Production-wise, I thought Bakuen was a fine anime on its own. The animation felt limited in places but the art style and character drawings were very nice, I would say that in this aspect, Bakuen was superior to the original. Also, the OP and ED don’t get enough love - bringing back Machico to do the OP was a great callback.
However, it’s a strange entry in the Konosuba franchise as a whole, because Bakuen is a much different type of show.
I think a lot of anime-only fans, myself included, probably expected a straight comedy, but Bakuen was instead a very laid back slice of life. The change of tempo between the laugh-a-minute comedy of original Konosuba versus the slower Bakuen probably caused a bit of expectation shock for a lot of watchers.
I found myself not liking Megumin’s characterization very much in this series. She has always had that sort of playful mean streak that is generally associated with chuuni characters (peep my pfp) but I thought that the writing leaned too hard on that aspect of her personality and didn’t provide enough other opportunities for the viewer to grow more attached to her. Additionally, I have mentioned this before on other forums and started to see some other people recognize this fact as well: one of the key appeals of Konosuba is the dynamic between Kazuma and Aqua; in Bakuen, we have Megumin and Yunyun and their interactions are cute, but they are not nearly as interesting or comical as those of the former duo. As awesome as Megumin is, I do think that this show exposed her too much. To use a sports analogy, it was like putting your second string player in the starting lineup.
edit: at least on desktop, kbin squishes that gif into an ugly mess, but the full resolution is there if you click on it
More Yunyun and Megumin hijinks! I wish we got to see more of this duo in the main series, they bounce of each other really well as characters! Megumin is now on a 2-0 streak against powerful demons yet still nobody wants her in their party. The negative reputation of explosion magic sure is powerful!
The emotional scene in the bedroom was really nice, but this is Konosuba so of course the entire thing was played for laughs moments later!
I actually really enjoyed this anime! It was a nice bit of side content to help with the wait towards season 3. Getting to see an entire different side of Yunyun compared to the main series was probably the best part, as well as getting more development for the Crimson Demon village as a whole.To be honest I enjoyed SoL prequel more that orginal S1 and S2, (I didn’t watch movie yet). The dynamic between duo was great and also overshadowed by cultural norms that are required of crimson demons.
It was nice to see the Megumin and Yunyun relationship build, but overall I was disappointed with the series after they left the village, A few good laughs at the axis church arc, but overall it didn’t really build to anything, it was just the characters meandering around until they reached the point that Megumin joins Kazuma and crew.
I think you expected comedy show and we got slice of life show. For me it was an upgrade but I can see when somebody enjoys comedy more than SoL then it would be a downgrade
Cross-posted from https://lemmy.world/post/455954
I really liked whole season, first arc was nice where our protagonist was learning in the academy. Second arc was mid in my opinion, but the shenanigans with the church were funny. Third arc had too many forced glipses to first season for my taste but the final episode tied all relevant plots nicely.
The progression of Yunyun x Megumin friendship was nice but the ending departure felt forced. But still the final scene where the ED played was top notch.
As a chill slice of life in fantasy world Konosuba: explosion holds up very strongly.
