devolved to us that one can't help but wonder how things got to this stage from the little info we have.


Don't hate him, but the hero bit has been done quite a bit by now.

Was it? I remember Kanata posing a question, though maybe it was when Shun was fighting Hugo and not during the Sophia bit. As for the other question, it was more rhetorical than anything else, but thanks for the answer. I do know he thought of the other reincarnations due to the images, but he could've just as easily called a truce considering Sophia told him that they were told not to harm the reincarnations, aka they are going to be safe.

groudonvert said:


An anime that follows the story.

tinynoselargehat said:


Now that's just untrue.

The anime has cut, introduced early, or changed so many things in the human story that made it significantly worse.

So many LN readers want to defend this anime, especially the human story because they loved it in the LN, but for an anime only it is horrible, without the prior knowledge of the LN all the human characters are boring or annoying and the interesting characters like Katia and Frei have all their interesting development cut entirely for time.

The only good part of this anime is the spider scenes, the director clearly doesn't understand why people liked the LN and botches the human story terribly.

tinynoselargehat said:


Now that's just untrue.

The anime has cut, introduced early, or changed so many things in the human story that made it significantly worse.

So many LN readers want to defend this anime, especially the human story because they loved it in the LN, but for an anime only it is horrible, without the prior knowledge of the LN all the human characters are boring or annoying and the interesting characters like Katia and Frei have all their interesting development cut entirely for time.

The only good part of this anime is the spider scenes, the director clearly doesn't understand why people liked the LN and botches the human story terribly.

groudonvert said:


Katia posed many questions about the elves and Oka's motivations and what they did to the reincarnations and she wasn't surprised to learn that the were kidnapped or sold by their family.

And at that point, it was impossible to call a truce because the elves were attacking Sophia and Kyouya.

linkhuesitos said:
This isn't a problem the anime created, the novel does exactly the same. It's up to the reader to piece together the information.
The best example of this is, Why Kumoko was constantly attacked by every monster in her field of vision?
The novel never gives an explicit answer to this, but in Shun's story is explained that appraising other human without permission is bad manners 'cuz the target feels chills and an overall sense of discomfort.
Now apply this information in Kumoko story and this basically means that she was the one aggroing all the monsters.

The anime also showed the effect of Appraisal in Episode 10 but not in the same way as the novel.

Vyudali said:
I may need to clarify: I was referring to information within context of the adaptation, so nothing in the manga/LN.
It's perfectly normal to expect watchers to pay attention and piece together information provided - but when it isn't? That's an issue, and a lot of LN readers keep responding to Anime-only watchers who are lost or have criticism with 'well actually in the LN it's explained!' Which .. . ok, but this information isn't given in the Anime, so imo it doesn't matter in the context of the adaptation? - at least according to the director. The team behind this didn't do a good job leaving clues for certain things, that's all. I firmly believe they could have ordered everything in a way that didn't leave people completely confused and frustrated with the characters - even with the time skips. Instead we have this subpar attempt.

Sigmar-Unberogen said:
Was the plot written by a 15 yo?

groudonvert said:
You can ask this question for every Isekai.

beast_regards said:

Yes, but "every Isekai" doesn't claim it is a super smart mystery with a super deep message because it is generic

groudonvert said:
That's funny, I hear everywhere that Shun is a generic Isekai protagonist, then most of those who said that don't know his backstory.

beast_regards said:

He doesn't have a backstory. He is a generic Japanese highschooler reincarnated in a generic JRPG world, whatever backstory he supposedly had wasn't included in anime for sake of 'mystery" and considering how strongly you try to convince everyone there I suspect he doesn't have a backstory in that glorified novel either

curvedtree said:
I got curious halfway through the show and I read the wiki and Japanese Amazon's reviews to know what is happening in the Light Novel. Maybe if you don't mind spoiler you should check those too, there are some good things, but there are some bad too, for instance there are 2 volumes of the Light Novel that doesn't have Kumoko AT ALL and Japanese readers were pissed, with reason, after all, shouldn't it be a story about Kumoko?

gophercg said:
Finally setting up elfs as main villain, and Ariel's goal, but they should explain more worldbuilding/factions besides just the kidnapping. And lol wats with the mechs & screens from these tree dwellers??

Long fight was dragged, but nice at least Hugo got put in place, but didnt follow Oka's prediction yet.
What's with making Shun this stubborn hero trope with awful lines? Need Fei to knock some sense in him. Sophia not much better, basically 1000% pride & arrogance skill. Besides the elfs, what's the life difficulty she had hinted? Kumoko & attendant babysit her for most of her time, and born with high skill points.
Plus lots of late appearing randos we dont care about.
At least white demon finally speaks.
And who was the root cause that moved Shun group into elf village? (Hugo & Oka both seem like pawns by now). That made the demons' job harder too. Could've made them stay out of the way in Sariella instead, or like not exile Shun at all, if the end goal was getting Potimas.

linkhuesitos said:

Only volume 11 doesn't feature Kumoko at all.
Volume 12 does have a few chapters from Kumoko's POV but that Book's focus is the Great Human-Demon War and shows the war in both fronts with all the major characters, this volume is a weird one 'cuz the whole book takes place in a span of only a couple days.

groudonvert said:
Shun is born with a golden spoon in his mouth. Everything was easy in his new life, still he had to aclimate himself to his new life in an unknown world. But since his encounter with Katia, he wishes that everything would be as their previous lives were. Even asking to Katia to not change too much (ironic when Katia was a boy in his previous life). He doesn't want to kill Hugo because he thinks that he can come back to his previous self (same for Sophia by the way).

Do you think that's a generic Isekai protagonist backstory ? But maybe you have examples of something similar (for a main character of course).

And about mystery, if you're spoil yourself about everything, it's sure there's no mystery ;) I encountered a guy like that on Reddit.

beast_regards said:

They still behave like they were reincarnated yesterday, so his backstory doesn't really matter, he is just a generic high school student with no personality whatsoever, plot armored to hell and back, so serve as a designated hero. There is nothing special about him in the way he is presented. Actually, the "fight" is even framed in the way he isn't really beaten by Sophia, they just have a talk, and at very best it looks like a stalemate.

And no, there is no mystery either. The show actually expects you to read the novel, that's why you understand it, so spoilers are actually expected.

gophercg said:

Long fight was dragged, but nice at least Hugo got put in place, but didnt follow Oka's prediction yet.
What's with making Shun this stubborn hero trope with awful lines? Need Fei to knock some sense in him. Sophia not much better, basically 1000% pride & arrogance skill. Besides the elfs, what's the life difficulty she had hinted? Kumoko & attendant babysit her for most of her time, and born with high skill points.

groudonvert said:


Potimas, Ariel and Dustin, the three most important leaders, were all introduced. In the only episode where Dustin appears, it's revealed he's behind the war against Sariella (and it's also revealed that the Godess worshipped by Sariella is the same god worshipped by the Word of God religion). In terms of worldbuilding, we know many things already.

About Sophia, it's normal to be confident. She's very powerfull, high stats and broken abilities that she knows how to use them. Even if Shun aimed for her head, he would lose. She's too strong for them and Shun had to learn it after he tried everything he could, not just because someone told him.

gophercg said:


We already knew all that as the show explained it. Issue is a lot is still missing. There's very little about the church side. Full event of the Sariella war + aftermath. How the Sariella war leads to the Elf war. If Dustin really caused Shun exile, instead of Hugo or someone else, why would Demons be ok with that as that just adds obstacles into the Elf war. And the real point of killing Julius. Would his existence have lead to the apocalypse Wisdom predicts.

beast_regards said:

They still behave like they were reincarnated yesterday, so his backstory doesn't really matter, he is just a generic high school student with no personality whatsoever, plot armored to hell and back, so serve as a designated hero. There is nothing special about him in the way he is presented. Actually, the "fight" is even framed in the way he isn't really beaten by Sophia, they just have a talk, and at very best it looks like a stalemate.

And no, there is no mystery either. The show actually expects you to read the novel, that's why you understand it, so spoilers are actually expected.

Abredon said:
The information about appraisal is not story critical knowledge. The anime does not have time to fill in ALL the side story information in the way a written book does.
So you only get clues for those as in Ronandt's reaction to Appraisal, certain changes in Katia's reactions to Shun, etc.
When a back story has critical plot information it gets shown (e.g. Oka's rebirth and communication with Potimas).

As far as plot critical information that has not been revealed in the anime, that information isn't revealed until later in the Light Novel either.

So lack of important information is not a problem in the anime. Bad animation is, but plot and story are properly implemented.

Also, all information provided comes from a character in the story. Taboo and all system information was written by D, so if D (and Ariel and Gulie, who were alive at the time) wanted to deceive everyone, us readers/viewers could be fooled.

So there are 2 stories: one from Potimas and the elves, one from D, Ariel, and Gulie. We can't know for sure which is true, but we can evaluate the reliability of the messengers.

Showing these 2 competing narratives is another reason for the Human part of the story.

linkhuesitos said:

The Appraisal information may not be critical to the plot but it's important for context.

I have seen hundreds of comments (that funny enogh are contradictory to each other) in these threads that basically say:
A) Finding reincarnations is super easy, you just need to appraise them.

As if Appraisal is a super easy skill to get that even peasants have it, when the reality is the complete opposite.
Appraisal is so hard to get and level up that is universally known as a shit skill.

B) The reincarnations can't be appraised.

People that say this have literal golden fish tier memory.
Hugo has been appraised twice already and Ariel (a non-reincarnation) can block appraisal too.


These 2 misconceptions could have been fix with 3 lines of dialogue.
For "A", they just needed to show the conversation between Shun and Katia talking about Appraisal for the first time.

For "B", the fix is even more simple. It's literally just 1 line of text of Kumoko during the fight against Ronandt:
"Requesting Ruler Authority, Activate Appraisal Block Function"

renimus said:
Dude did you fall asleep during the last episode the hero and his party literaly monologue out loud on the fact that sophia is op and can easily defeat them and fighting her is pointless the fact that shun ia a naive idiot with very bad ideas on what it means to be a hero is part of his character (he is a idiot born with a silver spoon as a contrast to the nightmare that is the life of the spider and kanata)

Shun's also dosent have plot armor sophia explixitly states that her master wants shun and his party alive thats why they are able to escape from the coup another thing that is literally explained out loud by one of the characters if you are wondering why thats one of the mysteries that this anime apparently dosent have

Honestly i thought that the story was way too blunt and lacked subtlty but maybe it was just me because you apparantly missed half the plot.

Its also kinda of dumb that i had to explain and defend a character that i think is incredibly simple to understand and i personaly despise

beast_regards said:

I wish I missed the part of the plot.
It's the really bad part of the plot.
I wonder how they handle the supposed defeat, as they didn't show him losing, they just were all talk.

groudonvert said:
Yeah, you definitely slept when they were fighting.

beast_regards said:

Do you call that a fight? Nothing happened to the moron. It's technically not outside of what shounen normally does I suppose, but that's a bad thing considering how hard you try to convince people this isn't one.