When writing fantasy stories, I believe it’s of utmost importance not just to change one singular thing about the already existing formula. Multiple unique or interesting ideas/concepts need to be featured in your story in order to distinguish yourself from the exhaustive ocean of run-of-the-mill, lazily thrown-together fantasy shows that this medium boasts. Goblin Slayer, in my opinion, does absolutely not check any of the boxes here, but instead constantly and awkwardly falls back on the ONE selling factor that the show has: Goblin Slayer himself.
There is nothing special to the world presented in the series, none of the characters are ever intriguing, and the story never goes anywhere. I mean, the characters are even named “Elf”, “Lizardman”, or “Dwarf”, like Jesus Christ, this just makes it look like the author themself have no respect whatsoever for their own work. In short, the writing is an absolute mess, and it doesn’t really get any help from the team who produces the show, considering the uninspired art style, janky animation, non-existent directing, and forgettable music doesn’t do it any favors.
The one praise I can give the show is that you sometimes get presented with some pretty neat techniques that Goblin Slayer uses in his goblin slaying, as opposed to always resorting to his brute strength, which many other stories would’ve done. This actually somewhat elegantly conveys his expertise and experience in the field, but as soon as you start to take things seriously, “Cow Girl” shows up again and shatters whatever little immersion you had in the story up until that point. Like, am I supposed to take the show seriously, or is this one where you just enjoy the cool fights and move on? The action is extremely lackluster, so I sure don’t hope that’s the case.
Maybe I’m missing something, but I think that it’s really evident that this show still runs on the fumes that the first, “controversial” episode of season 1 produced, not delivering anything new for the consumer or content of value.
