So I'm a Spider, So What?

This show is how an isekai should be made… but at the same time how an isekai should not be made. Kumo Desu ga, Nani ka doesn’t look very promising at first glance, the premise is pretty much the same as your average isekai anime, with our main character dying and reincarnating in another world with RPG videogames terminology. Not even the fact she revives as a spider monster is something new or original at this point (but at least is more striking than a lame slime!). But what it lacks in originality, it makes up for in personality and self-awareness, while taking enough care ofimportant things that other animes of the genre don’t bother to even show. Let’s address it by parts. Our protagonist, simply and unofficially named Kumoko, was reborn as a spider monster, the weakest monster race, inside the most dangerous dungeon in this new world, while still remembering her previous life as an antisocial loner otaku (of course it should be that way). Sooner than later we are introduced to the main selling point this serie has: Kumoko struggling really hard to survive in this new world, trying not to get devoured in the process, while getting new skills, becoming stronger and learning about the world. All this is done in the most energic, charming and amusing way, thanks to Kumoko charisma and positivism. Now, this is not the only thing we’ll see, alongside Kumoko, her classmates and the teacher died and reincarnated as well, having enough luck to get way better lives. Don’t let this innocent and rather simple premise taunts you. Which may initially appear just a fantasy story about a spider monster striving inside a cave, turns out to be a way vaster and more convoluted plot as it appeared, borderline on pretentiousness. Outside of the dungeon we see there are factions, nations and politics issues, going for wars between races and churches ideologies clash, which get more fraught as the series moves on, to ancient god and demons scheming over the world origins. Not only that, the skill system by itself, initially just appearing as a hook for RPG fans like in many other isekai animes, ended up being an important part of the mystery of the world, and the reincarnation itself. Yet those topics are touched in a very basic way, the serie fills up this ambition with a solid narrative going hand in hand with the story. The narrative switches over two different POVs: the inside of the dungeon with Kumoko, and the outside world with a little group or reincarnates. Yes, this isekai does focus on story and worldbuilding, and while these two perspectives are rather different, they actually complement each other really well, sharing information actively, and explaining terminology that is going to be used in the next segment, without feeling forced. Subtlety is well-handled as well, mentioning topics or terms that are going to be important later on the serie in a very natural way (ex: talking about a skill that will be important to explain the MC motivations, or why the skill system by itself can be dangerous). Some people couldn’t notice at the beginning that both perspectives, Kumoko’s and the reincarnates’, are actually from different timelines, considering they were born in this world and the same time, but we see Kumoko from her birth, while we see the reincarnates when they are teenagers, and it’s only later on when the reincarnates’ side mentions Kumoko existence as a kind of legend, without directly telling it’s her; they don’t even cross paths until the very end of the serie. This kind of subtlety and naturality to show and explain important topics in a narrative this ambitious is pleasant to see nowadays. Story and narrative are very good by themselves to support all the serie, because the rest of it is… not so impressive. Characters, for example, are like day and night: >On the one hand, we have Kumoko. As previously stated, she’s pretty much the main selling point of the serie: if we search the definition of “charisma” in a dictionary, it would be her. Kumoko is charming, funny and very optimist, always doing her best to survive even with all the rough situations she goes through. Her role in the serie is pretty much acting like a guide to the viewer, constantly breaking the 4th wall and making comedy with a lot of references to popular culture, yet she’s witty enough to be aware about her situation without unnecessary edgyness; this serie touches dark themes in the least dark way, and Kumoko it’s the living proof. For a lot of people she alone carries all the serie over her thorax, but she’s not so perfect, she got little to no development along the serie (it’s not like she needed it) and remained pretty much the same even with all the harsh moments she went through, the things she learned and the power she got. Still the most solid character in the serie. >On the other hand, we have a little group of reincarnates who were Kumoko classmates (and the teacher). While Kumoko, as plain as she is, can still be described with a lot of adjectives, those guys can be described with just two words: boring and generic. Unlike our eight-legged MC, this group reincarnated as humans (most of them), living in prestigious families, so most of the outside world is showed by them: -First, we have Shun, we can say he’s the deuteragonist. There’re not enough words to explain how PAINFUL and INSUFFERABLE is to see this guy taking the lead. He’s pretty much your generic isekai protagonist, with all the cliches included in the pack: bland design, lack of personality, cringe hero complex (and yes, he was born in the Hero family, so he got blessed by the power of script) and harem pandering. He’s basically an Emiya Shirou, less pretentious but way naiver. And is this naivety by far the worst part, to the point every time he got the spotlight, the serie handled to make fun of it for being such a silly. He’s so misplaced to the point he got into a war he has noting to do just because “I can’t allow these people to suffer” (yep, even his sentences are prefabricated). Honestly, I can’t blame people for thinking human side is boring just because this dude. -Katia is Shun best friend in this and previous life, and your typical tsundere chick, with the plot twist that she was a boy before reincarnating. Actually there was a moment when this character faced her inner conflicts and decided to be honest with herself and becoming a full girl instead of a boy trapped into another body…moment that was never well-developed. -Hugo is your edgy vain and power-thirsty villain who thinks he’s better than anyone else. -Filimos is the students’ teacher who got reincarnated as an elf (excuses to introduce a loli character it seems). While started as a mysterious and a bit interesting character, later on it’s revealed her motivations, which are very dull, and she’s way naiver than Shun. -Generic crazy yandere girl is a generic crazy yandere girl who got brainwashed by the church. -Fei was actually the most decent character in this group. She, like Kumoko, reincarnated as a monster (a dragon), and she was a bully in her previous life, especially with her (she doesn’t know she’s alive living as a spider). She feels guilty, she feels this new life is a divine punishment for her actions, and she was always concerning about Kumoko and wanted to meet her to apologize. Sound like something that could drive to an interesting catharsis… except when she gets a human form and forgets about all of this. Initially, the serie got a 50/50 split between Kumoko and humans sides, but in the second part of the serie, when the politics themes and war calls became the main focus, human side got more spotlight. If it weren’t because, again, story and narrative by themselves are good enough, this would be really painful to watch because of this bunch of generic character. But at the same time, watching Kumoko getting stronger and destroying any trace of tension would be even more boring (and we don’t want such a thing to happen, right, Rimuru?), so the change of perspective was more a win than a miss. But actually… there is a third side here! Kumoko goes in her way, humans go in theirs, but there are a bunch of character that walk another path, this includes other three reincarnates (only two of them are worth it), some demons, and even Kumoko can be placed here under certain circumstances. What makes this group different from the other reincarnates, is that they were born under different circumstances, which push them to live under this new world rules, instead of being attached to their previous lives like Shun group. This group is by far more interesting that Shun groups, it’s a shame they weren’t fully showed in this season. Having this ambitious story and this charming MC would be worthy of a decent direction, right? Sadly this was not the case. I don’t really need to explain why this show has a very hideous animation, especially the CGI, everyone can see it, but the direction has to be the worst I’ve ever seen in many years. Not only it was disastrous in action-packed moments, where transitions and cuts were so random that was really hard to tell what was happening, and it seemed director forgot some frames in the middle, but also covering up all the scream with that hideous CGI instead of trying to hide it a little at least with dust or light rays. Even in slower or more serious moments it was a mess, like the catharsis of some characters like Katia and Filimos, they were so shallowed portrayed it’s hard to even care about what they said, even more to care about them at all. Luckily the music was decent enough to partially conceal this, and seiyuus work is really good, especially Aoi Yuuki as our favorite arachnid girl, big part of her charm was there. Yet there were a couple of good action moments with a decent -in this context- direction, like Kumoko vs Alaba. Kumo Desu ga, Nani ka is how an isekai should be made, with an interesting and promising new approach to an already burned-out genre, focusing on a deep plot with a witty narrative but shallowly developed, and a great main character to carry the serie. Kumo Desu ga, Nani ka is how an isekai should not be made, with really bad side-characters, going hand in hand with an appalling animation, and a very weak direction that doesn’t do justice to such an ambitious premise. Even with all its cons still is one of the most decent isekai animes out there, and I'd love to see another season, considering all the potential it has.

So I’m a spider. Well, not really, but so what? This is an anime that has been on my radar for some time now, mainly because it was originally slated for last year but got delayed due to production issues. Covid-19 must have not helped things there as well. But we did eventually get this year in the stacked winter 2021 and pretty much got overshadowed by Re:Zero season 2 part 2, Mushoku Tensei and Slime season 2. But I definitely thought to myself that I should not sleep on the spider isekai, especially as more episodes aired as time went on. And of course,I’m writing this review to tell you that you should also not sleep on the spider (mainly because you’ll squash it) but because it’s definitely one of the more interesting narratives that I have watched recently, even if it is burdened of being an Isekai. Which honestly, wouldn’t have worked anywhere else. So get your drink, put your feet up, sit back, relax and don’t squash that spider next to you as I present to you the anime review for So I’m a Spider, So What? Let’s begin shall we? Story: 8.5/10 A great catastrophe strikes a school and kills everyone hit by it. But fortunately for some, they get reincarnated to a fantasy world. Some even more fortunate than others. Like one of our main protagonist Shun who gets reincarnated as a son to the king and his brother (or one of his brothers) being designated the hero of the kingdom as well as reuniting with some of his former classmates and appreciates the life he have. But one was not so lucky. Kumoko was reincarnated as a weak spider at the bottom of a labyrinth with dangers from all over the place. Alone with no help, Kumoko must adapt and get stronger to survive the horrors in the labyrinth. The story does start off quite slow and in a rather typical Isekai fashion with our characters learning about their surroundings and the fact that there is a RPG like system that helps make people stronger and uses that system to get stronger themselves. It’s the standard Isekai affair to get viewers comfortable with something familiar but the problem with that is that it does make the first few episodes rather boring because it very much feels like we are going through the motion to get us introduced to the series and characters. Now, the real meat occurs around episode six and where things start to get interesting. I won’t spoil anything but let’s just say that the thing that kept me most interested in the story and the show in general was how Kumoko and Shun’s story were connected to one another. Throughout the show, we are given clues and leads as to how this connects to that and how this one action can affect the other story. It was essentially playing connect the dots to see how these two stories connected to one another. It did make me engage with the story a lot better than it did to begin with because I wanted to see all the little details that can have effect on the show overall. After an episode finished, I didn’t immediately move on to the next show I needed to watch, no I sat there thinking of what could this mean in the future. It got me thinking after the episode was finished and made me want to find out what happens next to see if I am right with my thinking. The show does a great job with how it leaves clues and hints to keep you theorizing and get you hooked to watch what happens next. What also helped with this was the show’s good world building. It’s not amazing but it was solid enough to help me understand the world better, especially as we get more episodes and more things are explained due to the situation going on in that episode. As well as the RPG like system that helps tell how strong an individual is. Although the walls of text you have to read when looking at the skills is just ridiculous. But the show does highlight the skills and titles that are important to the story so you won’t get swamped or confused when trying to read that wall of text. Characters: 7/10 I want to start with the characters from Shun’s story because honestly, I didn’t care too much about them but still enough to be interested (So a sort of middle ground). I mainly was interested in them and their side of the story was to see how they were connected to Kumoko’s story and vice versa. They all have a role to play in the overall story and I will admit that they do a solid job when it comes to it. Some of them I do like more than others like Sensei who who definitely has some secrets to hide behind that lively personality. By the end, I was interested to see what would happen to them and if they make it through alive. Although I will admit, I don’t remember all of their names but their personality (as well as their designs) do help them distinguish one another. The star of the show though was obviously Kumoko (mainly helped by a great voice acting performance by Aoi Yuuki). Being alone and no restrictions with the harsh environment she’s in and well, being a spider, she does a great job at being entertaining and try to have a positive outlook on things. What I like about her character though is her growth but not by sheer luck or by just being born overpowered. Through strategy and thinking quickly on her feet, we see how she progressively gets stronger, both mentally and physically. While she does get really strong as we go through the show, she’s always having to go against characters and monsters that are clearly stronger than her or not being simple pushovers and having to adapt and stratergise makes her fights more enjoyable than the ones in Shun’s story because of them being well paced and fleshed out to be more engaging. In fact, more attention was put into Kumoko’s fights and Shun’s fights but I will get into that in the animation section. Animation: 5/10 Okay this is going to open some unnecessary can of worms because I actually do think the CG looks good. Not top tier but good enough. Monster designs look good and some of the human looking cgi models like Ariel look good as well. And then there are the fight scenes which look fun, fast and has plenty of action without it looking jarring at all; making for the best fights of the show. Kumoko looks great as well, skittering along like a spider and her expressions are quite funny. What I also like is that while Kumoko’s perspective, she is a cuddly little spider, but from everyone else’s perspective, she is a scary ass spider that has the ability to kill you just by looking at you. Though that being said, they kind of phoned it in at the end, especially during Shun’s story segments. It looked rough and did not have the same polish as before. That’s where I think the animation budget went to because the traditional animation just looks really sub-par with the exception of the character designs as they do look good and do transition alright into CG. Compared to the CG fights, the 2D fights don’t have near as much attention put into them and sometimes boils down to still images that seem to be poorly ordered as well as to how the fights transpire. Episode 14 is the peak of this. Anyone who’s watched that episode can agree with me that the main fight scene looks janky as all hell and was difficult to keep up what’s going on. It’s weird that that the CG animation looks better than the traditional animation. It was clear near the end of this show that there were some major production issues going down relating to this show. And while we did get confirmation about what happend, it didn’t change the fact that it caused the animation to suffer by the end. Sound: 6.5/10 I didn’t really care much for this show’s soundtrack in all honestly. It’s not bad but it’s the usual standard fantasy orchestra you hear from other shows with little to make it stand out on its own. The only exception to this is any ost that relates to Ariel as it does help with her menacing and overpowered presence. It’s the only part of the ost that stood out to me because it does help set the tone of dread that Ariel has her sights set on you. In fact, all of the haunting tracks do a good job at being, well, haunting and setting the tone. So it ain’t all that forgettable. Really, the standout thing when it comes to the sound department were its OPs. Both, "Keep weaving your spider way" by Riko Azuna and "Bursty Greedy Spider" by Konomi Suzuki are both very similar as they both have great songs, great visuals and are chock full of spoilers. Considering both seemed to be tailored for this anime, they both nailed it out of the park for getting you pumped and ready to go to watch the episode. So it really comes down to personal preference as which one is the best and I would give it to “Keep weaving your spider way” because I like the fast craziness the OP provides with a little bit of a dark undertone to capture what the show is like from Kumoko’s perspective. I would group both endings together because they are basically the same and something I would believe Kumoko would do given the opportunity and are appropriately sung by Aoi Yuuki herself. "Ganbare! Kumoko-san's Theme” and "Genjitsu Totsugeki Hierarchy,” are both fast paced and crazy EDs and relay to us how Kumoko feels about her situation while still acting like her usual self. I actually did like them because they do rub off Kumoko’s personality well and they are fun to listen to and watching them as well. Conclusion I really liked, “So I’m a Spider, So What?” The way the narrative is structured combined with its solid cast made it turn from a show I was ready to dismiss to a show that I want to see more of. It gave me incentives to keep watching and to find out how the two narratives connect to one another. It was the main hook that kept me going and wanted to find out what happens next and to see if I was right. As well as actually having good CG; which most modern anime out there can’t really say. Yet despite that, it still has some noticeable flaws. The narrative was slow to begin with and it started tapering off in its last few episodes, Shun’s cast of characters could be better but are thankfully not bad, the 2D animation was sub par and the ost could’ve been better. It’s a show that has plenty of flaws that prevent it from being a truly great show. But it didn’t truly affect my enjoyment of the show. Again, the interconnecting narrative was the core of what made this show so enjoyable and thinking about how this relates to that while waiting for the next episode made this show so engaging to watch. There is clearly more to be told and more that is going on so I really want to see what happens next. But given this show’s past production issues, we might not get it and if we did, it might not be for a long while yet. Which would be a shame because there are plenty of things to work with here that could lead to one of the best narratives for any Isekai anime. One that actually gets you to think about what it all means instead of it being strictly another bog standard power trip fantasy or light hearted comedy (Not to say they are all bad, but there are quite a lot of them). It is an imperfect show, I will give you that, but I found this show better than I thought it was going to be and something I would eagerly wait to see if we get any more of this show (Or you know, go read the light novel or manga but where’s the fun in not waiting with anticipation?) My Personal Enjoyment: 8.5/10 Overall Score: 7.1/10 Recommendation: Watch it

The spider isekai is another case of trying to subvert a few things, only to fail in the longrun because you focus on the wrong things. One twist the anime went for was about having two storylines developing independently while at the same time feeding off each other. In one story you had the main heroine getting reincarnated as a spider and having to survive in a very dangerous cave, and in the other story it was about her fellow students reincarnating as various people and monsters in the human world where they are given proper upbringing and military training. The antithesis of seeing thespider having to fight hard in order to survive while the humans are having a mostly easy-going life was funny for a few episodes. Another twist in the second half of the show is the characters helping out the demon lord. Instead of having the heroes being the good guys who are gradually leveling up in order to defeat some distant evil party, in this show they become the evil party. With proper presentation, the anime could have been a very good subversion of a done to death formula. But as I mentioned already the presentation was far from perfect for the following reasons. 1) The production values are not very good. The CGI monsters are standing out too much and that takes you out of the experience. The artwork is also getting worse after awhile, resulting in the final episodes where things get more serious and should be given more attention to come off as very ugly to look at. 2) The tone shifts are not transitioning well. When the show wants to move from comedy to tragedy, or from lighthearted moments to more grimdark ones, it usually does it in a sudden way, which again takes you out of the experience. For example, the spider is constantly joking about things that a second later will try to kill her, and that can be very jarring. 3) The storylines are uneven. Instead of being treated as equally important, the spider side of the story is far more interesting than the human side. Every time the scene changes to show what the humans are doing it can be very boring since it comes off as a generic fantasy adventure with way too many bland characters who are doing close to nothing. As a result, you never care about the humans as much as you care about the spider, which means half of the show is very bland. 4) The videogame terminology is off-putting. Since everyone has levels and skill trees, you get this constant narration of an AI telling you how many experience points you earned and what skills you unlocked. If you are not fine with everything playing out like a videogame, you are not gonna like the show. In traditional stories you learn something new by studying or training. Over here it just appears as an extra ability in your mind because you did something. It’s artificial since it doesn’t happen in an organic way and it’s always followed by huge infodumps and statistic screens. Thus, despite its good intentions, the spider isekai is another failure of an anime that doesn’t improve the image of isekais as overused, badly written and badly presented escapism.

Could have been really good or something more I would say. The first few episodes were enjoyable regardless of me not really caring about the shun and other humans. The CGI was bearable at the start but does it goes downhill real fast, the last few fight scenes actually gave me eye cancer. The movements are so ass, the robots are turbo ass. The pacing is also absolute garbage. The original light novel has 16 volumes and by the end of 24 episodes we are almost at the ending already?? HUH??? I was so surprised when some endgame shit showed up like we didn't getto see shit. Terrible execution of a good source material overall. I am hoping this get a remake since I really enjoyed the light novels. Overall : Enjoyable first few episodes, turbo ass as it progresses(especially the last parts oh boy, this shit is comparable to berserks 2016 level: note ofc they are by the same studio LMFAO). Terrible pacing, if you are interested in the story or just have some level of respect to the author just read the light novels.