Hello and welcome to Project Nitsuj. Last week, I made a list naming my top 12 isekai anime, but there’s one anime I left off on purpose because I wanted to talk about it today, Hai to Gensou no Grimgar. Also known as Grimgar of Fantasy and Ash, this series was written by Ao Jumonji in 2013 and is still ongoing to this day. There was a manga adaptation in 2015 but that didn’t really go anywhere and ended in 2016. At a time when isekai was starting to takeover the industry this series became an anime in 2016 under the production of A-1 Pictures (Black Butler, SAO, and many more) and in my opinion may have came out before it’s time. Make no mistake, I like this series and consider it one of the best isekai stories out there. I just think if it had waited a few more months or a year, it would have had more attention around it. Unfortunately, 2016 was a turning point for isekai and the series was overshadowed by Konosuba, Re:Zero, and Drifters who also made a debut that year and would change the way we view isekai. Grimgar would also change the way we view isekai by focusing more on the characters and placing them in a more grounded scenario where we see their struggles and how they overcome their hardships to become a team and what each character must sacrifice for the sake of the team. Let’s enter this world of hardship and take a look at Hai to Gensou no Grimgar.
Opening and Ending Theme
The opening is “Knew day” by (K)NoW NAME. It’s alright. I didn’t really get into it but I don’t dislike it. The storybook visuals are nice and the lyrics match up perfectly with the characters and their story.
The ending is “Harvest” by (K)NoW NAME. Looking back, this song was actually a lot better than I originally thought. Very powerful, very heartfelt, very emotional, and very moving to listen to. Just closing my eyes sends me on an emotional journey whenever I listen to this song and once again the storybook illustrations are beautiful to look at.
Episodes 1-4
So the anime starts off with our main characters fighting the strongest goblin warrior of all time (although it doesn’t help that they’re all terrible fighters and uncoordinated. Scene here: https://youtu.be/YOKbmAPd7CU?si=pgmaVvIcyPDezsjf). This first episode is a little bit confusing, but I’ll do my best to explain what’s going on. Basically, this group of teens and young adults wake up in the fantasy world of Grimgar. They have no idea how they got here nor do they remember anything about their lives before they got here (sounds like a good night of binge drinking in Las Vegas). They’re put to work as volunteer soldiers since the main army has their hands full with maintaining order in the kingdom and their duties involve disposing of monsters in the hopes that it’ll help them remember their past. They each join a respected guild which in this world serves as their main class. Haruhiro became a thief (well at least he got a sexy teacher), Moguzo became a warrior (fitting for his size), Ranta a dark knight (surprise he’s not a mercenary), Yume a hunter (aren’t the expectations of hunter covered by the thief class?), Shihoru a magician (I believe the correct term is mage), and their leader Manato a priest (all they’re missing is the fighter and gunslinger class). There was some other people but they left them behind to pursue their own goals leaving Haruhiro and the others to defend for themselves.
Nothing much to say about episode 2. The group finally kills their first goblin but it’s one of the most traumatizing and painful things I’ve witnessed. You know how in SAO the characters just kill the NPCs like it’s nothing? Well here, it’s something. This goblin fought to his last breath and the group had a pretty tough time killing it as this bastard kept getting back up and fighting until they finally stabbed it to death and they’re all pretty disgusted at what they just did and it’s understandable. Keep in mind, they lost their memories of our world so to them this world is the real world, and they just took a life (a goblins life but a life nonetheless). If this doesn’t invoke some kind of emotion in you, if you were in their shoes then something just might be wrong with you. After killing the goblin, they decide to take the rest of the day off to let what happened sink in. Near the end of the episode Ranta tries to peek on the girls and gets smacked for his attempt (Baron: Amateur).
At the start of episode 3 the boys apologize for their actions except for Ranta since he didn’t see anything he feels no need to apologize (you are such a dumbass). It’s also around here where we see that the group isn’t all that friendly with each other. While they all may be living under the same roof and in the same party there’s an invisible wall between them all. They’ll fight alongside each other but they don’t know how to approach each other. A good example of this is Shihoru who is uncomfortable around the boys so much that she doesn’t even talk to them. The only person she talks to is Yume and only because she’s a girl too. Shihoru will fight with them but she’s put up an invisible wall to keep them out. After that incident the group faces a serious problem of not having any money and are so poor that they can’t even buy new clothes and have to keep wearing the same clothes which are worn out. In order to get money, they go to the next town over which is occupied by goblins. Quietly moving and mapping out the city the group attacks goblins while they sleep and earn themselves easy money. They use that money to buy new clothes, food, and of course fix some of their equipment. It’s a pretty slow episode but the group is steadily getting better.
In the first half of episode 4 things seem to be going well for the group. They’re fighting more like a team, they learned new skills, and they’ve become more efficient in their fights (it’s nice to see things go their way for once). However, things take a bad turn when they get ambushed by the goblins and Manato gets shot in the back with an arrow and unfortunately dies (scene here: https://youtu.be/Gvv8DMkM0f0?si=r-gC_YLbb1Oq15BU, he dies? It’s only the fourth episode and we haven’t learned anything about him yet). His death hits pretty hard (he was their healer and leader. Without him the group is pretty much screwed) and if his death wasn’t enough, we find out that they have to cremate him within 5 days or he’ll come back as a zombie and try to kill them (well. . .sucks to be them). They gather up all their funds and cremate him (it costs money!? By God they just lost their comrade and you’re gonna charge them?).
Episodes 5-8
So episode 5 is the aftermath of Manato’s death. Everyone pretty much shuts down and it’s all understandable (they have no leader, strategist, or white mage. If they went into battle they would all die). As the boys drink their sorrows away they find an old friend of theirs who introduces them to a priestess named Mary and the boys bring her into the party without consulting Yume or Shihoru (okay you see, that’s gonna get you guys killed in more ways than one). Mary is kind of bitchy. She refuses to cooperate with the group, doesn’t get along with everybody, and doesn’t really help out all that much in battle (if she weren’t cute I would honestly kick her out). While at the bar exhausted the boys run into Reiji one of the people who Haruhirohiro in the others behind to do his own thing. He has moved up in the chain of command ever since becoming a member of the volunteer army. He gives them one gold piece as his way of saying sorry for Manato’s death but Haruhirohiro gives it back to him saying he can’t accept it (balls! He finally shows brass balls! If he would have accepted that money I would have been done with him as a character. Why? Because that was pity money. Reiji is basically saying that without Manato they’re pretty much dead and he was offering them a way out of their predicament. But Haruhiro doesn’t want to take an easy way out. He got into this mess because of his actions as well as the others and now he and the others must live with those actions and come up with a solution to get them out of it). Haruhiro finally realizes that all this time he never talked to Yume or Shihoru about Mary and just completely ignored them so he goes to have a chat with Yume where she admits she’s pissed but not because they added Mary to the party without consulting her but because Haruhiro and the other boys shut her and Shihoru out. They’ve also been hurting from this ordeal and not once did Haruhiro or the others check up on them (man you guys are really blowing your chances of getting with these girls). Haruhiro and Yume embrace each other in the rain where Haruhiro apologizes, they cry over Manato’s death, and they both vow to work together and start treating each other as friends and comrades (so you two gonna kiss or what?). While embracing each other in a rather awkward pose, Shihoru sees them from the window and misinterprets (well at least they ended the episode on a laugh. We needed this).
In episode 6 the group sets into motion operation: Be nice to Mary, and it actually works a little bit as she starts to heal and protect a few of them (the process is slow but the results are rewarding). She still keeps her distance and rarely interacts with them. We also get a chance to focus on Haruhiro where he still struggles with the burden of being a leader but the ghost of Manato comes and encourages him (oh man, he’s finally snapped). The next day Haruhiro starts to show some promise as a leader by paying attention to Moguzo’s fighting style such as how he always holds back because he has no helmet so he’s more vulnerable to attacks and has to play it safe. Haruhiro and the others decide to pitch in and buy him a helmet for their next fight. The group continues to be nice to Mary by inviting her to dinner with them at the tavern but she declines so Haruhiro and the others decide to go ask Shinohara the leader of a strong guild about Mary since he seems to know her. He introduces them to Hayasi who used to be in a party with Mary in the past (so how many party members died? We all know it’s coming). Back in the day, Mary was a bright and cheerful girl who cared about her friends and everything. That is until they came across a powerful kobold in the mines who killed three of her party members and they barely escaped with their lives. After this, the cheerful Mary died and she stopped smiling.
Nothing much to say about episode 7. After finding out about Mary’s past the group decides to keep treating Mary nicely in the hopes that it’ll get her to open up to them (baby steps). At the same time they continue to hunt goblins and gain new powers all while building up their friendships with each other (again, the process may be slow but the results are good which is what I like. The series has established that it wants to focus on the characters rather than the action and they’re doing a good job at it).
Episode 8 might just be the best episode in the series. In the first half the group raids a goblin house and this raid is personal because these are the goblins responsible for killing Manato (avenge him kids. Avenge him~). We get an inside look into the goblins where we see they’re actually quite cultivated. For example, there’s this one scene where two of them are playing chess against each other to kill time and in another scene where Ranta tries to lure them into a trap and they see through it because they recognize how predictable it is (that is so amazing). What this show is showing us is that these goblins are just like humans. Well maybe not entirely but it’s clear that they think along the same lines as humans and have lived long enough to see our traps and learn what we do to past the time. Anyway, the raid battle is pretty good and intense as everyone plays their part and manages to take down the underlings and injure the leader goblin who’s realizing he’s going to die waits for them upstairs in a chair slowly dying (but if he’s gonna die he plans on taking some of them down with him). Another goblin hiding in the ceilings shoots Mary with an arrow (oh shoot it’s happening again) but before the goblin can shoot her again Haruhiro protects her and goes to kill the goblin himself while the others finish off the leader. The goblin who shot Mary happens to be the goblin who stole Haruhiro’s knife the last time the fought (as if the fight couldn’t get any more personal). With the help of Yume, Haruhiro manages to kill the goblin and the group succeeds in avenging their friend (man revenge is underrated, that felt great). In the next half the group goes to visit Manato’s grave where they tell him they’ve officially become volunteer soldiers, and they even bought him a badge.
Episodes 9-12
In the first half of episode 9 the party decides to take a day off (they avenged their fallen comrade and became official soldiers. They’ve earned it). Nothing much to say here except the drawn animation is fantastic and the animation on Yume and Mary is great as well (it’s obvious that the animators are favoring these two girls. I’m pretty sure one of them is going to fall for Haruhiro soon). In the second half the party finds out that their hunting spots have become occupied with more powerful goblins, so they have to find a new place to hunt. Haruhiro suggests the mines, the same mines where Mary lost most of her friends (if this is your idea of a joke Haruhiro then it’s a pretty sick one). Mary is scared but she agrees to go with them this time determined to protect her friends. Before going to the mines Haruhiro goes back to his hot teacher to learn the Spider skill (Baron: Oh that sick pervert! Sure hope that skill’s worth it because he’s going be in a wheelchair for the next 2 weeks resting his back after he uses it) which involves her tossing him around the room in order for him to learn the skill all while being squashed between her thighs (this training confuses and excites me). After that, the episode ends with them about to go into the mines.
In episode 10 the group enters the mines and fights kobolds which are wolves who walk on two legs and use shovels and pick axes as weapons (it’s a nice change from the goblins). On the first day, the group goes as far as the second level where they do a good job fighting the kobolds but tension rises between Haruhiro and Ranta where they bumped into each other during the fight and almost started fighting with each other on the spot. Despite their small bickering they manage to win their fight and Haruhiro decides to have a one-on-one talk with Ranta that night where we get a pretty good exchange between the two about faults (this conversation is so realistic that it’s almost scary). If you’ve ever been in an argument with someone chances are you’ve used the sentences and phrases these two are using. In this exchange, both Haruhiro and Ranta realize they both have different viewpoints, but they don’t acknowledge them or rather they refuse to view things from the other’s perspective. As a result, it turns into the blame game until Ranta generalizes things about his role on the team and how everyone views him. He’s the guy who has a hard time reading the room and doesn’t wear his feelings on his sleeve. He has hard time getting close to people and after what happened to Manato I think he’s afraid of getting close to others and losing them. He’s not going to pretend to be someone’s friend, but will do his part for the team which is being the team’s second tank and main fighter. This generalization is so good and on point that it stops all of Haruhiro’s momentum because Ranta is right. In his own little way, he sees that his job on the team is to be the guy that the group doesn’t/shouldn’t worry about and is someone who can fight by himself without needing any help thus taking some of the stress off the others. The next day comes around and the group journeys deeper into the mines taking on stronger kobolds but still being able to beat them. They eventually come across the farm fields (burn it all down) where they trigger the alarm alerting the kobolds of their presence and to make matters worse the boss of the mine named Death Spot (the one that killed Mary’s friends) is on the level and Mary is having a panic attack.
Episode 11 starts off with Mary in a trance remembering her party (good times. . .good times). Until Haruhiro manages to snap her out of it and they move down to the 5th floor which is the smelting floor (man these guys really are advanced. You got a floor for farmland and a floor for smelting your weapons. The more I watch this anime the more apparent to me it becomes that these monsters are intelligent creatures). After passing some of the workers they make it to a resting area where the group comes face to face with zombies which are the former friends of Mary (oh yeah, you never did recover the bodies did you? And if you don’t give them a proper burial they turn into zombies. Shit). So they have to fight the zombies who are actually stronger than them, but Mary uses dispel on them which allows them to turn to dust and rest in peace (take their gear. What? They’re dead, they’re not gonna need it anymore). While the group is happy about their victory, they realize that they still have a long way to go to get stronger and when they decide to move Death Spot shows up, alerts the guards, and now it becomes a race to escape. Haruhiro almost falls off a platform but Ranta saves him however he can’t save Ranta who falls off of a collapsing platform and becomes surrounded by kobolds (you couldn’t return the favor Haruhiro). Haruhiro meets back up with the others on the 4th floor where they regroup and head back down to save Ranta before it’s too late.
At the start of the final episode Ranta somehow escaped the kobolds and made it back up to the 4th floor (say what you want about that guy but he’s a tough S.O.B). He hides in the pigs until the farmers notice him and he has no choice but to kill them which alerts everyone else in the area to him. Just when he’s about to get crushed by Death Spot, Yume shoots him in the eye and the others get him to safety where they retreat to the upper levels trying to escape but Death Spot catches up to them (you hurt a sleeping dragon and he’s pissed). Stuck on a narrow path Haruhiro chooses to take on Death Spot all by himself while the others escape. Haruhiro uses the critical green line to take down Death Spot in one hit (instant death) and passes out from overexerting himself (scene here: https://youtu.be/Lh1HHD4pLL4?si=usMMnSaefQe73d24). He wakes up I want to say a day later where he’s safe and back at home where we see the group received 30 gold pieces for defeating Death Spot (that’s a lot right?). After that, we get a few small scenes to end the season as the group heads out once again.
Final Thoughts
Grimgar in my opinion is a great isekai. Does it have slow and boring moments at times? Yes, but they easily get outweighed by the character moments. You’re so invested in the characters and their development that you almost forget the slow and boring moments or aren’t really bothered by them like me. Haruhiro’s slow development into a leader of the group, Mary learning to open up to the others and accept them as friends, Ranta allowing himself to be vulnerable and help others, Yume opening up to Haruhiro and the others, Shihoru overcoming her fears and talking to the boys more, and Moguzo finding his voice and not being afraid to speak up for himself and others. These character developments are all great. While they’re slow they get the results we want to see and that’s the group coming together as a team and growing stronger.
The animation is nice here. It’s aged by today’s standards but I do like how it has this storybook aesthetic in the backgrounds. The music was decent. It didn’t leave that much of impact on me. I did like the enemies and how smart and tough they were. These weren’t enemies that they could just bulldoze through. They struggled, suffered defeat, got humiliated, and even lost one of their party members to them, but in the end these enemies helped them grow stronger and smarter, and then they finally got their revenge against them in a satisfying fight.
Final Score
My final score for Grimgar is 6.5/10. It really is a shame we haven’t gotten a second season yet. I really do believe that if the anime had come out later on 2016 or in 2017 it would have gotten a lot more praise and attention. If your someone who enjoys character development definitely check this isekai out if you haven’t already. Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time on Project Nitsuj.
