Maoyuu First Impression : THIS IS WAR

There is a reason why i definitely must survive 2012 anno doom and why i keep throwing money on the screen, yes bruh, this is the reason. finally it's here, the famous tale of a hero and the demon king (queen actually) directly from the 2ch, traveling from a novel, many mango, and finally an animu adaptation, Maoyuu Maou Yuusha.

Hero: “What is this, an evil ritual?”

Demon Queen: “No. It’s an economic study on the benefits of war as a large consumption market.”

I belive in the fantasy genre we already familiar with the tale of the hero party and their quest to defeat the demon king (duh), and there's many version of it too, you can say that maoyuu is that witty Churchill version, a deconstruction of the genre and the quest itself, the story about war, economics, politics, agricultural, and a love. and a serious story about how potato is the first world problem, srsly.

Usually the story ends when the hero meets the demon king and defeat it, but in Maoyuu this is where the story begins. You can't just go speedrun to the last boss and beat the game, what if the afterwar result is ugly for both sides? what if there's still no peace and happily ever after? what if actually the world is saved by the war? the war can't just end suddenly like that, as the wrong flag could bring the bad end, it could bring the catashtropic post-war state that could be more terrifiying than the war itself. What im trying to say is a plague, hunger, and a chaos. yup, a dark age is a cool age when every matter could be grave.

"if it's an army duty to end a war, it's a king duty to find a place for it ends" -as the demon queen said that, while she tell us that actually Yuri Orlov and Koko Hekmatyar is actually just a good guy with a good job, she propose the contract to our silly hero to playin the role of the messiah and actually really save the world from devastation together (inb4 all the demon queen wants actually just a consensual hug), and with all the explanation, as our hero with the justice of the world become a litlle-less not silly and educated, he agreed the contract and they both eloping together into an adventure time. so yeah, that's basically the summary of Maoyuu, it's a story about how the hero and demon queen become a messiah and save the world with war (or just potato actually).

"There is no war, yet peace has not graced the land... This story is about the stage in between." - Pumpkin Scissors, is a good references.

that's it for the little summary, now lets review it. a long story short, the first episode is actually about a talking useless meat...

"Holy shit! the boobs is talk!"

..or not. it's have a head you pervert.

I couldn't be any hype more with the episode one. the graphical artworks is beautiful, i love all the beautiful artistic painting-like setting in every landscape, ecspecially in the first 5 minutes scene and the nice boat scene, they really success to make it like we watch a rpg-ish fantasy and a fairy tale in this animu

The character design is pretty decent and well-drawing too since they using the novel design for it, but unfortunately the mango design still the master race for me. as the demon queen is potrayed with more dark and edgy outfit in the mango so it can live up to her title, this animu design is more safe if i must say, but either way the queen is still elegant though.

I really dig the music and the soundtrack. it's well match and fitting with all these medieval setting and stories, not even kajiuran but it's indeed have a celtic and grand taste on it, they even add the classy jazz bgm in the demon queen introduction scene, it's just awesome. and i didn't even mention the OP and ED, the OP was a great mood booster with a good music and animation scene, while the ED is artsy and avant garde with an ephemeral ancient taste that just fitting to ending the episode. it's really relevant to my interest.

Now is the seiyuu....this is what i really hypin for, it's the motherfuckin FukuJun and Ami Koshimizu! Finally i can hear Lawrence and Holo do a verbal sparring and lolconversation again, oh sweet heaven, how i longed for this, it was a good nostalgic feeling...

 

Let's put all the element together, all those economics involvement, celtic-ish music, medieval setting, and all the voice actress...with all the smiliarities atmosphere i can't help but to think that this is the another season of Spice and Wolf (aka the best animu ever), oh and did i mention that it was indeed produced by the same director and actually the ED of Maoyuu is perform by the same singer who did the OP for Spice and Wolf in Season 2? it's really makin it hard to separate this from the Spice and Wolf, they are just changin the role instead the traveling merchant and wise wolf of yoitsu, it was the Hero and the Demon Queen this time.

...the way they tell the story is pretty cool i guess, how the hero leave his party alone and so on. and yeah, the way they showing all the character cast to explaining how the politics and economics works in this series instead our bouncy demon queen is indeed a cool too, but unfortunately, that was pretty much missing all the important part, it makes the demon queen pretty much lost her charismatic and witty image.

I guess they really make it more light and more easy to understand in the animu, there's a bit of silly part in this episode, like how they didn't put the proper scene why our hero is agreed to hear out the queen while she is, the demon queen. that's makes our hero looks like he foolishly lured by the queen words to her lair without a good explanation (if you're curious, this is the missing scene). they really trying hard to bring out all the queen's dere in the animu, well i guess i know the reason since the manga is pretty serious and the dere is not as much as this, but they make every dere in the mango is a best dere. They even throw out our demon queen 'useless meat' trademark instead changing it with a 'flabby upper arm', yes, this was silly. but hey man, you cant pleased everyone, i couldnt get anymore complain with all the blissful quality they put in the animu as i said all above, it is still the best animu.

"useless meat denied, have this flabby upper arm instead"

If you really want to get all the philosophy and deep undestanding about how the plot, war, and politics in this story goes on, i definitely, definitely, recommend you the mango for it. as the big fan of the Spice and Wolf and another medieval age works, Maoyuu is my best bet for now

Overall i really enjoy the bliss of the first episode, definitely approve it. i dont know what will happen with this series in the future, wether the quality of the story or the graphical QUALITY will drop or not, but as you can see in all my post above, i really have a high hopes for this series and i will not abandon the ride till the end. if they didnt mess-up the story (with forced fanservice and scenes) and really following the original mango or novel, i belive this series will be my early year aoty, guhehe

so that's my review guiz, here, have this 30 seconds to mars song for the closing