With apologies in advance: this is a brand new movie, and there isn’t much footage
available to edit with right now, so we’ll be filling in the gaps using footage from
the tv show. So what you’re seeing won’t always perfectly represent what the movie
is, but I think it’s close enough, because… Konosuba the Movie: Legend of Crimson is basically
Konosuba, but, y’know, a movie. It’s 90 minutes long, and the animation’s WAY better
(mostly), but this JC Staff film is cut from wholly the same cloth as the hilarious Studio
Deen tv anime that first introduced us to Kazuma and co and the ludicrous fantasy realm
they call home. In fact this movie was made by mostly the same creative team as the show,
just working in a different building. And… Konosuba is one of my favourite anime
EVER, so that all sounds like good news to me. I relish any chance to join these lovable
idiots on another misadventure, and I have been as stoked as a human being can be for
this movie ever since it was announced. When I heard crunchyroll would be bringing it to
North America, I… continued to be exactly that stoked… because I set my baseline level
too high… Subsequently, I was pretty bummed to find
out that we’d be in Japan when the movie hit theatres (not that bummed. Like, we’re
still on vaction IN JAPAN! But a little bummed.) Thankfully though, the fine folks at crunchyroll
were kind enough to send me a press screener so that I could enjoy and review the film
before I left. As a result, I watched this on a smaller screen
than most folk will, at least in the near future, and even with a big copyright notice
taking up the top quarter of it, I think that my viewing experience benefitted from that.
I didn’t have to worry about bothering anyone with my overly loud laughter, which is good
news because the movie had me cackling from beginning to end. But also, it’s VERY obvious
that Takaomi Kanasaki is more experienced with directing for television than he is film.
There’s a lot of single-character closeup reaction shots, that, while they are beautifully
animated thanks to that feature budget, are probably gonna feel a bit overwhelming when
they’re blown up on a 50 foot screen. The way the film is paced and plotted makes it
feel more like a 3 episode arc of television than a feature film. Heck, it even uses the
series’ trademark eycatches to punctuate gags.
That said, I do still heartily recommend seeing this movie in theatres, if you can. The more
successful these anime movies are in general, the better chances are that we’ll see more
of them brought over in the future. And there are some VERY impressively animated action
scenes toward the film’s climax that BEG to be enjoyed at a massive scale with full
surround sound. Most importantly though, if you love Konosuba’s characters, world, and
sense of humor, you shouldn’t have to wait any longer for your fix.
In spots, I’d say this movie represents some of the best of all three.
The film begins, as many Konosuba stories do, with our heroes drinking away their shame
after failing an easy quest. This scene allows newcomers to briefly familiarize themselves
with the group’s comedic dynamic and all the things that make them so terrible as individuals,
before Yunyun comes in out of the blue with a proposition for Kazuma.
Uh, sorry, I read that wrong. What I should have said is that Yunyun propositions Kazuma,
insisting that she needs to have his baby. A letter from her father, the chief of the
crimson demon clan, has lead her to believe that the clan and the world are in danger,
and that only her and Kazuma’s prophesied child can save them. Our hero, as you’d
expect, treats this weighty request with all the respect and careful consideration that
it – ah, who am I kidding. His pants are on the floor before she finishes the sentence.
Luckily for Yunyun - not so much for Kazuma – it turns out there’s been a slight…
miscommunication. Yunyun decides to return to the village to clear things up, and geeling
guilty about letting her friendless “rival” go it alone, Megumin ropes the party into
following her, with the magical help of Wiz and Vanir.
After a bit of banter about Vanir’s ongoing efforts to get rich off of Kazuma’s memories
of modern japan, Wiz readies a teleportation spell, and an instant later our heroes are…
Surrounded by a tribe of sex-starved female orcs, who immediately try to rape Kazuma.
And the movie decides that’s just the perfect setup for a slapstick comedy chase scene.
Yeah. Luckily Yunyun shows up to save him before
all of his clothes are ripped off, and once the danger’s gone, the movie goes back to
konosuba’s classic running gag of mocking Kazuma for being pathetic. Look at this doofus,
crawling on the ground with his ass hanging out, desperately clinging to his saviour,
getting snot all over her robe because he can’t stop crying.
You know. Because he was almost raped, like, five seconds ago. Which is also the reason
that his butt is hanging out. But don’t worry, they acknowledge that the event was
traumatic for him. By putting up a “Kazuma’s trauma” counter on the next eyecatch.
Look, I’m all for dunking on Kuzuma when he deserves it, which is often, but this whole
bit left a really bad taste in my mouth. To be CRYSTAL CLEAR, I don’t think that
terrible joke, or the other one that comes up later “ruins the movie.” As I said
at the top of this review, I loved this film, overall. The animation’s often gorgeous,
I adore these characters, this is maybe the most interesting AND hilarious setting they’ve
visited so far, and I was laughing my ass off consistently from beginning to end. There
are even parts of this scene, like Darkness’s very on-brand reaction to learning that there
are no male orcs left, that made me laugh. But that joke’s overall premise is, at best,
tired and unfunny – girls bravo did the same thing well over a decade ago – and
at worst, it serves to reinforce some really shitty, toxic ideas about male rape victims.
I don’t wanna make this whole review about that, though, so, if you need some help understanding
why someone would see it as a problem, there’s a great video from pop culture detective that
covers the subject way better than I ever could. Link in the dooblydoo.
Like I said, there is one other really shitty, meanspirited gag in this movie. Without spoiling
things, at one point it’s revealed that a certain beautiful woman has a penis, and
after Kazuma reacts to that with a completely unwarranted level of disgust, the movie decides
to throw it up on the trauma scorecard. Next to the attempted gang rape. Which is the ONLY
other thing that ever goes on that scorecard. Implying that the two events were equally
horrifying. I… hope I don’t have to explain why that’s
bullshit. Now, maybe the joke is supposed to be that
Kazuma’s a transphobic asshole. But it doesn’t come off that way. It comes off as lazy, tone
deaf, and mean. And I think the movie would have been better without both of these jokes.
You might disagree with that. You might even think they’re funny. And I don’t expect
to change your mind if you do, but…if you’re feeling an urge to charge into the comments
and tell me that you think I’m doing something wrong by bringing this up as a criticism at
all… Please, consider for a second that lots of
different kinds of people watch my videos, many of whom might be personally hurt by jokes
mocking rape victims and trans people. And, as the purpose of this review is to help people
figure out if they want to spend money and time on this movie, I have a responsibility
to inform those members of my audience about these potentially unpleasant surprises.
Even though I would recommend seeing the film even to people who take issue with them, because
it has a lot going for it. Sorry for going off on a tangent. I read the
comments, so I know the vast majority of you already understand that, but I read the comments,
so I still felt it needed to be said. Those two scenes really did stick in my craw,
but I think they only stood out as much as they did because the rest of the movie is
so damn funny. More or less as soon as the gang of idiots
reaches the Crimson Demon Village, we see that they’re handling the demon king’s
army just fine on their own. Uh, to the point that I actually started to feel pretty bad
for the army of evil goblins. The crimson demons are a bunch of ridiculously OP anime
wizards, after all, and most of them know more than one spell.
But they’re also a bunch of melodramatic chuunibyou losers, and it turns out that the
part of her dad’s letter that had Yunyun most worried, “by the time you read this,
I will have already passed on” is just their version of “I hope this letter finds you
well.” The movie really commits to this concept of
performative Chuunibyou delusions as a fully realized culture with its own history, customs
and ettiquette. And every second that it spends building that world up is just… comic gold.
Every townsperson is delightfully quirky in their own special way, and each one wears
a costume more ridiculous than the last. The town itself is roughly styled after a traditional
Japanese village, but where you’d expect to see shrines or religious iconograpy, we
instead find finely-carved wooden bishoujo figurines. And the film’s eventual explanation
for how this culture came to be is… equally hysterical.
Konosuba really has a knack for making the ridiculous feel real, and this movie really
puts that strength to use. Learning more about the crimson demons in
turn helps us better understand both Megumin and Yunyun. The latter is the “local weirdo,”
which means that she’s the only sane, reasonable person there, and along with Kazuma, yunyun
gets a lot of hilarious opportunities to play the straight man against the wacky villagers.
Megumin is more at home here, and we get to see her actual home. The first member of her
family that we meet is also the cutest; Kommeko, a precocious mini-megumin, dressed in her
older sister’s patchwork hand-me-downs, who steals basically every scene she’s in
with adorably expressive animations and a lot of blunt “uh, aren’t you a bit young
to be talking like that” commentary. Megumin’s parents are dirt poor, which clearly
puts a lot of strain on them and gives their tiny house a slightly… tense atmosphere.
Her parents do cheer up when they learn that Kazuma owns a mansion and is about to come
into 300 million Eris, though. The way her mom reacts to that in particular leads to
a lot of great comedy, and a little bit of genuine character development as well.
As with every Konosuba adventure, the combative but steadfast friendship between our four
leads really drives this story forward, and imbues it with some much-needed heart to offset
the raw cynicism. But while Darkness and Aqua do get plenty of screen time, this is a Kazuma
and Megumin story. Which I think is a good choice, from a stortelling perspective, because
it’s a lot easier to take them seriously when the narrative need arises. And the other
two do great as comedy relief. Aqua’s definitely at her best when she doesn’t
have to carry any real narrative weight and she’s free to just be a stupid, whiny idiot
for laughs; and while Darkness is fully capable of taking heroic actions that move a plot
forward, it’s a lot funnier when she decides to, you know, not… do that.
I won’t say that the film uses them to their FULL comedic potential – I still think that
the axis cult arc that caps off season 2 is the funniest the series has aver been – but
their antics nonetheless had me rolling, and I think that most Konosuba fans will walk
away feeling more than satisfied with the laughs this movie offers. It’s also nice
to see an anime movie that actually feels integral to the overall plot of a series for
once – a result of this film being adapted from a light novel, instead of being anime
original. The trade-off for that is that this does just
feel like more of the tv-show, which might be disappointing if you go in looking for
something more cinematic. The movie does take advantage of its more lavish production values
by making the already vibrant characters even more animated and layering sight-gags into
the background of almost every scene… but, yknow, even if it didn’t, it’s been so
long since we last HAD “more konosuba” that I’d honestly have been happy if the
movie was JUST that. The konosuba fanboy in me felt almost 100%
satisfied with this movie for its brilliant riff on the series’ long-running “Kazuma
desu” gag alone. As I said, though, it’s got some really
beautiful and hilarious character animation on top of that, and there is also a big cool
action climax that’s packed full of sakuga, but… I’ll leave you to discover for yourself
how the movie gets there. If you only see one anime film this year…
uh, it should probably be Promare, honestly. But if, like me, you love Konosuba, then I
wholeheartedly recommend giving Legend of Crimson a watch as well. It’s not a perfect
movie, or even a perfect konosuba story, but it delivers on almost everything that made
me love the show in the first place, and there’s no other franchise in anime that makes me
laugh quite like this one does. The film’s best moments are more than enough to make
up for its shortcomings. Or at least, they were for me.
Konosuba the Movie: Legend of Crimson hits theatres across the US on November 12th and
14th. Click the link in the dooblydoo to see when and where it will be showing near you,
and to get your tickets today. Now, I’m back on vacation until November
16th, but there are two more great guest videos coming in the mean time, so please look forward
to those.