Review of KonoSuba: An Explosion on This Wonderful World!

Konosuba came out in 2016 and was a parody of isekai that were quite popular at the time. But the more time have passed the more bland isekai have released and the more love Konosuba has garnered. The third season is going to be aired next year and the spin-off/prequel to the series was made to satisfy the thirst. In theory, this looks pretty smoothly: it's a spin-off to a lovely franchise and the story is about admittedly the best girl; what can possibly go wrong? Comedies usually tend to use an episodic plot structure for storytelling. The main benefit of it is to create manydiverse situations, which produce different setups and, in the end, different types of jokes. Konosuba spin-off chooses a linear storytelling, that reduces the variety of situations. Nevertheless, I found some jokes funny, but the amount of them was scant and the linear storytelling can be an explanation. And, of course, the flat chest joke is present. Anime comedies never change.

Even though the show is more story heavy than the original Konosuba, it is still a spin-off and the expectation should be low. Unfortunately, the anime doesn't introduce new characters worth remembering, instead focusing on the already familiar ones. There are explanation of why Megumin chose to level up only explosion magic, how she end up being in Axel, and the origin of her relationship with Yunyun. It was expected from the prequel. Come to think of it, Yunyun has become a genuinely interesting character, rather than just a self proclaimed rival for Megumin.

Visually the show looks very good, including both the animation and art style. The most impressive magical cast in Konosuba was Megumin's explosion and every time she cast it is a feast for the eyes. It is used fairly frequently, but it still looks stunning. The ost is default fantasy music, have nothing to say about it. On the other hand, the music in OP and ED is good and ED, per se, looks fresh and unique.

The Konosuba spin-off is good for spin-off, buta nothing more. It failed to remind why people love Konosuba in the first place, as well as to nail the story or comedy aspect. It definitely isn't a disappointment, however it doesn't elaborate on franchise. If you are a hardcore Konosuba fan you will, for sure, enjoy this, but if you aren't you can easily pass on it.

Question of the day: is a prequel to an isekai still an isekai?