English Dub Review: By the Grace of the Gods “The Lady’s Training Session, with the Slimes”

Overview (Spoilers Below):

After completing his first mission with the adventurer’s guild, Ryoma joins the Duke and his family at their home. Eliaria wants to ask Ryoma to teach her how to play with her magic, so she cooks him a big breakfast and of course, it is delicious and he accepts. But it turns out that he learns a lot more than she does.

Later on, Ryoma accompanies Eliaria and the guards on an expedition into an abandoned mine shaft where they run into creatures to practice their combat skills on. When they run into a cave mantis, Eliaria manages to take it out. Then Ryoma takes out four at once, and they finish their scouting trip quickly. But the other party has also discovered bats, so they decide to put in a request for the adventurer’s guild to come and clear the caves.

Our Take:

The fifth episode of By the Grace of the Gods is a slight improvement over last week’s episode. Honestly, you can only go up after watching a kid and his slimes cleaning public bathrooms, so getting to see Ryoma learning new combat magic was definitely a lot more enjoyable. Although, this is still the same old show, so even though it was better, it was still pretty bad.

Almost halfway through the series, it’s safe to say that Ryoma is one of the most overpowered protagonists in the history of anime. He can do no wrong. He’s kind, humble, and can pick up any kind of new skill or magic on the first try. I found it pretty laughable when the butler teaching him the new tricks compliments him on his hard work. He literally tries everything once and does it perfectly, so I wouldn’t really call that difficult.

Eliaria, on the other hand, represents a much more natural student. She messes up, but keeps trying and eventually gets it right. When the group heads down to the caves, she’s able to KO a giant praying mantis with only two shots on her first try of live fighting, which makes me think Ryoma may not be the only lucky kid on the show.

The cave expedition is a bit more exciting than the training montage, but it could’ve been cooler for sure. The show set us up to think some kind of horrific monster could be lurking amongst the shadows in the cave. But since this is the blandest show I’ve ever watched, of course the monster just turns out to be a praying mantis, but bigger. Imagination and creativity is not By the Grace of the Gods’s strong suit.

The ending sets up a quest that will take place in next week’s episode, where Ryoma will join with his fellow beastkin friends from the guild in order to explore the rest of the abandoned mine, clearing monsters as they go. If this episode is anything to go by, they won’t have much to worry about, but with the way the show keeps dropping hints about Ryoma being comprised and his powers used by evil, there might be a sinister surprise lurking. Then again, knowing this show, I’d be more surprised if it isn’t a giant ladybug or an angry butterfly