Scooped Up by an S-Rank Adventurer! – Episode 1

What’s it about? After Lloyd’s hometown was destroyed by monsters he was rescued by his teacher and spent his entire childhood learning how to use magic.  He joined a hero’s party but was eventually kicked out for being “useless”.  Lloyd doesn’t get discouraged from this setback and ultimately looks for another hero’s team that will find value in his skills. 

I’m not sure why almost all of the leaders in hero’s parties this season are complete jerks.  The arrogance they display is something to behold and it’s almost a relief when they receive their comeuppance in later episodes.  Aside from that, this premiere is so bland and unoriginal that it almost feels like a joke.  Every single scene felt like it was copied from previous shows with a similar premise. Lloyd has no personality and is boring to the point that I found myself checking how many minutes were left before the episode finished.  At least the water animation for The Water Magician was nice to look at, and there’s a real sense that it’s TRYING to be interesting.  I think what both these shows fail to realize is that training arcs aren’t just about learning new skills, it’s also meant to help us understand the protagonists’ motivations for their goals and why we should be invested in their development.  

Instead, we are mainly subjected to Lloyd’s teacher showing off she’s stronger than him and continuously puts him down anytime he makes some progress in his training.  It seems that there’s a reason why she wants to keep him humble, but any intrigue this plot point could have is immediately thrown out the window because the story is too lazy to develop a cohesive plot. To be honest, I’m not entirely sure what Lloyd’s abilities are since there’s no explanation on how white mages like him are different from other mages.  Based on the title, Lloyd is probably secretly powerful and will eventually wipe the floor against every arrogant soul that dares to challenge him.  The main question is, why should I care? What does this show offer that is different from the rest of its genre? 

That said, I’m grateful that the female characters are fully clothed (why is the bar so low?), but they don’t come off as competent members of their team.  They mostly fawn over their idiot leader, not realizing that Lloyd is the reason for all their success.  Thankfully, the scene where Lloyd gets fired isn’t humiliating nor cruel like other fantasy shows from last season, but I sort of wish there were more moments that stood out so that there’s something else worth writing about.  There’s nothing memorable about the animation, to the point that it’s obvious they cut corners by consistently focusing on the changing clouds to indicate the passage of time.  It felt so forced and took me out of any scene that tried to make a semblance of an impact.  

This was super boring folks.  Everything about this premiere was such a waste of time that it made me want to pull out my hair.  I honestly suggest that you skip this one entirely.  There’s better anime out there and frankly this show isn’t worth your time.