Ore dake Level Up na Ken Season 2: Arise from the Shadow

This review contains spoilers. If we were to find the death of creativity at the end of the world, it would be at the bankrupt core of Solo Leveling's decrepit body, it would have a twisted dagger in one hand and a bag of money on the other. This is not only a review for S2, but also S1. Had to publish this review many times since MAL didnt show it in full because of how long it was. When we digest art, we naturally strive for some kind of value in what we are absorbing, be it thematic, a vision, a philosophy, technical value, legacy, extensive storytelling,worldbuilding, etc; examples abound, works such as Monogatari are endorsed for their thematic depth, potent dialogue and strong emotion with a great cast of characters; even with artpieces in the same shounen branch as Solo Leveling such as Chainsaw Man, a show that is very fun while maintaining a concise script and a constant, charismatic attitude. For technical merit, anime such as FLCL or Akira provide enjoyment in animation, scene composition, character design and choreographies for general design connoisseurs, Hunter x Hunter has a fleshed-out worldbuilding and a legendary power system for people who want to delve deep into a place of wonders, Ghost in the Shell is acclaimed for its philosophy, incredible thematical value, complex social intricacies and the powerful vision it holds, and I can name many more examples—however, Solo Leveling has no value that one can appreciate. It is the equivalent of a soggy french fry presented with a pink bow, eating expensive instant noodles; although completely vacuous, it has the audacity of presenting itself as something better or more innovative despite being the exact same slop that preceedes it, I honestly believe that Solo Leveling is the greatest demonstration of what consumerism and capitalism can do to art in the form of anime, being tremendously derivative, unoriginal and yet presenting itself as something bigger, improved or "peak" and the fact that something like this succeeds so much and influences the creation of a famous gacha game and so many copycats shows the true nature of Solo Leveling—one that is more malicious than you might think. Slop Leveling, Solo Glaze, zZZzZZzZZolo Leveling, Solo Slop or Solo Leveling is not only a deeply terrible anime, it is more than that; to me, this is the absolute emblem of acute consumerism in anime, one that leads viewers to digest works without any thought or mentality. What can one get out of Solo Leveling but wasted time? Nothing, I believe, nothing but time spent on a soulless product, created purely for an extreme capitalistic machine and to influence hundreds of copies. Solo Leveling is perhaps the flag bearer of artistical degradation in anime, a drooping mess managed by corporative clutches that oppress art and force it to be soulless, yet they cynically use it to inflate their colossal pockets. Solo Leveling was socially engineered to fit perfectly into the market mold; therefore, this is not an artpiece in any way whatsoever, but rather a derivative product directly baked in the putrid bowels of absolute capitalism, perfectly engineered to be tasted in the right way and without any reflection, without any lesson, without any theme, without any fun or artistical value; this is Solo Leveling, a corpse with well-applied thanatoesthetics by A-1 Pictures, something that has no aspirations whatsoever, it is the maximum hegemony of the anti-art in anime, one which cynically presents itself to be more than it really is. A work that inspires no one, that gives nothing, which desires and pursues nothing at all. It is therefore completely and irrevocably useless. AI-generated without being made by AI. Sterile, a black hole of creativity not worthy of attention, and because of this nature, Solo Leveling has no spirit, it is no-more than an amalgamation of previous power fantasies and derivative tropes with a fancy and pretentious veneer. If the name of this show, by itself, doesnt make you cringe, its content will probably do—if even this is not enough, then I envy you. I will not deny anyone of watching this, and its fine if you had fun—I had fun too, and I'm having fun while writing this review, but Solo Leveling doesnt feel right to me, and thus I had to write something on why I feel like this. Now, did I expect the newgen Hunter x Hunter, or a thematically impactful and masterful artpiece a la Monogatari, or a legendary technical piece like Akira, a beloved underdog story a la Hajime no Ippo or just an absolute masterpiece in general? Not really, obviously, I already knew what I was getting into from the beginning, so my standards werent sky high, hell they werent even like, low standards at all, but I expected AT LEAST a minimum of decent storytelling, interesting combats or coming of age nuance—perhaps that was my key mistake, as you cannot ask even the minimum from a product made purely to be consumed and nothing more. Remember, the excuse of "its a power fantasy bro just watch it" doesn't work, we can criticize the shoddy elements of a narrative even with this into account, many forms of art are technically a "power fantasy" such as videogames like ULTRAKILL, which I actually really like. In this videogame you incarnate the strongest prime machine built for a massive war, named V1, who can feed of blood to function and kill entire armies of hellish monsters and gods alike, who was built to be the deadly counter to a gigantic robot who could destroy entire mountains—ULTRAKILL is clearly a power fantasy, yet it is FAR and away superior in grace, depth and execution than Solo Leveling—ULTRAKILL is actually fun and enjoyable too! One of my favorite games, Cruelty Squad, also has power fantasy elements and actively deconstructs that type of story. Also, to note, "Aura" and "hype moments" have their place in storywriting, Chainsaw Man, for instance, uses them excellently, but a proper narrative drive needs to be established, Solo Leveling forgets about this. For some reason, Sloppy Leveling can get away with murder as long as it delivers Tiktok aura, and I'm not sure why. And listen, this will be a weird point, but I think it's relevant to make this comparison. Sword Art Online was rightfully pummeled to hell and back, it is THE anime community's punching bag; from the many essays of Mother's Basement to Digibro's own videos smashing the series to bits or the hundreds of posts detailing the massive amount of flaws in SAO. In our current day, it is indeed the equivalent of beating a dead horse, as there must not be a single uncriticized aspect of that work; however, I haven't seen a similar reflection or act with Solo Leveling and its clear excess of mediocrity, there is much more acceptance towards Solo Leveling and I really don't know why, when in reality these two works basically rub shoulders with each other and are extremely similar? Sung Jin-Woo is Kirito, Hae-In is basically Asuna (in fact, I predict that they will be in a relationship, this was written around S2E3 for the record) and, just like in SAO, the rest of the "characters" revolve around Jin-Woo. The protagonist is also an obnoxious gigachad who is super OP, who breaks the rules of his own universe, kills any tension, everyone is looking to recruit him, both shows have mistakes and clichés all over the place, both are power fantasies, both have barebones world building... etc, I really don't know why Solo Leveling isn't judged more harshly, when it's such a lazy and clearly lifeless work. As of writing this review, it is THE HIGHEST RATED SHOW in Crunchyroll, why is it that this show succeeded so much, then? Why are Solo Leveling and Sword Art Online treated so differently and yet what makes them so similar? Similarly to Sword Art Online, Solo Leveling is incapable of doing anything through sheer talent, just like its main protagonist, and therefore must have relied on something else that might be more effective, and I believe that'd be the times in which we happen to live. Just so you know: I AM NOT saying that this applies to every viewer who has watched Solo Leveling, I AM NOT saying this applies to you, dear reader, who might've actually enjoyed this work because you had something to binge after work or class; however, I do believe that it is a factor that can be attributed to the overwhelming success of this work. Today, it is more than clear that there is a burgeoning powerlessness on a large part of the youth; they feel ignored by a world that renders them powerless, a helplessness that saps their vigor; this is a bureaucratic world of entangled orders which makes them feel impotent where class disparity grows bigger and bigger. Solo Leveling is, in any case, an escapist panacea for this lost youth; a vapid, non-sensical power fantasy that can provide temporal refuge, a mere distraction without any flavour. Solo Leveling is clearly made as a bandaid to a planet-sized issue, escapist heroine—everything in this work is engineered towards that malicious, hidden goal of pure consumerism and unbridled escapism without value—all of this disgusting concoction finally baked in A-1 Pictures' hell furnace. Solo Leveling for sure found a big part of its success thanks to appealing to this impressionable audience, I'm not virtue signaling, but rather indicating a huge part of Solo Leveling's overwhelming achievements. Power fantasies and escapism are common in media, especially anime, but Solo Leveling might be the leading man of this trend in anime, shows akin to "RESURRECTED IN A DIGITAL WORLD AND MY MAGIC KILLS EVERYONE IN ONE HIT?! AND I'M SURROUNDED BY HOT BABES?! HOLY SHIT?" are obviously of low-quality and very trashy, but they do not intend to have pretensions at least, they are unabashedly trash even with just a simple look. Solo Leveling, however, has a pretentious veneer and (very, very rarely) convincing makeup done by A-1 Pictures—all of this falls off with a closer inspection of its anatomy. Therefore, after this introduction, I will begin to tackle specific points of this show. 1. The Absolute Lack of a Story Well, but you'll argue: “What do you mean there's no story? It must have a story” And, well, technically yes; but it's more of a story because the author *felt obliged* to attach a story to this rather than something told by passion; it's a camouflage to use as a shield and sword against any allegation that this is nothing more than an empty, BAD and tawdry power fantasy with no shame whatsoever. The synthesis of this story is Sung Jin-Woo getting incredible power out of the blue, in a convoluted and boring way, and he becomes a very mighty and stoic guy with a lot of life hacks, and proceeds to become mightier and more boring ad infinitum, the reason behind Jin-Woo's actions feels shoehorned and underbaked. There is no story, the only "story" per se is the constant masturbatory session from the author and the entire world he has created to cater to Sung Jin-Woo's microscopical peepee. When we are treated to plot points, like Hwang's own vengeance to track down Jin-Woo, it is quickly dealt with and forgotten to priorize our main character's banal power trip (seriously, where is Hwang???) Like, nothing feels tied together; Solo Leveling is as pretentious yet as vacous as a plain bread with a pink bow, with no spine or spirit; the main defense I've seen for this is "it's not that deep" as if this were an Aegis shield to dispell any criticism—sure, a show can not delve deep and yet be good, an example of this is Mob Psycho, a show that doesn't really have a "deep" story per se, but it makes up for this with a charismatic attitude and style, even aboarding interesting themes like Mob's social anxiety and self superation; yet Solo Leveling, nevertheless, doesn't have any of this, if you're gonna have a more "superficial" plot you NEED to make up for this, Mob Psycho, apart from what I've mentioned, also has an unique art direction and the character cast is decent and relatable enough; what does Solo Leveling have to make up for this THIN VENEER that we are obliged to call "plot"? A barebones world, a terrible self insert as main character, addons as characters, non-dialogue, incoherent direction, inconsistent style, boring combats, no themes of any kind, splendid anticlimax, no tension, no stakes, no earned empowerment... like there is genuinely no excuse. This pseudodefense of "just turn your brain off" or "just have fun lol" are completely ridiculous when you consider the fact that everything else also fucking sucks, and that something can be good while also being fun! Why do we need to stand for such a shit story just because "muh animation n budass chudructer" elements that, in this show, arent even that special? Isnt 100% Shigeo Kageyama badass? Or Hayakawa Aki? Or Guts? Or Kusanagi Motoko? And every single one of these characters are far, FAAAAAR better than Jin-Woo in any way too. Why do I have to accept this terrible storytelling and excuse, no, GLORIFY utter slop with such asinine claims? WHY cannot fun, cool stuff and quality of storytelling coexist? "Just have fun lol" is an idiotic fallacy when you realize this. Solo Leveling even fails in trying to do a "good" power fantasy. Regarding the overall world in this anime: We are fed with rotten breadcrumbs, basically. We are shown a flashback to Jeju Island at the beginning, but nothing else with substance, there's just a straight-up time skip. There is no common thread leading these characters, no interesting events that precede Sung Jin-Woo, no worldbuilding, it feels more like a collage of cool and badass scenes rather than a work with a well-knitted story of its own. There is no overarching union that unites these characters, no common goal to aspire for, no trajectory or road to speak about or anything relevant per se, it is a spectacle of incoherent scenarios and situations where the main theme is a constant glorification of our main character. There are interesting points to tackle, like the sorcerer who is mentioned in Jin-Woo's powers or the PTSD in hunters, but these two things, conveniently, are never brought forward... because they are complicated to tackle and this show is braindead! If there was a feeble story, it died in the power vomit that is this hack authors' writing and his idealization of Sung Jin-Woo. This world feels dead, there are no stakes or any plotlines beyond budget Chimera Ant, which is fucking lame, hilariously derivative and terribly anticlimactic. Sung Jin-Woo's reasons to-be and motives are flabby and weak, merely vague cope, nothing more, and nobody else has an interesting motivation with weight in this universe and story. There is nothing to grasp. There is obviously a reason for these weaknessess, and that is probably the author planning his self-insert first before the story. Solo Leveling has no story because the author probably didnt plan to make one in the first place, the power fantasy of the bully doing the bullying is the "story" we are offered. Why do we have to stand mediocrity because it's a microscopic bit better than ABSOLUTE shit we have already seen? Yeah, this show is not "I get Giga Amazing Powers and Turn into a Chad and I can Kill Everything and My Smell Attracts Sexy Powerful Women!" but... yeah, that actually... sounds exactly like Solo Leveling. Sometimes we'll get these faux breadcrumbs of "muh identity issues" but they're overshadowed by how edgy, out-of-place, underdeveloped and tacky they tend to be, with Jin-Woo looking like LowTierGod and saying "huh... I always wondered if you could feel FEAR..." close enough, welcome back, Sasuke Uchiha. 2. Sung Jin-Woo and his Addons' Bizarre Adventure I can say with utmost certainty and confidence that there are no characters in Solo Leveling either. But how? Simple, no character beyond Sung Jin-Woo is anyone we can get to know, there is no one we can empathize with or grow fond of, there is no one we can deepen our bond with; rather than an actual cast of characters it is “Sung Jin-Woo and the addons that surround him” because there is genuinely NOTHING engaging about the pseudocharacters we are exposed to. They typically have a trait that flanderizes them, they change erratically to adhere to a non-existent story, or they shift characterization to serve the protagonist in some way. Of course, characters appear and disappear as the author deems relevant to further elevate his protagonist. EVERYTHING revolves around him. Characters hold nothing at all, the "S class" title and the "aura" thing loses all weight VERY fast, to a ridiculous point. Later on, the S-hunters are reduced to mere fodder to set up the scene for Jin-Woo. Not only this, but the cast is tainted by insufferable nationalism, the author insists on painting the Japanese as absolutely egotistical and manipulative, and the United States as an alienating metropolis represented by a narcissistic Korean immigrant—who later on gets beaten by a Korean, father of Gigachad Sigmalord—all incapable of proper cooperation and international organization in the face of global adversity such as the ants. Theres no subtleness about the obvious and insufferable nationalism in this work—Goto, the strongest Japanese hunter, who fought against Jin-Woo, is apparently off-screened??? Characters get presented to just get off-screened, one-shotted or exiled after few episodes—the japanese getting the worst treatment—all while Jin-Woo delivers the strongest dose of slop power-toupee imaginable. The character designs are uninspired and generic to death, their personalities are terribly one-note and underdeveloped, with a tendency to revolve around Jin-Woo, with the cherry on top being A1 Pictures' limited artistical vision and expertise in Dorito phenotype. Jin-Ho is the classic "comedy relief friend" archetype of our protagonist, someone who never truly gets developed upon, someone who starts and ends behind the main characters' shadow, someone whos end is generic and obvious; he begins with his barebones motivation and he ends with the same barebones aspiration but modified to glorify the protagonist; apart from being occassional comedy relief, there is not much to his character, since he eventually falls into just being "the main character's friend" and getting stuck behind Jin-Woo's shade. Like everything else in this show, his insecurities and the relationship he has with his brother are overshadowed in a grandiose way to prioritize his relationship with Jin-Woo instead; this causes his character to absolutely fall behind and never get a truly satisfying arc, as his development is at the mercy of Sung Jin-Woo, and his feeble pseudoarc is looking very sloggish, with inconsequential acts and very insubstantial dialogue. Apart from his truly nothingburger personality, exclusively dedicated to celebrate Sung Jin-Woo, Jin-Ho's design is nothing special, he looks like a washed down version of Yuuji Itadori, just boring as fuck honestly. We never truly see Jin-Ho follow his path as a honorous tank, mighty hunter or paladin either, as this facet is quickly dropped in favour of catering for Jin-Woo's colossal ego. My prediction is that his guild issue will be solved by him just joining Jin-Woo's guild (Jin-Woo WILL lead a guild, because this appeals to the huge boner that the author has for his own MC) as the vicemaster. Jin-Ho is utterly barebones, only serving a purpose for comedy relief and to stroke the main character's ego. Again. He's not a character, but rather an addon; if Joo-Hee was the initial romance and friend that Gigachad Jin-Woo grows apart from, Jin-Ho is the comedy relief and new main source of egostroking for our main character, someone who constantly emphasizes just how powerful Jin-Woo is—another addon, at last. We eventually get a female version of Jin-Ho named "Esil" who is a busty, cute demon girl, because of course Gigachad Sigmalord gets that—Esil gets enamoured of the protagonist within mere minutes and proceeds to follow him around, by the way. Jin-Ho is eventually seldom vanished from the show to focus on Jin-Woo's toupee, his demon waifu with gargantuan breasts and his sexy tradwife. He just... disappears, for most of the second season, and he receives no valuable characterization or interaction. 1. Jin-Ho knows Jin-Woo, he praises him. 2. Jin-Ho befriends Jin-Woo, tries to lead a clan, priorizes Jin-Woo. 3. Jin-Ho gives up dream, decides to be Jin-Woo's right hand (probably) Cha Hae-In is the modern-day Asuna, a submissive-yet-powerful Stacy who will eventually fall in love with Sung Jin-Woo and form the absolute duo of a Mary Sue and a Gary Stu, a diahrrea-worthy connection between two characters who do not exist in a composite form, and then create a family of Mary Sues and Gary Stus, how adorable! Hae-In is shy, awkward, unaware of common social stuff but SUPER powerful and practically an idol!! At some points, Hae-In feels like the counterpart to Jin-Woo; whereas some male viewers might feel oriented to self-insert as Gigachad Sigmalord who easily courts every woman, the very few female viewers might, probably, view themselves as this easy-to-assume beautiful and capable young girl who is OBVIOUSLY destined to be the ultimate waifu of our Chad protagonist. This trait, where she senses a good aroma emitted from Jin-Woo, allows the author to isolate her from the possibility of engaging with other characters, and it kills her already small characterization to a point where she HAS to rotate around Sung Jin-Woo exclusively. Hae-In is this gross dichotomy of a compliant waifu and, at the same time, the classic "strong woman" archetype who is strong, with no personality, no fun and capable of anything, sports, bureaucracy, being a hunter, you name it; I call it gross because its a duo of traits clearly seeking for utter dominance by the isolated male character, Sung Jin-Woo—the only hunter who smells good to her—along with subordination and complete flanderization of this female character in exchange for waifu pandering, knowing this author's shenanigans, this character assassination is very predictable, just absolute "GIGACHAD SIGMALORD SMELLS GOOD TO ME OMG". Asserting dominance over Hae-In—who is the strongest female hunter in Korea—elevates Jin-Woo's character as "THE ULTIMATE GIGACHAD SIGMALORD ALPHA MALE!!!!" even more, accentuating this shameful power fantasy further beyond—she will still be infatuated by him despite Sung Jin-Woo being one unappealing son of a bitch—she, and many other female characters, of course. Hae-In is clearly made to sell dakimakuras, she is THE uberwaifu in Solo Leveling, a female self-insert & power fantasy and another egostroke for Jin-Woo. Not a character, but an addon for our protagonist; again, the fact that everyone smells badly to Hae-In except for Jin-Woo shows just how ostentatious this is. Moreover, Cha Hae-In is just bland and has very little screentime, whenever she appears, it's for fan-service, pandering, for nothing or to stroke Jin-Woo's onion even more; her dialogue and personality are barebones, and her character design is generic blonde with huge milkers. HE HAS TO ACQUIRE AND DOMINATE THA STRONG WOMUN!!!! Its clear that a relationship will surge between these two, and she'll become a housewife, as it is the logical outcome of a patriarchal self insert knowing a female cliché self insert, two pieces of plain bread liking each other, and one more victim to the classic female character treatment in shounen shows—before our eyes, modern Asuna and Kirito. When executed badly, this is one of the worst archetypes ever, and the author is a hack who cannot write, so of course they'll pull off this absolutely shit female character. Jesus fucking christ, she barely knows Jin-Woo and shes already worrying of what he might think of her, and how to pander to him, this is absurd; even as she appears later on in the S-class training, the first thing she does is presence Gigachad Sigmalord and say stuff about him. Afterwards, Gigastacy Tradwife is traumabonded to Gigachad Sigmalord thanks to the latter saving her after Bootleg Meruem's attack... never thought I'd write that sentence. Truly a match made in narrative hell. Cha Hae-In is nothing but plain eye-candy without any personality or characterization. She was purely made to serve Jin-Woo and replace Jae-Ho as THE uberwaifu. 1. Hae-In is presented to us as THE most powerful female hunter that we know of. 2. Hae-In knows Jin-Woo. Everyone else is STINKY except for Gigachad Jin-Woo, who smells like Old Spice. 3. Hae-In is infatuated with Jin-Woo, reduced to his love interest, subdued and flanderized. There are more addons, but they aren't really anything worth your time. And, finally, our protagonist, brace yourself. First off, this fraud is ANTI AURA. You cannot tell me that this glorified hentai protagonist with no charisma or charm has "aura" like, that is so untrue. Look at Metal Gear Rising, or any character from Devil May Cry, or any character from the DrakeNieR franchise, or Project Moon, or from Shin Megami Tensei, or Guilty Gear, and as much as I'm not in very good terms with Attack on Titan, even Levi from Shingeki no Kyojin, all better characters than Slop Leveling's MC too. Sung Jin-Woo??? Jin-Woo is representative of the broken youth who aspires to an impossible ideal. Sung Jin-Woo starts as a reserved and insecure person, a victim under the conditions imposed on him and his lineage, as he must take care of his mother and sister while being a hunter of the lowest possible rank; not only this, he is the WORST hunter of the WORST rank, so much so that he was called “The Weakest Weapon of Mankind” a nickname that, however, is weirdly mentioned very rarely, and that in the 2nd season ceases to exist at all—you would think that someone like that would be recognized in an infamous way, yet this infamy is very quickly forgotten. Jin-Woo is the archetype of the young man who is powerless in front of the powers on his country, he is a humble boy with straight jet-black hair and an average height, he is somewhat geeky and hardworking; considering all this, there is a clear connection with what I mentioned before and with Jin-Woo; he is CLEARLY a representation of that insecure young man that the show absolutely panders to; then, post-resurrection Sung Jin-Woo is a harmful power fantasy, a power fantasy for boys to self-insert themselves into him and believe themselves to be elevated into this role of the paternal alpha male capable of everything. This power fantasy engineered towards powerless young people is not only seen in the appearance of the protagonist or Hae-In, but in that the source of our MC's power literally relies in a blessing of RPG powers and the fact that he's the only one idolized by the old patriarch, Goo-Hee—something that obviously puts him above the herd, outside of the MATRIX!!!! Sung Jin-Woo is above le normies, they do not undastand. Despite his previous personality, Jin-Woo in only four episodes and through many scripted conveniences, exposition, deus ex machinas and classic elements of a shoddy power fantasy grows into what he, as a boy of a broken and manipulated youth, aspires to be: the ideal patriarch, a nationalistic, narcissistic, materialistic, paternalistic, breadwinner, boring and businesslike emblem of machismo; without any nonsense, without any flaw, without any art, without any introspection, without any whimsyness, he is the soporific and egotistical ideal to which many young people, under the oppression of a patriarchal plutocracy, aspire every day; with which they are nevertheless deceived, for this is nothing but an unattainable and harmful ideal; Sung Jin-Woo by becoming the character I satirically call “Gigachad Sigmalord” becomes this archetype I have just mentioned, an apathetic, sleep-inducing walking collection of tropes. This anime sells a falsehood, a pill that gives a dangerous fantasy, and even moreso in a country like South Korea that is going through very tense cultural and ideological wars. Sung Jin-Woo develops, in an absurd and abrupt manner, practically unbelievable features and becomes nearly devoid of emotion, there's practically no trace of his past personality. This show wants to sell us this false idea of an underdog growing up, but it's wildly ineffective considering that Sung Jin-Woo gets an RPG power dropped on him from the sky—something that would be somewhat excusable, except that this power is practically a life hack that covers everything Jin-Woo needs and makes him obscenely powerful from the get-go, also betraying the main theme of "hard work" in this anime—all given to him by a God who has yet to be explained, with conditions that have not yet been properly explained, and that everything in this story is fabricated for him to succeed—unlike in real life of course, where for the VAST majority of the population everything is against them. He is not only a blatant self-insert but also a Korean Superman of sorts, he is the prototype of the patriarchal Korean man who dabbles in individualism and pure ego; the insufferable type you'd see flauntering about their capital and achievements in work, yet have absolutely no soul at the same time—just like how this show flaunters animation yet has no real substance. Sung Jin-Woo starts with Joo-Hee, the latter tries very hard to make him pay attention to her and yet Jin-Woo barely gives her some breadcrumbs, keeping her at a remarkable distance and never getting emotionally vulnerable with her; the same thing happens with Jin-Ho, whom he treats as a “haha look how funny he is, what a funny friend, he is my funny friend haha lol” in this tremendously false and unconvincing way, all the relationships Jin-Woo establishes with the rest of his addons are absolutely superficial and boring, without any tension or substance, without any philosophy or emotion, without any attention to details. Jin-Woo is supremely bland and boring, which is catastrophic considering EVERYTHING revolves around him, his underdog story is unconvincing, and his introspection is remarkably shallow and ends in the blink of an eye, like his extremely dumb "me vs me" part in the Class Selection quest, something that goes nowhere and is executed in a corny way; you'd think someone who was given such colossal power would spend it pondering, constantly thinking about how to use this power, how it can affect him and others, and yet this show prefers to focus vastly more on how BADASS he is and how COOL he is!!!! And how smart, and how strong, and how fit, and how insightful, and how he dominates women, and what a good businessman he is, and everything!!!!! Jin-Woo does everything!!!!! Including killing his own anime's stakes, of course. He's not only a stupidly overpowered protagonist, but he also has this smug attitude that grows old QUICKLY; you need to have talent to pull off a likable smug character, but this author has no talent at all in storytelling. His blink-and-you'll-miss it montage of workout undermines the faux growth of our protagonist due to how generic and far-fetched it is and because the restrictions in this world make it suspiciously convenient for him to grow, his underdog status changes in the blink of an eye, and his vast amount of hacks makes it so its impossible to care for him and his underdog story, so when he goes full smug grindset stoic Gigachad Sigmalord it's just... so lame. Jin-Woo is just a walking deus ex machina. When we are presented with stuff like the venom that Jin-Woo might use as a double-edge tactic, it goes nowhere because OH he's immune to poison and crowd control alterations so he can use this without any downsides!!!! Why? Because fuck you!!!! Oh wait his MP is being drained out... HE HAS MP POTIONS!!!!! Oh wait he's about to die. OOPS he hadn't done his daily quests yet!!! Oh wait, he's about to lose to an enem- LOL NO, his skill levels up conveniently!!!! When he was about to go OOM vs the high shaman orc and he popped out an MP potion, refilling his MP bar... I nearly went insane. This is not even taking into considerations his dumb shounen badass boosts where he goes full-on edgelord Shadow the Hedgehog mode and he beats the shit out of enemies who were towering over him in power. Jin-Woo kills any tension, has no value as a character, he gets insane power extremely fast without earning this empowerment, so all of this underdog story is complete and utter faux nonsense, hes impaired by weak characterization, his dialogue is a nothingburger, he has no interesting philosophy or moral compass, no introspection, his combat style is boring, his interactions with the rest of the cast are superficial, his backstory is terrible, he has no interesting emotions or thoughts, his character design is barebones, etc. Sung Jin-Woo is, also, obnoxious and unpalatable, not only because of the aforementioned traits, but also because of his tendency to overlook the emotions of others, do irrational shit and to be spiteful for completely absurd reasons; the latter is even shoehorned to be a motivation for this character, but it is rather irritating, as this black-haired cringelord prefers to be an insufferable jerk and hold a grudge in the most forced and clichéd way possible, despite the completely understandable and fair situation in which he found himself into; Sung Jin-Woo's raison d'être, his sick mother, is presented in a very weak and cheap way, with only a few brief scenes showing super-flat “feelings” on Jin-Woo's part and zero reflection, absolutely nothing else—the most emotion between them, that he showed for his MOM IN A COMA, was touching her hand. More than anything, it feels like the self-insert came first AND THEN the author remembered that he needed to give a background to his Frankenstein monster, but he probably got lazy and made the most clichéd and boring backstory possible, written with a lukewarm and flimsy pencil—the show barely touched on this theme, and yet it's treated as the Jin-Woo's absolute reason. Sung Jin-Woo's core motive is flabby and weak, his emotional state inconsistent and confusing, his mother is brought up as a fundamental reason for his grind but the audience is hardly shown these emotions and feelings that Sung Jin-Woo feels for her, the author prefers to drive his empty work into a ridiculous power fantasy instead of delving deeper into his character's psyche—but, to be fair, when he tried to do this, it was absolutely lame and ended up with an edgy shoehorned Nietzsche quote, and lets not forget the cringey ME VS MY INNER DEVILS melodramatic part in the last episode of season one, what a wasted opportunity, this goes nowhere afterwards and no introspection is done. All of this are such sudden and underdeveloped things that they strike as superficial and, rather than deepening the story, they just turn into unfiltered cringe, especially considering how Jin-Woo outmatches everyone; nobody is worried by the fact that he might not reach what he wants, since Jin-Woo just mogs everyone and everything in every way, he is full of hacks for every situation and his characterization lacks all substance. Jin-Woo is Saitama without the charisma. One as an author MUST build this sympathy and make his character earn the empowerment, but Solo Leveling fails at this. Amazingly hollow. His decisions are also irrational and unlikable, causing unnecessary suffering, like doing a strength test against the Ant King when he was OH so worried about Cha Hae-In, like??? Are you a fucking idiot??? This is so incoherent, theres zero sense of urgency. This protagonist is not only lazily written and highly embarrassing, but he ALSO kills all the suspense of his own work, as he evolves into the phenomena I baptized as "GIGACHAD SIGMALORD," a walking deus ex machina who grows his power exponentially while the rest are forced to stagnate, our GIGACHAD SIGMALORD does some push-ups, some squats and THEN he grows several centimeters tall, his jaw sharpens like a Dorito and becomes bigger, his body acquires an abnormal complexion, his vocal cords deepen and other ludicrous changes happen, like getting absurd gear out of the blue, skills leveling up in convenient moments, downright hacks and RIDICULOUS amounts of experience; not only this, Solo Leveling's plot loves to force events and empower Jing-Woo in an absurd way to do impossible things, such as perfectly resisting the total attack of a monster that was way ahead of him by several levels or, even before becoming a Chad, BEING ABLE TO FLEE FROM THREE GIANT WORMS, IN A DESERT, JUST AFTER BEING HOSPITALIZED, we are talking about pre-chadification Sung Jin-Woo, or outrageous and eye-rolling shounen boosts. At this point, the vapid fantasy is very clear, and the author has no qualms; all the waifus instantly feel an infatuation for chadified Sung Jin-Woo, as if he releases some kind of reproductive pheromone or something, it's super ridiculous and blatant, all the women in this work are transformed into love interests and simps of Jin-Woo—although, admittedly I don't expect good female representation from SOLO LEVELING of all shows; of course, our individualistic Gigachad with the sigma mindset doesn't give a second of the day to these succubi—except for modern Asuna, who he'll undoubtedly court. Despite the enormous power he acquired, everyone conveniently ignores his nickname and bad reputation as “Mankind's Weakest Weapon” and everyone's IQ is reduced when they are around him, as no one asks questions, no one is inquisitive enough about how he suddenly hit such a radical change of personality and physique, NO ONE asks anything about him, no one is able to fight correctly when around him, it's extremely convenient—the guys in black who follow him are impossibly inept, and dont even try in intercepting Jin-Woo. Sung Jin-Woo has to be one of the worst "protagonists" in anime history, an obvious self-insert with powers of all kinds, zero personality and introspection, dense yet also a waifu attractor at the same time, with a lazy and impossible development, who fights in a boring way, with no interesting dialogue and devoid of any philosophy or interesting moral code. Jin-Woo sucks. He is the modern-day Kirito. I hate this smug little shit, Jin-Woo doesn't receive NEARLY ENOUGH punishment compared to how OP he gets. His mere pretense of a backstory is dumb as shit and non-sensical. Sung Jin-Woo's nature as a hunter is vaguely tempted upon but quickly dropped in favour of more dumb tropes. Moreover, Jin-Woo's raison d'etre (his mom) is built in a weak way, as shown by the widespread negative reaction that this plotpoint got.. apart from the reaction of fans expecting more of the same thing. I'm aware that actions usually mean more than words, but was it so hard to replace some of the idiotic power fantasy stuff or dumb unnecessary dialogue for more thoughts or dialogue of Jin-Woo with his mother? Or some flashbacks? We get an ATOM of a flashback just as Jin-Woo remembers the cause of her burn in her neck, but thats the only thing that pops up to build this relationship; maybe someone else knows her, or expresses her emotions or condolences at Jin-Woo's mom being hospitalized for a lethal disease (BARELY anyone reacts upon this woman suddenly being healed from an incurable sickness, this is never again touched upon). This man, who was alleged to be losing his humanity (where did that go lol) in both S1 and early-mid S2 is crying rivers because of his mom being healthy again; of course, that is perfectly reasonable for a normal person, but not for this dude who was "GAZING AT DA ABYSSSSSSSS" or who "WANTED TO KNOW IF YOU FELT FEARRRRRRR" or "FIGHTING AGAINST MUH INNER DEEEEMONSSSS" "IM DA NECROMANCER BABYYYY" just a while ago while recruiting literal demons, like it completely undermines this "inner darkness" or "losing humanity" plot point, as this sequence shows that this never mattered at all and it went nowhere, a waste of time. Imagine if, his reaction at seeing her healthy again, was numb and he expressed a lot of impotence and inner struggles at this reaction, leading him to make less use of his skills and focus on other stuff, that'd been more interesting I believe and wouldnt be such an anticlimactic ending, the objective would then metamorphise and give Jin-Woo SOME character, it would be another layer of depth, AND it'd lead this "losing humanity" dumb plot somewhere. But no, it's instead delivered as a poorly-built climax, a waste of time, another thing that Solo Leveling cannot execute properly, falling in a hole of tropes and clichés. The scene was so awkward too, lol. The narrative line isnt properly established, so all of this emotion falls flat on its face because the show was more focused in doing dumb unnecessary shit rather than developing this, it's so badly done that the only thing one feels is disappointment and time lost. The show puts all of its effort and attention into Jin-Woo and everything else is neglected, yet Jin-Woo himself is terrible, thus Solo Leveling ends up being... nothing, this leads us to my next point. 3. Solo Leveling is Supremely Boring and Spineless There are many legendary anime fights one can mention, examples abound; but is there even ONE battle in Solo Leveling that is memorable? Honestly, I don't think so, and I always find myself laughing whenever a random Fraud Leveling post pops up on Twitter, flaunting about aura and battle choreography, and then they're showing the plainest piece of white bread imaginable. They all end in a very anticlimactic and lame way, Jin-Woo has hacks for every kind of situation; everyone fights in a boring style, you have the cliché paladins, the tanks, generic spellcasters, assassins with the typical stuff like stealth or killing blows, bland warriors who warrior'd their way into battle, bow dudes, average Joes and then Jin-Woo is everything, except for a healer, oh oops that isnt true, he has HP POTIONS and CURE ALL ANTIDOTES—really, there's nothing interesting or minimally captivating about this anime. The tension is never there and the battles are predictable and with very underwhelming finales, a great example of this is the Cerberus that Sung Jin-Woo kills, as the combat ends with the protagonist simply stabbing an INFERNAL THREE-HEADED GIANT DOG in the eye and that's enough to kill it???? And I am not even tackling about the absolute creative bankruptcy in this monster design. Am I the only person who finds this extremely boring and anticlimactic? Moreover, the battles that look promising, such as Jin-Woo's new party vs. the orcs, are also ruined by the author's INABILITY to not aggrandize his protagonist; I was expecting a dirty, complicated but satisfying battle—however, the author decided that having Sung Jin-Woo do everything to make them win was a superior outcome. I expected Cha-Hae to help him with the orc chief and have a cool fight where both excel and form a combat synergy; however, we just get more slop from the one and only Jin-Woo, with the cherry on top being that Cha-Hae now gets flustered upon seeing our protagonists CHAD power. Also, the action itself isnt even good: Apart from the anticlimax, many of the shots were boring, with constant camera shots to instant decapitations or incoherent lights clashing, bad CGI like the orcs battling with the shades, or the shades themselves being extremely clunky, there is no strategy whatsoever, the asinine battle choices, off-model characters and more. Solo Leveling is also fucked by its ABSURD use of vertical progression and a poor worldbuilding, both of these flaws directly makes it so the author needs to glaze Jin-Woo constantly, in dumb ways, for him to prosper; the restriction put in place for hunters not only kills the little thematical value of this show, but its also a bullet to the foot as a writer. But what about the villains? Well, exactly as you'd expect, boring McBaddies with no substance. There is no valuable exchange of ideas whatsoever. Even in this aspect—the action and the animation—where this anime should triumph, Solo Leveling disappoints. Choreographies such as the one in Jin-Woo vs Baran are dizzy and annoying; with confused lights flying everywhere, boring ahh Clash of Clans fights and non-sensical movements, absurd close-ups or camera shots and an insane incapability to make a coherent battle that you can properly follow, all with a predictable ending; meanwhile, the animation is worsening overtime and has no proper identity or sense of style. Bosses usually die in a few hits from our protagonist, yet he resists EVERYTHING and never faulters. EVEN what should be the best thing in this show is weak and cliché. And this guy, THE DEMON MONARCH, who resisted everything thus now and barred Jin-Woo's summons, is distracted by a girl throwing a thing to him which didnt cause any damage whatsoever while he's handling Sung Jin-Woo in close combat, that's contrived bullshit; plus, this dude who CLEANED Jin-Woo is suddenly overwelmed by him? Or why didnt his dagger rebound to him? Why didn't he drink a potion and use his shades to overwhelm Baran when he dropped his summons? It's not like you cant drink a potion while moving or something. These battles are sooooooooooo boring, superficial and predictable its absurd. Fight against Ignis is based on pure raw and convenient luck with a contrived mistake, while the battle against frost elves was derivative, boring and predictable—like everything else, also repeating every mistake with off-model shades and terrible choreographies. Mind you, Jin-Woo vs Baran was the HUGE hype of this season, yeah, that predictable monster of the week slop without any nuance was the most hyped thing in this show. Pathetic. "Totally not Meruem" and his arc are also hyped as fuck but they end up being another predictable slog with no nuance, with lazy deaths and poorly-done sequences; at this point, they have completely given up and resort to instadeaths and battles with a non-existent dynamic or minimal exchange. Bootleg Meruem will just change his fighting style, in an irrational way, to appeal for both the nationalism of this work, for fanservice and to let the anime glaze Gigachad Sigmalord, like one poster said in the forums: "One shot the Japanese only, he only slapped the Koreans for X reasons, only for then to be useless agains Jinwoo. Consistency all over the place." and Jin-Woo wins the fight because of a deus ex machina. This shit looks like a stagnant turn-based game rather than real time action, it is very clunky and boring to watch, all of this with a complete lack of a build-up and proper narrative. Thats the thing about Slop Leveling, even what SHOULD BE its strongest aspect is noticeably feeble. It is an incoherent mess of tropes, idiocy and irrational decisions. Solo Leveling's poor structure, the OP protagonist and his deus ex machinas negate any kind of tension and excitement that the fights may have, even if this show tries to gaslight you otherwise—as far as I know, the biggest strategy Sung Jin-Woo displayed so far is TAKING HEIGHT AGAINST THE ENEMY, and that's it, everything else is solved by conveniences, mere chaddisms or hacks. Sung Jin-Woo's sidekicks are usually worthless, standing around watching, being annihilated by the enemy, glazing him after Gigachad Sigmalord demolishes the enemy or plainly doing nothing, all while our protagonist does the work. Tense scenes and battles will suddenly cut away to repeat information we already know, to show reactions for the thousandth time or to demonstrate the foul inner soliloquy of these pseudocharacters, inner speeches that prove and display little to nothing of value and grace; many times, Solo Leveling will treat these thoughts or hype moments (usually from Jin-Woo) as grand revelations, incredible climaxes or impressive ploys, but they are usually obvious narratives and things the audience can interpret for themselves without a third party, and they all fall flat— there is no value here. Some shounen, such as Jujutsu Kaisen, can save a shred of dignity with fights and action, Solo Leveling doesn't even have this gambit, as no battle has been interesting or has had a modicum of tension. Solo Leveling's direction and action is derivative and fruitless, truly without any soul, just like its worldbuilding. We have no reason to care for Chaddified Jin-Woo, there are no stakes, there is no reason to care for anything or anyone in Solo Leveling as they are unlikeable or very one-note. Also, levels indirectly restrict the author's liberty, since the only way to respond to Jin-Woo's excessive amount of hacks is by upping the monsters' level in a grotesque verticality; but, meanwhile, everyone else stays in the same place, essentially a lame vertical loop of apathy and boredom where only Jin-Woo gets stronger and the rest remain in a pit of mediocrity: > le stronger monster is here! > Jin-Woo kills it, gets more chaddified > le stronger monster is here! > Jin-Woo kills it, gets more chaddified ad nauseam As a fellow writer, I believe that some ideas should probably be kept in the writers vault for a reason! And no, your show being called "Solo Leveling" doesnt justify creative bankruptcy and complete neglect of your work's characters, this argument is absurd. 4. A trite meandering from non-characters There is not much to say about this; of course, I don't expect a dialogue masterclass from Solo Leveling of all shows anyways. The dialogue in Solo Leveling tends to be "from X to Y" with characters just going by the tide. We get no interesting philosophy or phrases from anyone in this show, not even a modicum of anything; we are usually presented with a situation and the characters will replicate what the audience is already thinking, or say derivative things, with constant cuts and exposition of stuff we already know or things other characters already know; do you remember any iconic or notable dialogue in this show? Not that this should be the forte of this work, of course, but it doesnt even achieve the bare minimum, you could erase all the dialogue in Solo Leveling and it would function anyways, it really adds nothing. One of the moments I remember, because of how dumb this was, is this specific interaction between Jin-Woo and Joo-Hee, the context is that they are both going to enter a dungeon and Joo-Hee isnt very sure, since some party members are criminals, it looks generally sketchy: Song Jin-Woo: You cannot go, Jo-Hee, it's dangerous. I'll go. Joo-Hee: No, if you go, I will go too. Song Jin-Woo: Alright. Well, THAT WAS FUCKING EASY. You know she cannot do this, its a dangerous instance, Jin-Woo knows of her issues, yet he is convinced with such trite. Had Jin-Woo been developed in a better fashion she would not have been in danger again and the audience would be more inclined to sympathize with them; however, this is not the case, and Jin-Woo will let Joo-Hee give up even her life for a character who gives her nothing in exchange, who encourages her to participate in an instance that puts her life in danger and has probably made her trauma worse; it's frustrating and very unnecessary, it shows not only the lack of synergy and substance between these two, but also how unlikeable Sung Jin-Woo is even if hes supposed to be likeable by the author's standards. Solo Leveling is packed with boring exposition interactions and utterly soporific mundane chatter. Just completely worthless. When our characters explain their battle strategies or stuff they like, it is in the most spiceless and deadpan way possible. Characters will just spit nothingburger dialogue with a cinematic blandness and simple camera shots, its like asking ChatGPT to make dialogue for you. Another instance that hits me as bad dialogue is this one: Jin-Ho tells Sung Jin-Woo that Song-Yi is a minor Sung Jin-Woo: "So?" And now, due to your incompetence in writing proper punchlines and jokes, you have a good amount of people who equate your protagonist to Epstein—seriously, just read the MAL forums on this episode; all because you couldn't deliver the joke in a right way, and due to the contrived scenario and NON-EXISTING synergy between these two (Jin-Woo and Jin-Ho). Or so many instances where Sung Jin-Woo compares his life to a videogame, or anytime the characters use RPG language (bosses, dungeons, mana... really) It is seriously cringe, or where Jin-Woo will straight-out spit the most cliché phrases in existence. I feel like not using straight-up RPG terms in a non-isekai anime is kind of an unspoken rule honestly. The women who see Jin-Woo will normally goon about his body in the most masturbatory and grossly erotic way possible (talking about the author) and people will normally suck him up—those who don't, normally meet dire consequences. A lot of characters are suddenly broken apart to favor Sung Jin-Woo, such as the B-Class Tae-Shik who is suddenly revealed to be Jeffrey Dahmer for some fucking reason, of course, he's the same guy who quotes Nietzsche in the most ridiculous way; he also dons some of the tackiest dialogue ever, trying so hard to be creepy but instead he ends up being edgy, his case never comes back again. Solo Leveling's pathetic attempts at emotional or introspective dialogue are lame, and many times end up having very few stakes or weight in the actual plot or characters, or just being executed in the most absolutely cliché way imaginable, without any elegance or nuance. 5. Solo Leveling is a Frankenstein Monster The worldbuilding in Solo Leveling is a VERY unpleasant and non-immersive pastiche of realism, soft-medieval aesthetics, generic fantasy, soft politics and finally, the cherry on the cake, RPG terms and mechanics used in a non-ironic way, the labor of the hunters is a bastardized version of Hunter x Hunter's hunters but without Togashi's fascinating pen and paper, but most of all, the worldbuilding doesn't feel cohesive, nor does it make much sense. Somehow, the author figured that condemning his characters to stay in the same social and power echelon was a good idea, while his main character could just improve indiscriminately—this not only kills any kind of tension, intricate development or interest—again, writers can ditch or modify ideas while writing their stuff if its needed!!—but also thematically betrays one of the great pretensions of Solo Leveling, which is “work hard and you'll get what u want” which of course tends to be another malicious lie in a top-down, classist, "meritocratic" and corrupt society like the one in Solo Leveling, where your birth and latent power dictates your position forever; and, following this, for some reason, S-class hunters have the freedom to commit whatever debauchery they want, above and beyond any law; and this is one of the most ridiculous things in my opinion, One Punch Man manages to establish an alliance, such as the Hero Association, with problematic and contrasting personalities, all of whom function under a common allegiance of protecting humanity; however, the political associations in Solo Leveling are constructed in a flimsy and vague manner, with a rare lack of laws, punishment, information, associations and moral codes to limit individuals with this incredible power, both for the S-class and the hunters who are dedicated to killing others; it is so disastrous, in fact, that these peculiarities in the worldbuilding break any immersion and interest, turning certain situations into an eye-rolling or contrived or bland mess. The magic stones that dungeons offer monopolize almost all things and energy sources, making the development of this world extremely boring and purely based on a single resource—it is a very effective way to reduce the quality and variety of your worldbuilding, just base it all around a single thing without development. Solo Leveling feels like a world scared of showing or developing itself, aesthetically unpleasing and inconsistent. Solo Leveling's society is vaguely organized around the dungeons for how important they are, there is no science or knowledge or government organism specifically designed to better understand them, post-dungeon reports are very poorly controlled and there is virtually no introspection into what could have been done better, what could have been avoided, hunters are also badly treated and managed as a resource; overall, everything feels very sloppy for a job that has been going on for many years, one which brings home some of the most important resources, VERY little information is also given to ensure the highest possible safety of the hunters, which is strange considering the lethality of this job; yes, there is some randomness attributed to dungeons and their nature, but this is also the case in many real life occupations such as mining or mountaineers, and yet we create many laws, protective measures and items to protect these workers, this is not the case with Solo Leveling hunters; for example, in the case of Tae-Shik, his punishment is barely addressed, no detailed report is given on such a political and relevant issue, we are not given more information on how these kinds of situations are handled or how they are dealt with publicly, and soon this opportunity to delve deeper into this world is abandoned, later on he's never mentioned again—all of this is crazy when Solo Leveling takes hunting as such an important job, the whole anime is based around this, but the occupation by itself is “explained”and "tackled" in such a vague way that it is pitiful. S-hunters just wander around without weapons, people are noticeably lax while going through the city, they are weirdly relaxed even though portals have been known to be breached, etc. It feels so alien. Moreover, apart from Jin-Woo, not only is the S class' character design utterly bland and without any personality, but they are USELESS and almost never there for raids, are they so seemingly occupied that they can never give support and associations have to bring civilians and average Joes to further lose workers? These stupid incompetent morons from the association are registering the danger of ants WHEN THE CITY IS ALREADY IN RUINS AND A LOT OF PEOPLE HAVE DIED lol, like this worldbuilding is BARELY glued together, how come there are no external security measures of any kind around the portals or the beasts that dwell there when they've already been recorded to have escaped into the real world when hunting has become SUCH an important job? Why is there so little analysis around hunting? Why is this world SO feeble? Now, the second season shoehorns some type of "hell" which is vaguely mentioned by Esil, someone who is just brushed off the show when she serves her purpose as an addon and walking exposition. Hunter x Hunter was able to combine several styles in a cohesive way thanks to Togashi's talent, who managed to connect many different worlds and unite them in a mix that captivated the world of anime and manga, practically raising worldbuilding standards and inspiring many artists; however, Solo Leveling achieves nothing, it would be an insult to Togashi's magnanimous work to compare it to a soulless aberration like Solo Leveling. The worlds of SL feel alienated, dull and disconnected, you'll see a mention of the United States and its hunters, the only thing we see of this idea with so much potential for international politics is some random metropolis and one of the antagonized characters (Hwang) is depicted as an unabashedly selfish, Americanized narcissist—who is then beaten up by the father of our main character, Il-Hwan Sung, this and the Jeju Island arc are a great example of the pedantic nationalism in this work, along with the fact that all the japanese are presented as directly egotistical, apathic, murderous or malicious. There are a lot of questions to be asked with the world order regarding hunters, but Solo Leveling refuses to provide answers and instead offers soulless slop, goofy power fantasies, etc. Each character has a generic, random style: you have a paladin, then another guy with a sword, a guy with a dagger, japanese dude with a katana, sorcerers—the sorceresses are, funnily enough, in lingerie and semi-nude or with an exaggerated and impractical cleavage—and these guys will act exactly as you expect them to act; not even the acclaimed S-ranks look imposing, they are simple Joes without any trait that makes them interesting to the eye, in another work they could perfectly be side characters that are abandoned, but here they are taken as absolute icons; later on, when Gigachad Sigmalord surges as an S-class, we get nothing of how the lower classes live in this world, amplifying this disconnect even more. Overall, it makes for a world devoid of immersion and originality. Incohesive, boring and poorly built. Bland, without a sense of proper aesthetic or style. Solo Leveling is worth nothing visually, it doesnt matter just HOW MUCH budget A-1 Pictures puts into this thing, as its aesthetic is fundamentally flawed due to being lost, bland and not properly defined. The combats feel lost, disoriented, with no proper build-up or nuance, more like a child playing PEW PEW with toys. It is really such a shameless Hunter x Hunter ripoff, at the end of Season 2 there is literally a budget Meruem and the budget Ant Queen from HxH. I am really gaslighted, by this anime, to believe that a modern world as such didnt contribute in the creation of magic stone atomic power; even more, I'm led by this anime to believe that they didnt nuke the shit out of Jeju Island before these bitches could even fly; EVEN MORE, I am led to believe that all of the nations in the world are just ignoring this surging threat, yes it's happening on another country, but international associations and alliances exist for a reason! Or is the entire world just completely disconnected one from the other? Or is everyone enemies with each other? I can understand Japan and South Korea being in a feud or a disconnection, but the USA and South Korea?????? This worldbuilding is stagnant, null and worthless, scared of showing itself and completely incoherent, without any sense of self whatsoever. 6. Solo Ending After this entire diatribe, I have nothing more to say about this abomination. Solo Leveling is, essentially, an ontologically rotten piece. I'm not saying you can't watch Solo Leveling by the way, I'm not the anime police, but I felt the need to express all of this as it is so blatant and absurd to me. I saw a comment on Reddit that said "Solo Leveling is the equivalent of eating cake for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for an entire year because the story boils down to JUST Jinwoo. Jinwoo saves his friends, Jinwoo killed the demon king, Jinwoo has the best powers, Jinwoo owns the best weapons, Jinwoo mowed his neighbor's lawn, Jinwoo paid off my college loans. It's Jinwoo 24/7. There's no fucking variety." and I don't blame them for having this conclusion, as it's absolutely and completely true. In any case, Solo Leveling is the upmost example of not having a spirit or artistical drive, and one of the worst animes I've ever watched. Terrible worldbuilding. Terrible characters. Terrible story. Terrible comedy. Terrible villains. Terrible battles. Terrible character designs. Terrible everything. Classic A-1 Pictures animation with a big budget, like applying makeup to a corpse. Everything I've seen thus far has been bad, yet the most loyal Solo Leveling fans will operate in sunk cost fallacy with claims like "bro believe me it gets better" as if the build-up and introduction to a climax didnt matter at all, as if everything we are watching was perfectly fine enough, as if we had to ignore everything just because the terrible becomes a bit less terrible later on, even if that climax will be based on this TERRIBLE build up; as far as I know, the only merit of Solo Leveling is knowing how to capitalize and be released in the right time, Sung Jin-Woo will just continue to get stronger, and when this show finishes absolutely nothing of value will have been lost. The build-up? Feeble. The characters? Worthless. The action? Anticlimactic. The plot? Bland. The battles? Incoherent. The dialogue? Unnecessary. The emotion? Ridiculous. The pacing? Irrational. The sidecast? Non-existing. The power fantasy? Insipid. No matter how much makeup you apply, its still a corpse at the end of the day. Because of everything I've said, Solo Leveling deserves the minimum score in every way, there's nothing salvageable.