The Rising of The Shield Hero First Cour Review With Karandi

Hello everyone and welcome to the Anime Shelter! 🙂

Today is time to have another friendly chat with the awesome Karandi! As you probably already know, at this side we are commenting The Rising of The Shield Hero and today we will be commenting the last part of the first cour. In other words, we will be reviewing the last 3 episodes. Seat tight, get a cup of whatever you prefer as a beverage, and let’s go!

My part is in baby blue and regular font while Karandi’s part is in purple and in italic!

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Hey there Karandi! Thank you so much for joining in for another talk about The Shield Hero 🙂 Although it does not have closure as Meiji Tokyo Renka since it’s going to continue airing in the next season, this last 3 episodes of the first cour were fun to watch. What did you think?

Hey Arthifis. Thanks for having me back to discuss Shield Hero. I actually have enjoyed the last three episodes, though, full disclosure, I kind of only just caught up after having a couple of weeks off from watching this. While I’ve been running behind with post writing, knowing I wasn’t discussing this one until this week I just kind of kept putting it off.

Normally, that’s not a good sign when I’m avoiding watching something, but in this case it kind of paid off because the last three episodes kind of go together really nicely and watching close together meant that a lot of the pacing issues I’d been having with the show as a weekly watch kind of disappeared.

So yes. Lots of fun. But where do you want to start?

That’s a hard question, to be honest! Like you, I also postponed the 3 episodes and watched all in one go yesterday xD

In fact, there’s not much happening in these 3 episodes besides the action of the second wave. So, maybe let’s start from there? What did you think about this second wave and how the Shield Hero has developed in 12 episodes?

I really like that Naofumi has kind of fully gotten used to fighting with Raphtalia and Filo and I also like, that after a lot of persuasion, he allowed the soldiers to join him. It kind of shows clear growth from where he was during the first wave to now as he’s definitely letting some people back into his life.

I kind of didn’t like how the wave itself was shown as there was a lot of standing around on the boat deck from the other heroes. It kind of felt like it needed to be a bit more frantic. How about you?

Well, first of all, I’m with you! It was great to see how Naofumi has become more strategist and better at people reading. For example, the thing that he asked the soldiers to get 150 silver was very intelligent. I already knew that he would use the money to improve their equipment. However, by doing that he was also able to understand if they were actually in his side and that they really wanted to help out.

When it comes to the wave itself, well, I have to say that my best memory of it, is the old lady kicking monsters’ butts haha I know that is for the funsies, but I actually enjoyed to see someone who he has helped in there helping xD In fact, most part of these 3 episodes is to show us that the “normal” people accept the Shield Hero and see him as a saviour, contrary to the other heroes.

Regarding the ship thingy… Well, I understand your point, but I believe it’s a way to show that, since Naofumi had to actually grid with any help, if this was a videogame without money to become an op character, he actually had to learn about teamwork and strategy, while the others are just used to do one attack and that’s it, the fight is done!

I agree with you about the old lady in the village. She was really fun to watch and it was great seeing that she and the soldiers Naofumi ended up with were really helpful during the sequence.

And yeah, you are right in that the scene on the boat really does illustrate the difference between Noafumi and the other heroes even though they are higher levels compared to him. Also, what is with their supporters? Do any of them do anything in the entire fight or are they literally just there to follow the heroes around?

Hahahaha I thought the same way as you xD I think it’s again because the different ways they are levelling up. I mean, in Naofumi’s party, he is in fact in the lower level and is the tank of the party. Meaning, Rapthalia and Filo are the ones doing all the fighting. When it comes to the other parties they just need to follow and not do much, I mean, as I said, the rest of the heroes are basically OP and normal mobs end up being easy for them to finish off in one strike.

I do have to say that, in this wave, it clearly showed why the shield hero is so important! I mean, anyone who plays RPGs knows how important is the tank, so I’m not really sure why the other heroes, who do play RPGs do not see that right away.

However, in this last wave, a small mystery is put into place… That overpowered girl who they are not able to finish off. Do you have any theories about her?

None. I haven’t gotten to a point in the books where we know anything more about her either so I’m just kind of wondering. I’m assuming it’s all tied into how the waves work and clearly the waves must be orchestrated because they can’t possibly be a natural phenomenon.

Still, Glass was very cool. I loved her weapons and attacks and I kind of wish the other heroes had put up more of a fight so we could have seen more of her in action.

Do you have a theory?

Yeah, I also found her cool! Though this time was just a small introduction, so it’s normal that the fight didn’t go far. It was completely one-sided lolol

Well, nope… I don’t really have any. However, I believe it has to do something with the backstory of the king. We were able to get some phrases here and there. From what I could get, it made me believe that the king had some kind of problem with the last shield hero… Maybe, and this is a big reach that I’m going for, the last shield hero is the one that is behind of the present waves.

That would make a lot of sense. Not only on how the king is handling things but how the Queen asked Melty to travel to the capitol and make amends. I mean, clearly, we can see that the king and the queen are not in good terms when it comes to handling the shield hero. Which leads me to, probably, my last question… What did you think of the cliffhanger at the end of episode 12?

I was really happy the story got to this point because I kind of like what it leads to (but I won’t spoil). Still, the way the last episode dealt with the transition from the wave to the confrontation with the King, followed by Melty catching up to the Shield Hero before that cliffhanger… it all just worked really well. It was probably my favourite part of this show so far mostly because it just seemed like it did what it needed to do without wasting any time and each segment just kind of flowed into the next one.

Then again, a cliffhanger at the mid-season point is a little bit rough on viewers. Mostly it feels like they don’t trust us to stick around for the second half of the season which is kind of silly given most people who stuck with this show past episode one seem to be enjoying it (there are a few exceptions out there, but the majority of reviews seem reasonably positive).

How about you?

I’m with you when it comes to the pace… It just felt very natural! They didn’t waste time, but it didn’t feel rushed at all! I believe it was one of the best pace management points of the show so far.

When it comes to the last part… I don’t know… I think that the episode ended up like any other would end to be honest. I actually thought how funny it was to have a cour finishing in such a simple way. Nonetheless, it’s true that there is a cliffhanger there, but they could have done worse.

For example, they could just finish the episode when the soldier was about to attack, letting you in the dark if Melty was killed or not. So, I think it was a nice way to finish it! You know Naofumi was able to understand what was happening and defended Melty. However, it finished in a way that intrigues you enough to come back to the next episode.

Nevertheless, you are right. Anyone who is following Shield Hero so far won’t just quit right now. And I’m addressing typical viewers right now, not Anibloggers since we, sometimes stick with an Anime just to do a review, which is different from sticking with an Anime because we are actually enjoying it xP

Is there anything else you want to address?

I don’t think so. There’s a lot of stuff with the King and Queen and Myne and Melty that is all kind of bubbling away at the moment but we haven’t quite gotten there yet and really these episodes focused more on the wave and we’ve discussed that.

As much as this one is sitting kind of in the middle of my watch list in terms of what I’m enjoying, I am enjoying it. For all that I might poke at bits of it and be a bit more critical of it because it is one of those cases where I’m reading the source, it’s a fairly fun watch and I think I’ll probably leave the episodes until there’s a couple to watch together in future because it really does make the pacing feel a bit smoother without the wait in between.

How are you finding this overall so far?

Well, I’m really enjoying it. I still haven’t finished Neverland, so I can’t really say if it’s my favourite of the season or not, but it’s up there. I would say that I’m enjoying more how this one is developing than Goblin Slayer for example.

However, I do feel that there are some pace problems here and there, especially when it comes to Naofumi and his crew travelling to one side to another. But, well, we will just have to wait and see how it will proceed.

For now, I’m loving the main characters and I’m actually intrigued to see what is happening in that royal family (I live for that kind of intrigue). So yeah, this one is going to be one of those that I will keep up with happily and enjoying myself 🙂

Again, thank you so much for coming over to the shelter and spend some time discussing Shield Hero! The new season is about to start and it seems promising! 😀 Also, I hope you have the best trip to Japan ever ^^

Thank you. I’m starting to get really nervous about the travel but that’s mostly because I’m ridiculously swamped at work and I haven’t even packed yet… Oh well.

Thanks for having me and I’m glad we have been discussing Shield Hero together. Very much looking forward to catching up in a few weeks time when we are in the spring season and seeing where this has gone.

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And that’s it for now everyone! What do you think? What are your thoughts on how Shield Hero paced itself during the Winter Season and are you excited to know what is happening next? Tell us everything down below in the comments! 🙂

Also, don’t forget to go to Karandi’s side and check our overall review about Meiji Tokyo Renka. An Anime which, again, deserved way more love and popularity than it got during the Winter Season.