1) The battle royal premise. It is a battle royal that will lead to another battle royal full of sexualization, lack of tension, teenagers with revolted hormones, stereotypes, edgelord shit and meaningless dialogues (many of them are memes currently). Reliance on the original source limits the freedom of writing and forces many situations presented in this show. Why did they try to make a psychological thriller that gonna end in a retarded fighting shounen in the next show?
2) The bastardization of mythological figures. They converted Arturo Pendragon and Excalibur myths in a waifu that was made to warm up otakus for example.
3) The show is pretentious. The premise of the show doesn't have anything serious, is a fucking battle royale against "mythological" figures to the death, how can this be taken seriously? The show doesn't even function as mindless action. There are few fights with a lot of pretentious dialogue that goes nowhere by not ending in several cases. It's supposed to be a battle royal to the death and no character of importance dies for multiple episodes. The battle royal is not really that, is basically the other teams against one in particular (like Dragon Ball Super).
4) The characters are forgettable. Many of them are summarized as a negligent or sadistic. One of the main characters change the band/team becuase the script wants it that way. The reason of the change is stupid and it does not square with what had been introduced of the same. A character sholudn't be changed drastically with a few dialogues. Other main characters have a past and a reason to be part of the battle royal and that's it. During the show, they don't have a real development.
5) Edgelord levels. The way that some characters suffer before they die are unjustified and it's only a resource to get audience's attention. Also there are filler episodes in order to show this suffering, in other words, more edgelord shit.
6) The philosophy of the show. Is simple, retarded and childish at the same time (in the context of the show): If you kill, you are a bad person. So if I kill someone with the same attitude as Hitler, I am automatically a bad person no matter how many lives I have saved by doing that.
7) The logic of the world: if the show is placed in a first world type, how is it possible that no one has noticed the magicians and supernatural powers of the characters?
The only good things that this garbage has is the soundtrack and animation.
In conclusion, it could have been better if Urobuchi have made an spin-off instead of a prequel (it would have failed anyways knowing the mastermind behind this franchise).
