[Warning: Spoilers]
Shield Hero is another overrated isekai the fandom overhyped it being "different from other isekai" and to an extent I could see where they’re coming from since it did have a promising start, but then it continuously declined with each episode and devolved into a generic, power fantasy, loli harem isekai.
Story (3/10):
The story is about 4 otakus who get summoned into this world where they’ve become legendary heroes and have to defeat the succession of waves to save the World in order to go home. However, the show would be over if we fought all the waves so quickly, right? To drag out the story, we follow Naofumi’s party daily lives as they: learn about this world, fight monsters, fulfil side adventures, buy new items/equipment, become merchants and start trading (which comes off as bootleg Spice & Wolf), and most importantly deal with the latest contrived drama Naofumi has gotten himself into. I’ll explain this in more detail later on.
Characters (2/10):
Naofumi starts out as this misunderstood ‘nice guy’. That’s all I can describe him because he had no personality and we know barely anything about him or his past. He gets played by Myne and is accused of a rape accusation. This is only the first of many acts created to shit on Shield Hero. The show constantly goes out of it’s way to portray the royals, heroes and pretty much everyone in the world as unlikeable assholes to make Naofumi the victim. Naofumi is the “nice guy” who believes he has terrible luck for being chosen as the shield hero, which is seen as the worst class. Myne’s betrays him, steals all his money, he gets a false rape accusation, a bad reputation, ostracised by everyone and because of this Naofumi’s drastically changes into a edgy ‘morally grey’ anti hero- who buys a child slave in order to fight for him. Thus the story how the Edgelord Hero is born!
My problem with this is Naofumi at the beginning is a blank slate that isn’t fleshed out enough so his sudden change doesn’t resonate with me. I’m not yearning for Naofumi to go back to his old self because we didn’t spend enough time for me to care about him. Edgelord Hero doesn’t have much of a personality or endearing qualities, he’s just a standoffish, cynical asshole who’s less sociable, has trust issues and asks quest givers money for his help.
The amount of forced drama is so poorly written and contrived that it’s emotionally manipulative. The writer wants you to feel sympathetic to Naofumi’s cause and root for him in this ultimate underdog story. Too bad I’ve got none for the Edgelord Hero! For example, why should I be rooting for him Vs Spear Hero to win his duel so he can keep his slave?
You want to know what I don’t understand? Is these evil assholes who are hellbent on screwing with Edgelord Hero, [i] need him [/i] to save their world. He has no reason whatsoever to fight for them, so why do they hate him with a passion? Why do they keep handicapping one of their four chosen heroes? For example, the King giving him less starting gold, not giving him information about the hourglass to access the waves, not letting him class upgrade. It makes no sense.
We aren’t given a explanation as to why they act the way they do, so unless it’s for the Lolz, it’s to make Edgelord Hero the victim. LN readers are constantly saying “there’s a reason for all this, you just have to wait!” but the writer has dragged this out for 20 episodes with little hints alluding to why (e.g. a history of nefarious shield heroes), while adding more contrived drama to the point where I’m exhausted and desensitised to the whole situation. The reveal after all this buildup was sooooo underwhelming. The consequences was incredibly childish and pathetic, that I will spare you the details and just say it was akin to one of the school playground punishments.
Raphtalia is a bland, poorly written heroine (Demi-human) who went from a scared, meek little girl with a tragic backstory of being tortured, in slavery, had PTSD over her parents death, to losing all her flaws and any potential of emotional conflict that could have led to some good character development because of how she changed in a instantaneous, implausible manner e.g. an absurd personality change and rapid aging that happened offscreen after two episodes to gain qualities to make her the “perfect waifu”. Her development is too unrealistic. She remains a static “Naofumi sama” bot for the rest of the show.
This may sound sensitive to some, but I have to say, this show romanticizes slavery. It sweeps under the rug the nature of Edgelord Hero and Raphtalia’s master/slave relationship, him buying her out of necessity because Edgelord Hero can’t attack or trust anyone else to party with. Edgelord Hero punishing Raphtalia when she didn’t bend to his orders. It’s worse in the manga where it was stated Edgelord Hero bought her because she’s a girl that looks similar to Myne so he could project his pent up hatred on her.
They wasted the opportunity to explore the themes/morality addressed with slavery and their dynamic in detail. For example, Raphtalia essentially was a broken slave who’s lost everyone she’s ever cared about. It’s clear Raphtalia developed stockholm syndrome for Edgelord Hero over a few instances of kindness due how shit her life has been and the story about the legendary Shield Hero who will save the demi humans. Instead of showing how unhealthy their relationship is with both of them depending on each other to “lick each other’s wounds”, leading to some good character development for both of them, it’s portrayed to make Raphtalia the perfect waifu who unconditionally loves Edgelord Hero, who worships the ground he walks on and will stand by him even when everyone in the world’s betrayed him. Doesn’t that sound like a edgy fanfiction to you? They could have slowly developed their relationship into a genuine romance with them gradually growing closer- slowly letting each others walls down, begin to trust each other (despite being ostracised from society) and eventually fall in love.
It was hard to watch the scene where Raphtalia was angry that the kingdom freed her from slavery and was defending Edgelord Hero basically saying:
“Naofumi sama is kind! He feeds me, bought me a ball, he tortures me when I don’t bend to his will i.e. being scared to fight, but it’s okay because I want to be his slave!” Her level of stockholm syndrome surpasses that of a battered wife. Raphtalia is nothing more than pure waifu bait. Worse of all is Naofumi doesn’t see the problem with slavery, he doesn’t change his perspective with the slave trader and becomes a regular customer, hell he doesn’t even apologise to Raphtalia. This is further evident when Raphtalia wants to go to the slave owner’s shop to get a new slavery mark because she likes being his slave- she wears it as a badge of honour now. Who the hell cares about her years of PTSD when it’s magically cured from a few moments of kindness?! As long as you fed and pet your slave then you can be a great slave owner!
Filo is a one-dimensional, generic, cute bird loli with no depth. The only reason she’s a loli is for fan service. I despise Filo because when she joins the party the story goes downhill. It started off deep with a darker tone to it which was interesting, but slowly devolved into a lighthearted, generic harem isekai with loli’s joining one after another. The parental relationship between Edgelord Hero and Raphtalia becomes a competition between Filo and Raphtalia for the Edgelord Hero’s affection, despite him not returning it. Malty gains feelings for him too, because it’s not Isekai if all the girls don’t worship/ fall in love with the self-insert protagonist right?
Myne is a one dimensional, spiteful, unlikeable, basic bitch with no depth. I don’t think ever witnessed a character who was created to be as insufferable and hated like her. Her only motivation in life seems to be ruining Edgelord Hero’s life e.g. faking a rape accusation, stealing all his money, lying about Raphtalia being held against her will as a slave, interfering in the Shield/Sword duel while trying to have the King and Pope cover for her. I don’t even hate Myne anymore because that’s what the author wants and won’t give him that satisfaction. I feel sorry for her for being a victim of bad writing. Together with her trusty sidekick Spear Hero they become so comically evil, i can’t take them seriously. There a discount version team rocket because even they have more depth than them.
The king is another one dimensional prick who’s hated the Edgelord Hero since his inception.
The Queen feels like a plot device. She’s isn’t present for the first 15 or so episodes to allow for Naofumi hate conspiracies to continue and when she eventually shows up out of the blue after her Country had gone to shit. She magically solves all of his problems. The Queen’s reason for being away from her Country is absolute BS, since if she really wanted to reprimand the King her little shadow bodyguards could have delivered the message.
The three heroes are one dimensional caricatures. We never follow their journey, view events from their perspective or really learn anything about them:
Motoyasu aka. Spear hero... the guy has the most screentime out of the three and yet he’s a utter moron lacking any brain cells. Seriously, his level of stupidity is unrealistic. For example, who the hell starts a fight in the middle of the city? and when they get called out for damaging the place he gets all pissy about being a hero. The dude was the first to pipe up accusing Naofumi being a sexual offender, all the while trying to molest Filo at every given opportunity. Why is are these hypocrites okay with this? Pedoyasu needs to be castrated because his Filophilla is uncomfortable to watch. Honestly, I’ve given up on Spear Hero. The guy’s either being a brainless pawn or straight up comedic relief.
I literally can’t describe Itsuki aka. Bow Hero, because he has no personality or character besides a hero complex.
Ren aka. Sword Hero (Not Kirito) seems to be the most competent out of the three, too bad he’s still as bland as the others.
The three heroes are more like the three stooges. Everything about them from the lacklustre characterisation, to their dialogue and actions are some of the most lazy, poor written I’ve ever encountered. It’s really annoying that they are continuously portrayed as incompetent morons who can’t do anything right, since their sole purpose is to make Edgelord Hero look good saving the day! I understand it was it meant to be a plot point to portray how they view the world as a game e.g. them not treating the NPCs as real people or not properly completely a quest, however the writer goes out of his way to emphasise the stupidity of these idiots by making the three heroes' attacks always follow the same move of “Meteor shot/thrust/slash" and attack at the same time like when they fought the dimensional spirit it’s simply lazy writing on the writers part. Their development is inconsistent. After Edgelord Hero points out the three heroes flaws and they come to terms with him not being the guy he’s been portrayed as you’d think these guys would grow, but nope. The three heroes are the still the same idiots who antagonise Naofumi, still use the same attacks and treat the world as a game. The heroes (especially Motoyasu) always follow every word Myne says, being gullible to the fact that the Edgelord Hero is being setup at every opportunity for no reason. I think the worse case was when Myne said Edgelord Hero was brainwashing Melty so she tried to kill her sister.
The game mechanics are stupid and unnecessary in this fantasy setting. It’s been proven time and again that levelling means absolutely nothing.
The way how the everyone in the Country is portrayed as unlikeable, cult following assholes who hate Naofumi is beyond unrealistic. None of them behave like real people. Whenever Naofumi points out how obvious it is that everyone is conspiring against him, no one seems to bat an eye? They never believe him, which to be fair he does a shit job at defending his case e.g. The heroes accuse the Edgelord Hero of brainwashing his party and yet they have no evidence to support their claim. Does Edgelord Hero mention this? No. Why doesn’t he show one of the heroes his skill tree to show he doesn’t have a brainwashing shield? Myne states that Melty has been brainwashed and has to be rescued, she then proceeds to try kill her and all the heroes do is stand there like dumbasses as if she didn’t just do what Edgelord Hero was saying. Myne’s whole potryal and evil laugh is like the most generic mustache twirling villain ever.
The pacing was bad. The constant montage sequence to try develop character interactions where they’re bonding isn’t working. It’s a shallow attempt to make me care about them. Another problem is the way it’s chopping scenes together e.g. Edgelord Hero & Raphtalia are waiting for Melty & Filo, the next they’re meeting the Pope.
I really don’t like the rage shield. Not only is it a powerup that focuses on his rage boner, it defeats the purpose of him being a tank. It’s bullshit that the lower level tank is doing more damage to the enemy than the three heroes combined who are higher levelled, got better gear, equipment and are offensive classes. It would have been better if the heroes cooperated and Edgelord played the tank. Not to mention, there’s no real consequence for using the rage shield. Edgelord Hero didn’t need time to learn how to master the shield e.g. he just uses it in the second wave not because his party or the other heroes were defeated and it was his last option, but because it was taking to long to defeat the boss. In fact, there’s no tension in the show. Edgelord Hero is stronger than everyone in the Country who could try to mess with him. His party is loyal to a fault and will never leave him.
Animation (5/10):
The animation is mediocre, the CGI is horrendous. Don’t believe me? Look at the T-Rex. Th action scenes are terrible. Not only are they so static that it reminds of you a Pokemon battle where characters take turns attacking, but the choreography and storytelling is weak.
Conclusion (2/10):
Naofumi is a classic example of a MC who in real life would be so unlikeable that no one would hang out with him, let alone have girls fawn over him. This show panders to the types who want to think it's the worlds fault.
Everything that happens to Edgelord Hero is fuelled to making him the poor misunderstood victim of a revenge story going against the authoritative power (e.g. royalty, legendary heroes), who are the bad guys. The audience is supposed to emphasise with his plight as a underdog trying to free his name/reputation and build towards the satisfying climax where Naofumi sticks his middle finger at the big guy as he finally gets his revenge for all their wrongdoings... The problem here is the execution is appalling.
Shield Hero has the elements to be a good show, such as an interesting story, usage of game mechanics and world building, but the storytelling is badly written, the characters having no substance, the villains have nothing going for themselves and are comically evil- to the point it becomes repetitive and boring. If you need to hammer down the same plot points and themes while sacrificing any potential interesting thematic elements then you’re doing something wrong.
I’ve read the manga to see if it might change my perspective and manga/LN readers kept banging on how much better it was. I’m pleased to inform you, that’s not the case. The anime has been more faithful than most isekai adaptations. They did change a couple of scenes and remove, but that was bound to happen due to time constraints. The anime toned down Naofumi and omitted his inner monologues to make him more of a generic, good guy isekai MC. I don’t see this as much of a problem though, since him being a edgy insufferable twat like his manga counterpart isn’t any better.
The point is the manga isn’t much better than the anime, as it still suffers from the same pitfalls. Shield Hero is shallow, poorly written revenge porn.
