-So Overlord is one of those animes that should be great, a kids wet dream. Who doesnt want to be the Lich King from WOW or as op as One Punch Man? Its a very unique idea to play as the final boss of a game rather than the ones trying to get to the final boss (like Sword Art Online).
-The problem with this anime is its poor execution in every way.
There is 0 character development. Some reviewers have mentioned that the main characters humanity seems to be slowly slipping away by the end of the show but that would mean that he had an emotional range to begin with. He is bland and hypocritical throughout. At one point even referring to the fact that this is so. This doesnt make it any less frustrating. At one point our main character is masquerading as a common adventurer and joins an up and coming guild while hiding his true power (just like Sword Art Online) and then 3 episodes later after hearing countless minues of these characters interact they are all slaughtered and the main character does not even care. Passively mentioning that he had just met them. It makes the 3 episodes of their development completely pointless and makes the "Overlord" far less sympathetic.
-There is a long list of supporting characters and their designs are mostly interesting such as lolita vampires, tsundere succubus, A nazi changeling who cracks jokes, etc. But the characters are all one dimensional-they spend all of the show praising the main character, even at the end when one of them betrays the group she still praises the main characters power during the battle. It is incredibly dull and does nothing to diversify their interests or motivations. If you have a thing for large breasted characters though the head guardian will certainly please, constantly trying to get a skeleton mind you, to have sex with her.
-The story is nonexistent. The main character was the head of large guild in an MMO and then gets stuck in it after shutdown for reasons that are never explained. What happened to his body? Who knows? who cares apparently. There are at least 5 instances where the main character talks about putting the castle that he lords over on high alert or concealing it from enemies which sounds good on paper but during the course of the show there is never an enemy introduced who could defeat his subordinates let alone penetrate his castle. By the end of the show we still havent met any additional human characters stuck in the game, he has not conquered any portion of the world, and has not learned any meaningful new power or ability. In short nothing actually happens except they get a giant hamster, walk around a village stopping small fry, and fight amongst each other (the 2 episode end fight) for reasons that are never clearly explained.
-I wanted to like this show so much and maybe a season 2 would speed things up for me and make it more interesting but as of season 1 i can not recommend this show to anyone except those who are fans of fanservice and the general idea of people getting stuck in video games.
-The biggest problem with this show that I simply cant get around is it is so dull. There are 4 "real" fights in this 13 episode show and during these fights the characters spend as much time talking about how great and unstoppable they are rather than doing anything interesting. There is no suspense when you know that our protagonist can obliterate everyone on a whim if he so chooses-which he often does not. Instead it takes 15 minutes for the use of one or two spells that would have ended the fight in mere seconds. For a show called Overlord you would think there would be more lording and less walking around and talking which is simply not the case.
