Goblin Slayer Mid-Season Review

I’m not sure if it’s just life being strange but I didn’t even process that mid-season was upon us until I started drafting up this article. The biggest thing that hit me was the fact that they really started this episode with where the newest manga chapter left off (about a dozen chapters ahead of here). While this isn’t too big on a high-level view, I really find it fascinating that they are adapting this to be more anime friendly than most adaptations. Even more than that they are updated and planning as the chapters come out, indicating a high level of interaction with the creator and White Fox.

So the show starts out rather dark with some Elder Lich looking dude approaching a nude blonde woman being held by tentacles. Before some late night Cinemax style things occur, a Hero and her party appears to stop the dastardly villains before they can do unspeakable things. Evidently they just went in and fucked some shit up, or so the story goes as told by the newbie adventurers. Of course as the other adventurers are happy and proclaiming such a story of a recent victory should be taken with a grain of salt, Goblin Slayer just doesn’t give a shit. He does however inform his companions of a quest he plans to undertake for the reward of a bag of gold, which is evidently a unit of measurement in this world. The most hilarious and D&D reminiscent part of this is when his party has “the talk” with Goblin Slayer. For those of you that don’t partake in D&D, this is when you have to talk down the Murderhobo before he goes full Murderhobo mode.

 

After a bit of traveling, they arrive in Waterdeep Water Town and move towards the temple in town to meet the quest giver. And so Priestess realizes they’re going to meet the Archbishop of the temple, The Gold Ranked Sword Maiden; Hero of the People. After receiving the adventurers, Goblin Slayer being very curt and direct accepts the mission to hunt down the goblins that had been killing people and likely living in the sewers. While the team is down there, they’ve begun to truly synergize well, operating as a cohesive unit even in the face of something hilarious and unexpected.

That’s right, goblin pirates and honestly I think I’m doing this for my next character in D&D, other than a goblin vampire slayer named “Goblin Slayer.” They even come with almost endearing features as they sail down the sewers towards the party. After a really well coordinated battle, with Priestess covering High Elf Archer, who in turn was covering the rest of the party as they attacked the boat, the ship is sunk and the party sits at the side of the river bank. It is at this moment I feel the comedic timing of this show is just perfectly done and conveyed better than the grimdark and rip-and-tear feel of the manga.

And with this, we have Goblin Slayer lead them out of the sewers and assesses the things they’ve learned. Using a significant amount of logic, he figures that given the stupidity of goblins, they likely didn’t learn to build boats on their own, but would be capable of using them. He also reasons that they did not come about this naturally as they would have been wary and scared of the Florida Swamp Cat “Swamp Dragon.” Through this he comes to the conclusion that someone is training the goblins, and we leave off there with that harrowing thought and an ominous figure. Goblin Slayer has been doing an amazing job of keeping me entertained, even more than the manga and I didn’t think that was possible. As such, I have to keep this baby rated at a strong and fun 9 pirate goblins being eaten by giant alligators out of 10.