I would be very honest to say that I greatly underestimated My Isekai Life. I would describe this anime as the "good shit" in a literal way, saying that I didn't believe I could laugh that much at what seemed as “another isekai like we can find masses of”.
Alright, now that the hot take is said, you might say to yourself, “Ohh, yet anooooother troll review that would give that piece of turd a 10/10”. I can already see these comments coming. It is by pure evidence by seeing the full title of the anime that comments like this can suddenly arise. This is typical of anime fans that have seen over 300 anime and for people only watching anime for the purpose of reviewing it and/or attracting drama. But here, with this anime, I was able to ask myself a question to which I am not sure to have found my answer yet.
“What can make an anime bad and boring, and what can make an anime good and engaging?"
First, I will tell an anecdote.
During this season that My Isekai Life was broadcasting, I wanted to go back in older seasons to watch an anime called Death March, with a friend, for a joke. Since he was watching My Isekai Life with me and he knew it was going to be just as generic as Death March, he still wanted to give it a chance, which was the worst thing he could do. In the end, we were more than free. It was shit, nothing worse. The story brought absolutely nothing interesting, the characters were just as forgettable, in addition to the dark haired protagonist giving nothing but hate to watch. In other words, annoying. A few days later, this same friend surprised me by forcing me to watch Choyuyu with him, as revenge for making him suffer with me. A political isekai to which I would like to say that it is certainly not bad, but which I was generally bored.
The main reason of why I wanted to make myself suffer on Death March was to cover myself again in what is referred to as a generic (shit) isekai. When we saw the full title of My Isekai Life, we both, like any other individuals, thought “Damn, this looks like shit”. And, through mountains of laughs and "This is the anime of all time"-style memes, that was when I suggested him to watch it with me. And so, we did, while watching Death March and Choyuyu, which we had now finished and hated.
The result, you guessed it.
This was where I wondered, especially for isekai: "Why would Death March suck and why is My Isekai Life enjoyable?" Both carry a similar promise, but… why is one better than the other?!”
We are talking about a protagonist like any other existing isekai. He is listless, dark-haired, doesn't talk much, and got overcheated powers when he was transported to the other world. Yuji, as he is named, will mostly use slimes to summon his almost inexhaustible magic. And… he has to go out and save the world, period.
Let's replace the part I'm talking about with slime and we have the basis for any isekai that may exist. Instead of slime, it's a gun, and we have Death March. You put a phone instead and you have Isekai Smartphone. Instead, a literal mom, and you have Okaa-san Online. Then comes the hatred towards this format, since it is the same thing, but with an attribute that’s supposed to make it different as a goal to stand out. But that doesn't answer the question. It only lowers the format with an argument that I certainly approve of, but which remains ridiculous. It would be to the point of saying that all anime romances suck because we have the same set of characters, with a waifu with a different and more aesthetic character design.
I'm not saying it in force to say that this was the best Isekai I've seen, by far. I'm just confused why people watch this anime with a disbelieving eye.
On our side, my friend and I had seen this anime with a mocking eye. We knew it was going to be shit, yet this anime just unintentionally gave us the opposite. It's still generic, we were surprisingly able to predict less than a quarter of what we kept predicting, but most of all, it was fucking hilarious. More precisely, this ANIME ADAPTATION was hilarious, because it sucked. We even wondered if Reveroot was aware that what they were doing was crap.
Excessive reuse of pre-existing animation, ridiculous repetition in the dialogues, sound design that may come from a stock site, all with a delicious coulis of comedic timing.
It was something we hadn't found when we watched Death March and Choyuyu. “It must be intentional”, we kept saying to ourselves. Have you ever watched a Youtube Poop when it was still popular? This anime was almost an equivalent of that with every Isekai that could ever exist. You expect this anime to be poorly written, which you instantly see when it's called "My Isekai Life: I Gained a Second Character Class and Became the Strongest Sage in the World", but instead of searching for the flaws, you laugh at it because it’s the best way to fully enjoy this anime. Can you imagine if a movie reviewer was forced to watch a Youtube Poop and was asked to review it? It was made for an audience that can parse humor through "the willfully badly done" and it well deserves that audience. Similar to the YIIK community who knows the game is extremely poorly written, but still full of memorable memes and music.
The story is not what stands out from the anime, nor the characters, it is the humor brought by this adaptation that seems deliberately badly done. Again, I'm only talking about the adaptation which is good, since I know even less about what the original light novel is. Maybe the author had written "Yuji does the same movement as in the other five chapters" and Reveroot only literally adapted what was written basic. I’ll never know.
Even as I write this, I know that I would only bring a few people to watch this hilarity. If I want to talk about the jokes, It would destroy the twist of watching this anime, clueless. So why in spite of everything, you wouldn't want to give it a chance. Maybe it's just the title and description that bothers you, because you've seen it over a billion times on other isekai we have every season? Telling yourself that the description is so simple judging, it would be a bit like doing the same for Madoka Magica on MyAnimeList, which does not talk at all about the infamous moment of the anime. Is this then an anime not to be judged by its cover? How ironic!
Nice work Reveroot, as well as Shotou Sinkou. You made me cry laughing even tho it was shit.
This isekai is a ride!
