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Am I the only one who's sick of the isekai?

Yeah it was fun in the beginning, after all who never thought about being transported to another world where you ate a big hero with swords and magic?

But what the hell, I'm pretty sure there's more isekai now than other genres/settings. It's gotten to a point that if I see the tag I just move on.

82 comments
  • My main critique of the genre is how lazy it's done. There's nothing wrong with having the MC reincarnated, transported, or made overpowered. One Punch Man has a massively overpowered MC but it's still really good. The problem is that they're all low effort cookie cutter stories that are just checking items off a list.

    They're also fairly unrealistic. "Gasp...is this that isekai thing I've been reading about? I guess I'll go join the Adventurer Guild and get a super dangerous job killing monsters despite the fact that I've never been in a dangerous situation before."

    There's no way all these random people will just calmly accept finding themselves in another world with no freaking out or depression setting in first.

    • I've actually been writing a story with a more realistic idea on this

      Dude has the stamina to do all that walking? His mother made him do a sport and track is the only thing he could tolerate. Still ends up exhausted when he has to carry the stuff a normal adventurer has to deal with

      When he first arrives, he is flipping between trying to find the cool side of it and freaking out because, "Oh fuck uh I actually was ripped from my home"

      Lots of action happens within the first few days? Has a mental breakdown when his brain finally catches up and he can no longer distance himself by comparing it to isekai tropes

      "My modern knowledge makes things easier"? "...We uh, have magic that does that, why the hell would being able to harness electricity to make light matter? Besides, another country figured that out ages ago thanks to magic, just many of us prefer to use magic for it because cultural momentum"

      • When I think about what I would do if I suddenly found myself transported to another world, the last thing I would be doing is looking for a job as a mercenary. As stupid as a lot of the plot is, I really like Striving for a Luxury Liner simply because the MC recognizes that he's not cut out to be an adventurer and becomes a merchant instead.

        The only isekai I've read that properly utilized the isekai genre was Release that Witch since the MC's "cheat" is his knowledge of mechanical engineering. He kicks off his own little industrial revolution to defend his territory.

    • Yes, there's a lot of very good stories that have that basic setup, I'm just tired of how lazy and unimaginative most of it is.

  • There are decades worth of good anime out there. If new stuff isn't doin it for you, pick up a show from spring 2006 or something. A lot of trash comes out every season (and always has) but nobody is forcing you to watch it.

  • I'm willing to compromise with the isekai setup.

    You're in a new world. There's magic and sword play and monsters to fight. You get some skills and abilities that give you a decent chance to survive. I'm perfectly fine with that setup.

    But what I want once you have been given that setup is an interesting world to explore.

    Interesting characters to meet.

    Actual challenges and hardships that have to be overcome by the main character.

    Real relationships with people that have their own goals in life.

    And character growth that happens organically given the constraints of the system.

    We have far too many Mary Sue protagonists who never failed anything and never do anything wrong and who have so much power and are just so kind and giving in every single way and everybody loves them and nobody could beat them even if they didn't love them.

    We have far too many villains whose entire character Arc is "hurr durr look at me I'm a villain".

    And for some reason when those villains get converted into sidekicks they always become comical parodies of their former selves.

    And finally, even in a harem situation, the main character should neither be asexual or a man removed. Let him have some feelings about the person he's with and not automatically fall into some unspoken love scenario with the women around him.

    If you're going to have romance at all in your isekai anime, let the guy actually have some preferences and pick one person and stick with them.

    Like I get it you've got to give people a taste of the familiar but the taste of the familiar is only to lure us in. Once we are in, you need to give us something new and strange and stressful and worrisome and make us doubt the outcome of the next series of events that are going to happen.

  • Probably not, but after something like 2 decade of zombie shit everywhere i will take ANYTHING over it. Also there are good isekai, bad isekai and chinese isekai where the only thing coming of it is the protagonist using modern Earth idioms and perfectly assimilating otherwise.

  • The anime doesn't have to be good, it just has to make you interested in the lightnovel, which is where the profits are. With that in mind, the cheaper the anime can be produced the better. This is probably why there are so many shitty isekai and they keep coming.

  • no, i havent been watching anime at all for a good while because of this

  • You very much are not. However, that's how things always work out, a new theme appears and fascinates people, then everybody and their mom start using it for many years until it gets strip mined. Another comment mentioned zombies as an example, you can hardly see new zombie apocalypse stories these days because it's been overused already, before that i believe it was vampires, and other prominent themes have preceded those and passed. Isekai as a trope is still extremely popular to the point that stories that don't even need it get it tacked in as a prop to help it get popular. It's the way these things happen, and will continue until the next fun thing appears. Then it becomes just another trope to be used at the right time.

    It too will pass.

  • I really like the genre, I am mostly sad it's mainly very short ones with a single season. Would love something longer again like SAO. But I also don't watch a lot to begin with

  • I think that has been a pretty common opinion for the past 4 years lol

    My problem isn't isekai as a concept, it's the fact that all of them are pretty much the exact same. I enjoyed Sasaki and Peeps last season precisely because it deviated from most isekai

  • Disclaimer: Coming here from all, so I might not be the audience you're looking for.

    I don't tend to just browse for new releases that might be neat, but I've noticed this from the outside as well. Just through the stuff I run into under reccomendations on streaming services and sites. There's a ton of anime coming out that's either isekai, harem, power fantasy, or a combination of those themes.

    I think there's potential for some really good shows within those areas, but like most media, I feel that you're more likely to find quality by stepping back a bit and waiting to see what holds up over time.

  • Konosuba is the only decent isekai show, and it would be an even better show if they dropped the in-world video game mechanics.

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