Tate no Yuusha no Nariagari Season 3

Terrible, stupid, ridiculous I can't believe I wasted my time watching 3 seasons of this horrible thing that is this anime... don't do like me... take advantage of this time to watch something worthwhile, the story has been bad since the first season, but it manages to surpass itself in this regard, the plot focuses on an objective, but the development of the facts occurs in a repetitive and stupid way. The fact that none of the characters have the slightest ability to reason unless they are part of the hero's team makes things absurdly bad, especially when it comes to the other 3 heroes who wereALL deceived in the same way

Second chances are typically so rare in the entertainment industry. This is only natural considering that creative writers are always bidding for the favor of the audience, so massive flops generally turn into IP suicide as audiences are quick to fuck off to the next big thing. However, a rare second chance is precisely why you and I are watching the third season of Shield Hero, and at the end of it all, I can genuinely say that this series thoroughly squandered this opportunity to correct the absolute stinker of the second season. I’m not even going to pretend that this season is downrightterrible, in fact, it's actually best described as being just another run-of-the-mill anime in the fantasy genre; a claim that becomes practically damning when you consider that the aforementioned genre is thoroughly oversaturated with anime just like this. You see, this season of Shield Hero primarily focuses on establishing and developing more characters and story elements to be cashed in later on in the series, which is usually a good thing for any anime trying to develop into a higher-quality work. However, in the case of this season of Shield Hero, both the character and story development is ok at best and frankly, shitty at worst. A small aspect of this is Naofumi, a protagonist who apparently needs little to no character development this season, as he already received all of the development he needed in the first season. This is a fairly annoying trend surrounding the 4 characters from Naofumi’s party that you actually care about. The character development that Naofumi receives essentially turns him into a Christ figure who wants to “free the slaves” and give “prosperity to the entire kingdom” through the exponential growth of his commune for his slaves, friends, and subordinates. This endeavor causes Naofumi to lose a decent amount of impactful screen time: when does receive some, it at times walks back upon the abrasive personality traits that defined him in the first 2 seasons, sort of diluting what made him unique when compared to the standard fantasy protagonists. However, I don’t believe that this hurts this season that much; Naofumi is still the clear bright spot in this series, admittedly dimmed by the shit around him. Unfortunately, the commune’s new inhabitants don’t really do much for the story. Sadeena and Syne seemingly have some promise, but they spent the majority of the season just chilling around the village, adding flavor text occasionally to remind the audience that they still exist, so they can have a triumphant moment when they eventually land a hit on the raid boss at the end of the season. Additionally, there are also some other recurring demi-human inhabitants that just exist as stock characters for scenes that show the progress that Naofumi’s commune is making. The only members of the commune that are of any significant narrative importance are Fohl and Atla: demi-humans with “high potential” or something like that makes them stronger and worth training. They do get a small bit of backstory explaining how they were abandoned, which is appreciated, but it would be even more appreciated if their development was more complete. I’ll take what I can get, but this unveils one of the bigger issues with Naofumi’s commune: with such a big character cast (and more characters being introduced throughout the story), these new characters just never had a chance to have any sort of significant development in a fast-paced 12 episode anime. This naturally calls the “fast pace” into question, as it's possible that we could’ve seen some high-quality character development without it, but I digress. A running theme with the arcs that comprise this season is that all of them sound really interesting on paper, but in reality, they are usually not fully realized, or if they are, it's done in such a way that just screams asspull. For example, the tournament arc was a major aspect of the season’s promotional art, which gave me the inkling that it would be an impactful part of the season. 2 episodes and 1.5 out of 5 meaningful fights later, and I’m left with mild disappointment as I realize this arc was just a poor excuse to establish a group of side characters who are not nearly as impactful to the story as they were made out to be. Another example of the latter is the “Zombie Dragon Arc” where the entire setup for the eventual battle only occurs because Naofumi and all of his subordinates decided to turn off their brains for an afternoon, allowing Mega-Charizard X to wreak havoc. That description doesn’t nearly do this arc the appropriate justice, as it may have been the dumbest thing I’ve seen throughout this entire anime, which is saying a lot. These arcs range from disappointing to downright stupid, but honestly, they were probably the two arcs I enjoyed the most this season, despite their numerous fuck ups. The arcs concerning the Cardinal Heroes however were completely non-offensive and borderline irredeemable. This season, the Cardinal Heroes finally receive their long-awaited character developments that elevate them from essentially being clones of each other with slightly different personalities established through their past experiences. The result? A heinous waste of potential and the destruction of all three of them as potentially nuanced and competent characters on the level of Naofumi. First is Motoyasu, who doesn’t actually receive a large extent of character development, instead getting over his Malty-caused funk through the prospect of one day marrying Filo before he mysteriously fucks off from the plot in any meaningful way until its time to fight the Phoenix. Turning Motoyasu into a glorified gag character when he deserves actual character development is an… interesting choice, but I won’t knock it because we have two more Cardinal Heroes to evaluate. Next, we have Ren, who somehow gets tricked by Malty who preys on his deepest insecurities to manipulate him. Influenced by this, he dons a stupid new antihero getup related to those insecurities and starts attacking people for money. Eventually, he runs into Naofumi and friends, who try to convince him to join their cause. After denying this offer, he gets beat up by a woman who deeply cares about him as established in earlier seasons, receives a bit of character development through a short backstory, and officially joins Naofumi’s team. Then we have Itsuki, who somehow gets tricked by Malty who preys on his deepest insecurities to manipulate him. Influenced by this, he dons a stupid new antihero getup related to those insecurities and starts attacking people for money. Eventually, he runs into Naofumi and friends, who try to convince him to join their cause. After denying this offer, he gets beat up by a woman who deeply cares about him as established in earlier seasons, receives a bit of character development through a short backstory, and officially joins Naofumi’s team. If you didn’t notice, those are literally the exact same paragraphs with Itsuki and Ren switched out. I don’t think I have to tell us this, but repeating the exact same character arcs for two very similar characters isn’t a good idea, as it cheapens both characters’ developments while being pretty boring to watch from a viewer's perspective. Overall, the handling of the Cardinal Heroes has an overtly negative impact on the series as a whole. It thoroughly squanders the potential for them to become thoroughly interesting characters. It cheapens Malty as a manipulator, as her success with the other Cardinal Heroes can only be explained by every character besides her being a dog who gets tricked by you holding the ball behind your back, or her having some sort of psychic powers to force you to do whatever she says. Finally, it makes Cardinal Heroes less realistic as people, as each of their insecurities is so over-exaggerated that they genuinely feel like caricatures of the characters that they are actually supposed to be. Not to mention, these arcs weren’t well written in terms of entertainment, so they also served as some of the most nonsensically boring moments of the show, which isn’t necessarily conducive to a good anime, especially when you consider that it takes up half the season’s screen time. Granted, I will give Itsuki’s sequence credit, as it did give some decent character development to Rishia, a character that sorely needed it. However, overall, the attempted development of the Cardinal Heroes is really the worst aspect of this season, and when you consider that the above complaints all concern different aspects of the season that I consider to be mid to bad, it really calls into question what exactly does this season do right. For all of the hating that I have done in this review, I can’t deny that all of the aspects pertaining to production were done extremely well. The animation and slightly new art style perfectly fit the anime, the soundtrack, op, and ed were really good, and there were no delays (a fairly impressive achievement in this age of anime). Still, this season of Shield Hero doesn’t reach the peaks necessary to escape the valley created by the second season. While it does have some bright spots, particularly in Rishia’s and Atla’s character development, those are outweighed by the sheer amount of shit it does wrong. It fails to provide meaningful character development to so many deserving characters, in part due to poor pacing. It fails to be competent story-wise, as many of the arcs are nonsensical or boring and monotonous. Finally, The character development provided to the Cardinal Heroes backfires in a way that almost ruins the 4 characters that had the most potential to become actually interesting. At the end of the day, although I almost exclusively spoke negatively about this anime, there were aspects of it that I did enjoy. However, this did not allow it to be comparable to the first season: something that was absolutely mandatory for it to be considered a reversal of the second season’s mistakes. Maybe one day, we’ll get a season that will finally be a return to form, so that the Shield Hero can rise again. Thank you for reading, and someone please find me some less corny lines to end my reviews with.

After the absolute disaster that was Tate no Yuusha season 2 was, the only way this franchise could go was up, and luckily it did. Season 3 is an improvement in every way over season 2, and as a massive fan of the books I’d place it over the first season as well. Sadly, it may have been too little too late. Tate no Yuusha took the anime world by storm in 2019 with a gripping revenge narrative, a cool world, a unique mechanic with the MC only being able to defend, an awesome Kevin Penkin OST and one of the most popular waifus in recentmemory. The show seemed poised to break into the proverbial stratosphere as one of the mainstays of the anime community. I mean, not only did it get another season, but they announced two at once which was unheard of! This franchise was on top of the world. Then it all came tumbling down with an absolutely God awful adaptation in season 2. The biggest issues being adapting more books than the first season in half the time which inevitably led to awful pacing issues, and horrendous CGI. Season 3 addressed those shortcomings by only adapting 2 books over 12 episodes, which was actually better pacing than season 1. This allowed for characters to be introduced and fleshed out a lot better than in the last season. The show plays out a lot slower than before as result. We actually get some nice intimate moments with Naofumi and the new characters. For me personally, the books that this season and a potential 4th season are adapting, are my favourite in the series so I’m a little biased here. This is really when this series starts to become peak. Not to mention the best girl(Atla) being introduced. I really enjoyed the instant impact that she and her brother had on the story and how they interact with Naofumi, Raphtalia and the others. And of course, you can’t forget new faces like Shadeena and S’yne. This season cleaned house from last season and has totally different staff and directors involved. A rather peculiar situation where there’s 3 directors actually. It worked out for the best though, as the direction is noticeably improved, scenes flow better and you have plenty of time to actually understand what’s going on. Unlike in season 2 and 1, it’s apparent that the staff have actually read the books and care about the source material. They know what to emphasise and focus on, and more importantly what scenes are meant to convey. While the season is not as action packed as season 1 for example, I think the characters and world building more than make up for it. Now, my biggest issue with this season is not really a knock on the anime specifically, but the writing in general of two of the main mini arcs in this one. They’re extremely repetitive and revolve around Malty. By now we’ve all realised what kind of person and character she is, so seeing characters continue to fall for her tricks one after another is a little boring. Luckily those were only a few episodes, but even when reading them didn’t enjoy those parts of the story. The production values are massively improved on this season 2. There’s only really noticeable CGI during one big fight towards the end of the season, but it was pretty decent. The art and animation generally look amazing, much sharper and more refined than last season. It’s very clear Kinema Citrus put their A team on this and it paid off. Look, I’m going to be honest. What made this franchise really appealing for a lot of people was Naofumi getting screwed over and going out for revenge. Now that that’s kind of gone, this may not be the story for you anymore. I won’t call it generic, but it’s definitely not the same type of story the first 20 episodes or so of season 1 was, and it’ll never really be that again. I personally enjoy the characters, the world, conflict against the waves and other lore about this story the most, so even without the edgy revenge goal, I’m content. Here’s to a hopeful 4th season.. Tate no Yuusha gets 8, out of 10

I honestly don’t know why I continue to watch this anime series. The first season was great and generated a lot of excitement. However, the second season was disappointing due to its lackluster animation and missing information. Despite my disappointment with the second season, I decided to give the third season a chance, hoping it would redeem the series. Unfortunately, the third season failed to meet my expectations. The storyline, which revolves around three missing heroes and the Shield Hero’s attempts to save them, is uninteresting. Moreover, the characters are easily manipulated, which adds to the frustration. One aspect that particularly bothers me is the Shield Hero’sstruggle against seemingly insignificant enemies. As a hero, he shouldn’t be struggling to fight a normal assassin. This inconsistency makes the series seem pathetic. In conclusion, I cannot recommend this series to anyone. Please, do yourself a favor and spend your time on something more worthwhile.

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