Frieren

 

For the longest time I really struggled to get into anime. There are several genre conventions that varied from  off-putting to outright repulsive to me. I knew there are many fans, there is lots of quality and artistic drive but to me it often felt like I  just could not get the type of recommendation I as a pretentious queer feminist arthouse nerd would have needed.

All that changed when I met Jolyne, she was deep in that medium, understood my preferences and watching shows with her helped me to find some really good shows.

I previously wrote about Apothecary Diaries but the show I know would recommend to my younger self would definitely be Frieren. It is unconventionally slow paced for anime yet pretty accessible. It has profound artistic intentions. It does not struggle with sexism and other topics I would critique about other popular anime. And most importantly it is fun.

So what is Frieren about? It is about an elf called Frieren. The first episode starts with an adventure like the lord of the rings however since elves basically don't age in Frieren. She loses track of time after that and comes back to the capitol a few decades later only to find out about all her fellow adventures now being old men.

This realization changes something in Frieren. She later decides to take in an apprentice of one of the other adventures, live more consciously and reminisce on the adventure she went through decades ago.

I think the premise already explains what makes that anime so special. The perception of time. The reflection on the past and how this past shaped people. And the idea that the most special thing just happened and you did not really have the time to acknowledge it. Frieren executes all that really well. There is a lot of slice of live stuff happening at a slow pace and the show always takes the time to show why those little moments are as impactfull if not even more impactful on the characters then the big fights happening along the way. It asks what makes a hero really a hero and why we always have to focus on those big stories of saving the world.

I think that must be what I most like about this story but what makes it great is how layered everything is written. And I mean everything: You have a magic system that first and foremost is a science yet Frieren, with her centuries old magic, puts everything into question the modern wizards believe to know about it. You have those ideas on oral history being on the one hand inaccurate and getting lost over time, yet showing what it was about those historic events that really affected people. You have demons that are simply evil from a human perspective, yet they have their way to deceive people into giving them a false sense of validity. I read into that a comment on ideology, but it really is open in regards to how you read them.

I could get lost in details and discussions about Frieren now, but this is a review and not an essay so everything I could now write would be derivative of the base idea, that Frieren is just awesome, different and touching. I love Frieren.

 

Short: Frieren is the best written anime I have seen so far.