Review of Frieren: Beyond Journey's End

I hate this show so much. Purely because it’s opening handful of episodes were so incredibly good that it hurts how mid the rest of it is, and I’m shocked to see it as the number 1 highest rated anime of all time, currently. It has a wonderful opening, compelling and fresh in the genre with beautiful vibes as it takes its time enjoying the magic and the world, complete with some fantastic worldbuilding. Like, the demon race being intrinsically evil is handled very interestingly. My favorite part is the Killing Magic section, where Frieren wakes up a sealed demon with the strongest magic in history,to reveal that the humans studied his magic and it is now just normal attack magic. Amazing stuff.

………and then the show takes a big ‘ol poo over everything when the show randomly pivots into a Hunter Hunter-like battle shounen (which it is not suited to) and nothing makes sense anymore. The fact that the humans could study and adapt to the Killing Magic no longer makes any sense (the scene is practically retconned) as we learn that magic is basically just an application of visualization and willpower, which can make *literally* anything happen- from nearly omniscient future vision, to completely negating all defensive magic. (Relatedly, the explanation for why you can’t manipulate the water inside people’s bodies is total BS- at the very least, you should be able to reliably manipulate stomach acid or pee, since those are typically located in about the same area for everyone)

Under the magic system as described later in the show, delusional people should all have godlike powers (as demonstrated by that one cutting girl) and somehow NOBODY IN THE WORLD HAS FIGURED OUT THAT MAGIC IS THIS EASY TO ABUSE IN ALL OF HISTORY

I think what happened, is that the author ran out of ideas after [the first big demon antagonist] dies. I’ve read the manga and it never fully recovers its identity (though the arc with the demon in the gold city was pretty good), and I am so disappointed in it.