Forum - View topicEP. REVIEW: Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation II
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Blood-
 Bargain Hunter Posts: 23854 |
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@ Key - I certainly can understand why you cited those two examples. I don't think School Days applies because you're supposed to hate the MC. That's his function. Now, you can argue that you are supposed to be irritated by Rudeus too and then be gradually won over as he changes. But I would classify it as a different kettle of fish. NGE is probably a better analogy for me. But as frustrated as I got with Shinji, I still never held him as much distaste as I occasionally hold Rudeus. God, even his name is calculated to get up my nose: Rudeus Greyrat. Rude-us. A rat. I hate rats.
Last edited by Blood- on Wed Jul 26, 2023 6:05 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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NeverConvex
 Subscriber Posts: 2328 |
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I think MT wants to be a character study, and maybe imagines itself as one. I don't think it really gets there, fully, at least not so far. It has come close at times, but the show is at least as interested in leering at the women Rudy mistreats and exploits as it is in exploring his broken self and approach to relationships and the people around him.
By contrast, MT has been super effective, and I think uncontroversially so, whenever it has leaned away from the "character study" attempt and into world-building and fantasy adventure. I enjoy a good character study, but MT's going to have to step its quality up quite a lot in that regard if it wants me to stop yearning for it to lean into what it has so far clearly been much better at. |
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b-dragon
Posts: 468 |
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I think it does manage to do good character work, and not purely by accident. I'm of the mindset that the scenes reuniting with Paul last season were outright fantastic in terms studying issues and bad patterns, and having the characters learn and try to move past them. And while that is, I think, the best scenes that the show nails it also isn't isolated. Rudeus, this person who had difficulty connecting to people in acceptable/moral ways spends a lot of time on the Demon Continent reaching out to others, showing an improvement over the person he was. He resolves to take care of Eris, to help Rujierd, and several of the cases he gets involved in. Its good stuff, truly. Pity it just throws so much of the progress and goodwill away when the horny gets involved. Or at least, thats how I feel about it- that despite all the progress, setbacks and progress again (because character growth is messy, and this is a good thing to portray,) Rudy still has Roxy's panties enshrined as an object of worship. And its an unfulfilling sort of frustrating to keep viewing, because the payoff, the growth to this part, is always further on in the story. Frickin Charlie Brown and the hyper-sexualized football here.
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Juno016
 Posts: 2395 |
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This is definitely one of those things where in the novels, it's portrayed almost comedically like a sacred, pure, innocent item that Rudy turned from a sign of his sexual immaturity into something more emotionally important to him, always accompanied by a reflection of his journey, the personal progress he's made, his anxieties and fears, his motivation, etc. He truly finds this dumb cloth comforting, in a serious, non-sexual way. If you remember his lesson to his half-sister when he gave her the head protector as a souvenier, he wasn't lying. That's truly how he feels about the underwear. In text form, it's so easy to suspend disbelief... ...but no matter how they adapt it in the anime, I mean, it's just a dude holding someone's stolen underwear up like a creep, isn't it? How do you even adapt that? Just seeing it causes my suspension of disbelief to flee with its tail between its legs. Like, stop it, Rudy, you absolute creep. That's not cool. Or funny. Burn it and move on with your life. GOD. Lol A lot (but not all) of this discussion can boil down to the anime exposing just how weird and creepy he is through its visuals. Even more so if you walk away with the opposite idea of what's going on than what was ctually going on inside his head or the exposition in the same scene in the novels. The anime isn't bad at this necessarily, but I question how much it is even capable of presenting to us that information without the alarming visual distraction. Make no mistake that Rudy can be a creep in the novels, too, but you kinda get the vibe of what the author is trying to say in any given scene in the novels, and it's ha'rder to read that intent in the anime. |
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NeverConvex
Subscriber Posts: 2328 |
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I actually agree the scenes with Paul last scene were quite good in this regard (though apparently not so good that I remember details; this is more of a fuzzy, overall emotional and intellectual recall). I don't think that's enough to carry it, I guess, though. You talk about the reason why in the rest of your post, although I would change the emphasis a bit; it's not just that the show is horny, but that it doesn't do horny/sexual/romantic in a way that is thoughtful, touching, or reflects seriously on Rudy's faults or mistreatment of others. At least, not usually. Some of the culminating romantic scenes between Rudy and Eris last season actually were getting close to well done, I think, but unfortunately they're like a 1-in-a-thousand exception at this point. This season's interactions with Sara have been a bit more uneven, but somewhat better in this respect than last season's early interactions with Roxy or Eris (or, ugh, Rudy's mom). Maybe it will continue to improve in this regard, but so far I still groan inwardly whenever we hit a scene like this, which is unfortunately frequent. |
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Sp12er
Posts: 12 |
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You Guys are overthinking it. Mushoku Tensei is, at its essence a VN. the plot progresses, met hurdles, and change courses in arcs and routes, where it solely focuses on the characters, first season was basically the prologue, now we're entering Sylphy's route.
spoiler[We know the heroines are 3, Sylphy, Roxy, and Eris. and this story doesn't only contain their introduction-warming up- S3x- marriage, the step most VN ends at, its also about keeping the relationship, having kids, keeping family and friends safe, till his death. ] People who got to S2 should know by this point the focus wont ever be changed from Rudy's perspective, most of change in perspective that happened is setup for future encounters and events. |
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freebird1994
Posts: 73 |
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I just wanna say that I'm kinda glad that a lot of the discussions here are on the actual aspects of the show and it's characters in it, for better or for worse, and its not just people posting "Rudy is a P-word therefor the show is bad". It's very fun reading people discussing the show on various literary merits from character development to world building to the themes and how they are portrayed. This is defiantly a better start than what season 1 discussion threads devolved into.
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2-2Distracted
Posts: 148 |
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Eris. The context wants to act like she seduced him, but he still had sex with a child. So it's statutory rape and thus sexual assault. Not to mention the constant harassment throughout season 1 |
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Sp12er
Posts: 12 |
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15 YO snowflake children is different from an orphaned warrior who spent years travelling the world, defeating monsters and bandits on the side. People need to stop underestimating Eris, she is her own Person, and is a proper adult Both for that world standard in actual age and life experience.
She made her own life decisions, she doesn't need your "protections" stop projecting your value to an anime character. If people meet Eris with the same introduction as Sara people wouldn't be seeing her this way, its just people know her since she was a kid so... There's literally nobody around that can help her pick her life choice anymore, heck there's only one and thats the butler pushing to marry her off for the land's sake. Last edited by Sp12er on Sat Jul 29, 2023 1:26 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Hal14
 Posts: 674 Location: Heart of africa |
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He groped her in her sleep before the teleportation incident, when all the justications you list happend**. How can you argue for a characters agency but then overlook such an invasion of a persons agency like molesting them when they’re unconscious? Also, most people wouldn't have an issue with rudy having sex with eris if he didn't have the mind of an adult. Saying she made her own decisions is like saying a teenager agreeing to meet a paedophile (oops, i said the word) that catfished them online is her own decision. **it's wierd to argue that this is the world standard when child adventures seem to be a rarity. Even, Rujeed didn't want them to fight. People can't have it both ways: claim that this is a redemption/ self-improvement story but ignore or reduce the things he's done. |
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Sp12er
Posts: 12 |
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Dude read again, in mushoku tensei's world, people doesn't celebrate yearly birthday, they celebrate in multiples of 5. in his 5 Rudy got his book and sword from his parents, he got his wand from Boreas family at 10. at 15, is the last time they celebrate as by that point everyone regard you as an adult, Eris is 15, Orphaned as well , no brother, has a distant uncle, and nobody else. the only choice she was presented is to be married off for the land's sake by a nobody, an ex servant.
Can you really think up of any person that can pick her choice, other than herself? heck even when her parents are still alive, his dad jokingly encouraged Rudy to play with her, and her mom send her to his room at night. if all that isn't a clue on how loose people there think about morals there, I'm not sure. They exist not for encouraging Rudy or the watchers to do whats suggested, normalizing them or whatever, no, its simply the different morals between modern world and medieval one they live in. and no, spoiler[Rudy's not the only one thats getting advantaged, he will be faced with the exact same problem when the ones doing the "immoral" thing is his sisters and kids. ][/spoiler] |
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Hiroki not Takuya
 Posts: 2532 |
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Sort of funny how the discussion S2 has been about other things like the story and characters for weeks and in the last week or so has gone to "GOD, I hate Rudeus..the sight makes me sick...he is so annoying..." so I'm here to say I really like Rudeus because I find his characterization relatable and somewhat realistic. He is flawed in ways most men are if they were honest/courageous enough to admit and he acts on some of that when he shouldn't (which isn't OK) but he has many admirable qualities such as perseverance, self-reflection, loyalty, honesty, kindness and a loving heart among others. Now, praying to the Holy Panties was more than a bit much and distasteful Ep4 so he got minus points from me but he is maturing slowly and I am a patient viewer...
Speaking of, now Rudeus can best a Red Dragon and it wasn't so long ago that Eris wanted to go after one and Rudeus tried to dissuade her doubting his ability to take even one. Seems the pace of S2 is brisk but I still love that the adaptation team is careful to keep enough details in that it doesn't seem like skimming... Also, anybody else hearing the Pillow's style in the Ed? |
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Snowcat
Posts: 190 |
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Season has some problem in quality compared to season 1 but i hope it can manage it on the long run. The episode 2 was disappointing in directing and pacing but episode 3 and 4 did the job.
Concerning Rudeus, the character is flawed: he is a pervert, on various aspect a coward and indecisive but i have less problem with him than with Shinji in Evangelion because he get less people killed because of his mental issues. And the pervert aspect doesn't annoy me much because it looks like the author mostly uses it for comedy inspired by 80's anime (city hunter, ranma). I suppose he is probably not very good on this front. The theme of this isekai seems to be the family bonds: from his previous life where he doesn't understand it at all to his separation with Eris where he doesn't really understand her request leading to current state. It's quite different from the other Isekai and can be really interesting. I'm still very interested in the show and I like Rudeus character but i'm a little bit afraid that the incoming magic academy plot already seen in so much fantasy/isekai will feel boring. |
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The Anime Binge-Watcher
 Posts: 94 |
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"Can you really think up of any person that can pick her choice, other than herself?" As a matter of fact, I can: the author. Because Eris isn't a real person, she does not exist, she literally cannot make her own decisions. It was the author's decision to write a world where fifteen years old is considered adult and sexually mature, despite it being underage in our world. It was the author's decision to write her into a scenario where she sleeps with a mentally forty-year-old man who previously tried to assault her multiple times. She didn't make those choices: he did. Hope that explains the issue. |
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MFrontier
Posts: 11604 |
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It's funny how we have a Tomokazu Sugita character who can't have sex with a Rie Tanaka character. Chobits, anyone? I actually wonder if this was a good chance for Sugita and Tanaka to reconnect, I can't remember if they've been this close in a show since then (I mean, they probably have, but still).
I don't think I've ever seen a female character in an anime have as much sex on-screen as Elinalise. Nothing represents Mushoku Tensei's horniness like a sexy seductive waifu who bangs practically every man on-screen except the protagonist. She even pays them! Though it does make you wonder why she's so set on making sure things don't get serious. What did Paul do that made so much of his party hate him? Especially because I don't think Elinalise would care about him being a sex fiend unless it impacted Zenith, who nobody bears a grudge against like they do her husband. The only thing worse than having ED is being constantly barraged with watching everyone in your party get to have great sex and hearing it every night. Man-God returns in all his naked glory! To tell Rudy he has to work on his performance issues, basically, both sexually and magically. I guess also investigate the Fittoa teleportation, which might progress the main plot? And he'll finally reunite with Sylphie. Soldat was a true bro in the end, in his own way. I hope he and Rudy can reunite for drinks and hookers. Probably a better chance of that than seeing Counter Arrow again. Looking forward to seeing what is in store at the magic university arc, seem like a strong collection of characters for Rudy to bounce off of and some major reunions. I do wonder if Zenith is really as okay as everyone is acting like she is. |
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