How The Hell Does The Rising of the Shield Hero Support Slavery?

We’re more than halfway through The Rising of the Shield Hero, and two things have been consistent: the quality of Kevin Penkin’s incredible soundtrack for the show, and the outrage of many Western anime fans, bloggers and critics over the story’s ‘controversial’ elements. From the first episode alone, many denounced the series for its use of a false rape accusation to establish it’s central conflict, claiming this to be outright misogynistic or simply in poor taste in the wake of ‘#MeToo’ activism. But beyond that initial furor, another outcry has been consistently present on social media.

Rotten Chivalry: The Role of Women in Goblin Slayer

(note: this article is from an anime-only perspective, and is primarily aimed at anime-only viewers)

Medieval fantasies often have trouble with the agency they give to women in their worlds, from societies over-populated with passive princesses to ‘strong female characters’ that have little complexity beyond being, well, strong and female. These stories are always under the shadow of period of history that saw the height of a patriarchal social structure and the treatment of the ‘fairer sex’ as little more than property. Modern writers should feel encouraged to subvert tropes and cliches in order to find new room for characters other than knightly men to flourish. Yet, one show this season has stumbled when it comes to handling a large part of its cast.

KonoSuba S1: An Unnecessary Review

(this review contains spoilers – you have been warned!)

The ‘stuck in an MMO’ story, on the back of SAO’s commercial success, has been repeated enough to become a genre in itself. Give Studio Deen that story, however, and they turn it on its head. If they truly are ‘saving anime’ with shows like Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu, it fits that they’ve revitalised the tropes of fantasy harem anime all over with their second project of the Winter 2016 season.