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Fall 2024 Update

Greetings. Thank you for stopping Anime Rants. I’m here to give a quick update about the shows I’m blogging about for Fall 2024. I made a list of potential shows in this post a couple weeks ago. I’ve decided to write episode reviews for all of them except Demon Lord 2099 and The Do-Over Damsel Conquers the Dragon Emperor.

I also briefly considered writing about Dandadan and Acro Trip, which were not on my original list at all. While I will most likely watch Acro Trip at some point, I don’t have the motivation to blog about it this season. As for Dandadan, I still haven’t watched the available episodes because it sounds very targeted at young boys, and I’m not particularly interested.

Now, you’ll notice that I said I won’t be covering Do-Over Damsel regularly. But I will write out my thoughts on the first episode because I already watched it. To be honest, I did like a few aspects of it. Overall, however, this show is not for me, and will probably annoy me if I keep trying to get through it. I’ll review the positives and negatives below.

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The Do-Over Damsel Conquers the Dragon Emperor: Episode 1 Review

Episode Rating: 6/10

Content Warning: Mentions of Grooming and Pedophilia

The premise of the story is that Jill Cerval, a warrior woman in a fantasy world, was betrayed and killed by her twisted husband. This man, Gerald, was in a secret relationship with his sister for the whole of the marriage. He tried to have Jill executed when she found out. When Jill put up a fight, Gerald impaled her with a magical spear.

Much to her surprise, Jill found herself reborn back in the past. She was only a small child. To make things worse, it was the night of the party where Gerald first asked to become her betrothed. Jill desperately tried to avoid Gerald, but he was persistent. Just before he asked Jill for her hand in marriage, the little girl grabbed the person nearest to her and declared that she was in love with him and wanted to marry him.

Unfortunately, the person Jill blindly chose was Hades Theos Rave, the emperor of a neighboring kingdom. In the world Jill knew, Hades became a cruel and evil emperor who waged war on Jill’s kingdom. In other words, she just picked her worst enemy as her betrothed. And Hades is going to take her proposal very seriously.

Immediately, this anime caught my attention because it features a character that can time-loop. I love characters like that. However, it seems likely that there will only be one time-loop. If Jill screws it up this time, I doubt she gets a third chance. That makes things less interesting. I was also attracted to this anime because it featured a strong female protagonist who could fight. But now it seems like Jill will be stuck as a child or a teenager for most of the story. I don’t imagine there will be many epic battles.

So far, any positives have been immediately canceled out by learning more about the nature of this series. However, there is definitely one positive element that I can’t deny, which is that I like the visuals and character designs. For example, Hades is extremely attractive. Unfortunately, his character traits are not cool like his design. This is the strongest negative I will complain about: Hades is a groomer and a pedophile.

There are cases where I can deal with this sort of thing (in fiction, that is). For example, I still love The Ancient Magus’ Bride despite similar issues. But getting into a new series with this kind of problem is not an easy task. I’d have to absolutely love most of the other elements – like story, music, and characters- to put up with it. The Do-Over Damsel is not that special to me. So, rather than try to put up with a gross character every week, I will just drop this anime.

In case you’re wondering, it’s not an exaggeration to call Hades a pedo and a groomer. He literally explains that he wants a young girl in particular, and that ideally, Jill should have been slightly younger. To be clear, this man is nineteen, and although I’m not certain of Jill’s age, she looks about ten. Pedophilia is an element we never see in The Ancient Magus’ Bride because Elias is not a human. His interest in Chise was never physical.

When Jill suggests that age differences would make it hard to produce heirs, Hades makes it clear that he has no intention of being sexual with Jill – yet. While that’s relieving, it still means he will be grooming and romancing her with the intent to make her carry his children when her body can handle it. I know this is fiction, but it’s still gross. So yeah, this anime is not for me.

That’s all for today’s update and episode review. I apologize if the discussion at the end was triggering to anyone. It isn’t pleasant for me to write about it, either. But unfortunately, it’s a discussion that constantly needs to be brought to the light if you’re going to consume a lot of anime. Until next time, Sayonara!

~Thanks for reading~

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