Review of Drug Store in Another World: The Slow Life of a Cheat Pharmacist

Recommendation: Drugstore In Another World is going to appeal to a very specific audience, those that want a relaxing, zero drama, cute comedy. If you are easily bored by "slow life" anime, this one will be no different. Story: None to speak of. It is an isekai on paper only, the fact that the main character, Reiji, came from another world is barely even referenced until the last episode of the series, and there's almost nothing even worth saying about it. Reiji hated his job and boom, he's suddenly in another world. That's all there is to it. The actual episodesare formulaic, with a character coming into Reiji's pharmacy with a problem and Reiji inventing a medicine to solve whatever the issue is. How well each of these segments works usually depends on the characters involved.

Audio/Visual: The voice acting is pretty hit or miss. Too many characters have high pitched cutesy voices, but Reiji's VA (Fukushima Jun, best known as Kazuma of Konosuba) does solid work. Visually, it's a struggle. It's clear that this show had almost no budget. Animation is poor, there are a number of cut corners, and embarrassing errors like frames where Noela is just a head and arms with no body. The saving grace here is that they manage to turn this into a joke at times, notably Reiji's medicine making dance where they use the same clips of him shaking test tubes or chopping lettuce over and over to the point of absurdity and it starts becoming funnier every time they do it once the series hits its stride.

Characters: Mostly good and funny characters. Reiji is your typical isekai MC, his reactions are funny but he doesn't have much going on other than being a nice dude that helps people with their problems. The other main characters are Noela, the childlike wolf girl, and Mina, the ghost in the house that Reiji runs his pharmacy out of. Both are cute in their own ways, but overly saccharine, all things considered. The side characters are mostly good, other than insane, jealous woman from the first episode. Paula, the foul mouthed blacksmith in a frilly pink dress, and Vivi, the powerless lake spirit, were my personal favorites, but there are plenty of fun characters here. There's typically a rotating cast of part timers at the pharmacy, so they change up the combinations of characters in each part of the story, though Reiji and Noela are always involved. They generally keep the show from getting boring and are the main reason to watch, though there are some misfire segments here and there.