Tate no Yuusha no Nariagari, known as the The Rising of the Shield Hero (Shield Hero), is yet another attempt at the popular isekai genre of the last few seasons. Simply put, it is more the same, showing the tale of a random japanese guy sucked into a new fantastic world where he is gifted with superb powers and destined to greatness. The escapism also explores the MMO elements of every other sad attempt at medieval fantasy, as well as not wasting time into turning the adventure into a harem of absolute no consequence. Yeah. Pick a random show of the last two or three years and chances are it is the same as Shield Hero. Sad thing.

The story itself is about Naofumi, an otaku who is summoned to another world where he becomes one of the four heroes destined to save the land. Those four heroes are represented by the weapons they wield: sword, spear, bow, and shield. The shield is Naofumi’s weapon, and with it comes a lot of prejudice as he is pointed as a weakling, a guy who cannot attack, and the most useless of the four heroes. Of course, if you’ve seen any random anime in the past half decade you know this is bullshit. Naofumi is simply the most overpowered of the heroes and no one stands a chance against him.

It starts with interesting twists though

Naofumi finds himself in this new world with a fantastic task of traveling the land, recruiting a party, and leveling up until the next wave of enemies comes from the skies. Things are not all great for him though, as he quickly discovers people in this land mock the shield hero and treat him with disgust, especially the king. The first episode makes this obvious as he is betrayed by a friend, framed as a rapist and villain, and must ultimately walk his own path instead of bathing in glory as the other three heroes. It is an interesting twist, one that makes Naofumi veers toward a darker way of dealing with things and where he is constantly pissed for good reason.

And his darker way…

Means demi-human cute slaves, of course. After being unable to build his party, Naofumi buys a slave. As any other japanese teen with dubious criminal mind, he chooses a very young half-racoon girl as his slave and puts her to work as the damage dealer of his party. This girl, Raphtalia, somehow grows older when she levels up and becomes the vassal of every otaku dream. Yeah. She is in love with Naofumi because, despite being a villain, he is a good guy. Shit. We’ve seen that again and again, that otaku lead acting all badass but never really doing anything to deserve the fame as villain or evil. At least here Naofumi is constantly being treated as garbage by everyone and framed in the most ridiculous ways. I would even argue that it is unrealistic how stupid people are when believing the shit the king and princess tell, but hey, considering our real world I think the show is quite spot on on people’s stupidity.

It’s boring though

Although it is nice to see Naofumi being treated as a weakling, it is sad that he is simply the most powerful hero around and is capable of doing basically anything he wants with his shield. Instead of having a direct arc with an adventure, Shield Hero is simply about what Naofumi does between the waves of enemies popping. He goes around killing random mobs, saves a small village here and there, becomes a merchant, and do a lot of stuff with no consequence in the larger plot. In fact, he ends up recruiting yet another demi-human girl who becomes his slave, this time a full-time child for his sick pleasures, and later he is joined by a cute pre-teen princess too. Yeah, it is a basic harem experience with a lot of boring fights with MMO terms popping around and Naofumi unleashing a berserk-power that beats everything (or he is spared by enemies for later).

Naofumi being treated as garbage and being betrayed becomes rarer as the episodes progresses, and with that the show loses its only real power to make it stand among the horde of similar shows.

It’s a decent production

It seems Kinema Citrus put the money they’ve gained with Into the Abyss to use here. Shield Hero is among the best looking shows of the season and especially among its MMO-like genre. The characters are consistent, the clothing offers decent detail, the scenery is good, the colors are bright and clear, and the special effects are also very interesting. It is just a pity it puts so few action sequences to truly test all this sharpness and colors.

Shield Hero could be more. It is, by the end, simply yet another rehash of shows we’ve seen a lot since Sword Art Online released back in 2012, but it has, perhaps, the best glimpses of success among this horde of shitty shows. Naofumi is a decent lead for most part, being the most grey character to occupy this spot on the genre, yet the show triples down in boring anime tropes, harem-vibes, and generic MMORPG terms, which ends up ruining a tale of about a guy who is betrayed, tricked, and kicked from society through lies and deception.

Unlike Sword Art Online, it manages to show us these glimpses for more times than simply its first episode. Unlike Overlord, it offers a better pace and it is less shameful because it doesn’t have lizardmen intercourse. Unlike the modern isekai horde it offers a protagonist that suffers and reacts with reason. You see? There is a lot of good things tucked into this dying corpse of an overused genre. The thing is, this is a dying corpse of an overused genre, so no matter how much mascara or perfume you put on it, it still reeks and is decomposing. Let it die for Christ’s sake.

Anyway, if you have in you to watch more isekai stuff or MMO-like shows, you can give this a chance. Its glimpses of greatness are worthy a watch, but sadly it is always reminding you that this is a rehash of stuff you’ve seen a thousand times in a span of just around half a dozen years.