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Column Anime Spotlight

Anime Grab Bag: Trial by Isekai

We spin the dreaded wheel of isekai, and are transported into a world of pain…

By Leah Thomas

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Published on June 12, 2025

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Author’s  Note: The original title for this piece was “Anime Grab Bag: My Best Friend And I Decided To Stream Anime But Suddenly We Were Both Hit By Different Trucks At The Same Time And We Woke Up In Another World Where We Were Forced to Watch Isekai?! (Ise-Cry: The Animation),” but because Reactor is a respectable publication and not an isekai, it could not stand.

Welcome to the Anime Grab Bag! In this series, we’ll dive into the depths of specific anime subgenres and hunt, perhaps futilely, for hidden gems. Each month, long-time otaku and old friends Leah and Bridget will spin a custom roulette wheel composed of qualifying anime and watch three random pilot episodes. You can find this volume’s wheel here! 

While the wheel will contain most feasible titles in the subgenre, your hosts must abide by the following rules:

1. Each show must be an anime that at least one host has never seen.
2. Each show must be available to stream somewhere so readers can join in if they want to.
3. We are forbidden from doing any research on the show before viewing it, although a simple Google search and some Wikipedia-ing during and after are fair game.

We’ll react to our selections and share our thoughts on where they fit into the anime landscape. We’ll comment on everything from music direction to character design, make comparisons to other series, and finally ask the most important question: Would we watch more of this?

Feel free to play along by watching these shows (if you dare), spinning the wheel to meet your fate, or sharing your thoughts below. 

This week, after polling readers last time, we must ask you all a question: What can man do against such reckless hate?

The people chose isekai. Come. Suffer with us.

B: Are you ready to spin… that… wheeeeel?

L: Honestly… um. I hope our torture is fun torture. 

B: Yeah, me too. I was telling my friend Daniel that I’m kind of really not looking forward to this. For this subgenre, I think we are each allowed one hard veto. 

L: Let’s be honest, we are coming into this one with a negative bias. And though commenters say there are a few good ones, the oversaturation of terrible isekai makes the ratio work against our favor today. If this is The Hunger Games, we are not going to live.

B: I did comb the internet and put a few on there that are good, or queer at least. Hopefully we’ll get some of those. Daniel (a gamer friend) said that maybe we’ll find out we actually think it’s an alright genre. I said, “Hmm, I don’t know about that…”

L: Daniel is an optimist. Look, as a story conceit, it’s lazy, but it can work as a simple worldbuilding prompt. Like, rather than writing a character that is an established part of a fantasy world, you can pick any average, relatable guy and thrust him into a magical setting that’s just like video games and start there. It’s a shortcut that leads to easy investment and allows for infodumping because the hero is as fresh as the audience is. It’s not the worst narrative shortcut and portal fantasies are a long-established thing. But man…

B: It works better when the concept is reversed. Escaflowne is great because the characterization is good and they come to our world instead. And it has a Yoko Kanno soundtrack. 

L: And Maou-Sama. Bring the freaks to our world and watch the culture shock unfold. That’s tons of fun. But the wish-fulfillment ones that objectify women? Nah.

B: I will say Daniel just texted me like, “How’s the isekai going, sport?”

L: Does he want to join us? A guest appearance from Daniel?

B: Daniel says, “Maybe catch me on shōnen or sports day.”

L: Tell Daniel he’s a coward.

First Spin: Re:Zero—Starting Life in Another World (White Fox, 2016)

B: It’s a classic. It’s Re:Zero.

L: …oh, hey. That’s a good show!

B: I never watched it.

L: Then it qualifies. Somehow, the one good thing that could happen during an isekai wheel just happened. Now, I haven’t watched it since it aired, but it was great because it uses isekai as an allegory for dealing with trauma. It’s got kind of a Groundhog Day premise where he keeps failing in the other world and getting the bad ending and watching his friends die and then wakes up and tries again.

B: What I remember is the characters’ designs were charming.

L: The key memory I have from it is a general overwhelming feeling of distress. Ahaha. But also, the characters had a lot of hidden depths.

Viewing Summary

After a long day of holing up in his room playing MMOs, teenage shut-in Subaru heads to the conbini for some snacks, and then something goes wrong with his head. He is no longer in a dark parking lot, but in the center of a bustling fantasy marketplace. Of course, as an avid gamer, he thinks he knows what’s up. He’s been isekaied, and he’s going to kick ass, become a hero, and win a girl. 

But this fantasy world is not prepared to indulge his delusions. Subaru gets immediately kicked out of restaurants and attacked by thieves. He learns quickly that he has no magical powers and no standing. He’s a useless goon, basically, and no one sees him as a hero. He’s just some weird, sarcastic kid in a tracksuit who clearly doesn’t know how dangerous the world is. 

B: This guy is kind of stupid. I love it.

L: Yeah, he’s read some isekai and thinks this will be easy. Our boy is in for some rude awakenings.

The fantasy world initially feels playful, too, with anthropomorphic shopkeepers populating the background, carrying about their business. Kids are buying apples from snake-headed vendors and fox-folk are conducting business in the square. Even so, there are rough edges, signs of poverty and discrimination that make the world feel a little more sinister. As Bridget remarks, “It feels like a lived-in world.” 

Subaru makes contact with a beautiful girl, of course, but she is keeping secrets. She gives her name as Satella, but that’s a lie. She seems surprised he doesn’t recognize her or hate her for being a half-elf. Subaru’s ignorance of the world at this point is charming, but possibly misleading. Yes, it makes him seem like a non-judgmental, nice person, but is that a sign of goodness or ignorance? He believes he is playing a role, and he is doing his best to fill it. The show is already laying the groundwork for unexpected philosophical questions.

L: Whatever bias he is supposed to have, he doesn’t have. But he also thinks he’s playing through a script. So a lot of the show becomes about not only finding out who everyone else, but also who he is at his core. 

For the most part, Bridget and I don’t have to talk a lot. The show is compelling, well-animated, and contains the sort of thoughtful pauses that are a sure sign of a competent director. We both like “Satella’s” familiar, a floating, clever little cat-spirit named Puck. Shakespeare reference? Duly noted foreshadowing.

In fact, the whole pilot, which is a whopping 50 minutes long, is increasingly laden with foreshadowing. Long pauses featuring Emilia standing on a bridge, walking into the shadowy slums where kids are homeless. Subaru, still trying to convince himself he’s in a grand adventure, refuses to see the signs of being in a tragedy. 

But when he and Satella attempt to apprehend a thief who stole her seal, things go terribly wrong. They walk into a bar and find the owner bleeding out in graphic fashion. All too soon, Subaru himself is gutted and dies on the floor, moments after watching Satella get killed as well. 

…and then Subaru finds himself standing in the bustling market square again.

B: Okay, but now I am really interested.

While the audience realizes immediately what is happening—after all, we’ve all played games with checkpoints in them, lost to bosses and restarted a few scenes prior—Subaru does not. He, freshly shaken from the horrible death he witnessed, sets about the day as if time is not stuck in a loop. He tries to reconvene with Satella, but of course, she will have no memory of him. This time, he learns about the thief firsthand, befriending her and the bartender, and he approaches problems with new insight. Even so the day ends in bloodshed. A terrifying, beautiful villainess appears, and immediately we both clock the voice actress.

B: She sounds familiar.

L: She was Benten (The Eccentric Family), right?

B: Oh my god she was Ichigo’s mom in Aikatsu! But this lady is so brutal. I love it.

L: The villains in this show are actually scary. I remember that well.

Subaru dies again. He returns to the market again. The pattern is established.

The boy is gonna have a hard time.

Conclusions

B: That was a good pilot.

L: It has a reputation for being a diamond in the rough.

B: Yeah, people talk about it like that. “Isekai sucks… well, Re:Zero is pretty good.”

L: Because it is a clever show. If you are caught in a loop and repeating your life all the time but retaining your memories, how does that affect you psychologically? In a video game, that’s normal. But in real life that is mind-fuckery. 

B: Isn’t it lucky that we did get the best isekai, though? So we won’t have to be totally negative about the genre.

L: I will say this: show makes me feel incredibly anxious. It stresses me out.

B: I love that. I feel like good anime should stress me out. It’s very much giving a Souls game, where this is the first level and it is fucking hard. It reminds me of playing Elden Ring or Dark Souls III. You get stuck for ages on some bosses.

L: See, but I can’t play games like that because I get too frustrated. I prefer something like Hades, where each time you die, you see the character grow and the story progresses in unexpected ways. I think Re:Zero nails that too, actually. The story doesn’t move on to a new arc until Subaru solves the problem and breaks the loop. And then he’s got another problem and loop to work on, and then another, and another. It’s hellish, but progress is made.

Would we watch more?

B: I really liked this. I could see it holding me for one season. I don’t know if I could watch all of it. Then again… I said the same thing about One Piece, and I have read all of One Piece. 

L: I remember the seasons were spaced out, and I don’t think I ever finished it, but I definitely enjoyed the first season. 

B: I was pleasantly surprised.

L: Bridget. We had an amazing appetizer, but I fear we are about to experience some whiplash. Re:Zero has the same fundamental pieces as all isekai but it does fascinating things with them. The others are going to have the same pieces and do diddly-squat with them.

B: Also, this show had a great little mascot in that floating cat. You know how I feel about mascots.*

L: I don’t love mascots as much as you do, but I love a familiar. I grew up adoring His Dark Materials and longing for a daemon.

F: Oh, familiars are different. Do you know who my favorite cat in anime is? The mean cat from the Ghost Stories dub.

L: Oh, he’s great, but come on. It’s gotta be Nyanko-sensei. Drunk old calico with wolf powers.

B: Aria Shachou. 

L: Although Turbo Granny could get there, too.

B: She is high on the list.

*Famously, Bridget has cried tears of joy upon meeting a pudgy Mondo Mascot at a con. 

Intermission 1

(Or, Bridget and Leah Talk About Other Random Shit to Avoid Watching Inevitably Terribly Isekai)

(synth intro starts) Tonight, on Unsolved Mysteries:

L: Hey, I know I keep talking about liminal space today, but there’s this show that I always think about that I think was a fever dream. Maybe you can help me.

B: Tell me more, what is it?

L: In college at Anime Club, probably in 2011 or something, we watched the pilot of some horror(?) anime about getting displaced in time or something. But it was these kids taking the night bus and getting stuck at a Japanese rest area at night. And everything was gray and eerie and weird.

B: That sounds familiar, but I don’t know what it is. 

L: Was it real? Or was I isekaied? Is it like a Mandela Effect thing?

B: I am looking up “rest stop horror anime.” No, no. Not the reststop isekai. Nope. I know in Nurarhiyon no Mago, they do get trapped on a night bus in the season finale. Was it that?

L: No. Whatever it is, it haunts me.

B: We can go on our ADHD journey later.

Join us next time. Perhaps you may be able to help solve a mystery.

Second Spin: Arifureta: From Commonplace to World’s Strongest (asread. /White Fox, 2019)

L: Oh, this looks terrible. Let’s watch it. “The series follows a bullied high school student who is transported to another world with his classmates and his teacher.” Uh-oh.

B: Oh no. I’ve never seen this. I don’t know anything about it aside from what you just said. Although season three looks like the sort of edgy bullshit I used to love. 

Viewing Summary

The opening sounds, to our amusement, like Yoko Kanno and Grimes had an elicit lovechild. Sonically, we don’t hate it, but…

L: I am already questioning the budget here.

B: What is this filter?

L:  Also, you cannot give someone a robot arm and expect an instant Edward Elric, okay.

B: Unfortunately, I am not immune to white-haired, eye-patched character. I am a simple woman, and I loved Tokyo Ghoul.

Okay, so we’re in a cave. There are gems on the wall. There’s a brown-haired boy in distress, and there appear to be ribs in the walls above him? Is he in a whale? A dragon? Is he catching cave-dwelling Pokémon? A rabbit monster with killer hips appears, and another monster eats that one, and our boy uses transmutation powers to make a sad little wall thing. Even so, the monster mauls him and he loses an arm just like that.

L: Wait, what?  Who is he? Where is he?

B: I am sure this trauma will have great payoff.

L: He should cauterize that. Transmute it or something! 

We have no idea what’s happening or why, but suddenly the show flashes back to a school setting. Text onscreen reads “10 days before.” Here we see our nameless brown-haired boy getting teased by preppy classmates or something.

B: So he’s a loser? That’s what we are establishing?

L: If the story started 10 days before, then start the show there too. Come on!

And now we have flashed back to him in the caves, but it must be some time before his initial amputation, because he’s not alone. He’s standing among some classmates maybe in armor and the girls have shiny shoulders and boobs but the boys are not shiny. It is so dark that no one should be shiny but okay. Like the low-budget animation, and the incoherent exposition itself, the pacing is really, really off.

L: At least the crystals on the cave walls are nicely drawn. 

B: Someone credit that crystal artist.

L: Cards on the table, I don’t know what the hell is going on. Why are a bunch of kids in a cave? Why are the monsters attacking? Why is the CGI animation being used for all the monsters? Is this a game? Are they dungeon-crawling? What is this?

B: I have no reason to care about this. Are we sure this is the pilot? Did we start on the wrong episode?

Hurriedly, we check, and double-check again, and discover: this indecipherable mess is in fact the series pilot. Oh, man.

A monster appears on a bridge, à la the Balrog of Morgoth.

B: That thing looks like the first kaiju played by a female actress.

L: What?

B: Rie Ota, the first actress to play a kaiju. She played Barugan.

L: …wait, are you talking about Godzilla?

B: Yeah.

L: Bridget, context. This is already confusing enough, oh my god.

B: Sorry, but pause? Is this even an isekai? It seems like they were already in a fantasy world?

L: But it said they were transported to another world.

B: Why didn’t we see them transport to this world? Is this really the first episode?

It is. It’s just a mess. As if in protest, my browser crashes. Nevertheless, we persist.

The randos fight the monster, and our dumb hero runs forward as a sacrifice and gets thrown off the Bridge of Khazad-Dumb into the depths, and now we are back to the scene we started at, with the bland boy getting mangled by the monster. 

Now we watch the art team try to salvage this debacle by going full sketch as our boy fades out of consciousness:

L: Take…. on… mee!

(both sing synth intro)

L, Verse 1: 

Monsters everywhere,
We don’t know why the boy is he-ere
Why is this boy
Fighting CGI-ee Balrog?

I don’t care
But we’re watching this anyway-ay

B, Chorus: 

He’s…. gonna get…!
(An eyepatch!)
He’s gonna get…!
(A robot arm!)
His hair will be white…!
In at least an episode or twoooooooooo!

L, Verse 2:  

Boobs are shiny,
We don’t know why, but it doesn’t matter
Something bad is gonna happen to you out of order!

B (abruptly): Why is his ass so flat?

And while he’s bleeding out or whatever and we are losing it entirely, the show flashes back to his terrible time in school again or something and—

L: TELL IT IN ORDER TELL IT IN ORDER TELL IT. IN. ORDER!  One, my classmates are rude to me; two, they sacrifice me because they don’t see my worth; I go on a mission and they leave me for dead; I prove myself and prove them wrong. To make up for the lack of any interesting elements they change up the linearity but that doesn’t do a thing to help.

B: This show is nothing.

L: I don’t care if no one rescues him. He sucks. 

B: “Is this really the first episode?” I say again, desperately.

Because by now we feel a bit like Subaru, trapped in a treacherous loop. Or maybe, like this awful protagonist in the hopeless pit of a cave (but at least his has crystals). And now our boy opens his eyes and says, with true shonen abandon, “I’ll kill!” So who cares if his arm is gone and he should be dead already? He jumps out of the cave and kills and eats the monster and then suddenly the show zooms way, way in, so that we can see how eating raw monster meat impacts a dumbass on a cellular level.

L: This reminds me of watching videos in biology class. The CGI platelets!

B: It reminds me of Osmosis Jones.

L: Wait, that’s another Bill Murray movie. Groundhog Day, now Osmosis Jones. What will our next isekai Bill Murray connection be?

As predicted, devouring monster tartare levels our boy up to a full-on man, the white-haired edgelord from the opening credits. And also, he now has grand powers of intellect! He can survive the depths now.

L: Eating nasty flesh to become powerful is not character development…

More and more green illuminated numbers keep appearing on the screen, pointless statistics as he’s leveling up. He is becoming more intelligent by gorging on gross shit! But if Dungeon Meshi makes eating monsters fun and creative, this show does not.

Our protagonist grabs a rock and declares, “I can tell what this rock is just from holding it!”

L: So can I! It’s a rock! 

B: I hate all the numbers so much. But at least there’s jazz flute. I will never say no to a jazz flute.

L: Hmm. Neither could Jethro Tull.

Everything and nothing is happening all at once and in one episode and we have no idea what we’re supposed to feel. The guy is no more likable now that he’s leveled up. But then the episode closes on a naked girl tied to something, for some reason.

B: Yikes.

Conclusions

B. The trouble is, deep down I really love edgy bullshit that’s terrible. But this? This is not good.

L: Well, even edgy losers should at least have some personality. 

B: I can see the ingredients they were cooking with. And then they did not make a good meal. You know, it’s like Bofuri.

L: Never seen it.

B: Bofuri …nuts. 

L: …

B: I’m sorry.

L: It’s fine. I think one episode of shitty isekai has already broken our brains. 

Would we watch more?

L: Hell no. I would say it would be impossible to go from a better isekai to a worse isekai… but I shouldn’t jinx us like that.

B: I genuinely am having fun because that was so nothing. 

L: The fact that we even had to question whether it was the pilot. That was a mess. I don’t want to think about it anymore. Bridget, would you watch more of that?

B: Absolutely not. But hey, why is Lelouch from Code Geass still the most looked-up character on My Anime List? What the hell?

Intermission 2 (THERAPY?!)

We go on a rant about how much we dislike Code Geass and how much we love director Takahiro Omori, and how Kuragehime has endless rewatch value, but these days we don’t rewatch anything anyhow. And are we avoiding more isekai? No, no. We just really need to talk about CLAMP character designs and the inconsistent art in XXXholic and the weird proportions of Watanuki and how much I kind of guiltily like it because I was obsessed with Jack Skellington as a kid, and then Bridget googles “clamp” in image search and laughs because a bunch of pictures of actual clamps on automobiles turn up rather than pictures of lanky teens drawn by a renowned studio of female mangaka. Fucking weebs, man.

B: We could do a CLAMP wheel.

L: Why would we do that? Neither of us are CLAMP girls. All due respect.

B: Wait, here’s an idea, and you will never let me do it. Why don’t we do a wheel that’s all random Zatch Bell episodes?

L: Bridget. Zatch Bell is not a genre! Put it on a t-shirt! Zatch Bell is not a genre!

B: I’m losing my mind.

L: I wish we’d gotten the gay old isekai where the boy gets flushed down a toilet.

Third Spin: Problem Children Are Coming From Another World, Aren’t They? (Diomedéa, 2013)

B: It will come as a great surprise that I have never seen this.

L: Shocking! Neither have I. You know, most weeks we have to spin the wheel so many times. Like half the article content is usually “Shows we couldn’t watch and why” and this week? That’s not happening. We have no excuses because we haven’t seen these shows at all.

B: Maybe we should watch a fourth show to get a little more of the genre?

L: Yeah, let’s do that. The animation looks terrible on this one, by the way.

B: I know, that’s why I don’t want to watch it!

L: And that’s why we must. 

Viewing Summary

So the premise ain’t awful, at least not to dorks like us. Psychic kids who are bored of life get sucked into another dimension where they have to compete in games to save the world? I mean, we are suckers for psychic children stories. 

B: How do you think it’s connected to Bill Murray?

L: I dunno, Lost in Translation probably.

We open in Japan along a riverside, so yes, this is our world and if they leave it, it will be an isekai. One psychic delinquent boy has yellow hair and headphones; the other two psychic kids are a rich girl who can control people through her words and a girl who can talk to animals. They all get sucked into the sky and spat out in another world, landing in a lake in a forest. A calico cat comes with them, which is nice at least.

B: This is how early fanfiction on fanfiction.net would establish characters. Like shitty Naruto fanfic I read back in 2008. Just throw them all into a lake together for no reason.

But what’s this? A bunny girl has appeared in the forest and is spying on them! She has recruited these rude psychic kids for a purpose, which she will now relay!

L: I’m happy she has only one set of ears. I hate when bunny girls have ears on top and the sides.

B: I’m not bothered by that.

Bunny Girl gathers the delinquents around and tells them all about the games they must play to earn, um, wealth and fame in the new society they’ve landed in. Why they should do this is unclear. Why the first game she demonstrates is a boring casino-esque card game is also unclear. Honestly, we are clinging to threads of coherence.

B: I’m not really understanding what’s happening. I’m just fixated on her (Bunny Girl’s) costume but it doesn’t make sense. It couldn’t exist in the real world.  There should be four panels in that skirt, not three. No garment would balance like that with that design.

L: Okay, why are these kids being presented with a casino craps table? Is it based on a mobile card game or something? Or did this anime have a partnership with a pachinko chain?

Anyhow, Bunny Girl continues to explain things, and the clever smug boy tricks her, and then the girls go to town, and the boy runs off into the woods. But mostly, it has dawned on Bridget and I that this is another brain-deadening waste of time. And damn it, what self-respecting writer lets moody psychic kids go to waste?

Isekai writers. That’s who.

In town, there are children everywhere for some reason, and anthros. The girls sit down for tea because sure, who needs urgency or purpose? Who knows how these girls feel about being thrown into another world? The point is entirely garbled. 

L: What motivated them to come here? Why did they? 

B: That’s a chronic problem in the genre. Characters are here just because they need to be here! There’s no good reason for it.

L: You could play it like this was a utopia, but then this evil casino came to town and took advantage of people, so let’s beat them at their own game! But they aren’t doing anything with it.

B: Seems to be an isekai staple. Just wasting characters and plot points.

L: I am tired.

Elsewhere, the boy fights a dragon for some reason and …you know what, none of it matters. Our eyes cling to the cute calico so that we can tolerate the tedium and poor writing. Nothing happens, and the points don’t matter.

Conclusions

B: No emotional payoff. No reason to care.

L: I don’t think they knew what their hook was. Was it worse than the other one we watched?

B: The other one was a mess, but we laughed more.

L:  …what’s the point. We are comparing cat shit to dog shit.  The next one can’t be worse at least?

B: Leah. Stop doing that.

L: Oh god, when will I ever learn?

Would we watch more?

Our answer.

Fourth Spin: Do You Love Your Mom and Her Two-Hit Multi-Target Attacks? (J.C.Staff, 2019)

L: Fucking hell.

B: Do you think it’s going to be a “I wanna date my mom” show or just a goofy comedy?

L: At this point, if it has a clear plot and actual characters, it is somehow a step up.

Viewing Summary

Based on the credits alone, we are in for a sleazy time. Yes, this kid almost definitely will want to bang his mom. The two are pitted together like a couple in a rom-com throughout the opening, and holding hands by the end.

B: Is he gonna fuck his mom? Or is it…

L: He’ll at least get a boner. Why…

B: … okay. It’s…

L: We can’t even finish sentences during isekai.

So this kid is terrible to his mom, but his mom seems like a really, ridiculously nice person. She doesn’t seem like a mom, which is maybe a blessing in disguise after the sickening opening credits. She kindly serves his dinner, and he complains.  

And then, when a strange woman shows up on the doorstep and teleports her son into a video game console for some sort of bizarre beta testing, he is so happy to be escaping his mother—but wait! She’s coming with him!

They land in a fantasy world and he is just so pissed that his mom is there, too. To be fair, as Bridget notes, she is a bit smothering.

B: Just be nice to your mom. It doesn’t take a whole adventure.

L: I’m just really appreciating how well-written Subaru was right now.

To our general shock, the animation is clean, and the art style is decent. This show has an actual budget. It tries to be funny, but not a single joke lands, mostly because they are wink-wink nod-nods about isekai and how annoying moms are. When this kid and his mom are placed in front of the king, he infodumps the whole damn premise in a scene that goes on for way too long. During this scene, Mom is supposed to be the ignorant butt of lame-ass gamer jokes.

And hey, when the scene finally ends and they get to choose weapons, our boy pulls a sword from the stone and feels proud until—gasp—his mom pulls two swords at once from the stones! Man, Mom is just the worst!

L: She’s gonna keep outdoing him and he’s going to be mad and she’s going to be “but I just wanna be a good mom.” 

B: I have beef with the way she was designed. She doesn’t feel like a Mom.

L: Because she’s a fetish, not a mom. And they call… me… mother!

B: Call… me… mother!

The dynamic is strange and unrealistic throughout, and when Mom shows a natural talent for using the swords in battle, the kid starts telling her he wants to disown her. More shit happens and it is not even worth talking about.

Conclusions

L: … Someone wrote this. Someone adapted it. A studio animated it. Someone paid for it. I am so upset. It deserves none of this. It is such a waste of someone’s talent somewhere.

B: It’s weird. And it’s not a parent-child relationship.

L: Even if it had been like a weird Munchausen’s show…

B: Why can’t it be Mom picking up the game because she’s trying to understand her teenage son and help him work through the death of dad or whatever and wants to relate to him?

L: Why are all these shows so fucking broken? 

B: Thank god it’s almost over. I can’t even get my thoughts out.

L: We can’t get this day back. 

B: So here’s the thing. A few years ago, my dad bought a PS4 at a garage sale, and now he plays games, and he’s become a gamer in retirement and has played all of the Assassin’s Creed games. It’s the first time in my life that I have shared a hobby with my dad. In the past, I would have said I would never play games with my dad, but recently I asked him to play Marvel Rivals with me. 

L: Aw, that’s awesome. It’s such a better story, too. And if that’s where they are trying to take this they are failing.

Would we watch more?

…

B: The wheel was very kind, and then it was very unkind.

L: Re:Zero gave us a little strength to push through.

B: We got it over with. We tore it off like a Band-Aid.

L: If you spun that wheel again, we’d probably get another piece of shit about banging your sister. In another world. I am mad about it. Who the fuck are these braindead people these appeal to? 

B: It is hard for us to understand because, from either a queer or neurodivergent or women’s perspective, the idea of wish fulfillment is so different. Like, being overpowered in another world would not improve our lives at all.

L: Exactly! This is the straight average guy fantasy for straight average guys who wish they’d gotten more from life just because they are straight average guys. Their default? It’s what other people and minorities aspire to in society: a comfortable life without huge challenges and access to a computer and games and time, and the ability to play them. But a society that is already made for you, I guess, is not fulfilling. So if it’s wish fulfillment, it’s also privileged as hell. Basic–ass milquetoast dudes getting to be awesome with no effort.

B: Yeah. This idea that there’s nothing special about me and I don’t want to work to be something special, but I get to be special anyhow. 

L: You are a mean kid who hates your mom but also you can still be a hero for no reason. It’s actually really damn toxic. This is also why Re:Zero works, though. Subaru isn’t awesome. He’s average, and a bit of a mess, and he fails and fails and fails. It subverts the crap. And other characters are not pawns but people who he has to see as people.

B: I think this is also why reverse isekai sometimes works. Because people are coming from these more supernatural experiences and faced with the mundane—I was a demon lord and now I have to work at McDonald’s. We can all relate to a letdown. And I can relate to someone who gets dropped in a fantasy world and doesn’t think, “I am going to be such a badass.” Instead, it’s like, “Ooh, time to start gardening.”

L: Exactly. Let’s figure out how to make a living. 

B: I can’t imagine that thinking “I’ll somehow conquer the world!” would ever be my response to being isekaied. This whole genre just puts me on edge a bit.

L: Yeah, I am exhausted by it. 

Bridget and I thought Isekai Week would be bad because all the shows would be the same—not because they’d all be so damn chaotic and foul-spirited. The problems we foresaw are not the problems we ended up facing.

B: I was hoping we’d get a cozy one, like The Savior’s Book Café Story in Another World.

L: Or at least a genderbender. I feel like we need a rainbow chaser or something

B: Can we watch the BL where he gets flushed down the toilet?

L: I don’t know that that’s going to help us. 

B: Theres a Hallmark movie where a woman gets sucked into a drier. 

L: Again, how does this help? You’re making me ise-cry.

B: *manic laughter*

Here is our advice: DO NOT WATCH these shows apart from Re:Zero. 

Next time, we need rehab. We are doing an absurdism wheel. And we are defining that loosely and happily, because this week was a lot. Also, please tell us what Bill Murray movie the last show is related to, because we can no longer make connections between things. Is there a movie where Bill Murray wants to bone his mom?[end-mark]

In This Article:

• Re:Zero—Starting Life in Another World (White Fox) Available on Crunchyroll, Prime, and Hulu.

• Arifureta: From Commonplace to World’s Strongest (Asread/White Fox) Available on Crunchyroll and Amazon Prime.

• Problem Children Are Coming From Another World, Aren’t They? (Diomedéa) Available on Crunchyroll.

• Do You Love Your Mom and Her Two-Hit Multi-Target Attacks? (J.C.Staff) Available on Crunchyroll and Amazon Prime.

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