English Dub Review: The Master of Ragnarok & Blesser of Einherjar “Tactics of the Wolf”

Too much tactics, not enough Wolf.

Overview (Spoilers Below!)

At night, Sigrun leads a Wolf Clan cavalry to the Hoof Clan base; she surprises Yngvi (the Hoof Clan patriarch) by attacking a mere few soldiers before fleeing. A few days later, Yuuto and Linnea prepare their armies to fight the Hoof Clan. Yuuto explains that it’s important for soldiers to eat and drink well in order to ensure their strength for the upcoming battle. He planned for Sigrun’s attacks (over the course of three consecutive nights) to utterly exhaust the Hoof Clan, and the strategy succeeds—she is able to easily kill Yngvi with a katana, a weapon Yuuto introduced to the Wolf Clan.

While Yuuto, Sigrun, and Felicia enjoy a celebratory bath, Linnea enters with a request for Yuuto: she wishes to marry him. Although Linnea insists that this partnership would benefit both the Wolf and Horn Clans, Yuuto is suspicious of her motives. Eventually Linnea reveals that, although clan patriarchs are usually selected by merit, she was chosen merely because her father was the last patriarch. She wishes for Yuuto to rule over her people in addition to his own, in order to restore the Horn Clan’s meritocracy.

In private, Yuuto reveals to Felicia that he cannot marry Linnea, no matter how advantageous a move it may seem (secretly, it’s because he’s still into Mitsuki, his crush back in 2018). Felicia tells Yuuto that she initially wished for him to marry Linnea so he’d feel tied to Yggdrasil and be less inclined to leave, but she now knows that her desire was selfish. Yuuto assures her that she is his most trusted friend.

Meanwhile, a new enemy appears on the horizon…

Our Take

I’m going to come right out and say it—this episode is boring. After last episode, I thought I was excited to see Yuuto’s military strategies in action, but the aptly named “Tactics of the Wolf” shows us that it’s possible to have too much of a good thing. The first half of this episode is mostly characters discussing military strategy, and it was so dry and technical that I found it hard to follow; several times, I caught myself spacing out in the middle of Yuuto’s conversations.

The actual battle scene is only a fraction of the episode’s runtime, and I wanted less talking and more action. We’re told over and over that the Hoof Clan soldiers are exhausted. Where are the visual examples of this? The same goes for the strength that Yuuto’s soldiers gained from their hearty meal—I heard about it but saw nothing actually unfold on the screen. The soldiers of all clans are animated to look near-identical, from standard faces to standard uniforms, and appropriately, we don’t see them do much of anything either. Why tell us Yuuto’s strategies when you could show us? That’s writing 101. It’s such a wasted opportunity.

The fight we do get to witness—the showdown between Sigrun and Yngvi—is appropriately epic, if disappointingly short. I’m a little confused as to why the Wolf and Horn Clan armies decide that Yngvi is a “monster” or “demon” just because he’s… taller than average. But so far, Sigrun is my favorite character in the show. A badass and highly competent fighter, she’s a refreshing break from the other characters who mostly just stand around talking. And when she does talk to Yngvi, their dialogue is overdramatic in the best possible way. I laughed out loud when Sigrun pulled out her katana, proving that this show is best when it’s cheesily over-the-top and doesn’t try to take itself too seriously.

The other characters, though, have failed to interest me. The intimate scene between Felicia and Yuuto should be really heartfelt, but it’s hard to get invested in such generic dialogue. Why does Felicia care about Yuuto so much? Is it just because he’s good for her clan? We really don’t know anything about Felicia, so it’s difficult to care about her as a character. The same goes for Yuuto’s feelings for Mitsuki and desire to return home—I would root for him much more strongly if I knew anything about their relationship or about Mitsuki herself. At the moment, she’s just a face and nothing more, the abstract idea of a crush. Speaking of which, are Yuuto’s parents worried about him? Is he missing a lot of school? I have a lot of questions about his situation.

In general, I want more specifics about the bonds between characters. The title card before the commercial break says that Sigrun distrusted Yuuto upon his arrival in Yggdrasil and immediately challenged him to battle. Since then, she has grown to respect him and regard him as a father. This is all super interesting, but it opens up another whole host of questions! How did Yuuto survive his battle against her? How did she end up coming around to him? This is an enormous opportunity for character development and growth that all happened offscreen, and we never got to see any of it.

Seeing some of that backstory would make also Yuuto’s leadership more believable because, at the moment, I don’t really get why everyone thinks he’s so incredible. Linnea says she never thought of giving her troops food before a battle; she pronounces Yuuto “amazing” for the idea. But honestly? It’s a pretty straightforward concept. The show keeps telling viewers that Yuuto is sooooo perfect compared to the backward and primitive people of Yggdrasil, and it’s both uninteresting and unbelievable. Yuuto needs flaws, and the people of Yggdrasil need strengths. At the moment, the show feels condescending towards its own fantasy kingdom.

And once again, this episode was pretty tonally jarring—we cut from a battle scene right to the girls arguing over who’s going to wash Yuuto’s back, littered with sex puns galore. The little sister/daughter thing? Still totally weird.

And the message about refraining from the unnecessary violence that I got from episode one? It was thrown away. When the Wolf Clan defeated the Horn Clan, its patriarch became Yuuto’s little sister. Why didn’t Yuuto capture Yngvi and make him a little brother? Who knows.

But this episode must have some good things about it, right? For one thing, the backgrounds in this show are gorgeous. The Wolf Clan city, as seen out the window of Yuuto’s tower, is painted beautifully. Animation of the main characters is consistently cute and fun—I especially like the quick series of pained expressions Yuuto goes through while trying to decide how to reject Linnea. And it’s such a small thing, but I really love how the characters are outlined in colors rather than black, making the show more visually interesting than many others.

And in the end, I was interested in Yuuto’s strategy. Planning attacks each night in order to exhaust the enemy before the real battle? Pretty smart. But one clever idea can’t carry a show. In the future, I really hope we learn more about the characters and see more battles in action, because at the moment, The Master of Ragnorak & Blesser of Einhenjar feels like a military history lesson, and I don’t want anime to feel like school.