English Dub Review: Kemono Michi-Rise Up “Quest × Demon Beast Killer”

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

Genzo tells Shigure of his big plan: to open this world’s first Demon Beast Pet Shop. They’ll capture the beasts they encounter on quests, tame them to be able to live with humans, then sell them to people as pets! But to do that, they’ll need more money, which means they need to take quests. And it looks like Genzo is already getting a reputation as “Beast Killer”, a title he aggressively rejects.

Their first quest sends them after a Salamander, a giant lizard of death…who Genzo quickly befriends and names Yoshiko. After that, they encounter some Soldier Monkeys, which he tames with fruit. With the earnings from that and other completed quests, they’re able to get their business rolling and put together an impressive menagerie of demon beasts. But they still don’t have a house to put them in, so they’ll need to do one more quest: fighting off orcs. Genzo’s not as interested in this one because it doesn’t involve animals, but this is where his pro-wrestling skills come in. He’s able to defeat the Orc Leader in a match, making him the new leader, but he leaves the guy he beat in charge. They’re still not even close to getting so much as a loan to get the house, but he’s committed to opening his pet shop, even though the purpose of the shop confuses the locals.

Meanwhile, a young dragon-girl escapes from a giant castle in order to get a sense of the outside world, with her attendant swearing to find her.

OUR TAKE

This episode digs into the two most interesting sides to Genzo’s character: his love of animals great and small and his wrestling prowess. He’s strong enough to go up against the toughest opponents or monsters, but has a great fondness for innocent creatures that makes him endearing. These aspects add up to a gentle giant who can hold his own but has clear and positive motivations and goals. He’s definitely an eccentric guy; with his love of animals getting weird even for probably the viewers, but it’s this combo that shows this series’ honest attempt at playing with the Isekai genre as more than simply a power fantasy for teen boys to latch onto.

That’s not to say there isn’t a bit of power fantasy at play, considering his massive strength lends itself to the show’s action scenes like the fight with the orc (which cranked up the budget just enough to give that fight the OOMPH it really needed), plus I have no doubt that future episodes will show us more fights for Genzo to totally tear through. But it’s also increasingly clear that this show is on a pretty tight budget. One need only look at the OP to notice that things in it are glaringly cheaply made. Luckily, this is a comedy show, meaning that it doesn’t necessarily need to be mind-bending budget draining effects all the time, but good animation can also lend itself to great comedy if shows like Nichijou are any indication.

But all that aside, I am definitely getting into what Kemono Michi is putting down. All the animation issues aside, its unique premise and easily likable characters help show that there is brilliance in the show’s ideas, with fantasy tropes and Isekai tropes used in many a clever way to get pretty hard laughs. The next episode looks to be bringing on two more cast members, which is appropriate for this point in things, but I do hope we get some more elaboration on Shigure as things move forward. Genzo’s pretty cool in his own right, but while he is the center, I think there’s plenty that can be done with the steadily increasing not-harem that we are starting to see form around him. All this to say that Kemono Michi, while not as great as it seems like it can be, is off to a very interesting start and I am here for it.