Reviews for Beast Tamer

This anime is replete withif it's a fairly predictable show.

The opening/closing music is great, as well as relatively peaceful and sweet. There is enough fodder for a season 2, and much worse shows have gotten renewed, so I think this deserves it. All in all, if you have extra time to kill, want to watch something where you can shut off your brain, and want to follow a simple storyline with good visuals and music, then you can give Beast Tamer a try.

This review is just my personal opinion. I don't want to discourage anyone from watching this anime, I simply want to share my thoughts on it, so if you like it that's great! Also, spoiler warning I guess. With that out of the way, I'll talk about the first 3 episodes. Rein is a beast tamer and part of the Hero party, set on defeating the demon king or someting. However, he gets fired by his teammates and now has to find a new occupation. That's the basic premise of the anime. Firstly, I find it odd that it took six months for the unapologetic heroparty to kick Rein out. Apparently they have found him useless for a long time but it took them this long to make a move, suddenly becoming aggressive towards him, but let's keep going.

Set on becoming an adventurer, Rein is in the middle of his guild entrance trial when he finds a cat spirit named Kanade being attacked by a ferocious monster. He tries saving her but she ends up saving herself, as cat spirits are apparently a very strong "ultimate species". At this moment I didn't understand how and why Kanade was even in trouble in the first place, since she was the one that got herself out of it. Why was she weakly sitting on the ground if she can easily defeat the monster?

Following this, Rein and Kanade immediately become acquainted and best friends, to the point where Kanade suggests being tamed by Rein, which he does. This moment along with the following episode tell us that, apparently, Rein is a surreal beast tamer, one of the best there's ever been. Taming a cat spirit, an "ultimate species", is no easy task after all. Then why was he kicked out of the hero's party? How come THE heroes that are set on saving the entire realm from the demon king and Rein himself aren't able to understand that Rein is so powerful? Why did he never even attempt to tame high level monsters if he supposedly can tame the strongest types of beasts?

Another thing I disliked was how quickly Kanade fell for Rein. I understand this is a wish fullfilment anime, and the MC is supposed to be the viewer's self insert, with the various girls filling an harem where they are in love with him or whatever, but I can't get over how in mere minutes Kanade decided to form a very serious life-long contract with a tamer she knows close to nothing about. In the 2nd episode she watches him beat up a bunch of dudes and she is just blushing and falling for him. I think these moments are very forced.

I just skimmed through the 3rd episode, but Rein builds his harem with a new Dragonoid girl, a tsundere this time, and that's enough for me.

I also want to mention that the animation is very subpar. The action scenes we got were very poorly animated, with many still frames and cuts. There are several cringeworthy attempts at comedy where Kanade is trying to be cute, but that for me just reinforced the wish fullfilment.

I don't personally recommend this anime but I feel like some people could enjoy this. I just felt like sharing why I disliked what I watched and thus serving as a warning to those who might want to give this show a chance.

‟Oh man another fantasy anime in which the MC uses their power to create a shitty sex slave harem” -Someone, maybe ? It seems that a few people has this opinion about this anime, and I have no idea where they get the shitty harem and the MC just taming girls to do lewd things to them. Sure, the tags and the description makes it seems as a generic anime in which you TAME BEASTS and a bunch of sinful things, maybe that's fair. But I wanna say that it's not that, it's just a very wholesome anime, of the best ones that I've seen thisyear, where you see an interesting, pretty basic true to that, but made in a very chill way, the harem part itself not really being used as a gimmick to have hot womans (and lolis) wanting to approach the MC, just as a gang of friends having fun together with nice story progression and character development, what else would you want ? To add to that, Rein isn't even making servitude, actually he even gives freedom to slaves in the anime, I think he is a pretty cool dude actually.

To start off, the story is about Rein Shroud (I wonder if he's goated at CS:GO) being a beast tamer, someone who can make link with animals and tame them so they follow their orders, in the infamous hero team, the hero team goal is to kill the demon-lord and save the world, very epic and generic. But the important part to know is that Rein got kicked out of the hero team because he's only a useless beast tamer taming foxes and bears to carry shits around, he is kinda seen as the worst class in a MMORPG. The whole idea of this anime is that Rein tries to find a goal in his life, have fun and prove to the hero team that he isn't a useless piece of shit. In the story, he finds out that he's fucking OP and the best Beast Tamer in this world, able to tame superior species, which in this anime are a bunch of very cool waifus. In the span of 13 episodes that this anime composes, Rein gradually tames more waifus to his harem of some sort and become stronger, trying to kick the ass of the hero team who rejected him, and are actually dealing with a lot of problems on their side. It's all about the gang of Rein with his waifus VS the shitty egocentric hero team, the dynamic of the whole anime is pretty good following that. The story isn't rushed, every few episodes we meet another waifu and all of the inbetweens of the very important story arcs are filled with wholesome moments and nice discussions with Rein and the girls, finding out that Rein is just a normal and chill dude making friend, a fully sane human that isn't filled with thoughts of lust and power or world domination with shitty edgy sex jokes humour like a bunch of other anime.

Everything about this anime is neat, sometimes great. Like the Opening sang by MADKID, it's pretty fucking good, while the ED is pretty chill and nice, what you'd expect for any ED from any anime that isn't called Chainsaw Man. The visuals are a very solid 8/10, always looking great in any situation and it's rushed or full of outsourcing in between, I don't have anything to complain about it. I already said how nice-guy Rein is, all of the other 5 waifus are also great, they vary from energetic, mommy (yes) and serious, loli twins with a desperate and a joking one and a shy girl. A great mix that gets better every episode, this anime can be cute, pretty funny and also pretty tense and epic when a big event is happening.

To summarise up, if you want a classic anime, not breaking any boundaries of the same genre, but is chill and qualitative without having ANY ECCHI OR SEXUAL THOUGHTS (except literally one time and it wasn't sexual), then this anime is for you ! Join the Beast Tamer enjoyer gang, appreciate how much cool the gang is and how the hero team are a piece of shit in a well paced anime full of cool waifus, because at the end we are all anime degenerates that craves for them.

A season 2 to this could be cool, pretty please.

The show itself is fine. It's exactly what you think it is. So why am I recommending it? Because it's exactly what I thought it was. Unlike every other review apparently. I didn't expect it to be a really unique and interesting show, I knew it was going to be a generic fantasy harem slice of life show. Is it a fantastic show? No, I'm giving it a 6/10, but it fills its niche exactly how it should. It's not some terrible show by any means because it makes no attempt to hide what kind of show it is. It's completely whatever and I don't faultit for that at all. It's by design. I don't know what people were expecting when they went into a show called "The Beast Tamer Who Got Kicked Out From His Party Meets a Cat Girl From the Superior Race" but the show I watched was the exactly like the image my mind conjured up when I saw the name. I can enjoy it for what it is. It's a power fantasy slice of life.

I love romance, and I love comedy. Throw in some action and fun combat scenes, count me in. But one area I just cannot get into is when the animation is so focused on Fan service and ecchi that is borders on the line of no plot and could have just been a hentai. This specific anime is once again with your OP MC that started out being concidered weak and dismissed from his party, to finding a super op anime girl that kicks ass for him, and loves him. Rinse and repeat for every episode. Some people love this genre, for me, they just dont makeit fun to watch.

This isn’t a show I’m that passionately angry about like Rent-A-Girlfriend but it is a show that I have no choice but to recognize as the objectively worst show I have ever seen. This show has nothing. The main character is the most obvious Mary Sue I have ever seen. It’s somehow worse than Kirito because at least in SAO they attempted to make him edgy. In Beast Tamer this dude (I still don’t know his name) may as well be Jesus with how unbelievably perfect he is (without the charisma of course). He does not have a personality. And the girls are no better.They are all just one-dimensional cliches. You have the peppy happy girl who likes him. The snarky but kind girl who likes him. The nice and blunt twin loli duo who likes him. The tragic shy loli who likes him. And literally in the last episode how about we add the found family maid who likes him. It is so bland it hurts. It’s all smiles and ‘Oh *insert characters name* *insert laughing track*’. This dude gets a whole ass house for cheap because the real-estate agent likes him. That’s some bullshit. All of the characters are just raving about how nice and kind the MC is. Any problem that arises just gets solved instantly. Any male adversary is a super evil scumbag with no motive and any female adversary is just someone to add to the female companion list. The MC has a tragic past that's apparently supposed to be sad but he’s just like ‘yeah it’s a sad past’ and that’s it. Everyone is overpowered so much so there is no conflict. Literally these girls are supposed to be the strongest in the world and this show still pulls off misogyny. Like these girls act as nothing but the male MC’s accessories to compliment him and tell him how great he is. To dedicate their life to him and to fall in love with him. Which brings me to the Taming part. … It’s slavery right? I mean every other animal he tames obey his command without hesitation until he breaks the spell, so when he tames these girls doesn’t that mean the same would happen to them? Why are they so happy about it? He never asks anything they don’t like because he’s a Mary Sue so I can’t say for sure but it certainly seems that way. Anyways the climax was laughably terrible and stupid. This demon attacked this innocent town and literally no one got hurt (I’m talking civilians here but the main team as well). The new knight guard captain and her loyal followers (female of course) got rid of the evil bad man captain and every corrupt knight (all males) so now the town is defenseless (but not like that’s an issue apparently despite them being in a war(which has no bearing on the plot)). This show tries so hard to make the females strong and powerful but it is so obviously misogynistic that it hurts.

Not sure where the hate is. It's like people were expecting either an erotic isekai beast-harem, or some epic world-spanning adventure tale. This show doesn't advertise itself as any of that, and it's none of them. It is EXACTLY what it advertises itself to be, a fun semi-sweet little romp of someone discovering they have worth while making a family of waifus. It's mostly done in an innocent sweet way. The art is pretty good, the animation standard, decent voice acting and the subs are fine. It's not high art or super-great anime, but it's not bad. I give itan extra half point taking it from 6.5-7 in in my book because it doesn't pretend to be anything it's not. It's not laying claims to high-fantasy, or insane story. It's not trying to be an erotic tease show with way to much fan-service. (There is some but it's more artistic and done in context than forced, and at times with appropriate glows of light).

Honestly people hating it because it's not isekai fan service (The guys from the same world, so no world-travel or anything so if they call it an isekai they'd have to apply the same thing to lord of the rings, it's not about travel to another world, it's just set in a fantasy world.)

Is it for everyone? No. Is it a "must see" of the anime line up? No. But If it's your type of show than you'll probably quite enjoy it. Your life won't be poorer for missing it, but it will be no poorer for watching it either, unless you bring your own baggage to the table.

7/10 for me (Wiith that half point markup making it so).

Enjoy.

Preface/Intro: ---- All right, we know why we're all here. Cute anime girls = good time. So boom, I was in my AP Physics class and was like, "this blows fat dick" so I decided I'd rather watch some anime. Let me say, the cover art did not disappoint. Art: ---- The characters are all well-designed and artistically developed including the main character (who is not just a random guy with black hair). The waifus are attractive and are able to become waifus. There is minimal CG and the CG is not bad. 8/10 Plot: ---- MC is betrayed by a bunch of dicks from the hero's party sohe gets a fuck ton of beast girl waifus and becomes stronger because of said waifus. Enough said.

7/10

Characters:

---- Attractive beast girl waifus that do silly and goofy things. No they do not have the motivations or development like someone out of Death Note but that is not necessary to enjoy them. '

7/10

Personal Enjoyment:

---- The cute anime beast girls were exactly what I was asking for when I clicked on this anime. Beast girls are better than normal waifus and that is a fact. Also if it's not your cup of tea, there are a couple of fairies that come into the show later that pretty much look human, but I have not met a singular weeb who is not dtf for a cat girl, so yeah.

8/10

Overall:

Good anime. Good waifus. Beast girls are better.

7.5/10

Well hello there, i think you already see me next door right? yes, why u are here? to tell you that this anime is perfect main character that never do anything wrong in his life and make everyone agree whatever he said even said go kill yourself So how about story? story about get banished from hero par...., BORING!, wait let me finish it, boring i know what it gonna be, so what gonna be, he is powerful right? yes, hero party is total evil right (cant say the word it begin with A end with E and 7 letter) right? yea how do youknow that? its already air last season mate, You sure you dont want hear the rest review, nah im good

Real review right here : So like i said earlier, the story is about mc get kicked from hero party, then he become OP, form harem, and make the powerful party that surpass any hero party in history of mankind, character itself is very generic, mc is angelic, not flaw or anything, heroine in this anime is easy to conquer (which mean whatever he done, even breath, she instantly fall in love with him no doubt), You guess it right? the hero party, they are total ... (word begin with A end with E again) who dont appreciate the mc work yadda yadda yadda, they will regret it after that and beg them life to have mc join the party again.

TL:DR : Its generic, totally generic but i dont say its worst anime this season (now i said it, its not seriously its not), its better than anime next door tbh, the only good thing in this anime is how cute heroine is, just that

I dont recommended it tbh if you seek "story" "character development" "MC who have flaw" etc

I do recommend it if you seek fun and waifu purpose

and again "Sometimes my review is trash sometimes not, take it as grain of salt, and ADIOS!"

A perfectly acceptable cozy watch. Not the best of its kind, but inoffensive. As many of the more negative reviews have pointed out, there isn't much original here. The setting is pretty generic, the heroes are good people, and the antagonists, like the "Hero's Party" are obnoxious for the sake of being obnoxious. It's not really a story about characters, it's a story about archetypes. If you just want to see some cute monster girls hang out with a chill dude that's nice to them without much in the way of drama, this is your show. You're not going to remember it next season, butthere are worse ways to spend 30 minutes a week.

This is an anime that easily could've been a 7/10, but due to it's horribly made antagonists and abysmal pacing, it makes this an obvious 5.5/10 due to it being so immensely bland that it isn't worth your time. Then you may say "why did you mark this as a not recommended, instead of a mixed feelings?", this is simple to answer. The answer is, it's bland and is cookie cutter levels of basic, with no real personality, but doesn't do anything inherently bad or good enough to be positive. As such, it just ends up to be immensely frustrating for how much potential it hasbut doesn't do anything with it, causing this to be utter trash.

- More precise reasons why this isn't good, and some positives down below -

Reasons why this absolutely sucks:

1. Way too many characters in the harem, which I mean it has 4 extra members that it really could do without. Being more specific, Kanade and Tania are good enough for this series, they have enough energy and comic relief, that this anime would be just fine with them only. When you get past these two members of the harem, it vastly decreases their screen time, and these two characters are by far the least annoying of all of the other MCs.

It would be interesting if the MC "Rein" could combine his beast followers, so they could get a mix of the personalities and character of these beasts that he adds to his harem. I say this because it could get rid of the many characters in the harem that feel like a baseless add-ons, and makes the characters be more interesting with more unusual skills. Alas, this story doesn't do anything interesting like that, and just makes a lot of side MCs that follow the MC around like Pokemon to it's trainer.

2. The episodes (especially late season) have horrid pacing. This entire season, could've been put into 9 well organized episodes because most of these episodes have useless stuff that happens and takes away a lot of time that can be put towards actually improving the story and characters.

3. The personalities of the MC is so generic, that you cannot even see any reason why the harem characters would even like him. He is the equivalent of a side character in any other anime, yet here he is portrayed as an MC, when he has zero personality. Not to mention, he is so unrealistically positive every moment something negative happens, that it makes him more generic and more dislikable.

4. The antagonist hero's party is so unbelievably stupidly crafted, it's a wonder how they once stood on their own merits. This anime went with the most generic way of making an antagonist just unrelentingly hate the MC for having some skill, and doing so, it actively makes the anime much worse. A case with this can be the fact that we never even see the party actually get anything done, as such, how is the hero's party even supposed to have any notoriety, or have a semblance of helpfulness, to have these reputations. If the viewer could see a sensible reason why the MC can be disliked by the antagonists, it improves the story massively, and can show some personality for both sides.

Reasons this has very good parts, and the reasons it doesn't help enough, plus what it misses:

1. The MCs Kanade and Tania are really well done, probably the best in this anime, the problem with this is the fact that no other characters get the same level of characterization, even Rein. This ends up just make you start to feel the rush of the show pushing more characters in your face every other episode that do not have the same interesting personalities that the first two beasts had. This makes it become more frustrating as the series goes on, and there is no progression for the MC and his original two beasts that he had tamed.

2. The way this anime flows should've had a more "Spice & Wolf" esque story, where the MC just completely leaves his old party behind, and meets two beasts that he tames, then travels across the lands. This would fix 70% of the issues with this anime, like personalities, they would just get expanded on as the show progresses and the MCs would gain likability. For characters, they would be shortened down to the two main MC beasts and Rein, which would fix the issue of having far too many characters crowding up the story.

3. The potential for this anime is immense. These issues I have pointed out, can easily be fixed in another season, though I doubt they would cut down the number of beasts, and get a more defined focus. However, this is not to say that most of the pacing issues and characterization issues cannot be easily fixed in another season, these wouldn't take much to clean up the story by far. If another season came out, I would probably have low hopes, but I would still recommend giving it a try if a future season ended up above a 7.1+ rating on MAL, then this season might be more worthwhile to watch through.

All in all, this is mid. I wouldn't ever re-watch this, and probably wouldn't watch a future season unless it got good reviews and a 7.1+ rating.

🗿 Kinda Mid, 5.5/10 🗿

In an age when nature and magic rule the world, there is an extraordinary legend: the story of a warrior who communicates with animals, who fights sorcery and the unnatural. His name is Dar- i mean Rein Shroud, last of his tribe. He is also called Beast Master- i mean Beast Tamer. Its nothing special. The anime starts off with Rein getting scolded and fired by his squad. They label him as weak and useless because all he can do is talk to animals, or so they think. Rein doesnt really "tame beasts" though. A catgirl is about to get mauled by some kind of sabertoothed tiger.You'd think he'd use his "beast taming" skill but tries to fight it with a knife... and loses. Only for the catgirl to save the day.

But because this is anime the airheaded catgirl really likes him and lets him tame her. And he inherits her superstrength...

And as the show progresses he encounters more of these magical animal-girls to add to his harem. Each of which add to his abilities.

Because the writing of this anime is so weak it just feels like all these girls are joining his party because they have no lives and have nothing better to do.

Rein's ability to control animals is not completely useless. You have good scenes where he takes out bandits with bees or uses small animals for reconnaissance. But alot of his accomplishments are due to the fact that he gained the girls' powers. Meaning if they didnt let him tame them he really would be useless for the most part.

Rein just isnt that interesting of a main character. He cant carry this anime.

The anime as a whole just doesnt have a strong foundation.

The least they could have done is throw in some fanservice. It would have made the anime atleast a little bit worth watching.

This is a review that only really focuses on the more negative aspects of the series so far. If the following aspects of the series do not bother you then, it might be worth giving the series a try. First the story is about how the main unappreciated character is kicked out of the "Hero's party" for seemingly no good reason other than the fact that they didn't see him as being exceptionally strong. The "Hero's party" is portrayed as being very unappreciative , somewhat cowardly and amoral. Like most stories with this setting, the "Hero party" realizes over time how important the main characteris.

The main issue of the series that some people might find frustrating is that the main character is constantly being portrayed as "Mary Sue" character. The main character is pretty much shown to be flawless in everyway.. He is kind, compassionate, heroic and ridiculously strong compared to everyone else. Of course, one the key factors of this trope isn't just his or her abilities but how everyone else perceives the character. Just being a flawless character wouldn't be that bad of a problem in the series if it wasn't compounded by the fact that he is constantly being recognized and reaffirmed as being such a great, strong, and amazing person. The main girl who accompanies the main character is pretty much always expositioning on how freakishly amazing the main character is. Everyone the main characters meets is pretty much completely "wow'd" by how strong the main character is.

In this aspect, the story feels like it's supposed to appeal to those who feel underappreciated from society, whether it would be with work, family, etc. . The anime feels like it's a fantasy of the people who are constantly thinking "if I weren't here, you'd realize how important the things I do are".

Another aspect of the series that seems weak to me is the main heroine of the story. Her trust and devotion to the main character feels very undeserved. It's one of those scenario where in anime, everyday basic bare minimum human kindness intereactions are treated as "saintly acts". Series usually try to heighten these basic acts of kindness by making everyone else the main heroine has met as selfish monsters. The main character pretty much just feeds her when she's hungry, and unintentionally shows off his amazing beast taming powers, and the main heroine decides that he's the best human being in the world. Anotehr aspect about the main girl that might not be a problem to a lot of people is that her main personality is that she's "kind". As mentioned before, the main heroine, half of the time in the story is just expositioning on how amazing everything the main character is doing. Personally I'm not too fond of these types of characters. To me, the "bad" girls in the "hero party" are way more interesting because they have the opportunity to develop and change.

I want to say the series would be way more enjoyable without he constant "wanking" by everyone else of the main character but unfortunately it's tied to the whole story. Tied enough to the story to say that being "unappreciated by people you know from the past" when in actuality you are "a special amazing star to most other people" is the main and reoccurring theme (so far).

The animation isn't much to say about. Even one of the first scenes that shows that the main character is actually proficient at fighting is shown in "still frozen shots" of the main character fighting many armored enemies with the main heroine commentating on how strong he is.

I know I've mentioned lots of negatives about the series so far but despite that, the series isn't so bad. If you don't mind the main character being a "mary sue" and aren't bothered by the constant accolades and commendations the main character receives with ever thing he does, then the show is at the very least a decent fantasy "pokemon-styled" harem series.

To me, there are potentional interesting scenarios in regards to the "asshole" original hero party. The male leader of the hero team is depicted as being almost irredeemable but the rest of party seem potentially likeably. The female members of the party seem like they are slowly coming to the realization that they made the incorrect decision to let the main character go. If I were to continue the story, it would be to see the interactions between the main character and "heroes party" after the main character has proved himself more.

While I don’t think this anime tries to be anything special, most aspects of its presentation come across as wooden. The characters feel like lifeless puppets. All of the introduced heroines seem to want nothing more than to be property. As soon as the protagonist introduces himself and solves whatever mildly inconvenient issue is bothering the girl in question - like a switch they become extremely familiar. It doesn’t stop with simple gratitude, nor does it stop with friendship or even infatuation. The girls meet the protagonist over a period of hours and want him to own them. Why everything has to be mirrored withthese fateful encounters, and why they cannot just co-exist like regular adventurer parties (as he once did with his previous party), is confusing and feels artificial.

Some of the antagonist might as well be background characters with the label “menacing knight #5”. An antagonist is described and introduced by one of the heroines, and as soon as the explanation is finished it cuts to the protagonist immediately fighting with the antagonist. Within a minute the antagonist is defeated and no longer relevant; no personality, no motivation, no meaningful tie-in with any form of plot. But what we did get is another two girls, this time with indoctrinated prejudice and hatred towards humans (one of which he only met after the fight) also wanting to be the pets of a human out of absolutely nowhere.

The hero's party's disdain for the main character doesn’t quite make sense. And once again their emotions are flipped like a switch for the convenience of the plot. If they made his expulsion from the group a bit less cartoonish, it would make the budding rivalry between the groups feel more natural and grounded.

As a whole the social interactions feel like they are written by an alien.

Animation is watchable, but the fight choreography and cinematography is jarring. Although I wasn’t expecting much, the choreography shouldn’t look like Dragon Ball Z animation created back in 1989.

Everything else is as expected I suppose, not great but an easy watch… until some of its nonsense has me calling it a day; only to return when out of all forms of procrastination.

With every anime season there’s a minimum of five terrible new fantasy anime to come along with it. Genre fatigue has been slowly setting in for years, and nearly every one of these glorified internet fanfics have been derided as “power fantasies” or “self-insert series” by people who actually care about the quality of the media they consume. Extremely bland peerless main characters plowing their way through any obstacle and hundreds of indistinguishable girls in increasingly trite fantasy realms seems to be the basic establishing formula for these series, most of which were written on novel websites made for the sole purpose of getting shelteredJapanese teenagers a chance to become a regular Nisio Isin (if he had zero literary credibility). Name any seasonal anime that sounds even marginally like what I described and it’ll probably have spawned from one of these places. They don’t even have to be isekai anymore, that’s the really tragic part. The cancer has been metastasizing into other genres. It’s basically an endless content farm for fledgling hacks who think originality is unoriginal, the ones who keep using the same exhausting story beats over and over because they genuinely can’t conceive of anything better. Beast Tamer happens to be one of the worst to rise from these kinds of places in recent memory; a series that falls onto the production line already pre-assembled, ready for mass consumption and unlikely to induce any kind wonder, awe, or intellectual stimulation of any kind.

Seriously every episode gets progressively less and less separable from every other foray into the genre that by the time I reached episode 13 I couldn’t even remember the name of the show. Was I still watching Yūsha Pātī o Tsuihou Sareta Bīsuto Teimā, Saikyōshu no Nekomimi Shōjo to Deau or was I watching Shin no Nakama ja Nai to Yuusha no Party wo Oidasareta node, Henkyou de Slow Life suru Koto ni Shimashita? Or was Ningen Fushin no Boukensha-tachi ga Sekai wo Sukuu you desu? (Fucking Christ stop letting these people write their own titles. They’re longer than some chapters in their own novels.) Summarizing the plot of this show would take too much effort, when it deserves so little; basically this boring asshole named Rein gets booted from a party of annoying one-dimensional asshole adventurers who do nothing but bitch and moan about literally everything (everyone in-universe hates them too because this show lacks subtlety), since his incredibly useful and niche Beast Taming power isn’t strong enough to reach their specific standards (even though they recruited him in the first place, I’m not sure why it suddenly became a problem after what seemed to be years of companionship because the show doesn’t explain anything about any of the characters’ reasonings) and he goes from place to place using his talent to pick up chicks to add to his harem-party. They all happen to be unfathomably overpowered too, so they all team up to fight monster designs traced from a middle schooler’s How to Draw Manga book. Then they meet the boring asshole heroes again and predictably beat the fucking shit out of all of them in the least cathartic fight ever “animated”, I’m talking 5 FPS here, and after being defeated they offer Rein his position back like a bunch of NPCs and he predictably says no, because who would give up crushing monster girl pussy every day for a bunch of the writer’s high school bullies personified? They fight a demon at the end of something too. They have another Microsoft PowerPoint battle, Rein uses some dumb new power to save the day, they meet a new ghost girl, everyone still hates the asshole heroes, and nothing else happens to meaningfully change the status quo. If you think I’m oversimplifying it, you’d be wrong, because I’m actually making it sound even more complex than it actually is.

I can’t imagine why anyone would watch this kind of creatively bankrupt slop; I’m not even trying to sound pretentious here. I like Fairy Tail for God’s sake. I’m just dumbfounded. Getting through a single episode of this shit nearly put me to sleep, because within the first 2 minutes I had already predicted nothing engaging would happen for the rest of the episode. If an uncultured Philistine like me struggled to watch half an episode of this series without convincing that my life was critically lacking in some form of intimacy, I hate to imagine what would happen to the most prodigal media analyst if they tried engaging with this. They’d probably lose the will to live upon seeing how far anime has degraded as an artform. I might sound a little defeatist here but it’s hard not to when the medium you’ve loved for years has become almost unrecognizable, just a corporate-controlled springboard for mediocre writers to keep regurgitating the same content for years instead of trying to hone their talents. 90% of anime looks like this now, and even then not many other forms of media are faring well either. Art used to be about constantly challenging yourself to create something only you could make; but now it seems like anyone could make half the stuff you see on tv or in theaters. It’s not hard to imagine why so many people are even more depressed and unfulfilled than ever; all their routes of escapism are slowly becoming homogenized and boring, and art only exists to tick off boxes on a checklist to appeal to the stupidest kinds of people. I fucking hate Beast Tamer, I hate that it’s getting a second season, I hate “web novels”, I hate isekai, I hate what the anime industry has become. It’s just the same goddamn thing every month. If any aspiring writer picked up a pen one day and made something genuinely special, something that doesn’t fit into any preconceived molds and fills others with inspiration, one that an AI couldn’t replicate with minimal effort, it’ll render corporate-approved swill like Beast Tamer completely worthless. Please everyone, go out and write a story no one else can. Don’t let this be the future.

I'm sure you know what kind of anime this is based on what the reviews say. It's true, though it's very generic and similar to other Isekai Harem genres. Regardless of what the critics say, you can still have a good time because of it. And here's my opinion about this. Yes, I did enjoy watching this anime all the way to the end, and of course, I was anticipating what might happen because I, too, had watched a genre like this. This particular genre happened to be appealing at the time. The story and characterization were fine as they were, but what you wereanticipating was what was going to happen next in the story.

It would be impossible for a show to hit you over the head with its paper-thin concepts and premises in a more obvious way than Beast Tamer. Every character, line of dialog, and story beat serves to remind you that the good guys are good and the bad guys are bad. At no point will you be left conflicted over a character's motive - they will, instead, be spelled out for you three different ways four different times all in the same episode. The main character is selfless, while the villain(s) - the main character's old party of "friends" that cast him aside one minuteand thirty seconds into the first episode - are rude, obnoxious, and annoying. Every other character only exists to remind the viewer that the main character is the exact opposite of that despite the implication being that they were universally seen as a loser before being abandoned by their comrades.

Naturally, the unshakable and enterprising main character sets out into the world and begins collecting women who love and cherish him unconditionally within the same scene they're introduced. This is all thanks to the incredibly contrived concept of "beast taming", whose name might suggest it only works on beasts, but luckily applies to a subset of attractive women with various animal-like features called "ultimate species." By the end of episode one, the main character has resolved nearly all of the conflict introduced thus far, making it clear the viewer will never need to worry about keeping track of complex story arcs or inter-episode character development. What little conflict does exist never survives more a few minutes, and is almost always resolved by something unexpected and underwhelming. If the hero appears to be losing a fight, you can bet his nebulous "tame" ability will have been secretly triggered earlier in the battle to harness the power of a conveniently-placed group of wildlife that sweeps in to save him. This, however, doesn't happen often because the main character and his harem happen to be composed of the most power creatures in existence who easily wipe out seasoned swordsmen and god-like mages without issue.

There are no redeeming factors to consider on a technical level or otherwise. Much like the writing, the characters, world, and art are carbon copies of every other vaguely medieval world with endless green pastures and happy blue skies. The monsters are flat, the fighting is limp, and the animation for anything other than the main characters is equivalent to a keyframed PNG moving around the screen.

3/10.

First I would like to offer my sincerest condolences to the poor voice actors that had to take their job seriously and deliver episode after episode of cringe cliche garbage dialog. I'm sure that part of their soul has died as a result. How in the f does trash like this get dubbed while so many good shows do not. I will be the first to admit that I enjoy me some op main character wrecking everything and anyone that gets in his way but this show is everything that is wrong with these types of anime all in one. Firstwe have the biggest bitch of a main character that I can think of with all of the cliche tropes (beautiful women take one look at him and fall in love instantly, white knight that turns away any and all advances from said women, always does the right thing no matter what, helps everyone, saves everyone, is always considerate of everyone's feeling, on and on). I seriously want to know, Is this the kind of person that Japanese men aspire to be, because if it is they are in serious trouble. Just the dialog of this show is unbearable enough, but the story is something right out of a elementary school kid's notebook. Oh look the MC is in trouble, oh never mind here is another power that he didn't even know he had. Oh every 30 seconds one of the harem girls have another cringe thing to say. Please save yourself and don't watch this utter tripe.

This is basically just Pokémon with cute cat girl bitches. “Uhm, ackshually, they’re not all cat girls, but rather various magical demihu-“ SHUT THE FUCK UP, EUGENE! A new budding subgenre of the parent fantasy category seems to be that in which a member of the hero’s party gets kicked out or banished for one reason or another, and then, on his own, grows to be greater and stronger than his old mates and becomes the de facto protagonist of the story. In a sense, you could call Shield Hero the prototype of this style of narrative development. Beast Tamer is not the first of its kind,but it’s the first I’m watching, though I suppose Chillin’ in My 30s technically meets the criteria, if not explicitly. The show is just about as artificial as they come. The warm candy-colored palette, the valium-induced smiles on all the good characters’ faces, the Dick Dastardly-type evil grin on every bad guy’s face, the straight-forward, simplistic nature of the conflicts, it all makes the anime feel like a moving painting you would find in Harry Potter’s Madam Puddifoot’s Tea Shop.

It’s a self-contained sugar bomb for the soul, nothing more, nothing less. Does it seem extraordinarily convenient and not overly coherent that all these cute cat girls are just lining up to be “tamed” by the protag for no real reason? Does it seem a bit abrupt? Does it seem stupid? That’s because it is. Don’t burden yourself with unnecessary thoughts. This isn’t that kind of anime. Why does everything work out for the MC so easily? Why is everyone so readily sucking his dick? Why do the cat girls want to be “tamed”? Because the author wants to fulfill his cat girl harem fantasy. It comes down to nothing more than that. It’s as deep as a puddle.

That said, the action animation has some surprising moments of brilliance. Are we talking Spike vs. Vincent levels of amazing martial arts animation from the Cowboy Bebop movie? Not by a long shot, no, but a ways better than most of what is coming out of the medium these days. Besides, as jaded as I may want to profess myself to be, I just couldn’t help but find the characters attractive. It’s not even that the designs are the result of any virtuoso insight or clever way to weave the characters’ identity into the way they look. They were just really nice to look at. I could especially not really take my eyes off the 2nd waifu – no, it’s not because of her breasts.

Meru Clewis, a writer for the Anime Feminist website (don’t get me started), makes the bold claim that the show wants you to believe that being able to communicate with animals is uncool. “But whether you were a Horse Girl, a Cat Girl, a Dog Girl, or like me in my AFAB youth, a Bat Girl, you know that this is wrong: you know, instinctively, that actually, being able to be an animorph without the PTSD and horrific animal transformations (that is, being able to relate to animals) is hella cool. It’s the dream come true: how many times have I wanted to grow my own bat wings and take to the night? How many times did I want to echolocate? Let me tell you, it’s a non-zero number for sure, and a part of me still gets a bit giddy at the thought of being able to join bats in their soaring, night flights. The child in me still loves that.” I will skip the cancer of the more uniquely feminist critique, because I don’t want to waste my time. Let us simply focus on this singular point.

The confusion is simple. The show doesn’t want you to believe that communicating with animals is uncool. The show is simply aware of the fact that most people think it is uncool. Yes, I understand you think it’s “hella cool”, I get it, you wanted to be a bat in your “AFAB youth” (again, do not get me fucking started), but do I really have to explain how that is not a typical experience? I don’t think anyone is laboring under any kind of delusion that any kind significant subset of children dreams of being bats. Why was Aquaman the butt of every superhero joke for the past half a century? Because people thought being table to talk to fish was uncool. I am not suggesting it actually is uncool, nor is the show doing that. We’re merely pointing out that in the eyes of the general public, it is. The whole point of Beast Tamer is to show how that’s a mistaken prejudice and how being able to communicate with animals is in fact “hella cool”, as it were, so the criticism is pretty fucking far from fair.

Ultimately, the contention of our esteemed academic hailing from the hallowed halls of Anime Feminist intelligentsia, and that of so many other critics of her ilk, is that the show is mediocre. Why? What’s so mediocre about it? Which one of the things it actually sets out to do does it handle poorly? Sure enough, does it compare favorably to Legend of the Galactic Heroes or Vagabond? No, but it would be ridiculous to judge it by those standards, because that’s not what it’s trying to be. It makes no sense to judge all media against some kind of arbitrary universal standard, because not all media has the same universal goal. You might say that Citizen Kane is better than Legally Blonde, and there’s a case to be made for that, but that does not make Legally Blonde a bad movie, because the comparison is fundamentally myopic. They are wildly different works of art that aim for wildly different things, and as far as they both achieve what they set out to do, they’re both good. Which is why I argue that judging any work of art against what it’s actually trying to be is the most logical thing to do. You might think Transformers is bad because it’s all just giant robots and explosions, but if the goal was precisely to deliver giant robots and explosions in the first place, because that’s exactly what the fans wanted, then it’s good.

I would seriously posit that Beast Tamer is an unironically good show because it knows exactly what it wants to be and achieves its goal with flying colors – a cute little wholesome harem story about girls with animal ears. “Oh, but please, think of how much more the author could have done with the concept of beast taming, the protagonist could learn the view the world through an animal’s eyes, could gain animal attributes, could learn to transform into them, and all we get instead is him rizzing a cat girl.” Yes, and I’m sure that if you had written your own story about a beast tamer, you would have written it in the way you wanted, with all that interesting stuff and no cat girl rizz. Seeing as though you did in fact not write it, the author wrote it in the way he wanted, and he wanted to write about cat girl rizz. Deal with it.

If you personally don’t like harem shows just by virtue of the fact that they feature harems, that’s fine, to each their own, but you can’t just write off a show as objectively bad or mediocre just because you take personal issue with the content. For instance, I am not overly fond of horror, myself, but I can still recognize a well-made horror movie or show when and if I see one, regardless of how I feel about the genre. As such, all of this talk about how Beast Tamer is insubstantial exhausts me. Fuck off. It’s got all the substance it wants to have and, indeed, needs to have.

If I were to compare it to anything, I would posit that Beast Tamer looks and feels a lot like BoFuri, though I’ll admit that the latter felt like it had more soul. I don’t know if that’s really due to BoFuri being of legitimately higher quality, or if it’s just a consequence of the fact that Shied Kirito was a cute girl, and (mostly) virgin loser weebs are more likely to be forgiving of a cute girl’s self-indulgence, but that’s neither here, nor there. All of this is to say that Beast Tamer is a transient experience that is pleasant for the heart and easy on the eyes – light entertainment through and through. The characters are uncomplicated and the narrative does not ask much of the viewer, while still managing to stay gratifying enough to be engaging. You could do worse in terms of media to soothe the soul at the end of a difficult day.

If that tickles your fancy, go right on ahead. You’ll have a nice time. I sure did.

P.S.: Here’s to another fantasy anime that isn’t an isekai. Cheers!

P.S. II: Tania is my wife. You can’t have her.

Judging by merits of other trash isekai animu... this is not really good. I gave it a 5, and I'm already doubting that it might be too high. This is just way too cookie-cutter sort of plot, I mean it's not even isekai, but you get a harem, check, OP plz nerf powers, check, completely unredeemable sort of characters in antagonist role who exist solely to grief you and be beaten up by newly upgraded hero? Check. It's that sort of "grievance revenge fantasy" I think, where you're supposed to just take most base and animalistic glee from bullies getting their comeuppance without any actualwork being done to earn that. It's not even funny to watch the protagonist party fight the "hero party" -__-