Our protagonist, a sage known by the name of Gaius, desperately wishes to become stronger. But in a world where an individual's magical abilities are predertermined at birth and cannot be changed, he is severely limited by his given crest which is not suitable for combat. Wanting to obtain his desired crest instead, Gaius decides to reincarnate into the future and is reborn as Mathias Hildesheimer thousands of years later -- succeeding in his goal just like he had expected.
However, it appears that the world has changed dramatically during his absence; humans are now not nearly as efficient in magic as they once used to be. The crest that Mathias that worked so hard to attain is considered the weakest, and even basic techniques like chantless casting are thought to be extremely difficult to use. Soon, Mathias figures out that demons are responsible behind the immense downfall of humanity, and he subsequently embarks on a quest to thwart the demons from realizing their agenda.
Does this sound familiar? I'm sure it does, because I can already name almost 10 titles off the top of my head that start pretty much exactly like this -- which is one of the biggest problems I have with Saikyou Kenja. It's not only the start, but the entire plot of the show feels like a rehash of other already existing power fantasy series -- albeit not as dumb or tryhard -- but still completely predictable and almost boring enough to be sleep-inducing. And this problem of Saikyou Kenja is only exacerbated by its insipid protagonist, Mathias.
As it is the case with most overpowered protagonists in power fantasy anime, Mathias is at the center of everything that happens in the show. Thanks to his impenetrable plot armor, everyone around him unconditionally trusts and relies on him even though he has the appearance of a little kid. Mathias also acts like the active narrator of the show; he monotonously spells out all the events in the storyline and the brief exposition that we occasionally get is only ever told from his perspective. Because of this, the worldbuilding of the anime is merely limited to Mathius' monologues, which makes the world feel completely lackluster.
Of course, this creates other problems too. Since the plot is almost entirely moved forward by Mathias, all the other characters in the show get completely brushed off as unimportant and always remain under his shadows. They are rarely given any time to properly display their individual personalities, as their actions and dialogues are limited to mere reactions for the most part. It doesn't help that Mathias himself is as dull as the supporting characters -- if not more -- and even more frustratingly, few of them are actually a lot more likeable and entertaining than him.
Bluntly put, Mathias is wholly uninteresting. His only personality trait is that he is insanely overpowered and wants to become even more overpowered for whatever reason (keep count of how many times I use "overpowered"). And because of the fact that he is so overpowered, there is practically no sense of tension that could be felt throughout the story. Even if the skill level of the enemies is increased tenfold (be prepared to hear this million times), it barely matters because Mathias will probably defeat them with his bullshit powers anyway. There are times when he does use proper strategy and teamwork to win the battles, but they are unfortunately few in number.
I suppose another personality trait of Mathius, only if it could be called one, is that he can be incredibly stupid and oblivious. Occasionally, the show tries to be humorous by making him say or do something really dumb, but it doesn't work at all and instead becomes very awkward as it feels completely out-of-place for his character. Following the same pattern, Mathias tends to be clueless at some of the most bizarre and simplest things—which, again, doesn't suit his usually arrogant personality and only makes the comedy seem tryhard.
Speaking of which, Mathias frequently acts like a smartass. For some reason, he constantly needs to say to himself that he is extremely powerful and intelligent, and it is reasonably very irritating. Him being irrationally overpowered was already enough of a turn-off for me, but that being followed by his overly smug reactions made it worse. From time to time, the characters of the show also like to remind us that he is overpowered, and it annoyed me to death most of the times they did so (not every, since there were a few funny ones).
Lurie is an inoffensive character; she is neither interesting nor unlikeable. Almost the exact thing could also be said about Alma, but I personally "liked" Lurie a bit more. These two receive by far the most amount of screentime besides Mathias, and even then they are never treated as significant characters. Their interactions with Mathias are expectedly bland, usually consisting of -- as I previously said -- the two laughing at his cluelessness, acting surprised by his overpowered abilities for the umpteenth time, and more concerningly, Mathias and Lurie blushing at each other while Alma teases them.
The romance between Mathias and Lurie is portrayed in the anime as heartwarming, but I personally find it kind of creepy. Although his physical appearance and lack of maturity may tell you otherwise, keep in mind that Mathias is actually an adult (who presumably lived for many, many years). On the other hand, Lurie is most likely the same age as Mathias' current self, which means that she should be around 12 years old. Taking that into consideration, their relationship becomes somewhat messed up -- but luckily enough, the romance isn't given that much focus.
There is one character that I do genuinely like, though, which would be the "dragon girl" Iris. She is without a doubt the best character of the anime by a mile. Her over-the-top and fittingly clumsy personality is actually funny, and the scenes featuring her casually destroying her surroundings are easily the best from the entire show. Unfortunately, Iris doesn't get much focus throughout the story, and although she is a part of Mathias' team and supposedly a main character, like many others, she is rendered insignificant for the entirety of the series.
I don't think the other characters are even worth mentioning, but I will outline their roles and personalities just to show you why they aren't. Firstly, you have the unmistakably benevolent king and principal who can't do anything themselves without Mathias' help, and to oppose the good principal, there is the bad principal who has the mind of a 10-year-old kid (and definitely not a smart one). Finally, you have the boneheaded demons and their underlings, whose job is to act cocky at first and then get absolutely thrashed by their gigachad lord -- obviously none other than Mathias.
And that's it. I just fully described all the supporting characters that appear in the show; there is nothing more to say about them. Unless you count the academy students as characters too, who literally make no more difference in the narrative than a cardboard cutout would.
In contrast, I think the animation of Saikyou Kenja is quite decent on the whole. The character designs are generic for sure, but the animation quality is fairly consistent and there are not that many noticeable flaws in my opinion. I might even say that Saikyou Kenja is one of the better looking isekai/power fantasy shows in the last couple of years. The soundtrack is rather generic on the other hand, but the voice acting is expectedly very good.
Repeating what I said in the beginning of my review, Shikkakumon no Saikyou Kenja is probably one of the most generic power fantasy titles I have seen to date. But you know what? As much as I criticized the series, it is not completely garbage. Even if Mathias is a dull and unlikeable protagonist, at least he isn't always obnoxious. Even if the storyline is repetitive as hell, at least there is no insufferable drama or harem. Even if everyone besides Mathias is practically worthless, at least someone entertaining like Iris exists. Even if the writing sucks, at least there is somewhat decent animation.
The point I'm trying to make is, there are many more power fantasy shows out there that are worse than Saikyou Kenja -- it is far from being the worst one. That alone should be enough to convince some people to watch the anime and even enjoy it, but clearly, it wasn't nearly enough for me.
