English Dub Season Review: Peter Grill and the Philosopher’s Time Season One

Our Take:

Peter Grill… is a show.

It’s a relatively short and light watch, each episode minus the opening and ending being barely fifteen minutes each, so it’s not like you have to commit a lot of time to it. The premise revolves around a famous peerless warrior, Peter Grill, and his sexual exploits. He has a fiancee, but he also has a lot of women who are attracted to him because of his strength, and want to have a child with him.

It’s kind of hard to say if there is much character to any of the characters, because everyone feels very surface level. There isn’t much in terms of internal conflict, besides Peter’s ‘distress’ about having cheated on his fiancee multiple times, which I don’t really buy to begin with. Nobody was holding a knife to Peter’s throat and forcing him to sleep with them (except once, and that felt like one of the few clever parts of the show). The character with the most depth is Piglette who has a semblance of a character arc. She is not very confident in her appearance, and when she is offered to Peter as a political marriage, she has to take steps to gain her confidence. She ends up being the smartest person in the show, but really, this isn’t saying much. As for everyone else, they’re bland and I couldn’t get attached to them.

Peter himself is also pretty dull, because if you’re not into reverse rape as a kink, then Peter doesn’t really have anything. He is apparently strong (we don’t see the tournament in question) and apparently respected, but that’s not something we’re shown. From how he acts on-screen, it’s not something we believe either.

To be fair, Peter Grill is  not a harem anime with much of a story. It’s entirely focused on Peter’s exploits and how the girls always one-up him. Most of the attention is put onto how sexy the girls are, so if you enjoy the fan-service and nothing else, I’d say it succeeded. If you’re not really into that kind of thing, then I’d say skip it. It doesn’t really do anything special, and if it isn’t unique, then why should it stand out among the rest? There’s plenty of ecchi harem anime out there with a lot more interesting characters and a lot more plot to sell, so there are many better choices out there.