Oh dear, here it is. The ultimate show of all time. Behold my friends! This is what history was waiting for, the apex of the japanese animation industry, the culmination of years of work! The merge we were all expecting! Yes! ISEKAI MEETS MAGIC SCHOOL!!!!

A-ham! You were not expecting this? What?

We’ve been fed with waves of endless magic school shows in these past years, mixed with the ever growing and tireless isekai horde that Kirito has left us with. It was just a matter of time for this merge to happen! Rejoice! Or… beware? I don’t know, let’s see what the heck this is about.

Wise Man’s Grandchild (Kenja no Mago) is, first of all, a show with a fucking decent name. It’s short, it tells us its ideas, it’s easy to remember, even its japanese name is quite simple. Thank the gods.

Other than its name, this is the tale of Shin Wolford, a beloved japanese student reincarnated in another world and taught magic by Merlin himself, well, this Merlin being an old hero of the region and known for his magical knowledge. Being adopted as a grandson by such a famous person comes with other perks though, and Shin is also instructed in swordsmanship and enchantment spells by the best in each field. Finally, when he comes of age, he is asked by the king to attend a magic school, so he can finally make some friends and enjoy his young days with something else other than training.

Yes, the ultimate mixture

An isekai with a magic school, oh boy. Anyway, if you’ve been watching anime for the past years you know the trend, right? Boy with some weak magic or lineage joins magic school, ends up being god-like powerful and proceeds to date girls and form a harem. Kenja no Mago, however, borrows the isekai’s trope of our main guy being an overpowered piece of shit for no reason whatsoever, no weak magic or lie to the initial idea. Shin is simply the most powerful being in the entire world by the age of 15, and now he can finally revel in… a japanese school (with magic).

It can be surprising…?

Well, yes? I was surprised. Shin may be the overpowered nerd and the excuse for his power may be the simple fact that he thinks about the process of creating magic and not the result (well, as always, everyone in the medieval world is a dumb wooden plate who never thought of that), but he is a nice guy.

Yup, he obeys his elders, he is well-mannered, he is ready to help people, he is kind. Jeez, is this possible in an isekai or magic school? He is not even a pervert! Good for you Shin! Good for the show as well.

This is better than you expect

Not being a dick with supreme powers, but a good guy with supreme powers, surprisingly works wonders to make everything else more reasonable. Shin manages to attract people to his side not simply because he is god powerful, no, he really befriends them, he is nice, he teaches things, he hears and learns. God damn, has there ever been a protagonist like this in previous glorified isekais?

Not only that, but not being a womanizer with a girl-magnet attached to his ass also nets Shin an early romance prospect, to whom he becomes really loyal and devoted. Fuck, what is happening? An isekai protagonist that is not a dick and gets a girlfriend? How? Sword Art Online taught me that only by being a dick and having people killed for superfluous reasons would net me a girlfriend!!? Was Kirito wrong all the time?

It’s not any masterpiece though

Surely, don’t get your hopes up. Kenja no Mago may have the most outlier of a protagonist for its genre in decades (or in history, perhaps), but the generic medieval fantasy vibes are all over the place. Let’s not forget that he is still an overpowered little guy who no one in the universe can stand against too.

Those two things combined make up for a show that doesn’t really offer any twist or tension. It is really focused on Shin, so there is no fear for his life, no challenge he cannot face, and every kingdom or empire thrown at our face is just a detail in a plot where our little hero will conquer everything given due time.

It does better with the rest of the cast though

Another thing in favor of Kenja no Mago is the fact that it gives a bit more care to the side cast too. Shin’s friends are given prominent importance (as it is possible, because they are all weaklings compared to him) and most of this show is about how Shin teaches his friends ultimate magic powers and about his little romance with Sizilien (I’m sure her name is Sicily, but whatever). There are even many scenes dedicated to humanizing one of the villains, and he does have a tragic past and some decent reasoning (but well, he is a mad demon).

It’s also pretty

Silver Link studio surely can make cute little girls, we know it. This is a decent effort in general by them, although they can’t not make this generic medieval fantasy any less generic, as everything is bright and colorful and every loli is cute as hell. It does work to make the middle part of the show tolerable and cute, because the boring shounen romance gets dragged on for too long.

Jeez, this was… good. Yes, more than decent, actually good. How the fuck? It’s a mixture of the isekai plague with the most annoying type of high school there is, and yet, it’s miles ahead in entertainment than Sword Art Online or Mahouka or any other modern shit that it clearly draws inspiration from.

It’s not void of problems though. In fact, it is still plagued by the issues of its subgenre, but Shin being a good guy allows for stuff to happen with some decent reasoning, the royal prince acts like someone who understands his position, and even the cute lolis at least fit their roles. This surprisingly decent cast allows for generic medieval fantasy to flow and even cheesy teenage romance to be enjoyable. The deres never plague this, the girls don’t want to bed our main guy every damn second, and he also never acts like a dick towards them. Hell, he acts like a shy teen trying to get a girlfriend and doing things that make fucking sense. How can this be so damn hard for other shows to copy from? Okay, it’s just basic romance and there are plenty of much better romances around, but for an isekai? This is like the rarest thing to happen.

Anyway, I was expecting this to be the most pathetic show that ever existed due to its mixture, but I came out of it with perhaps the most decent isekai of its season. It’s simple, fun, drags a bit around the middle, but makes sense and has a cast that is not annoying. Thank the gods.