“Go ahead and kill me. Go on. You’ll kill me no matter what I say, right? Fine by me! I want to die!”

Ishura represents a weird oxymoron that I had difficulty wrapping my head around. It is painfully unoriginal in a rather original way. I can easily see where it draws influence from, but I don’t know that I’ve seen those influences thrown together in this particular manner. If the production was remotely competent, it might even be considered promising. Instead, Ishura blends mediocre visuals with so much edge and rushed drama that I was left bouncing between confusion and apathy, and that was before I even realized it was an isekai. When I skimmed through the new shows of this season, I noticed there was a huge volume of fantasy series premiering. Fantasy anime are pretty common to begin with, but more than half the titles on my shortlist of “ones to sample” were some flavor of fantasy. This left me with a question that was reverberating in my head throughout this first episode. With so many new fantasy series to try out, why would I bother wasting any more time with this one?

Ishura starts off in a world where the demon king has already been defeated (like in Frieren and plenty of other fantasy series). Our protagonist, Yuno the Distant Talon, has grown up in the Nagan Labyrinth City, a city built around a mysterious labyrinth from which artifacts can be discovered (like in Made in Abyss and plenty of other fantasy series), but hostile, mechanical golems also emerge from within. One day, when Yuno was spending idyllic time with her best friend, Can’t Bother to Remember Her Name-chan, the labyrinth awoke to reveal itself to be a giant golem, which immediately started Attack on Titan-ing the population of the city (Like in well… Attack on Titan… and countless other- you get the point). Yuno is horrified to see “Can’t Bother to Remember Her Name” get brutally dismembered before her eyes. That’s how the first five minutes play out. It’s like watching a clip show for a series you’ve never seen. As Yuno contemplates suicide by murderous robot, she’s suddenly saved by our other protagonist, Soujiro the Willow-Sword. You see Drax the Destroyer Soujiro the Willow-Sword is a skilled isekai victim who promptly takes out the golems attacking Vash the Stampede Yuno the Distant Talon using only a dull sword. He then takes the opportunity to also kill the towering labyrinth, not because he wants to save Ronan the Accuser Yuno the Distant Talon, but because he considers it fun. As you can see, this show displays a cavalcade of influences, but it never materializes into a coherent or, god-forbid, interesting narrative. Also, I may be making fun of the show’s Blank the Blank naming format, but it’s truly ridiculous. There are 18 characters listed on the Wikipedia page, and every single one follows that naming convention.

The production is being headed up by Passione with Sanzigen handling the CGI animation. I’m not in love with either aspect, but I think it’s the latter that really lets the show down. The CG environments, background characters and enemies don’t mesh well with the traditional animation, and even in mild doses it’s distracting. Sanzigen evidently did CG animation for Fire Emblem: The Three Houses, so the studio can clearly turn in some quality work in limited doses, but I was left unimpressed here. Still, the biggest problem of the show is the writing. Even if Passione and Sanzigen had turned in exceptional visuals that wouldn’t change the stilted dialogue and incomprehensible pacing. This show legitimately starts with what feels like the first episode and a half of Attack on Titan crammed down into 6 minutes, but with constant lore being layered on top. I found myself thinking back to Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress, a show which I remember being jokingly called “Attack on Train,” but at least it had its own identity and had some semblance of logic. I walked away from this episode not only convinced that I didn’t understand Ishura’s lore, but determined not to try. I apologize to Can’t Bother to Remember Her Name-chan for the disrespect.

Before I wrap up, a few Notes and Nitpicks:

• Evidently Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress received a movie sequel? I don’t tend to check out anime movies all that often, so I’m probably not going to watch it anytime soon, but it’s apparently on Netflix.
• What constitutes ‘fantasy’ can be a little subjective, but by my estimate, roughly 24 out of 45 series airing this season could be considered to fall under that umbrella. I’m wondering if this ratio has actually increased, or I’m just more sensitive to it since we have less blockbuster titles coming out this season.
• I think the only series I’ve sampled by Passione was Citrus. I only watched one episode of that, so I don’t have much opinion of the studio, one way or another.
• Honestly, this anime season crept up on me a little. In my head, I still had a few days, but that’s probably because the shows I’m still following from last season come out around the weekend so I didn’t think of it starting until then.

Ishura is derivative in a frustratingly disappointing way. I can imagine a world where this show could come together to offer an engaging twist on the popular tropes of the moment, but that’s not the world we’re in. We’re in a world where Ishura falls prey to rambling dialogue, dissonant visuals, and uninteresting characters, so unless you find yourself isekai-ed to that other world I described, I recommend you skip it.

Score: 2/5