Review of The Demon Sword Master of Excalibur Academy
I started this, was disappointed, dropped it, and now I picked it up again and finished it. I left the original / preliminary review unchanged, and the rest of the review will be at the bottom. ### Previous preliminary review (5/10 after 6 episodes) The first two episodes seemed kinda interesting, the premise was definitely not new but it did seem like it could be enjoyable, but it slowly became more and more boring until I couldn't get motivated to watch another episode, and eventually dropped it. It's not the worst thing I've seen, but it has zero redeeming qualities and is a mix of all the olderpopular series with demon lords (and maybe a few more), taking from them 3+ bad parts for every 1 good part. The result is a run-of-the-mill story, with poor animation, poor story, uninteresting characters, uninteresting magic, uninteresting everything.
Maybe it's worth a watch if you have nothing else to watch, but I'd honestly start my 4th rewatch of Overlord rather than keep watching this. Then again I'm a no-lifer, so I might end up finishing this at some point, who knows.
### Review after finishing (4/10)
So... I do a 4th rewatch of Overlord, and there are a few more weeks until the next season's series are completed, so I came back and finished it. My disappointment only grew.
By far the most annoying thing was the MC. You have this demon lord (adult, seemingly in his ~30s when he died, and probably "lived" many more after that) from a thousand years ago who was resurrected back into a 10-year-old child. At times he acts, thinks, and speaks like an IKEA demon lord, but for the rest of the series he acts, thinks, and speaks like the flustered teen stereotype MC you see in every anime. He's so "cruel" he doesn't bat an eye when someone dies in front of him even though he could save them... but obviously protects the poor orphans and then attempts to "save face" by trying to explain to his old subordinates that he's still unchanged and has some reason. Contrary to Overlord, this duality doesn't seem humorous, it's just in poor taste. But okay.
Magic (modern or old) is never really explained, not much lore and background is there either except a few (admittedly, somewhat interesting) pre-reincarnation flashbacks. It's a 12-episode series, so let's not be too hard on this point. Based on the story so far, some stuff would likely have been revealed later on and it's what the MC is trying to figure out, but there are still some places that could use improvement.
Animation, sound, dialogue are all poor. Not the worst I've seen, but at most average, likely a bit below. A few animations were reused too (**thrice**!), without even bothering to make even a minor change - I guess the budget of the last episode was half that of previous ones. Music is a bit above, even if misplaced or exaggerated at some points, but maybe 6-7? CGI is on the bad side too (think Overlord skeletons). The VA-ing is okay-ish but not consistent and maybe has some sync issues too. Character design is exactly average for the main cast, and very bad for the enemy mobs.
Maybe I'll rewatch an old favorite to clear the bad aftertaste this has left. Are you sure you've rewatched your favorites enough times? Even if you have, maybe just pick another genre you don't usually watch and try that instead? Unless all else fails, don't even bother with this one.