YMMV / So I'm a Spider, So What?

• Anti-Climax Boss: Mother is built up as the most formidable threat Kumoko has ever faced thus far, handily outclassing even powerhouses such as Araba, and dangerously intelligent to boot. She orchestrates several ambushes that nearly kill Kumoko and even confronts her in person for a Hopeless Boss Fight. Once the time finally comes for Kumoko to fight her properly, the reader/viewer is hyped for an epic battle. What follows instead is a Curb-Stomp Battle as Kumoko plays right into Mother's hands, and then a curbstomp the other way once Kumoko assimilates Mother's power stolen by her Parallel Minds. The whole thing barely takes 5 minutes in the anime. Some fights against mooks took longer. So while it wasn't an easy battle per se - as Kumoko would have gotten absolutely destroyed if it weren't for regaining her Parallel Minds - it definitely wasn't the climactic showdown you'd have expected from an opponent like Mother.
• Awesome Music:
  • The first ED, "Do You Best! (Kumoko-san's Theme)". Which is just awesomely batshit insane. A bizarre mix of J-pop, a brief Enka section and then full on speedcore with Aoi Yuuki managing to sing the entire thing like she's on fast-forward.
  • The second ED, "Genjitsu Totsugeki Hierarchy". A kickass bit of J-Rock with Aoi Yūki bringing up some very Hibiki like flair to make it all the more awesome.
  • Not to be outdone, the 2nd opening theme, "Bursty Greedy Spider" is a completely hype intro, with Konomi Suzuki absolutely bringing it to get the viewer amped.
• Broken Base:
  • Starting from around when the manga adaptation began, the fanbase developed a notable split. The cause of the split is the fact that the manga completely ignores everything in the novel that focuses on characters besides Kumoko. Supporters view this as working in the story's favor, as it focuses on Kumoko's development without any distractions that would slow down the progress of the plot, while detractors see it as potentially causing massive amounts of confusion that would make manga-only readers think certain future arcs came completely out of nowhere, or at the very least would drag the plot out even longer than the novel already did. While most of the arguing from this divide died down over the following years, it resurfaced with a vengeance once the first anime trailer released, showing that it would adapt said content, with manga readers complaining about where all these human characters came from, while novel readers were happy they were getting a more proper adaptation.
  • With the anime adaptation, a new one comes in the form of episodes with very little, or no Kumoko at all in them, focusing entirely on Shun and the other humans. The comment section of basically every such episode on Crunchyroll is divided between two groups. The first group is people who severely dislike the plot, in no small part thanks to the anime already cutting out many human-side scenes, which omits a great deal of character development, and thus Shun's party appears generic or flat in comparison to Kumoko, and some of those episodes having noticeable drops in animation quality, especially during the action scenes, compared to what Kumoko get, and thus argues just skipping those bits entirely. The second group argues that those bits are important and necessary for the plot and the human-side characters become more interesting and developed when they become more active in the plot instead of being vessels for exposition about world-building and thus shouldn't be skipped - though even they rarely argue the content's dip in quality compared to the Kumoko-heavy episodes.
  • There's also a broken base between those who preferred the early parts of the story focused on Kumoko, and those who prefer the more political war story post-ascension. This is related to the split over Kumoko-light episodes in the anime, since the post-ascension story focuses more on the world that was developed in those plot arcs.
• Complete Monster:
  • "D" is a powerful goddess charged with managing the Underworld, but is lazy and sadistic. Following a war with the dragons that left the Other World depleted of its magical energy and on the brink of collapse, D—who could have simply replenished it by herself—implemented the System, a JRPG-style cycle of reincarnation that only prolonged the Other World's degradation at the cost of millions of souls. Growing bored, D snuck off to Earth and masqueraded as a Japanese high-school student named Wakaba Hiiro until a Hero and Demon Lord destroyed the classroom in an attempt to assassinate her. Collecting the souls of her classmates, teacher, and a spider, D inserted them into the System while altering their reincarnations to play cruel pranks on them. When the spider—Kumoko—apotheosized into a goddess intent on avenging the suffering D had inflicted on everyone, D named her Shiraori to prevent her from doing so while sabotaging her plans to save the Other World. In the light novel, D further brainwashed Shiraori into slavishly falling in love with her to ensure her loyalty. When Shiraori is left in a severely-weakened state after dismantling the System, D captures her intending to keep her as a slave for further amusement.
  • Potimas Harrifenas's unethical experiments with MA energy in pursuit of immortality led to the creation of supernatural demihumans and predatory monsters; turned his daughter Ariel into a human-spider hybrid; and sparked a war between humans and dragons that led to most of the world's MA energy being siphoned—leaving it on the brink of implosion. Evolving himself into an elf, Potimas grew fearful of divine retribution and hid himself away, using clones and cyborg doppelgängers to continue his experiments in secret. Millennia later, Potimas discovered his second daughter Filimøs was the reincarnation of a human from another world and tricked her into helping him capture the other reincarnates, killing those he deemed a potential threat to his plans and intending to sacrifice the rest to attain godhood. When one of the reincarnates, Kumoko, allied with Ariel to oppose him, Potimas attempted to manipulate them into helping him seize control of a planet-destroying superweapon—callously sending thousands of elves to their deaths in the process—while repeatedly attempting to kill them out of spite. Continuing his MA energy experiments and superweapon development, Potimas manipulated the reincarnates he'd gathered into fighting to protect him when Kumoko—apotheosized into the goddess Shiraori—and Ariel led an army to stop his plans, intending to have his daughters fight to the death while he attempted to escape the planet.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Among the Reincarnators (side-characters compared to Kumoko, even in-universe by others), Feirune is by far the most popular and liked. In large part this is because, unlike her more generic Reincarnator friends that she hangs out with, she has the most amount of story use due to being reincarnated as a Dragon over being a human or humanoid. Her humanoid form is also liked for being cute in design as well.
  • Ronant started out as this as well; he was supposed to be a one-off, but positive fan reaction made him a recurring character instead.
• Fan Nickname: The series is lovingly referred to by some fans as "Anime Dark Souls" on account of Kumoko's troubled beginnings in the labyrinth.
• Franchise Original Sin: The increased focus on the humans in the second half of the anime was largely viewed as a drawn-out and generic arc populated by depthless characters that were hard to care about, with Kumoko's role reduced to that of a Pinball Protagonist. But even in the first half, Kumoko's story was still just as much of a Random Events Plot revolving around her trying to survive and getting into fights, and the humans were just as lacking in depth. However, framing Kumoko's story as a series of fights actually worked to show her growth from a scared weakling into someone who could fight powerful monsters on her own terms, and the human story was clearly second fiddle—but with the importance of the two plots reversed, it became blatantly obvious how weak the characters and story of the human side was.
• Friendly Fandoms:
  • With The Saga of Tanya the Evil as Aoi Yūki is once again reincarnated to a Crapsack World and being bothered by a single letter God.
  • Also with That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime, due to similar premises of someone being reincarnated as a traditionally low level monster (Spiders and Slimes) only to have a game styled system to help them grow much faster and eventually reach and surpass the level of a Demon Lord. There was even a short Crossover of the two by Kadokawa with them meeting at the labyrinth.
• Fridge Brilliance:
  • "D" tells Kumoko that the Immortality skill is impossible to achieve through normal means but is still included to act as an incentive for people to continue gaining skill points. More likely, it was included specifically to tempt Potimas so he wouldn't leave. He built a spaceship and could have left at any time, but the Immortality skill was something he couldn't stop chasing.
  • The roof of the bottom layer of the Labyrinth is made of a different type of rock compared to the walls and floor. Most likely this rock was added by D so the middle layer's lava seas would have a stable bed and wouldn't cook anything underneath by convection.
  • The first half of the anime's initial season has rather chaotic and dissonant openings and endings, compared to the second half having more standard themes. This makes sense; Kumoko was thrown into life or death survival with absolutely no idea what she was in for and no choice in the matter whatsoever, and then by the time she manages to get out of the labyrinth, she effectively settled into her identity as a spider in the world and stabilizing her indignant fury into something more prideful and mocking of her enemies.
  • D using the System to suppress certain chemical reactions to force the world back to pre-industrial level seems like it's just part of her plan for entertainment, but it does actually serve a purpose. Without access to the underworld, the planet only has a limited pool of souls to draw on. An industrial population would strain the limits of that supply and souls would likely need to reincarnate immediately, wearing them out even faster. Reducing the population to a pre-industrial size means souls will get at least some downtime, extending the System's lifespan.
    • For context: The ancient civilization was comparable to Earth so assume roughly 5 billion souls entering the System. Assuming the two continents have roughly the same population as pre-industrial Europe, there are now roughly 250 million souls active at any given time. With a new generation born every twenty years, souls could potentially get centuries of rest between reincarnations.
• Genius Bonus: Shiro gets absolutely wasted on coffee. It's because she is a spider, and spiders get drunk on caffeine.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • In the light novel, Kumoko makes a passing reference to Puella Magi Madoka Magica. In the anime, she's voiced by the titular Madoka herself, Aoi Yūki.
  • Speaking of Aoi Yuuki, this isn't the first time she's been a spider girl. Also, its not her first time reincarnating in a Crapsack World and being bothered by single letter God.
• Les Yay: Shiraori follows and supports Ariel's plan not for the planet's sake or even Sariel's, but just because she will not accept any end that doesn't end with her Demon Lord smiling. She even jokes that her perfect epilogue would end with both confessing their love to each other.
• Moe: An Adorkable spider with the mind of a Hikikomori highschool girl? Pretty much the reason why the series got noticed. The fact that the manga made her a bright pink with a more cartoonish art style accentuates it.
• Love to Hate: Even though D is a completely vile character, she's also very popular precisely because she's so completely horrible. Part of this is due to not knowing just how vile she is immediately, coming off more as a troll than a Jerkass God. Her banter with Kumoko early on is very entertaining.
• Memetic Mutation
  • So I'm a X, So What? ^ExplanationThe series title instantly drew parodies concerning on what Kumoko does or even at the other media
  • She Is The Messiah ^Explanation Kumoko being mistaken as the divine beast in Sariella instantly drew comparisons to Monty Python's Life of Brian.
  • Detergent ^ExplanationSophia hilariously mistaking Ariel, the Demon Lord and the Origin Taratect, as a well known brand of detergent. With some◊ examples◊
  • Busty Greedy Spider ^ExplanationQuite a few fans misread the title of the anime's 2nd opening theme, "Bursty Greedy Spider". It helps that Shiraori's chest size makes the misread version not exactly wrong.
• Moral Event Horizon: Buirimis's method of "earning Razraz's loyalty", by magically compelling him to kill and eat his beloved sister universally destroyed any sympathy the readers had for him, if not for the sheer atrocity of the act, then by the stupidity of it, in violating one of the biggest rules on the Evil Overlord List. "When I have a monster or powerful animal in my thrall, I will treat it kindly, with decency and respect, so in the event that the control is broken, it will not immediately turn on me." In fact, most thought him dying at Wrath's hand was getting off way too easy.
• Most Wonderful Sound: The ding that heralds Kumoko's Level-Up Fill-Up and the following "Experience Threshold Reached". It's hard not to cheer.
• No Yay: Readers of the web novel frequently react with outright disgust at any hint of D/Shiro in the light novels given that D's behavior is highly abusive towards the former. Her normal behavior and motives are also incredibly cruel and selfish. Combining these, web novel Shiro hates and fears D, only submitting and following her will as much as she does because there are no other options. But in the light novel, Shiro actually likes her a lot and wants to stay away from her for completely different reasons, which comes across as very jarring to readers of the source material.
• Padding: One of the more common complaints about the series is that any scene that does not focus on Kumoko is boring, because the other cast members, such as Shun's party, are more generic isekai characters, and thus not as interesting as her. This complaint is especially loud in the anime, because the Compressed Adaptation makes them appear even more generic due to cutting out important character-building scenes between them.
• Rooting for the Empire: While Shiraori is the 'villain' in the overall story even by her own admission^note At least in terms of story dynamics because she at least believes she isn't causing unnecessary harm and is upset to learn she's wrong, you'll be hard pressed to find readers who are bigger fans of Shun than her or even just think it'd be for the best if she didn't succeed. While Shun is clearly morally in the right, he's also quite a bit less sympathetic or charming and lacks much of the depth of characters on Team Shiro, meaning few fans are invested in him. It's not unusual to find fans outright cheering on the attempted genocide of humanity simply because Shiraori is more likable.
• The Scrappy: Hugo. Obviously, he was intended to be hated for being a petty Card-Carrying Villain who hates Shun for nothing more than sheer jealousy, but it seems that worked a little too well, as he's one of the most blatant examples of Stupid Evil in the entire series and his character amounts to just being a petty jerk who thinks he's the hero without any real development or setup, especially in the anime. It's not uncommon to find readers that wish Sophia would just off him so they don't have to listen to his crap anymore, and quite a number of viewers felt the story would have been better without him.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
  • A criticism leveled towards Hugo's character is that his entire arc about feeling jealous and spiteful towards Shun is short and doesn't work as a motivation for Hugo's descent into evil. The audience is only given a few pages/episodes to see Hugo's building resentment before he decides to kill his classmates just to be seen as a hero. Hugo goes from being a smug jerk, to wanting to kill Shun in what amounts to only about thirty minutes of total screentime. The story never really goes into detail either on their relationship before they reincarnated either, so while it says they didn't get along, it comes across as Hugo just becoming evil quickly because the writer wanted more stakes and drama.
  • There's a wider similar criticism regarding all the Shun and humans plot, especially in the anime version, because the anime version cuts out a lot of human scenes that were present in the light novel. These characters are supposed to, by this point, have lived in this new world for 16 years. Almost as long, if not longer, than they lived in Japan. Furthermore they were born with all their memories and sentience. The anime never once addresses this aspect of their lives, instead treating it as though all of them were your typical isekai characters who only recently arrived in the new world. In the anime, Shun acts as a cookie cutter Isekai protagonist who seems to know nothing about the world he's in, and the rest of the cast save only a few characters are the same way. Compressed Adaptation hits them so hard that none of them act like they've been living this new life for over a decade, which makes the entire plot point about them being reincarnated a fairly useless plot point since the story could easily have just they awoke inside new bodies and the story wouldn't change at all except for the monster characters like Sophia.
  • Most of the reincarnated class remain as humans or humanoids after coming back. It would have been more interesting if at least half of them are reincarnated into non-humanoid monsters like Feirune, Wrath or Kumoko.
• Ugly Cute: The way Kumoko is normally drawn in the anime is still not classically cute given that she's still a spider, but her mannerisms and expressiveness still leave her looking like a cute dork. Plus, her 'face' is highly stylized with two normalish eyes and the rest looking more like decorations while her mouth just has Cute Little Fangs. Once the art shift sets in and we see how she really looks and moves, this trope instantly fades away: She looks even uglier than a real spider and is typically either completely stationary, twitching oddly or moving rapidly around in eerie ways.
• Unintentional Uncanny Valley: The manga depiction of Kumoko's Arachne form gives her humanoid upper body a chitin-like appearance, with mostly white skin-plates and black tissue in the flexing joints. Combined with her too-large and -round eyes and oddly jagged teeth, she resembles a doll stitched onto the back of her spider form.
• The Un-Twist: Julius dying. He gets only around ten minutes of screentime, is built up by everyone as The Ace, and is given a brief scene where he sees Shun where he promises to spend time with him. Once one sees that moment, him dying is so obvious that the shows attempt to make it surprising feels a bit silly. Plus the fact he's been given virtually no screentime means he would have to die at some point to justify Shun becoming more important.
• Woolseyism: In the Latin American Spanish dub of episode 13, Kumoko hums, in a very ironic way, La Cucaracha, despite being she a spider, while in the original Japanese version, she was simply humming a nameless song instead.^note This is especially even more funny because if you know the origins of that song: Contrary to what many people think, La Cucharacha is actually a Spaniard song that dates back to the 19th century, and for reasons not fully understood, became popular in Mexico during The Mexican Revolution a century later. In any case, the lyrics of both the Spaniard and Mexican versions of the song talk about a war, which is precisely what was happening in that episode. Even more so as one of the vulgar versions of the Mexican rendition of the song sung during the aforemoentioned revolution, talked about a spotted cockroach with white colors, which befits Kumoko even more, if you replace "cockroach" with "spider".