…Poor Kazuma.

I’ll be honest. I’m struggling to really figure out just what it is I wanna say about this series. Well, let’s get the description out of the way first, I guess.

When shut-in high school gamer, Kazuma Satou, dies in a series of… rather unfortunate events, he meets the goddess known as Aqua, who gives him the option of going to heaven, or going to another world to defeat a demon king. Naturally, he chooses the latter. Given the choice of one thing to take with him on his quest, he chooses to take Aqua, herself… very much against her will. And so the adventure of the pair begins in a fantasy world, set to the tune of common RPG tropes. Except… it doesn’t. Kazuma begins his quest as the lowest possible class one can have, while Aqua, being a goddess, is granted a highly coveted class. But even her class won’t get them anywhere without the money, skills, and allies to back it up. And they’re blood broke.

Pretty much all of the characters are walking tropes (So far. KonoSuba 2 is airing right now, and I’ve not watched any of it yet, so shush). Only one of them has any established backstory (and even that isn’t delved into, much, and it was fairly obvious). Beyond that, everything about the series is a joke, with Kazuma playing the role of the “Straight Man” to everyone else’s “Funny Guy,” and I do mean everyone else’s. In that regard, a fair amount of the humor really is found in just his reacting to everyone else’s. Though he isn’t exactly immune to the silliness, himself. Still, Kazuma is clearly the smartest person in his party (and certainly the most level-headed), and it’s always amusing seeing him put those brains of his to use. By contrast, Aqua’s pretty much just an obnoxious moron, more often than not. She’s supposed to be, and I don’t really find myself hating her, though I feel like I’m probably supposed to? She’s loud, rude, selfish, and a lot of Kazuma’s suffering is her fault, be it directly or indirectly. Perhaps the one thing keeping me from hating her is seeing her actually get her comeuppance, when it’s due. Darkness is… an acquired taste, I think. Even now, I just tolerate her presence, though she was initially a little more annoying. It’s primarily a factor of her pretty much being the same joke, over and over. Her “character” just didn’t allow for much to be done with her, and after a while the joke got old. In short, she’s a masochist. She often winds up trailing off and fantasizing about befalling some horrible BDSM-like fate at the hands of her enemies, and seems to be aroused by pain. That’s pretty much all there is to her. Although there is an inherent sense of honor. It’s an amusing play on the traditional Paladin/Crusader archetype… the first couple times. It is, however, funny that she evidently couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn. And I don’t mean with a ranged attack. I mean with a sword swing. That was a funny gag, and I feel like that one should’ve been played up a bit more. And last, but certainly not least, is Megumin. Megumin is a teen (I think?) mage who specializes in explosion magic. And when I say she specializes in it, I mean she can only use one spell – Explosion. She’s Louise from Zero no Tsukaima, but with a catch. She can only use her spell once per day because of how powerful it is. So basically take the Mage, which is usually your DPS unit and ranged support, and take them out of the fight immediately after a single use… and good lord is she proud of that. She even refuses to learn any other spells (though I have no idea how she was able to learn a spell that powerful without acquiring some other skills, first). Megumin is characterized by an incredibly passionate love of explosion magic, and a highly dramatic nature, which is endearing. Though she’s also kind of a one-trick pony. There’s a bit more wiggle room for her character to be amusing, however, as she’s also “the cute one,” despite her theatrical personality, so the contrast is often played up all the same. So we’ve got an all-around average adventurer, an idiot, a masochist who couldn’t hit water if she fell out a boat, and a one-shot absolute last resort of a mage. Needless to say, Kazuma isn’t exactly thrilled with his lot in this new life.

One amusing thing about the series does seem to be its memory. It remembers the events of previous episodes. And because of that, it can capitalize on jokes made in them. Actions in this series do have consequences, however non-serious they are. And that goes for the actions of multiple characters. Kazuma takes something from someone, sells it, and that dude isn’t seen again for a good while. Then, when he does show up again, he appears to be working to buy it back. There are constant callbacks to lines that most other series would regard as throwaway gags from previous episodes. And at one point, Aqua destroys something during a quest, and it actually costs them the reward money. It’s interesting seeing how the occasionally suspect actions taken by characters in more serious adventure epics of a similar nature wouldn’t go ignored or excused in this world, and how this world reacts to those things.

There isn’t a whole lot of anything else to say. When it’s funny, it’s funny. It’s especially good at visual humor, actually. But some jokes work better than others, and some overstay their welcome. The animation’s colorful, and easy on the eyes. The world is a standard RPG-like fantasy setting, which is always something I’m interested in, though it’s obviously been done better in a number of things (be it based on RPG tropes like DanMachi, or literally in an RPG, like Log Horizon). There actually isn’t a terrible lot of action, but it’s well done when it’s there. Don’t expect any real feels, here. You’ll not find them. This series exists to make you laugh, and little else. Which probably lessens the impact of some of the jokes.

All in all, I’d say the series isn’t perfect, but it is fairly entertaining, for the most part. If it sounds like your thing, check it out. KonoSuba 2 is currently airing on Crunchyroll. And with that all said, ladies and gents, I’ve exhausted my thoughts on this one. Thanks for reading.

Keep up the awesome, and take care
Chris V.