Story:
It's a Fantasy RPG world. Yes, we've seen hundreds of anime like this, so what makes this one different? Well, I don't know, as I haven't seen much of this genre yet, but in DanMachi the world already is in existance, nobody is thrown into it from the "real" world. I think this works better for anime like these, but that may just be me. Otherwise we have our standard shonen harem setting: A boy who wants to be a hero surrounded by hot girls who want to mate with him. Okay, that desciption is a little unfair, as the world is built well in my eyes, but that's basically the premse of this show.
6/10
Art:
I admit, the character design isn't the best around. It's not like they look boring or anything, but the faces aren't very imaginative. The good guys have the smooth faces, the bad guys are more angular. The fight scenes on the other hand look really amazing. This is one of the cases where I do not mind the use of CGI (which I am not a fan of). The battles are flashy and the movements are smooth. I think that outweighs the more mediocre parts.
8/10
Sound:
The opening song has to be one of the dullest J-Pop songs I've ever heard used in an anime. Sorry, but that didn't get me in the mood to watch this show at all. The ending was a lot better, maybe that's because I'm a sucker for well placed wind instruments. The background music was fine. The voice acting could have been better in my eyes. There wasn't a voice that made me think "I wanna strangle you until you stop talking" but nothing memorable came out of it either.
5/10
Characters:
After decades of harem anime, we should all be used to bland, ignorant male leads at this point. Bell is no exception (but at least he's a pretty boy so it's somewhat understandable the girls like him). Hestia apparently is a love or hate character, depending on wether you support her ship or not. I actually saw her more of a mother figure for Bell (or is that just a surpressed fetish?). The rest of the cast was hit or miss. I liked Loki, Hephaestus and Welf for example, but Lili, Freiya or Aiz never really connected with me. The bad guys were incredibly bland, basically being assholes because they are...assholes.
5/10
Enjoyment:
Despite all the criticism I expressed up to now, I felt well entertained by DanMachi. Maybe it really was the influence of KonoSuba and the comedic aspects of this anime that helped me not to take this anime too seriously. If you're looking for a dramatic take on this genre, you are looking at the wrong series. DanMachi is enjoyable on a popcorn cinema level. You are not supposed to think too deep into it, you just have to sit back and watch and hopefully enjoy.
8/10
Overall:
6.4/10
