This essay will reference sexual assault, child predation, and miscellaneous unsavory content. If that makes you uncomfortable or is unsuitable for your age group, this is your chance to step away from this disaster of the show. You will be better off, trust me.
Anime is chock full of unpleasant, unsettling, and disturbing content at the best of times. Most anime fans have come to accept that the medium comes with baggage, like the sexualization of minors, the not-so subtle winking at lolicons and the like, and all sorts of things that keep us from being able to enjoy all the great parts of anime. I’ve had to drop a number of series for crossing similar lines.
In the first episode of No Game No Life, we immediately meet siblings Sora and Shiro. Shiro is an 11-year-old girl, and the first time we meet her, she is posed suggestively in a shot that exposes her underwear. Before she says a word, the viewer is forced to see this child in a sexual light. I turned it off and didn’t look back.
In the second arc of Bakemonogatari, the protagonist, Araragi, gets in a scuffle with a schoolgirl. After the fact, she laments the loss of her virtue and he admits to having felt her chest. He does this with a straight face, completely unashamed, and almost sort of proud about it. I turned it off and didn’t look back.
There are more examples of this than I care to admit, but those are the most severe, and believe me when I tell you Mushoku Tensei is worse. For all its production values, voice talent, and compelling story, it unapologetically presents its protagonist as a serial sexual predator and proceeds to support his actions. With no hesitation, I can say that Mushoku Tensei is the worst anime I’ve ever seen.
Mushoku Tensei began life as a web novel at the very beginning of the isekai boom in 2012. I can’t speak for the content of the web or light novels, as I’m unwilling to go further with this story, but this may as well serve as a condemnation of the entire franchise. I will only be addressing the anime from here on out, though.
Our protagonist is an unemployed shut-in who gets hit by a truck and dies, and is reincarnated as a baby in a fantasy world. Befitting one of the first proper isekai, it plays those familiar notes in the song we’ve already heard. In its first six episodes, Mushoku Tensei has a handful of uncomfortable moments, but any experienced anime watcher can look at it through the corner of their eye and move on.
In the first episode, the newborn Rudy watches his parents have sex, and appears to be gratified by the experience. In the following episodes, as he grows up, he harasses the women in his life, including his mother, babysitter, and tutor. He ogles them, spies on them, and steals their underwear. He does all of this while taking advantage of the fact that he appears to be a child, even though he has the mind of a man in his mid-thirties.
However, there are two examples in the first six episodes that were far more abhorrent than Rudy’s usual tendency to be a sex pest, and while one was serious, two broke the camel’s back. If you haven’t given up by now, I’m sorry, but I guess you’re determined to see this through.
Early on, Rudy befriends an elf boy named Sylphie, after defending him from a couple of bullies. The two strike up a genuinely wholesome friendship, or at least it is until they get caught in the rain and return home to take a bath. At this point, Rudy is under the impression that Sylphie is a boy. Sylphie is short for Sylphiette, and is actually a girl, but that’s completely irrelevant to the point. The writer seems unaware that it’s irrelevant to the point, but let’s continue for a moment under that erroneous assumption.
Sylphie is reluctant to take off his clothes and get in the bath with Rudy. Rudy, despite being a grown man in a child’s body, ignores the possibility that Sylphie could have some underlying trauma or physical condition that would make him reluctant to undress around others. Heck, Rudy ignores the possibility that his androgynous friend could be a girl.
That’s not important, because for some reason, Rudy really wants Sylphie to take his clothes off, and what Sylphie wants is unimportant. He forces himself on Sylphie, stripping her, and when she fights him off, he decides to sneak attack his sobbing friend who is pleading with him to stop, all so that he can take her clothes off. Rudy only realizes he did something wrong when he discovers that the child he stripped and humiliated was a girl.
But here’s the thing; in what world is it acceptable for Rudy to sexually assault his friend because Sylphie was a boy? Is Mushoku Tensei saying it’s okay to molest children as long as the predator is the same gender? It’s not. It is just as egregious, and yet he proceeds to fake an apology to the girl he victimized and manipulates her into accepting it. Do you think that this is disturbing and the absolute lowest that Rudy and the show can sink to? Oh, you’re in for a treat.
Rudy later accepts a job tutoring his cousin Eris, a haughty rich girl who delights in inflicting physical violence on anyone who mildly inconveniences her. Gosh, they’re a match made in hell. Despite their differences, a scuffle with some bandits allows them to arrive at something resembling a healthy relationship between family members.
At least until they’re playing together, and Eris is suddenly so exhausted from the game that she drops in the stable and takes a nap in the hay. It might be a funny and humanizing moment for a character who up to this point has been vicious and aloof, but it’s not meant to be. While Rudy sees his sleeping cousin and starts getting ideas, it’s time for a quick reminder.
Rudy possesses the body of a child, and the mind of a 40-year-old man at this point in the story. Eris is eleven, and his cousin, and even if you want to invoke the casual approach to incest that this medieval world most likely has, Rudy should not be attracted to an 11-year-old girl in any way. For every normal human, that is wrong, egregious, and unacceptable.
So you might understand my dismay when Rudy begins to grope his sleeping, 11-year-old cousin and attempts to rape her. If not for the fact that he was afraid of being caught while assaulting his cousin, he would not have stopped. We already know his grasp on consent is nonexistent.
This is where I dropped the show and never looked back. It’s unapologetic garbage where the “hero” is an easily identified pedophile and sexual predator and shows no interest in portraying any of that behavior as obviously evil as it is.
I’m telling you all this now because, despite how clearly heinous it is, Mushoku Tensei was wildly popular when it aired last winter. It was the fifth most popular show in a season that had Attack on Titan, Re: Zero, Horimiya, The Promised Neverland, SK8 The Infinity, Beastars, and a dozen more good-to-great shows that deserve your attention far more than this filth.
It was so popular that its second season was announced right after it finished airing, and is slated to begin airing this fall season. So if you’ve heard great things about its character writing, animation, and story, those are all true. You might not have heard that it’s like Lolita if the main character was treated like a good person whose actions are not questionable.
So I might apologize for this break in my usual content; I try to avoid adult material that might alienate part of my audience, but my hatred for Mushoki Tensei is overwhelming to the point that I was willing to take a step from the typical Otaku Exhibition. Keep in mind that this was based on half of the first season, and I have no idea how much worse it got after I dropped it.
This is the part where I say leave a comment or talk to me about it on Twitter @ExhibitionOtaku, but I’ve already debated a lot of people who insisted that Rudy is somehow sympathetic or relatable, and the idea that this monster is relatable makes me want to puke. So if you want to comment, tell me how your day is going, or what totally wholesome anime you’re watching. Until next time, thanks for reading.
The Otaku Exhibition 
65 responses to “Mushoku Tensei is the Worst Anime Ever Made”
I don’t agree with your points. First, Rudeus has been reborn, so he is younger than Elise now. Rudeus is not a great person; he is perverted, but that is a by-product of his old life of a shut-in. He tries to do better as a human being. I know his actions were horrible, but the anime left out some ò the inner reflections of Rudy. I ask that you give the show more time or read the light-novel. There is a reason why an entire studio was created to adapt this 20-year-old series.
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If the source material is better then fine, but that’s not what the anime is. Asking someone to sit through it will only make things worse because you’re telling them to waste time on the lesser adaptation. And to be honest, it’s less of an adaptation issue and more a product of its age.
Twenty years ago, I wouldn’t have blinked twice, mostly because I’d be watching/reading the cool fight scenes and laughing at Eris beating him for it. Ten years ago I probably would have let it slide as well since Isekai hadn’t taken off to that extent and the world in itself is fascinating more than anything else. But now?
Reborn or not, he has the mind of a thirty-year-old man and if he looked his actual age you know that wouldn’t fly.
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The adaption has its own good points, and the light novel was written 20 years ago. It is the beginning of the reborn in another world genre. Rudy is not an adult. He was a shell of a person, and yes his actions are horrible. However, you can expect a 40 year old shut-in to be a amazing person, but he is changing. The author is not supporting pedophillic actions, but he is trying to show Rudy’s past and the person he wants to become.
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hes been reborn, so he snot a thirty year old man. all that matters is how old his body is, which is the same age, or even younger, than the people he sexualizes. no matter how old he was once, as of now he is a child, and is not a sexual predator at all
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It gets a lot worse and people believe in “Redemption arcs” and that in itself is ridiculous, Rudy himself doesn’t seek to redeem himself or change himself. Hell one of his wives is a loli called Roxy. Also the person relating Jaime from game of thrones? Hello? He wasn’t that bad of a character; sure he pushed a kid with the intent to kill him but he didn’t actively go around killing children or doing evil deeds. He did it to protect himself and his family. If the boy told people; everyone would figure out his kids weren’t the Kings. He’s actually not an immoral character. Rudy dies because his brother abandons him after he finds cameras in his daugher’s room. Rudy literally spied on his underage niece. Rudy preys on children in the anime and manga. There’s no, his body is that age. He knows what he’s doing even if he was a shut in. He was still a pedo and now he was in a world where he could act on it. He slept with his underage cousin whom he groomed and lusted for his cousin. There are redemption arcs for people who f’ed up and didn’t mean to; I don’t believe Rudy could redeem himself just because he does good deeds. He literally went too far with his cousin and with his niece. Just because you do good deeds doesn’t make the bad things go away.
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@kit so you all his effort to became a better person doesn’t matter at all? How long must he worked for then to get your approval? He has his pervy tendencies sure, but it this world he living and doing his best. His cousin and him in this world are similar in age and they risked their lives traveling together so felling develops over time. Are you saying he should try to woo a 40 years woman with a kid’s body?
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OK, so what you’re saying is you’d expect him to talk to 30 old woman as a minor that seems unsavory to me.
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The entire premise of the story is a redemption arc. Rudeus is meant to be a disgusting person. The whole idea of the story is him recognizing how bad he is and making an effort to do better. He is not meant to be liked, or be a self-insert character like a lot of other Isekais. You’re supposed to look at him, think he’s disgusting, and be proud of him for trying to make an effort to be better. Although I understand why you might think it’s just bad based on the beginning of the story, when he is at his worst, you kind of need to understand the context of the story to enjoy it. It actually ends up having one of the most wholesome endings I’ve seen in any anime. He ends up deeply caring about his family and goes to great lengths to keep them safe.
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He never seens to be treated as wrong and most times the anime seen to want you to also fell as perverted as him in this situations because of some camera angles,the girls keep liking with him even after he arassed them(i now the world is diferent but nothing impeace them to just stop interacting whit him) and hees stil seem saving people,etc. Indicating that he is some kind of heroe even tough of doing all of this
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Ok, Funnily enough, the world being different is almost reason enough for this kind of behaviour being valid, but ok let me break it down towards some principal points that I think you are skipping on.
Roxy – Roxy had a contract with the Greyrat family to teach his son (Rudy, Rudeus or whatever) so you could pretty much say it was for the money the reason she stayed in place at first sight. Still though as you see the season develop, you can find out that despite Rudeus is a perverted piece of shit (because he is and I am not trying to minimize it) he was practically a genius with magic. Being able to cast high level spells without needing to chant it. (This “genius” thing is also a thing that inspired Roxy to stay with him, as she did not find anyone else capable of doing such thing. At least on that time of course.) Apart from this, we need to also take in count that there are SEVERAL time skips within the anime, so we can’t really judge based on his actions that just happened very occasionally (because, funnily enough, the time skips practically just come right after where it portrays the bad things about Rudeus in this arc).
Sylphy – As much as it hurts and everyone will come with the comments of “CoNsEnT eXiStS” Rudeus didn’t really have a sexual interest towards her in the sense that he wanted to take a bath with her. This exact scene was rather a genuine caring (as perverted as it sounds idc) for his mate to not get sick (because, surprise! Rain can sometimes make you sick!) of course after that happened, the writer decided to fade it out, after all he showed how it made Rudeus feel bad about it and came to truly apologize to her. It also portrayed how awkward it was after that, usually coming up with uncomfortable silences between the 2 friends as Rudeus thought he did something wrong. Because after all, He truly thought that Sylphy was a very gorgeous man (of course, we can’t see for how long the awkwardness lasted because the anime uses time skips).
And the last, Eris – With Eris it is pretty much the same occasion as with Roxy. Rudeus was there to teach her, thus if she wanted to learn something like magic, she’d need rudeus to teach her (as thanks to storytelling most teachers are scared of her due to her aggresiveness.), same thing here as well, we can showcase the time skips (which is mainly why they give Rudeus such a shitty image) as it once again shows the bad things he did (after all this arc is all about redemption).
And of course, why wouldn’t he help people even if he has that kind of mind? After all as said before, this character seeks redemption, not to be a perverted idiot. And even though, he isn’t seen as a hero of any sorts. His family recognize him as a genius due to certain magic properties (that I won’t ofc spoil because it is related to later things within the series).
And to finish, on the end, its set on a different time, we can’t just compare literal modern times where so many ideologies originated to some medieval time where ideological development is not made at all. And yes, even if Rudy came from modern times, he won’t portray such ideals because it’ll just look weird to them as they do not understand what they mean. (This is portrayed when Rudeus told Ruijerd that he was a libertarian and he looked at the kid confused.)
So its not really matter of what values we have rn, but in what values the time has set within the series.
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I don’t agree with you, but this essay has given me a greater appreciation for people who are willing to discuss and elaborate on their views, as well as engage with those who disagree.
So it’s refreshing to read competent analysis by someone who’s going out of their way to be respectful about it. Most people who comment about it think I’ll change my mind if they write well enough or insult me harshly enough, and that just ignores the point of discussion.
I’m not going to abandon my views of Mushoku Tensei as long as I feel they’re valid criticism, and I’m not going to ask others to abandon their similarly valid opinions. Thanks for making the internet and this blog a little nicer of a place.
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to respond to Krauss about rudy and taking her clothes off,
it doesn’t matter if it was a boy or a girl he kept trying to take his clothes off despite constantly saying no and hitting him and trying to force him to take his clothes off, the fact he fainted that he wasn’t gonna take her clothes off but did it anyway to shock him its such a piece of shit move, it doesn’t matter if it was a girl if anyone did that to someone it would lead to getting the shit beaten out of you. when she started crying that was fucking sad man she looked traumatized, i wouldn’t be shocked if she didn’t trust anyone after that.
30 year old man forcibly pulling the pants of a 5 year old boy does not sound good on paper.
and just because he wasn’t interested sexually it doesnt make it ok at all.
that situation applies to any situation and he would still be a massive asshole, the fact he didn’t realize maybe it could be trauma shows lack of empathy and a literal cretin or simply bad writting,
i think anyone would realize something is very wrong, even the idiots would realize something is wrong, if he doesn’t want to take his clothes off, especially if it isn’t a girl. he still tried to force someone to do something they didn’t want to, man and when she cried what an absolute cold piece of shit, he was a psychopath in that moment. chances are he probably is.
it doesn’t matter if he’s trying to not make me sick, how i wouldn’t like medicine shoved down my throat, i wouldn’t like some piece of shit forcing me to take my clothes off. if you would do that to someone then fuck off.
you don’t have to be a NEET to do that, that is such a piece of shit move to do, he doesn’t try to really change his flaws, its more that his good side keeps rising, and his bad side keeps lowering, he never tries to fix his bad side. some parts yeah but not the core of the problem. the character really is written as 2 faced depending on the situation.
yeah the guy is 30 but even then his behavior is far worse than most people, man what a piece of shit, just because he saves lives doesn’t make him a good person.
but in here he is portrayed as a lowlife more equal to a bum on the street, he seems more fit to steal from others and do illegal shit than being a NEET. he just has criminal behavior and he would have gotten multiple lawsuits or arrested if he did that irl, it doesn’t change the fact that its “medieval” times, even back then these actions were seeing as lowly, that’s why the laws were made in the first place.
and its not the bigger problem the fact that he is this way, its the fact that hes unapologetic on his shitty actions barely ever gets called out or tries to sneak past them, and that his surroundings are full of enablers and are equally toxic, hell even encouraging his behavior, when he kept sexually harassing roxy, she was indifferent about it, she didnt take it seriously which lies in the problem she didn’t attempt to stop this behavior at all, and the author should have done more, its played as jokes by hurting him with slapstick humor.
also rudy fathr is horrible too, when he slapped his kid trying to put him into submission that he was right and the kid was wrong, it was very controlling behavior, sucks that rudy didnt decide to him him back fuck that guy.
even before he cheated i got the impression this guy was a degenerate.
and no its not back then it was ok to hit kids, its still fucked up kids back then when they were hit and its still wrong, it just wasn’t called out as today.
the way the show tries to solve its problems is not healthy its like putting a bandage on broken glass, its usually forgotten simply brushing it off like its nothing; or it never happened or manipulate the other person feeling bad for you. its horrible behavior nothing ever gets addressed properly or gets fixed properly.
its also the environment that its the big issue too, unlike shows like re zero and konosuba, their surroundings have people always reacting their bad behaviors, either they discourage like Kazuma, or try to help them become better like Subaru,
in contrast here, no one calls him out, instead they are his level, and the ones that are lower than him he gets to beat up to make himself look better.
it is honestly a self insert fantasy, he says self fulfilling prophecies that “dude its like how those cool guys do it get the girl and a childhood girl and marry her” and he gets to be the cool guy all the time coincidentally, which I’m guessing he does marry all of them in the exact way he describes cool scenes in his head, i haven’t read the LN but im guessing that’s how it goes.
and his pervert part is SUPER annoying, the honestly underwear worshipping is pure cringe, if its a joke i give it a 1/10 not funny whatsoever having the underwear of a supposedly 14 year old girl. holy fuck that really makes me cringe, that’s the opposite of funny.
under normal circumstances i would assume he has a bunch of mental disorders, if it was qualified he had adhd, BPD, autism, retardation, or down syndrome it would have been more believable.
i can handle 1 piece of shit in the story, but if you put 30 pieces of shit in the story while being unapologetic about it I’m out. its the quite the show to make me dislike most of the cast. they are just really toxic, and those points never get addressed.
man it would suck to be a woman in that story holy shit, the shit they have to put up in there.
anyway i don’t think it deservers all the praise it gets, its overhyped. but its a different story. though its plain weird and toxic, hopefully no one takes this story seriously and try to do the shit he does if anyone watches this.
anyway this was exhausting to rant on this series, very toxic show, I can’t imagine how the author is like. Jesus.
never want to watch this series, just wanted to say my opinion. GG
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he wont be treated like he is wrong cause to others he is just a kid? for others, he is just a kid doing childish thigs.
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even a hero cant be a perfect person, and itd be boring if he was
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Just read the Light Novel. He does not try to better himself in any way. I would like to just leave a few quotes from the novel that I have screenshot https://imgur.com/a/PG6pOaT
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It gets worse in the manga. There’s this weird focus on his erectile dysfunction after eris leaves him. I get that the audience is supposed to see him as an improving mind, but I didn’t see much improvement after the time skip. I tried giving it another chance, but I just can’t stomach anymore of the portrayal of female characters as a cure for his ED. Not only did this not make sense, since they had a well-established relationship (communicate much?), it just felt weird that they ignored the world-ending threat in the previous arc. It’s like, why even show it when you were gonna focus on an entirely different thing in the next arc? The story was good so far despite its flaws, but I think the flaws just kept growing for me to be able keep at it.
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God all these reply’s are so stupid. Yall are dismissing the MC’s actions based on character development. How can you dismiss the author straight up having 2 underage cousins have sex.
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Because
1) They are in essentially medieval times and that shit happens at that age. They specifically mention this many times that even Rudeus isn’t weird in comparison to the nobles of the time. Content and time periods are everything and it’s important to note that if you care enough to note Rudeus is of age (mentally) then there is no issue as Eris was 15 at the time, a legal adult in that world.
2) They are second cousins, not first cousins, and it’s even implied that Eris’ Father might have been adopted so they might not even be that closely related.
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in their world they are not underage technically
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These comments defending the show are exhausting. Anyone trying to defend him is completely ignoring the fact that they are 11 year old and 14 year old aged children he is touching with no remorse. I will give it to you that he is a shell of man that never had a real life of his own and never experienced any of these things HOWEVER, if he were not involuntarily and randomly reincarnated into a child’s body, would you still agree with him doing all the things he’s done? All the girls he’s touched? Looked at? Fantasized about? Does it make it better that he’s 40 BB because his creepy little hands aren’t 40 years old? Sit there and tell me that this show is creating a fantasy for pedophiles, you sit there and tell me that, I dare you. He even says a few times to himself “I’m taking advantage of her right now, I think this is wrong” literally! and then he goes and gropes a sleeping child. Not to mention when they rescue the beast children from a prison where they were being TRAFFICKED he starts oggling the half naked girls who had probably already been abused at that point… LETS NOT FORGOT THE DEMON GODDESS WHO LOOKED LIKE SHE WAS ABOUT 7 AND HE WAS VERY INTERESTED IN. GROSS. AS. FUCK.
I keep hearing “but it’s a redemption arc” as a rebuttal, but redemption implies the character is trying to be better, and like I stated previously, he makes a few comments about how even he is unsure about his actions bc he knows they are inappropriate, YET HE ALMOST ALWAYS ACTS ON HIS PERVERSE THOUGHTS, RARELY DOES HE EVEN TRY TO STOP HIMSELF. Almost every time he does stop himself it’s only because he will get in trouble, not because he cares. Also, outside of Eris beating the shit out of him, and many light-hearted jokes excusing his behavior, no one ever claps back, at least one person is always encouraging or empathizing with him, and every woman in the story is sexualized in one way or another. Truly and simply.
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If they showed more of his previous life he was most likely jacking off to Loli shit before they kicked him out, if they showed that before being isekai because obviously he has a loli fetish going after “sexy 14 year olds” in his own words, remove his “flaws” and he’s just a gary stu or Mary Sue.
Likely if he wasn’t a shut in loser he would most likely be a registered sex offender, the guy is disgusting and likely autistic or some form of mental disorder since he doesn’t get when others feel uncomfortable, he doesn’t learn from his mistakes he just brushes it off, and has the AUDACITY to manipulate other people being wrong not him.
Absolute fucking loser and a power fantasy to loli fetishers, there was no need to make a 100 year old or whatever look like a 14 year old girl.
They made the Mc handsome overpowered has a harem self insert. And the series is very sexualized, is just a fetish put in there. The guy is a pedophile and it’s never acknowledged.
Just keep him away from playgrounds.
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THIS ANIME WAS ACTUALLY A MASTERPIECE
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All this comments clearly show how people really being a bias and not reading the actual material but judge the entire series based on the MC actions at the beginning. I am truly disappointed at this article on the views also without even bother to do any research nor read the actual materials and what the authors trying to do. If you want a non controversial characters there are plenty out there, Naruto, Luffy, Gon Hunter x Hunter, etc. But if you watched or finished Attack on Titan you will know that Eren Yeager was the antagonist this whole time and people still love him at his death. To be honest, Rudeus compare to some characters in Game of Thrones are look like an angles, remember the scene where Jaime Lannister pushing Bran Stark (a little kid) down from a tower while having sex with his sister, Cersei. But guessed what? He had one of the most epic redemption arc, … At the beginning of the series, he was easily one of the most despised characters, but as more layers were revealed he became a beloved hero. It just crazy how people keep focus on all the bad qualities of Rudeus right now and despite the entire shows, but didn’t look at the fact that the author did it on purpose, if you despite Rudeus right now then the author did a great job on creating the most hated character in anime on the internet. But don’t put your opinion out there if you haven’t read the entire series and judge everything base on the beginning, this just show that you are ignorant and refused to change your mind based on your own biases. Even Eren Yeager committed genocide at the end people still like him which is crazy to me. But FYI for those who have not read Mushoku Tensei Light Novels, then I will just say this one line, MT world buildings are so crazy that it can even compare to Lord of The Rings world buildings, it is peak fiction and if you judge the entire series base on the controversy of the MC at the beginning which is not that worse than some character in Game of Thrones then it is just your lost on an incredible series I guess my fellow internet friends. All this controversy will start to change in the next 2 or 3 seasons of show and I bet the world will be shocked especially those who despite the series so much and not even bother to understand how a show as controversy as MT got the highest rating in the world (8.4 on Anikore Japan, 8.7 on Anilist, 8.3 on Bangumi China, and 8.77 on Myanimelist)
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Honestly,this whole discussion is tiring to read. So instead of “oh its right because its a redemption ark” instead i’ll take a different aproach
Yes you might say that early actions in the show/LN are disgusting to you,and you have the right to say so. His early action are disgusting,and the panties worshiping stuff is taken to a whole
other level which is pretty pointless.
But one of my favorite stuff about Mushoku Tensei is how it deppicts the ideology of a medieval world, compared to the modern world. There are moments in the LN were Rudeus strugles to make the switch between worlds.
My second and more important point is that while the show makes you believe that Rudues is 34, in reality he still has the kindset of a horny teenager. And while at first this combination might look disgusting, it looks a lot more right when he has the body of an actual teenager. Starting with the end of the second season, and the LN material that will be covered in third season, you can clearly see this. Even second season isnt as disgusting as the first
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Nah, mushoku tensei is 🔥
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Jobless is the best anime of its kind. The owner of this blog is clearly bogus and does not know what he or she is talking about. These types of people are what is wrong with anime. First of all calling Rudy, a pedophile for being born into another world is just stupid. He was 34 years old when he died and was reborn into another world. Having been a shut-in he had no sexual relationships whatsoever. Meaning that the closest thing he had to something real was porn or hentai. Calling him a pedo for watching porn clearly shows that you have no idea what the definition of pedo is. In his, before life, he was not out there touching younger girls and being disrespectful towards females. On the contrary, he respected women. He was bullied in shameful manners that caused him to be a shut-in. So how is he a pedo for watching porn or hentai?
Second, he was reborn with memories of his past. Meaning that he knows what sin is. The only reason why you don’t see babies doing the same shit he was doing is because babies are born not knowing sin. So how tf can you call him a pedo. Even so he was not out there actually touching females as a kid. He obviously lusted but who tf has not? As a guy, you will always lust over a woman. That does not make a pedophile. What this writer of this blog actually wants to see is him rudy being 7 years old dating a 34-year-old in his new world. You would actually want a 13-year-old to date a 34-year-old? To me, you seem like the pedophile pal.
This writer also had the audacity to mention that Rudy sexually assaulted Slyphi. I am actually curious if he actually fucking watched the anime at all. In all the animes I have seen take Naruto for example men always bathe together. So Rudy thought that Slyphi was just shy so he decided to push “him” a little so that he could see that there was nothing wrong with being naked. He wanted “him” to have no shame. What Rudy did not expect was for Slyphi to actually be a female since “he” had the appearance of a male. That was when he realized the reason for Slyphi saying “no”. Rudy in no point shows signs of enjoyment. He is actually shocked and stunned at his mistake and feels so bad about it. So how tf is he a pedophile? It’s not like Rudy got Sylphi naked on purpose knowing she was a female and enjoyed the moment you morron.
Third. The second season does a good job of showing who Rudy actually is. His little sister was trying to convince him to take her on a journey with him by stating that in the future she was going to “bloom”. Rudy then chops her on the head and tells her she should not be talking like that because it is not appropriate for her. Rudy even states in his head “what has she been teaching her”. If he was a pedophile he would have said omg you will bloom yes come with me. Like, stop hating on something you did not even watch. Stop talking out of your ass.
Fourth in the second season, Eris wanted to have sexual relationships with Rudy but he stated that he could not because they both promised they would wait. Eris however, told him that she would only say it once and she threw herself on top of him. She told him that “although you have lusted for me, are you telling me you still say no” he says no. But she still insists that it’s ok if they do it now. See if Rudy was not a decent person he would have done it with no hesitation. So how tf is he a pedo?
If you ask me you are the pedo for wanting to see a 34 year old reborn as a kid date a 34-year-old. Just turn a random 34-year old woman into a pedo, you weirdo.
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You’re a creep if you actually defend Rudy before or after the reincarnation.
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Can we agree at least that the author is a pedo? Also the anime seems to be made for pedos (or at least part of it). And I’m saying this based on what you and others said here.
Just try for a moment to get out from this fiction world and try to think about the writer and the animators. Can’t you see that there is something disturbing?
Let me ask something else. If someone enjoys watching only rape hentai or pedo hentai, do you agree that person has an issue? Even if he didn’t act on it.
One last thing I want to mention is that Japan is very relaxed regarding laws against pedos. It is something related to their history from what I read and only recently they were forced to be more restrictive. There was a couple of years ago a case with Nobuhiro Watsuki (a manga writer) caught with nude photos of 11 years old or younger girls. He just got a small fine and had no problem continuing to work at the same company. Apparently this was a common practice in Japan so this is why people there didn’t take it really serious.
I’m not writing this for you (as from your comment you seem to either worship this anime/LN beyond reason or have some hidden pedo tendencies) but for those who will read these comments.
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hi I am prob lot late for this comment tread but you are right author is a pedo, If author really wanted to make a good story about mc making a change then he could hv make mc yankee or make mc without having any pedophile fetish. Why I say yankee cuz yankee are look down upon in Japan society. But no author had to put pedophile in story and make characters easliy forgive those things. There were few cases where Japanese authors getting caught with doing pedophile acts, which honetly most got very light sentence. If this was happen in my country those pedos def going to suffer some series damage even the police won’t tolerate those acts
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Hi! I try to leave comments up whenever possible because I value discourse, especially differing opinions. However, if you’re going to insult me without offering any valid opinions or criticism, I’m going to delete your comment. If you’d like to offer your views, please do so in a respectful manner. Thank you, and have a nice day.
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I’m really glad that someone feels the same way about this terrible show because it’s been extremely concerning to me that this show got so popular.
The issue I have with this show is with the people claiming that it’s motivational, or that Rudy somehow changes or develops from the person he was before he died. Rudy, at no point is forced to truly struggle and confront his traumas because he’s literally reincarnated into a world that’s perfect for him. It’s a literal definition of an escapist fantasy. The people defending Rudy always say that he’s a flawed and realistic character, but that means nothing if Rudy isn’t forced to change. Making a few reflections, and thinking, “Oops, I did a bad” isn’t actual change.
Another thing that’s strange to me is how this show seems to be seems to be fine with Rudy being a pervert, and portraying his perversions in a comedic and lighthearted manner. Again, if this show truly wanted Rudy to change, his perverted acts wouldn’t be played off for laughs. The fact that there is also unironic fanservice of Eris, who is 11 years old also seems to cloud the whole “motivational” theme.
I think the show would be much more interesting is Rudy was reincarnated without his memories. Let’s say for example, Rudy is simply reborn as the same person with the same mind, but without his memories. Because he’s the same person, he makes the same mistakes again in his new life, and gets bullied and ostracized again. But gradually, his memories start to return, and he’s able to use his experience to push through the bullying and the isolation. He’s able to properly process the past, and develop strategies to deal with bullying, and to deal with his proclivity to isolation.
Rudy NEVER has to deal with consequences of his actions, never has to make up for lost time, and never has to work past the problems he made for himself and everyone in his previous life. I just don’t see any confrontation of the past in the original anime, which confuses me because people claim that this show is motivational or inspirational. Again, it’s a literal definition of an escapist fantasy.
The cherry on top is in episode 8 or 9, when Rudy is in his old body again and confronted by the weird “God” creature. He thinks, “Oh, it’s over,” which signifies to us that there has been ZERO development from the first episode. I truly don’t understand what everyone sees in this show.
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This is from a while ago but I’m pretty I heard that the reason he was kicked out of where he lived before he was reborn was bc he was recording and watching NSFW videos of his niece so I think pedo still works
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The people defending Rudy’s actions because of his “character development” are the people that add to the problematics of anime. Despite the story telling, action, and supposed “character development,” this show is hard to watch. I don’t understand how anyone can watch a 40 year old man in a child body’s perving on little girls and call it okay. ESPECIALLY since his inner voice is that of a mature man, which makes the “his body is young” argument is null. We also get flashbacks to Rudy being in his old body, speaking to god, which signifies that he definitely still has the mindset of an older man. I would even say Goblin Slayer is better, because at least in that anime, we know that rape is bad, unlike this pedophilic dumpster of a show.
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Sure Rudeus is disgusting and honestly not the most likeable character but this show isn’t a self insert, does every show require a clean skin character or only have flaws we deem acceptable?(a Psyco murderer seems more likable It seems because for some reason people can relate??), He does some pretty disgusting things, he does some good things, he develops, other characters get involved that have their own issues to deal with the world is vast, there is many things going on but it comes down to how you watch a show like this.
I find it more disturbing that some even say we agree with his actions because we like the show, or the author is messed in the head because of this, I don’t understand this criticism, sure he might start from an angle that we could find uncomfortable in a way that really isn’t common to see but at the end of the day we are watching a story, sure plenty of Isekai’s are MC self inserts but this one just clearly isn’t, he has real issues and those issues take along time to deal with especially when most of the people he is around don’t really understand what is really going on with him.
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To those who believe that Rudy will grow and improve as a person you are in luck! I have collected a small collection of screenshots from the Light Novels post anime that depict his growth as a person! https://imgur.com/a/PG6pOaT
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Wow giving this screeshit with no context Marvellous thar sexual assault thing isn’t even related to rudues
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It’s an anime, relax. It supposes to be funny. When I saw Rudy do all that stuff, I found it funny, because is a 35+ yo guy in a body of a child. So consider his past life, he will be kinda a weirdo that is trying to sneak to girls. From the plot of anime, from s1 to s2, I can say we see that he changes a lot, and that’s the point, to have a good character development. Also, some scenes over doing it, like the Syphi-bath scene, but in the end was funny, consider how the things turned up. Anyway, except from Rudy being a little weirdo, all the other stuff just show a different side of things.
I think, most of that things people find them funny and realistic.
In the end, animes are not for young kids, so, why not show some weird stuff in…
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I think the reviewer forgot 1 thing.
This is an anime, a freaking hand drawn fantasy series that is not real.
If you are unable to tell the difference between fantasy and reality, I would suggest seeing a psychiatrist and discuss it.
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I think there’s a difference between being a “perv” and being a sex offender. The main character clearly is the later. It’s normal to have desires and even fantasies but it’s not ok to grope someone against their will. I understand that they want to portray Rudy as an imperfect character, however the anime misses the mark by instead creating a misogynistic world where sexually assaulting women is allowed. It would be a lot more interesting if pervert thoughts were followed by a honest willingness to avoid them and pervert acts represented as learning situation. In the end we can ask what did the sexual assault instances contributed to the advancement of the story? Did we actually need them?
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Idk how far the anime got because I read the manga, just curious to see where it would go, and got through a lot of perverted BS until the moment that made me drop it. So basically, Rudy and Eris do i t . Underage you-know-what between a child and an adult. They’re not even in a relationship when they do it, it’s a one night stand out of desperation because Eris was about to get married off. I can handle perverted characters and scroll past perverted moments, although I don’t like them, but I drew the line there and realized my line is too lenient if Rudy, with all his red flags, got past it to that point. There’s some more arcs (I checked the chapter summaries and skimmed because curiosity corrupts) where Eris leaves to get stronger or something after the one night stand, Rudeus gets depressed thinking he was abandoned (no moral repercussions, he felt happy and guiltless the morning after), he goes on some more adventure and has more romance moments with other kids (some characters reappear like Sylphie and Roxy) despite what he did with Eris. My moral compass feels shot just thinking about it…
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the manga is considered the worst adaptation of the show/light novel and in the anime, it is a growth case in point episode 22 one of the most controversial episodes because rudy has sex with eris who is legal in their world. keep in mind rudy says no and is shown to believe that if he takes advantage of her he s wrong. And he would be however eris pushes herself on rudeus and the deed is done the wine spilling represents him falling back into his old habits. in this episode, rudy is in the wrong but it shows development yes it is small but episode rudeus would have jumped at the opportunity to have sex with eris
don’t get me wrong what rudeus did was horrible but bad people don’t change in the matter of 2 scenes change takes time
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please keep in mind rudeus is supposed to change slowly its a redemption arc. to everyone mad at rudeus that’s like saying bojack horseman is a bad show because bojack is a bad person and no rudeus is not glorified it looks that way because the animation is nice
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anybody making a comment defending this character or show is clearly infested with brain worms and has swiss cheese holes in their gray matter. motherfucker is a pedophile rapist and it doesnt matter if he’s in a child’s body if his mind is still 40. y’all need to watch/read something good for once
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First off the show is meant for the viewers to DISLIKE Rudeus secondly and this is just the truth no matter if he has a conscience of a 40 year old or anything else it still dose not change the fact that he is still a child. In my opinion the author is making Redues a bad person and in the story Redues constantly says he’s trying to get better I think your ignorant at the fact that there are WAY worse animes and i mean WAYYY worse but you do have a point it is absolutely disgusting for the things you said in this comment, HOWEVER it still has NOTHING to do with the show if this show isn’t for you stop fucking around with it I can name about TEN different animes that are WAYYYYYY worse then this one. And when was he a raptist? Im not done with the show but i would love to know (Most likely your most defiantly wrong) And yes he still is a fucking creep and an absolutely disgusting but that’s the story’s point it shows that anyone can change. Thank you for reading
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its change dumbass everything fundamentally changes when character has his previous life memories and also that characters mind is 40 years old. Child don’t have 40 years of mature brain and thats why childrens make mistakes a lot. that what makes them child since adult needs there to protect them and teach them, but here mc is alredy has 40 years of mature brain and he knows what pedophile is and how bad it is yet he does it again and again. That what makes him a pedo and also a creep
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People who believes in reincarnation (including me) based on their culture and religion believes that every single living creature reincarnated after their each death we could be of different genders , different time , we could be born as an Aryan German in one life while being a Jew in another life the same way you could be born as a tiger in one while while you were once a deer so your age is thus always taken as of your current age in your current life the only exception with Rudeus is that he remembers the memories of his previous life which thus plays an important role in his new life he is not the same 34 year old NEET now as he has a new body and a new life that too in a new world but is still such a fucking creep as his mind remembers him being happy on watching loli porn and playing hentai games as it is his addiction and an addiction never goes away so easily he starts the novel already telling us that he is a garbage of a human being who was always too full of himself while doing actually nothing while laughing on others doing something which is what was a huge change , him saying no to eris for sex as he was not fifteen years old like her which is an legal age for a adult shows development as his past self would have already jumped on the idea without much thought not to mention that situations like this happen in real life to many good people u know of ( FYI according to the Sharda Act in the 20 th century it was considered that a 15 year old girl and a 18 year old boy could marry) . People still look as Rudy the same while never looking it as Eris a 15 year old girl getting a 13 year old minor Rudeus to have it with her even the times when Eris actually came to his room on her birthday with Rudeus with him telling her that he may get a little naughty with Eris saying that it’s ok if it’s just a little don’t tell me that Eris do not know what she was saying in this world children are already aware of all these things , of course Rudeus giving in to that thought was downright in no way right as he sees it as her invitation to do it with her as he used to see in the porn movies he used to watch so yeah Rudeus is undoubtfully a disgusting person , a piece of shit as he shows the lowest a person can become but when people began to shit on him saying he never actually feels bad for what he does he do maybe it’s not enough for you but he do if u pay a close attention then you will see how much flawed are each of these people . In the LN it was mentioned how much a spoilerd brat was Eris how she beats one of his teacher with a stick when he was sleeping in his room making him go to a hospital she was such a brat that could even beat someone to near death just for angering her , she slaps Rudeus just because he only says that he knows things which she does nut know when he have not even done anything wrong with her but yeah she also got a character development as she got much better still if you thing that MT is bullshit then alright but please don’t shit on people by actually calling people pedo for liking something after all the story was always of a 34 year old NEET creep so it does not bother us because we already know what we are getting into
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Whole point of the story, in ANY iteration, is to show that a relatively shitty human being can change as the result of a second chance and the right opportunity. Certain predilections are ingrained into the character due to his previous life when the story starts, however it’s almost never glorified in the sense that these actions are considered okay. When he spies on Eris, he’s dragged away. When he oversteps boundaries in different scenarios with different women they address it with the shame and remorse that he feels for being that same idiot from his previous life who’s “learned nothing.” Gradually if you get into endgame of the currebtly release story and read oblige, his Astral form changes and that signifies that he achieved redemption, no longer being the same fucked up individual as he was in his previous life.
My opinion is that this is the quintessential reborn/harem manga that sparked an entire era of the one true purgatorious God Truck-kun. So outside that, be mad at the hypersexualizing and objectifying women in… oh wait, thats the status quo of damn near every manga/anime on the market. ._.
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Well, I could not watch the whole Season 1. Even if the show is meant to show a Redemption Arc, I could not watch it. It looks too much like a Hentai plot sometimes. It is not only the Main character that is a perv, even his family makes a lot of noise during sex and his ‘teacher’ gets all wet because of it. Some scenes that I did not want to watch.
If you are an adult and do not care watching perv scenes in anime or even like doing so, then go for it! But when I heard that 2 teenagers that I know and care about (boy and a girl) watched and liked it I got really annoyed. I do not think this Anime should be as widely popular as it is. It is always on front page of Crunchyroll. You all can say it was not meant for younger people and still can’t say they are not watching it or some other perv anime.
I really hope someday this will not be as ‘normal’ as it is right now.
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Why does no-one seem to remember that in a random narration line, Rudius reveals that his Dad, Paul, snuck into his ex college roommate and current maid’s room and raped her in her sleep. It shocked me that a show could mention such a disgusting story in a comedic way, as some sort of comedy one liner that is supposed to be funny, absolutely never bring it up again and then proceed to present the character as a role model of Rudius. I don’t believe this is a spoiler as it has exactly no impact on the story, there even include a supposedly emotional scenes between these two characters in which we are supposed to be happy at their reunion (a scene which I personally found laughable). Let me just say that Paul could cure cancer, war and all the wrong in the world and I would still never redeem himself. It is this disregard for people’s action that precisely define my hatred for this show.
I Understand that the show is supposed to depict an improving character arc for Rudius, and while I can admit that he came a long way, I do not think he deserves to be forgiven.
The argument that his reincarnation makes him “not a pedophile” is ridiculous as I know if I had been reborn as a baby, I still would not be attracted to children. From the first episode, there is no doubt that the only difference between his new incarnation and past life are his genes and body. No new born is getting turned on by breast feeding and stealing their parent’s underwear at the age of 1.
My last point is that NOBODY EVER FACES CONSEQUENCES FOR THEIR ACTIONS. The fact that Roxy and Eris continue to support and care for Rudius after being continuously sexually harassed and in Roxy’s case SEXUALLY ASSULTED presents the idea to audiences that ou can get away with these actions WITH NO REPERCUSSION. I aplore you to tell me where in the show Rudius apologises for attempting to rape Eris or acknowledges that it was wrong.
Throughout the show, rape and sexual assault are used as a comedic device and downgraded to the point that it is presented as a simple personality flaw, rather than a deep-rooted, disgusting, disease that needs to be eradicated. I frankly don’t care if the intent of the show is to educate against these issues because what has been produced so far within the first season is the exact opposite.
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I dunno, I’ve read a couple interviews with Rifujin na Magonote a.k.a the author of the mushoku tensei and welp, he’d seemed like a bit of a nice guy??? or maybe I’m just too naïve and gullible to depict a person character… after all, it’s only a simple question interview here’s a couple lines/questions from the initial interview though… on animenewsnetwork—-✥
⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩
You first started writing the web version of Mushoku Tensei in 2012, and almost 10 years later, your work has become an anime. Has working on the anime changed your impression of your original work?
Rifujin na Magonote: My impression towards the original work hasn’t changed because the anime and novel are different things. What do you think? No matter how wonderful and polished the anime is, it doesn’t make the original work any better. On the flip side, if the anime were so bad it makes you want to avert your eyes, it wouldn’t make the original work any worse.
Some of the most controversial aspects of Mushoku Tensei are at the very start because it begins with Rudeus at his lowest. Looking back, are there ever times when you think “Maybe that was a little over-the-top” or “Maybe I should have held back a little”? Or do you think the balance was right for the story you wanted to tell?
Rifujin na Magonote: I think the balance was right. Because he’s a controversial character, his mountain of regrets makes the act of redoing life more meaningful. Of course, I have no issue with criticizing Rudeus at the beginning stage, and it’s up to you to decide whether you don’t want to see the story because of that. With that said, if there’s someone like Rudeus close to you and that person were to have even a slight change of heart and try to start over, I sincerely hope that you won’t abandon them on the spot.
—————- disclaimer… this next’s section is bit odder or i’d rather say weird to say the least but, perhaps everyone interprets this in a different way.
relatively large part of Mushoku Tensei is about the sexual lives of the characters, including the side characters. Deviant sexual behavior is often depicted as well as a natural part of the world. What inspired you to take this kind of focus in your storytelling?
Rifujin na Magonote: In Japanese creative works, there are two polar opposite approaches to depicting sexual life: As “sacred” or as “pleasure.” I suppose I got my inspiration because I thought there wasn’t enough representation of the viewpoint that reproductive activity is natural to organisms.
I think that, among the instincts of a living creature, the urge to breed is the strongest even when put alongside the urge to eat. Most living creatures will generally live their lives driven by the natural desire to leave offspring behind. That inevitably goes hand-in-hand with sexual activity. Basically, it’s a natural and important aspect of being a living creature.
Because it’s an important part of the life of an organism, it’s not wrong to call it sacred. However, it’s also true that sex is associated with pleasure. You could also say that it’s natural for people to treat sex as pleasure for as long as pleasure is intertwined with the act. With that in mind, when depicting the world of Mushoku Tensei, I aimed for the middle ground between “sacred” and “pleasure.” That’s the vibe I was going for.
Incidentally, when writing the opening act of the story, I strongly emphasized Rudeus’s perspective on sex as a thing of pleasure. It’s only natural because he had no experience in his previous life, so the pleasure aspect was the only side he came into contact with. Consequently, there might be a lot of people who strongly feel the pleasurable side. But that shouldn’t be a surprise—you don’t broadcast something sacred for all eyes to see.
—————-
games have had on your outlook, but this is not a fact that’s well known in the English-speaking world. Could you explain your relationship with fighting games, and if that’s impacted your writing at all?
Rifujin na Magonote: I started playing fighting games when I was around 18. Back then, I wasn’t really good at dealing with people. In a fighting game, you compete against other people, so by taking up fighting games in an arcade, I started interacting with people without even knowing their real names. Most of them were older than me; it was thanks to them that I learned communication and proper manners.
But it wasn’t as if they gave me verbal tips, like do this or do that. I tried to imitate the behavior of the people I thought were good and avoided being like the people I thought were bad or often stirred up trouble… Basically, all the common-sense things that every human picks up from somewhere finally came to me in an arcade when I was around 20 years old. Basically, fighting games were what taught me how to clear the minimum bar.
As for how they influenced my writing, besides what I’ve expressed above, there’s one other thing. I applied myself to fighting games in my own way, but once I reached a certain stage, I started thinking, “I’ve reached my ceiling.” To put it another way, I thought, “I’m done.”
As far as competitive standards in Japan went, I was firmly in the middle of the pack, but in my local area I was the strongest. But I also knew that it wasn’t really true that it was impossible for me to get any stronger. For example, I could have left my home town and challenged people who were stronger than me. Despite knowing that, I didn’t want to experience the frustration and setbacks, so I ran away from it. Even though the truth was that I really did want to get stronger.
That feeling of regret was what supported me when I was writing Mushoku Tensei. When I was having a particularly difficult time writing, I would think, “If I flake out here, I’ll be the same as back then.” It was what allowed me to steel myself.
As a result, I was able to write the web version of Mushoku Tensei all the way to the end. If I didn’t have that experience with fighting games, I would have been satisfied at a much earlier stage, and when things became tough I would have run away from writing. Needless to say, I don’t think I would have reached no. 1 in the rankings, and it wouldn’t have gotten an anime either.
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Its a good thing for you to keep your health that you stopped early on cause shit went from lousy to worse.
Incest and pedo harem galore by just reading synopsis cuz i sure aint going to subscribe to this insulting debauchery by giving it audience.
Still i think its needed to keep an eye on it and react harshly to its demented sick fanbase cuz if you see evil and say or do nothing how can you be considered good & decent.
When good guys dont act thats when things get out of hand.
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Um… well I guess, just add my own take on this topic
firstly, I don’t condone any of redeus actions and the anime does play it out as comedy. Most of the time there’s no denying that, but at the same-time i do have to question a few points about some of these points like “Dad, Paul, snuck into his ex college roommate and current maid’s room and raped her in her sleep.” And unless I’m mistaken which I definitely could be, the scene isn’t played off like this at all and I’m pretty sure this is the line “Beside, the girls in those places never exercised a day in their lives once you get them out of their clothes and into bed, they’re a mess.” oh, and I’m definitely not defending this line Paul is a horrible person, especially while saying this line before his somewhat redemption arc but when is it implied that he ever raped her? And maybe you can interpret that but at least from my perspective, I don’t get same. whilst, I don’t wanna be forever entangled in this massive thread argument i will say he has matured over the season by the final episode, I do think he’s still perverted i just wanted to honestly know when he ever assaulted roxy.
to add, this isn’t me defending the series playing out sexual harassment or assault for comedy I just wanted to know when some of these lines or said or implied, since, on the contrary, I do hate these scenarios with a passion since it’s sort of cheapens radeus redemption later-on in the light-novel which I do enjoy read.
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from what i can read, you are easily butt-hurt.
it’s not like he is using magic to create tentacles to “play” with them.
So in the anime world, this is “meh” on the sexual harassment.
But, hey, I like miyasaki too, so have fun with totoro or ponyo
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My guy he’s 12 sure he’s a pervert but that’s it maybe learn what being reborn and reincarnation is
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So your okay with watching 12 year olds want to be sexual…
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This show is so filled with pedophilia it’s disgusting. There is no counter argument for it. It doesn’t matter if he was reborn it’s still pedophilia. The first season is filled with child sexualization. I watched all of season 1 hoping it would improve. It did not. It sickens me to see people defend it.
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I don’t have a problem with stating that Rudeus makes you uncomfortable, that too much of his screentime is filled with inappropriate sexual content, that he ruins the experience for you, or even that he’s a bad character. While I disagree, I won’t even blame you for thinking that Mushoku Tensei supports a deviant worldview. I despise fanservice in anime more than almost anyone else, so I get it. Where I take issue is when you claim Mushoku Tensei as a whole is bad, despite literally everything else being stellar. Music and animation? Amazing. Characters besides Rudy? Incredible. Power system? Excellent. Worldbuilding? Unreal. Plot? Some of the best, if not THE best, I’ve ever seen. So putting that below No Game No freakin’ Life shows either a bad faith perspective or a serious lack in anime experience.
Look, I won’t beat a dead horse. You’re clearly set in your opinion, and no argument of mine will change that. But having a burning hatred and shouting to the heavens that it’s a tragedy this is so popular, and THEN saying you refuse to even discuss it further, goes too far. This is a show that should have this level of popularity, even if you personally don’t wish to engage with it.
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(originally, this was a reply to a different post on this thread mentioning the author as i’d hoped to shed a little light on him with this post/interview. However i’d misclicked and now it’s attached to a completely different comment of a detailed, and point-by-point analysis on why he’d found mushoku tensei tendencies to be case and point equivalent to if puri puri prisoner magically received a newly created spin-off straight out the jailhouse itself. Anyways I’m hopefully this may give a bit of insight onto the author’s opinion and ideas< surrounding the aberration known as “mushoku tensei”—-)
I dunno, I’ve read a couple interviews with Rifujin na Magonote a.k.a the author of the mushoku tensei and welp, he’d seemed like a bit of a nice guy??? or maybe I’m just too naïve and gullible to depict a person character… after all, it’s only a simple question interview here’s a couple lines/questions from the initial interview though… on animenewsnetwork—-✥
⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩
You first started writing the web version of Mushoku Tensei in 2012, and almost 10 years later, your work has become an anime. Has working on the anime changed your impression of your original work?
Rifujin na Magonote: My impression towards the original work hasn’t changed because the anime and novel are different things. What do you think? No matter how wonderful and polished the anime is, it doesn’t make the original work any better. On the flip side, if the anime were so bad it makes you want to avert your eyes, it wouldn’t make the original work any worse.
Some of the most controversial aspects of Mushoku Tensei are at the very start because it begins with Rudeus at his lowest. Looking back, are there ever times when you think “Maybe that was a little over-the-top” or “Maybe I should have held back a little”? Or do you think the balance was right for the story you wanted to tell?
Rifujin na Magonote: I think the balance was right. Because he’s a controversial character, his mountain of regrets makes the act of redoing life more meaningful. Of course, I have no issue with criticizing Rudeus at the beginning stage, and it’s up to you to decide whether you don’t want to see the story because of that. With that said, if there’s someone like Rudeus close to you and that person were to have even a slight change of heart and try to start over, I sincerely hope that you won’t abandon them on the spot.
—————- disclaimer… this next’s section is bit odder or i’d rather say weird to say the least but, perhaps everyone interprets this in a different way.
relatively large part of Mushoku Tensei is about the sexual lives of the characters, including the side characters. Deviant sexual behavior is often depicted as well as a natural part of the world. What inspired you to take this kind of focus in your storytelling?
Rifujin na Magonote: In Japanese creative works, there are two polar opposite approaches to depicting sexual life: As “sacred” or as “pleasure.” I suppose I got my inspiration because I thought there wasn’t enough representation of the viewpoint that reproductive activity is natural to organisms.
I think that, among the instincts of a living creature, the urge to breed is the strongest even when put alongside the urge to eat. Most living creatures will generally live their lives driven by the natural desire to leave offspring behind. That inevitably goes hand-in-hand with sexual activity. Basically, it’s a natural and important aspect of being a living creature.
Because it’s an important part of the life of an organism, it’s not wrong to call it sacred. However, it’s also true that sex is associated with pleasure. You could also say that it’s natural for people to treat sex as pleasure for as long as pleasure is intertwined with the act. With that in mind, when depicting the world of Mushoku Tensei, I aimed for the middle ground between “sacred” and “pleasure.” That’s the vibe I was going for.
Incidentally, when writing the opening act of the story, I strongly emphasized Rudeus’s perspective on sex as a thing of pleasure. It’s only natural because he had no experience in his previous life, so the pleasure aspect was the only side he came into contact with. Consequently, there might be a lot of people who strongly feel the pleasurable side. But that shouldn’t be a surprise—you don’t broadcast something sacred for all eyes to see.
—————-
games have had on your outlook, but this is not a fact that’s well known in the English-speaking world. Could you explain your relationship with fighting games, and if that’s impacted your writing at all?
Rifujin na Magonote: I started playing fighting games when I was around 18. Back then, I wasn’t really good at dealing with people. In a fighting game, you compete against other people, so by taking up fighting games in an arcade, I started interacting with people without even knowing their real names. Most of them were older than me; it was thanks to them that I learned communication and proper manners.
But it wasn’t as if they gave me verbal tips, like do this or do that. I tried to imitate the behavior of the people I thought were good and avoided being like the people I thought were bad or often stirred up trouble… Basically, all the common-sense things that every human picks up from somewhere finally came to me in an arcade when I was around 20 years old. Basically, fighting games were what taught me how to clear the minimum bar.
As for how they influenced my writing, besides what I’ve expressed above, there’s one other thing. I applied myself to fighting games in my own way, but once I reached a certain stage, I started thinking, “I’ve reached my ceiling.” To put it another way, I thought, “I’m done.”
As far as competitive standards in Japan went, I was firmly in the middle of the pack, but in my local area I was the strongest. But I also knew that it wasn’t really true that it was impossible for me to get any stronger. For example, I could have left my home town and challenged people who were stronger than me. Despite knowing that, I didn’t want to experience the frustration and setbacks, so I ran away from it. Even though the truth was that I really did want to get stronger.
That feeling of regret was what supported me when I was writing Mushoku Tensei. When I was having a particularly difficult time writing, I would think, “If I flake out here, I’ll be the same as back then.” It was what allowed me to steel myself.
As a result, I was able to write the web version of Mushoku Tensei all the way to the end. If I didn’t have that experience with fighting games, I would have been satisfied at a much earlier stage, and when things became tough I would have run away from writing. Needless to say, I don’t think I would have reached no. 1 in the rankings, and it wouldn’t have gotten an anime either.
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(originally, this was a reply to a different post on this thread mentioning the author as i’d hoped to shed a little light on him with this post/interview. However i’d misclicked and now it’s attached to a completely different comment of a detailed, and point-by-point analysis on why he’d found mushoku tensei tendencies to be case and point equivalent to if puri puri prisoner magically received a newly created spin-off straight out the jailhouse itself. Anyways I’m hopefully this may give a bit of insight onto the author’s opinion and ideas< surrounding the aberration known as “mushoku tensei”—-)
I dunno, I’ve read a couple interviews with Rifujin na Magonote a.k.a the author of the mushoku tensei and welp, he’d seemed like a bit of a nice guy??? or maybe I’m just too naïve and gullible to depict a person character… after all, it’s only a simple question interview here’s a couple lines/questions from the initial interview though… on animenewsnetwork—-✥
⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩
You first started writing the web version of Mushoku Tensei in 2012, and almost 10 years later, your work has become an anime. Has working on the anime changed your impression of your original work?
Rifujin na Magonote: My impression towards the original work hasn’t changed because the anime and novel are different things. What do you think? No matter how wonderful and polished the anime is, it doesn’t make the original work any better. On the flip side, if the anime were so bad it makes you want to avert your eyes, it wouldn’t make the original work any worse.
Some of the most controversial aspects of Mushoku Tensei are at the very start because it begins with Rudeus at his lowest. Looking back, are there ever times when you think “Maybe that was a little over-the-top” or “Maybe I should have held back a little”? Or do you think the balance was right for the story you wanted to tell?
Rifujin na Magonote: I think the balance was right. Because he’s a controversial character, his mountain of regrets makes the act of redoing life more meaningful. Of course, I have no issue with criticizing Rudeus at the beginning stage, and it’s up to you to decide whether you don’t want to see the story because of that. With that said, if there’s someone like Rudeus close to you and that person were to have even a slight change of heart and try to start over, I sincerely hope that you won’t abandon them on the spot.
How much do you think you've changed as an author over time? Are there any significant differences between Mushoku Tensei and some of your more recent works?
Rifujin na Magonote: I don't think I've changed much. But more often these days when I get praised, I get a compulsive desire to make sure that what I write is proper, so my writing speed has slowed.
Mushoku Tensei is sometimes called the “pioneer” of Narо̄-kei light novels. How do you feel about this label?
Rifujin na Magonote: It's an honor, but I also feel it's mistaken. When I first started writing on Shо̄setsuka ni Narо̄, my work was already deeply influenced by the stories on there, so from my perspective, there are plenty of pioneers above me.
Some of the most controversial aspects of Mushoku Tensei are at the very start because it begins with Rudeus at his lowest. Looking back, are there ever times when you think “Maybe that was a little over-the-top” or “Maybe I should have held back a little”? Or do you think the balance was right for the story you wanted to tell?
Rifujin na Magonote: I think the balance was right. Because he's a controversial character, his mountain of regrets makes the act of redoing life more meaningful. Of course, I have no issue with criticizing Rudeus at the beginning stage, and it's up to you to decide whether you don't want to see the story because of that. With that said, if there's someone like Rudeus close to you and that person were to have even a slight change of heart and try to start over, I sincerely hope that you won't abandon them on the spot.
(Disclaimer since, there’s a bit of a policy against duplicates comments and I screwed up a bit. the full interview can be found either on the website for myanimenewsnetwork or just by scrolling a bit of upwards to find the original reply which is posted under the wrong comment)
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You absolutely nailed it in this blog and you are right. This story promotes pedophile and the author doesn’t seem to reflect what he wrote so it’s certain that the author of this story has pedophile fetish. Japan had cases like these where Japanese authors getting caught by doing pedophile acts and only gets light sentences. To all those people who felt disgust by this story (including me) you all should be proud because it shows that you are good human beings that knows what is right and what is wrong
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Tbf can easily just skip the weird scenes, that’s what I’m doing as it’s like watching miniladd when those scenes are playing.
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I too never understood the popularity of this series. Maybe if it wasn’t so lavishly animated people would have a very different perspective on it? Rudeus doesn’t really go through much of a redemption arc, nor do any of the other rapist characters within the series. Sexual assault is kind of just handeaved in this series which seems rather bizarre. I’ve heard many people compare this to Game of Thrones, but at least in that series people met brutal consequences for their actions and depravity. In this series not so much. What this really strikes me of (especially at the beginning of the series) is a young, inexperienced and naive writer who just wanted to write a sexy fantasy, but was not very privy to how sexuality, consent, and trauma actually function. Because if these issues were taken seriously Rudeus would have faced more consequences than he did. Also, as he was sexually traumatized in his youth as well, maybe it would have dawned on him how some of his behaviors were inappropriate as well? People will dismiss the fact that he was socially inept in gis past, but that is still no excuse being that he was a man in his mid 30s. In the end the series is an escapist fantasy where a hotrible person gets to have 3 hot anime waifus, and that’s it. The world is interesting, but the main character was absolutely abhorrent. This is just another in a string of horrible main characters who get excused for their sexist behaviors because they say a cool line and are involved in some flashy fight sequences.
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This is crazy, this is a work of fiction created from the authors desire to tell a compelling story, controversy and detestable acts are commonplace in a great story, the same, if not much worse issues, can be seen throughout all literature, I can understand if this particular story is one you may not like, but u have no right to make any judgement on the author, anything more seems to me like ur misunderstanding what manga, light novel, anime is!
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You know why the author hides his identity? Probably because he knows he’s a pervert and doesn’t want to get found out. Even if the Rudeus wasn’t a reincarnated 34 year old man, even if he is truly an 11 year old boy–sex between children is disgusting. What kind of person writes about that?
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Bold statement to make about a writer you have never met. In addition, why is it not a smart decision to hide your identity as an author when millions of people online need nothing but a name to find someone’s whereabouts and personal information? Clearly it’s individuals like yourself that have no problems vilifying an innocent man as a predator, only on the grounds of disliking his work and nothing else, all while having no remorse that by doing so you could actually put them in serious danger, unlike your arguments about a world that doesn’t even exist.
By the logic you convey with a character like Rudeus, then every anime where the adult MC travels back in time to when in high school and finds a love interest, is a PEDO. This means that Takemichi (Tokyo Revengers) is a child predator when he romantically hugs and kisses Tachibana in the past, because he does it with the memories he has as an adult. Denying this only denies the point you try to make, seeing as Takemichi is 27 in TR. Sure Rudy is a bit scumy throughout the show, however every romantic interaction he has in the show is consensual and legal within their respective universe, even though nothing “sexually explicit” is shown for television’s sake, but only implied. (keep in mind that it was only a couple hundred years ago irl that life expectancy was around 40, and people would look down on guys and girls that didn’t marry and give birth to an heir before the age of 14, as this was practiced worldwide). The “bath” scene is hardly romance and to insinuate that it is, might be a little weird on your part for perceiving it that way. I have had to bathe with my younger cousin and older sister before, as well as my aunt, all while I wasn’t even of voting age. That does not mean my family is guilty by any means, nor should they be subject to your mediocre logic.
Although there were some themes of the show I viewed which came across as distasteful, it was nothing compared to the many gruesome/horrific scenes I witnessed in Game of Thrones, such as rape, incest, child slavery, murder, suicide, maiming of a sexual organ, physical/psychological torture, and forcing innocent people to commit atrocities. With all of this, how is it that the author of GOT is not labeled as a murderer, rapist, or child trafficker? Please let me know what your able to come up with, I’d love a justification. Preferably one not in the form of a contradiction.
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