Goblin Slayer (anime! light novel!)

M84 is trying to say that Goblin Slayer has the same kind of cutesy character designs that you'd find in some casual bait shows that don't feature rape as a selling point. And to a degree he's not wrong. If you just removed the rather shaky premise behind it, Goblin Slayer really isn't much more than an average and family friendly DND campaign.

Speaking of character designs, I've never seen any work that borrows character designs from other works this blatantly.

Not that I mind it too much.

It can be a tad amusing to try and pick out the expies and their original source material.

And Priestess apparently used to be an even more blatant expy of a Dragon Quest Priestess.

Just need a fighter that looks more like Jade with a Superpowered Evil Side to boot, and you’d have a fighter that would’t Suffer the same fate as the one from Ep 1...

Some of the character designs are really obscure expies, too. Either that or they were so heavily redesigned from what the original expy was that it might as well be original. Half the fun of the big crowd scenes in the manga is trying to figure out who is from what.

That's why I say it's not as dark as Berserk, because besides the horrid goblin antics it's pretty much a usually bright adventurous world. And as people say, it makes the dark elements even more unsettling. It's like a shonen world being invaded by a senien type cynicism.

Honestly, it makes the dark elements seem even worse from a writing standpoint because they seem even more out of place there. It's such an awkward tonal shift and the series seems to want to have its cake and eat it with "it's dark and gritty and edgy and we'll open it with a horrible rape" and then shift immediately to "lighthearted fun adventures now that's done with."

Edited by Lightysnake on Oct 15th 2018 at 12:36:26 PM

I guess it did serve to put readers on their guard. Like, Goblin Slayer as the protagonist and the one the series is named after has some measure of plot armor, but any of the other characters are fair game for horrific goblin death. And even he's not ruled out, since it could very much be a case of Take Up My Sword and someone else could be consumed by lust for goblin murder and become Goblin Slayer. There are definitely points in the story where I really felt that someone could legitimately die.

Edited by danime91 on Oct 15th 2018 at 1:07:56 AM

Him being a Legacy Character could be an interesting concept.

This level of Bad Things Happening to Cute Girls reminds me of a certain RO artist who also does a lot of dark stuff.

Remember Xration?

Not really an immediate shift.

I'd say the second episode was more somber (for the lack of a better word) than the first despite not being as dark. For if it's not the focus story make it clear there always going to be that element hanging around. For example recent arc in the manga had plenty of lighthearted moments which only made it worse when the party nearly got wiped out.

Edited by Cross on Oct 15th 2018 at 7:31:59 AM

Berserk tends to overall be pretty dark, which is what makes the moments of hope and optimism and basic human decency stand out even more.

In Goblin Slayer, the overall cheery adventure atmosphere makes the dark moments seem even worse. The Greenhorn team's fate in the first chapter is the most blatant example. They start out thinking being an Adventurer will be a life of, well, adventure, only to suffer a grisly ignoble end in a filthy cave.

I feel, to a degree, that works. The most effective moment for me there? The goblins mobbing the fighter and stabbing him to death. It works because you don't see much of it.

Yeah if they had done that the same way with the rape, I wouldn’t be as stricken

The problem I think with how the anime did it and from what I hear of the manga, they over do the grisly parts and with the rapes and sexual violence, make it pornographic. If it’s pretty much indistinguishable when compared to a hentai production, that’s bad.

I just got the first two novels on Book Walker so I am excited. I usually don’t get much isekai or fantasy stuff besides Grimgar and Konosuba so this is new.

Well, the second episode more or less adapted out the second grisly bit. The fate of the female Steel adventurer party is covered in more detail in the manga and LN. In the anime all you see are their corpses from a distance or in shadow.

Their fate and the way the Goblin Lord rose to power show that even experienced Adventurers can fall prey to Goblins if they aren't careful.

Edited by M84 on Oct 15th 2018 at 11:18:06 PM

Was that the one where the team archer got to shot to death from her own arrows?

Yes.

Yeah, I got spoiled on that and thank goodness it wasn’t shown

Oh then thank the apathetic Dn D God’s that wasn’t shown.

Just read that in the manga.

Of course the writer used a female adventuring party of 'experienced' adventurers who of course get slaughtered so we see how epic Goblin Slayer really is. And one gets raped to death graphically because of course that's what happens.

Edited by Lightysnake on Oct 15th 2018 at 10:07:11 AM

I know this might be morbid, but if there is an expy of Guts there must be an expy of Casca somewhere.

Let it never be said Kumo Kagyu or the manga guy was ever a smart or tactful writer.

No, Guts gets with the expy of the girl from Final Fantasy Tactics instead.

Edited by Rynnec on Oct 15th 2018 at 12:12:55 PM

The farm battle at least highlights the difference between GS and a normal Silver-Rank.

Heavy Warrior and Female Knight are able to take down a Goblin Champion after a brief if not easy fight. When GS and his companions face off against a Champion and his goblin minions, they are almost all slaughtered. Only GS's Heroic Second Wind keeps it from being a TPK and he's still on the brink of death afterwards. GS cannot fight on the same level as other Silver-Rankers, which is why he uses such "imaginative" tactics.

It's funny that Female Knight is an expy of Agrias since Agrias at least still has her magical power. Female Knight is actually kind of a jerk — so much so that her god revoked her Paladin powers until she shapes up. That seems unlikely to happen anytime soon, since she's also the kind of person who would rather blame her own god than admit that she needs to grow up. It's almost Miko Miyazaki levels of delusion and self-absorbance.

Edited by M84 on Oct 16th 2018 at 2:47:07 AM

I honestly didn't mind what happened to the Steel party was shown going by what i've heard about it.

Especially since they used this episode to give some backstory for Goblin Slayer.

We're they separate chapters in the Manga/LN?

It's actually worse in a way in the LN since the LN actually goes into gory detail about what happens to all of them. Especially Human Monk, who had her own comrades' entrails stuffed in her mouth to keep her from committing suicide.

The LN also mentions that the party was exhausted after killing a lot of goblins along the way (which was why these goblins went straight to the torture and killing rather than keeping them as breeding slaves — they were really pissed at them), which was why Rhea Ranger missed the alarm trap.