One day, a man claiming to be a god suddenly hacks a certain school's intercoms, ordering all of its students to team up and prepare to be transported to another world. There, they will be given special skills in the hopes that they become that world's heroes and defeat the Demon King that ravages the land.
The initial transfer is a success. However, Seiichi Hiiragi, who suffers from his classmates' constant bullying due to his somewhat undesirable appearance, is left behind as no one is willing to be his teammate. Nevertheless, the self-proclaimed god decides to send Seiichi to the parallel world and lets him join his peers. Unfortunately, this fateful ordeal causes Seiichi to arrive at a location deep in the forest, far not only from his schoolmates but from human civilization as well.
Desperately searching for a way to change his predicament, Seiichi's miserable days only seem to continue to worsen. Yet when all hope seems lost, Seiichi discovers a strange fruit known as the "Fruit of Evolution"—which may be his first step toward a significantly better future.
[Written by MAL Rewrite]
I love Isekai. I hate Isekai, when the fantasy world is stale. I love Isekai, when it's done right. I hate isekai, when it just feels oh-so-wrong. I love Isekai, more so in the form of parodies because they are comedic and subvert expectations. I hate Isekai, when the content amounts to nothingness. I love Isekai, even when it feels like trolling trash. I hate Isekai, when it's unbelievably actual trash. I love Isekai, but Shinka no Mi is legit dysfunctional trash deep down to the very core. I hate Isekai.And the cycle repeats itself all over again. Where thou art are you, Isekai God???
Hoo boy, where should I really start with this one? It's no doubt yet another one of those shows with the Isekai Reincarnation setting, combined with the story that's very akin to Isekai Spider or even Arifureta, and has comedic moments like last season's Tsukimichi. But make no mistake when I tell you that Shinka no Mi a.k.a The Fruit of Evolution by novelist Miku has none of all of the above's exquisite taste whatsoever, in the span of the wide standard wish-fulfillment fantasy that peaks at its most ridiculous and garish. I kinda liked Spider-sekai and Arifureta even more so, even if the animation is garbage, much less Tsukimichi being self-aware about its parody and elevates that comedy into something worth watching. Sure, Shinka no Mi has all that, but trust me, you'd find yourself gawking in awe of how horrible the absurd story plot is with the same character archetypes gone haywire up to 11, coupled together with yet again, horrible animation. Hello, what is the Hotline that I can call for help!?
The story itself (or plot rather) can be dumbed down to these obvious truths: imagine if the MC is like Arifureta's Hajime Nagumo or Spider-sekai's Kumoko playing the usual reincarnation formula with his/her class but has the looks like Tsukimichi's Makoto Misumi, only fatter. That's who Seiichi Hiiragi is: an ugly fatso that with the dawn of the Isekai reincarnation light, gets transported away from the rest of his class, whose duty is to repel the Demon Lord and his army. Since Seiichi didn't like the fact that even in the fantasy world he still looks ugly and unglam AF, there's the secret formula: the Fruit of Evolution. Eat 10 of these and you'll evolve into to becoming the stereoptypical good-looking generic MC #69420 who is certified OP and continues to gain more altitude and powers to become ridiculously strong. The best part is that these nut-like "fruit" are abundant everywhere, so levelling up is a cinch. When in an Isekai did it become so easy and lax just to be the center of attention? Only in Shinka no Mi, you will be.
The cast of characters are a total joke. Seiichi Hiiragi for one, IDK why he has such a childlike voice, only dialled up to 11 in the cringe aspect, and I'm in total disbelief that someone like Hiro Shimono could VA his character. It's as if that Hiro Shimono had been inhaling helium just to get that intended voice, and it's very annoying that I had to turn down the volume umpteen times just to avoid hearing Seiichi's rug-tug expressions. The harem of girls that come after Seiichi's way aren't so hot either. Beginning with the red gorilla Saria, I always find myself facepalming the unbelievable relationship between human and gorilla, not even after the transformation into a pretty-looking girl with HanaKana's voice in it. The next person to come: the Calamity Artoria Gremm, who's claim to fame is only that she is a misfortune through and through. Everyone who swarms around her leads to their deaths(resulting in her Calamity nickname), and it only took both Seiichi and Saria to accept her that she is willing to drop her guard and confide trust in them.
While I can confide that at the very least both Saria and Artoria had the most screentime around Seiichi for their characters to be fleshed out, the one that come after only becomes more ridonculous like Lulune the donkey, Louise Balze the Valkyrie warrior, Oliga Calmeria the slave cat and Karen Kannazuki (going off the actual photo with the obvious harem of girls). I understand that harems can be both good and bad, but while Tsukimichi has beautiful god-like mature adult beasties at Makoto's side, Shinka no Mi just goes with the flow to accept all that comes Seiichi's way, regardless of their origin stories. If you want to incorporate a harem, fine, make sure that it has appeal, but not to the stupidity of being sacrilegious with the absurdity that mind-boggles your audience.
You want to know what's the bigger mind-boggling sin of this show? The garbage animation, that despite feel. and Children's Playground Entertainment (the studio producing this season's Saihate no Paladin a.k.a The Faraway Paladin) collab name on this list, both studio's aren't at fault for this for helping (cooperation) with the production. If you need an entity to blame, vent your frustrations at the totally relative and unknown studio Hotline instead, of which funnily enough, adding the production staff (even the director) altogether, all went into definite hiatus since 2013 (well, except for scriptwriter-cum-series composer Gigaemon Ichikawa who mainly worked on children shows). That should immediately tell you that as much work as they've done in the past, no amount of time gone will ever repair the fact that this show was lazily done and just to get by the day for "acceptance" quality. I don't even think that the novelist Miku also batted an eye on his/her work, because the earlier incarnation of yet another work of his/hers (Isekai de Cheat Skill) just shows that the writing prowess will forever be trash. But since trash work goes hand-in-hand with even trashier production, the adage of "birds of a feather flock together" is the right way that I can sum all of this.
Sound-wise, it's also outright bad. Is this really that dull and mundane, because it truly is to let the OST of Yoshino Nanjo's OP and Poppin'Party's ED sink the fact that they're both unimpressive songs, and not even mediocre, let alone decent ones at that. Usually I don't expect much of the music department to ever hold itself up, but wow is this some of the worst OSTs that I've heard in watching anime for years, and I'm an anime OST Maestro myself to really know what's hot and what's not.
You don't need me to tell you that throughout this review I've been ranting that after the brillance of Summer 2021's Tsukimichi as a parody Isekai, with Shinka no Mi, we finally felt what it was like on the other end of the spectrum, where the grass is definitely not greener on the other side. For one good thing we can trade for a bad thing, but Shinka no Mi is a show that if you liked what you saw, that's because you watch it as a troll or joke to get the enjoyment values out of it. I really want to laugh at how horrible this show is, but my brain cells have suffered too long just to voice all of these "shitty" opinions.
Trash? Definitely. Worth watching? NOT recommended.
StStark700
December 20, 2021
Not Recommended
This show, or rather, this fantasy fufillment of an adaptation lives up to its standards of being one of the biggest jokes this year. Jokes are meant to bring laughter but for Shinka no Mi Shiranai Uchi ni Kachigumi Jinsei, that translates to an embarassing testament of exactly what's wrong with the isekai trope. When you have a gorilla as a main character, there's more than red flags than raised. We live in a world where literally anyone can come up with an idea and put it together to sell a product. I don't know what the author was thinking when they crafted this show'spremise but is anyone actually impressed by the promotional material on this MAL page? If you look over the preview videos and promotional poster, what you see is a boring generic main protagonist surrounded by a colorful cast of cute girls. Oh wait, you can barely see the guy! He's there in the background looking like a fool, because that's what he is, at least from his past. In the fantasy world, male protagonist Hiiragi Seiichi turns into a champion with a gorilla girl as a companion. Before you start firing questions at what that means, it basically spells out all the wrong ingredients on how to sell a proper story.
Now, I will say the anime makes a bold attempt at trying to win the audience over. What went wrong? It's because Hiiragi is the one of the most boring characters you'll witness. He's just a kind person with no special traits or characteristics that defines his character. Really, that's about all I can say for Hiiragi because his character has no depth, development, or unique qualiies. Gorilla girl Saria isn't any better after she turned into a human through evolution. Yeah, that's right. She went from an animal into a human because the show's plot demands it. When we see her as a human, there's really no change to her personality at all. And really, she's just as lackluster as Hiiragi.
The rest of the character cast are far from intriguing. We have tomboy adventurers like Altria, to sadists like Ellis. Others such as the cat girl Origa Carmelia (that's right, this anime can't be complete with a cute catgirl) or Valkyrie leader Louise felt like something crafted with no coherent effort. The only character that added some slight interest to the show may be Kannazuki Karen. She adds a more mature tone to the anime but unfortunately, the show's plot makes little effort to develop her story. To sum it up, this anime's character cast seemed like it was made by a whim or as if the author wrote them from their wildest fantasies.
Among the various sins this anime commits, the story is perhaps the biggest bust. Let's face it, this anime's plot really had no direction or even an idea what it's trying to do. Some episodes introduces to new characters while almost every episode jokes around with itself. The jokes in the anime quickly wears out because if you've seen it once, it feels like you've seen them all. And finally, don't expect this anime's character relationships to be deep or meaningful. An interspecies romance between Hiiragi and Saria is best described as childlike at best and dumpster fire at worst. And that's what sums up this anime altogether. It's a dumpster fire.
No, studio feel, Children's Playground Entertainment, and its producers could not save this anime from being a bad joke with its animation quality. The character designs looks cartoony and outdated compared to modern standards. Every scene in this anime feels like a sitcom gone wrong. Really, even the action scenes are mostly forgettable and the overall chereography kills any sort of value the show had. I'm sorry to say this but Shinka no Mi Shiranai Uchi ni Kachigumi Jinsei really represents the worst of what isekai can offer. It's that terrible.
Not RecommendedFunny
'The Fruit of Evolution' is allegedly an anime television series based off a light novel of the same name, but personally, I take issue with this dubious origin story. In 1969, Adam Levine published a notoriously controversial text — one that, without doubt, had a substantial impact on perceptions of religion, morality, media censorship, and even on the very substrata of modern culture. There are many factors attributed to our divergence from faith, but none can as succinctly elucidate this drift as a question I asked myself as a child — and one that many people have pondered upon: "Why?" Why? Why am I being told this? Forwhat purpose, and with what explanation?
Clearly, the author of this series had similar thoughts. Only a blind man could create something so profoundly devoid of light. On that note, here's a quote from the aforementioned Satanic Bible:
"Can the torn and bloody victim 'love' the blood-splashed jaws that rend him limb from limb?"
Allow me to correct for context.
"Can the unfortunate viewer of this show 'love' the cursed world in which they were born, just to suffer through it?"
No, they can't. I can't. I have no more faith left — not in God, not in myself, not in the world.
...
'The Fruit of Evolution' reaches a degree of flagrant incompetence that I didn't think possible. To refer to it as 'bad' is insulting to anything I've ever called, well, merely bad. It's incomprehensibly terrible. It stoops so far below the realm of mediocrity that it's absurd. There's not a singular positive quality: the animation is dull, ugly, inconsistent, and stiff; the characters are fools with no actual 'character' whatsoever aside from the most mind-numbingly tropey bullshit; the humor is lame, immature, and in utterly poor taste; there is no depth to the story, nor any semblance of interesting or detailed writing or theming anywhere to be seen.
I swear on all that is holy, one of the most important scenes in the entire series is literally only possible because the authors forgot how to do basic multiplication. That's how little effort it was made with. Not only that, you know what the annoying, bland, unfunny, uncool, pathetic excuse for a protagonist says in spite of this?
"It's basic math!"
You're a basic bitch. You also made out with a gorilla. Freak.
1/10
GrGrenadeJ
December 20, 2021
Not Recommended
This review will contain minor spoilers - however this isnt a particularly plot driven anime so it really doesnt matter. Fruit of evolution appears like it attempted to be a generic and average isekai, the type you usually see at least 2 of each season, and yet somehow it failed to copy and paste the same standard formula that all the other clique isekai have adopted. Now full disclosure, I personally enjoy trashy isekai. I know I will go and see a doctor eventually. However, even my underserved love for the standard isekai traits could not make me actually like this anime. In this review I willexplain why.
Firstly there is no plot, this isnt particularly surprising for a trashy isekai but it would've been nice to see one nonetheless. Instead the protagonist just seems to wander around almost randomly building his harem and abilities as he goes. Those two aspects in particular will be the focus of my criticism as they are the key aspects of most trashy isekai.
The harem itself is unique to say the least. This anime, for reasons I cannot begin to fathom, put an unexpected twist on his harem.
He marries a gorilla.
Yes she turns into a beautiful woman later on, but he fell in love with her before she did so. He also gets a Donkey that turns into a girl but that wasn't even surprising at that point.
As well as this, there's none of the satisfaction of him getting a harem. The girls just immediately fall head over heels in love with him the moment he sees them. For example, the only human girl officially part of his harem (in the anime at least) is meant to be a loner who purposely keeps away from people and yet seems to fall in love with him about 5 minutes after meeting with no actual actions from the MC himself.
Its not worth writing too much about how OP the main character is. As per isekai rules he becomes outrageously overpowered almost instantly and without any effort, yet infuriatingly he keeps complaining about his new powers despite there being literally zero negative consequences. Obviously, he never uses any of them effectively but still manages to slay the most powerful monster in existence, so there's no need to worry if he's the strongest or not.
Moving on from the plot, the studio itself didnt do the anime any favours. The animation quality is terrible, something which doesnt work well when trying to animate cool fights with magic flying around, and the music/ost was forgettable at best. That said, if the animation and music was incredibly high quality then it would only feel out of place considering how low effort the actual story was, but that doesn't justify the end result.
Moving on from classic isekai traits, I will mention the other main focus of this anime, comedy.
Comedy is meant to be subjective so I wont go on an egotistical rant about how my taste in comedy is superior to anyone who likes this anime, however I personally found it was very hit or miss, miss being the most common result. I will begrudgingly admit, though, that I chuckled at a couple of jokes but the overall quality of the comedy was about as good as everything else.
So... since ive been insulting it so much, why have I given it a 4 and not a 1? Firstly, as previously mentioned I have an irrational love for trashy isekai and although I hated almost everything about this anime, it was still an easy way to turn off my mind for 20mins. I never found myself actively dreading each Monday when I would watch it like I have for some anime.
(*cough* See my review on Seven deadly sins dragon's judgement *cough*)
Furthermore, the anime knows that it is low effort and this works in its favour. Some anime attempt to be a high quality and well done masterpiece and it only makes it fall harder when it ultimately fails to reach that standard. Fruit of evolution simply doesnt try and doesnt raise your expectations as a result. You know you're going to watch something trash and you get what you expected.
Overall, do I recommend you watch this anime?
Of course not, this show sucks. There is literally no reason to watch this, there are better things out there that exceeded this anime in all qualities.
However, I was able to make it through all 12 episodes without any major negative symptoms so if you read this and still really want to watch it, im not going to try to stop you.
Thanks for reading my review!
