Goblin Slayer: Goblin's Crown

Goblin Slayer: Goblin's Crown begins with a 25-minute recap of the first season's highlights, preparing viewers for the film's events.

At the end of the recap, the movie begins, lasting an hour. Despite the inviting premise, the narrative disappointed me. After the first season's introduction, I expected a more linear and inspired story, one that would convince us to follow the development of the events of Orcbolg or Beardcutter, the names by which Goblin Slayer is known to the elves and dwarves, respectively.

The Sword Maiden has a new assignment for Goblin Slayer and his companions: a noblewoman swordswoman has decided to abandon her family to become ... an adventurer and has accepted the task of eliminating the goblins that infested a small village lost in the snow-capped mountains together with other companions. However, none of them ever returned from the expedition.

Despite its lack of an elaborate plot, the movie Goblin's Crown is a faithful successor to the first season of Goblin Slayer. The writing is simple and straightforward, without any twists or turns to keep viewers engaged. However, the film's appeal lies primarily in its charismatic protagonist, who remains the fulcrum of the entire work. Goblin Slayer is a serious and dark character, but he occasionally shows an immature and naive side that can slightly undermine his grim charm. Fortunately, there are very few such instances in the movie.

In this new adventure, we continue to see the change in the hero that we witnessed during the main series. This is most evident in the bond he has with his companions, whom he is now able to trust even more. He knows that he can rely on them even in the most difficult situations.

However, the relationships between the various members of the group remain somewhat static, and there is no effective development. This could also be due to the lack of good characterization of the other supporting characters: once again, the Elf, the Dwarf, and the Lizard Man seem flat and one-dimensional, so much so that they feel like they play less incisive roles.

The hero's lack of closeness to the other members of the party, except for the Priestess, could be interpreted as a narrative choice, given his unsociable nature. However, I would have preferred to see the three supporting characters better developed over the course of the movie, especially since it is now clear that they are no longer simply supporting roles, but integral parts of the story.

As for the Priestess, there is very little to say about her development, as she has not changed much since the first season finale. However, the young cleric is now more confident and less afraid of facing hordes of goblins. She is able to be useful to her companions with her defensive and healing magic.

As for the new character, the noble swordswoman in need of rescue, it is quite clear during the viewing that she is suffering from the loss of her companions and the torture she has endured. However, everything is handled in a hasty and superficial manner, so much so that I was unable to fully understand how the torture has specifically affected her. I would have preferred the story to offer a more detailed construction of the Noble Swordswoman, not just through a few sequences, so that we could better understand her feelings when she sees the goblins.

Putting aside a somewhat unconvincing plot and poor character development, the real focus of Goblin Slayer: Goblin's Crown remains: the cruel sequences, such as torture and nudity, which allow us to understand the depths of depravity that goblins are capable of, and the violent scenes, which often lead to gore.

The visual system is also well-made and contributes to the film's overall quality. While it does not reach the artistic heights of a typical feature film, being more similar to the series, the animation is painstaking and attentive to detail, even if some larger shots have noticeable imperfections. On the other hand, some sequences feature overly conspicuous and wooden CGI.

The sword and magic clashes feature fluid animations that maintain the increasingly pressing rhythm of the action. Short sequence shots in some scenes make them even more adrenaline-pumping.

The fights are also convincing due to their extreme violence, which is not gratuitous but well-suited to the type of production. The anime's plot is not well-developed, so it relies heavily on scenes of Goblin Slayer attacking all kinds of goblins with extreme malice, staining the snow with their blood.

In conclusion:

Goblin Slayer: Goblin's Crown has the same writing as the series, with no notable narrative twists to encourage viewers to continue watching. However, the film is supported by the characterization of the protagonist, who is still fascinating with his mysterious and aggressive demeanor, but is now more open to his companions. Unfortunately, some of these companions are underdeveloped, despite not being entirely secondary characters. The co-protagonist has remained unchanged since the season finale.

The various plot problems are partly compensated by the technical aspects of the film, which, despite some stumbles and unpleasant CGI, feature painstaking design that allows viewers to appreciate the moments in which Goblin Slayer slices the small green creatures, because, after all, the only good goblin is a dead goblin.

Personal rating: 6.3/10

Goblin's Crown is a 25 minute recap followed by an hour long movie. The movie can best be compared to a small goblin slayer arc that spans multiple normal episodes like when they went to water village in season 1.

The movie starts with a recap that you can skip if you just watched the first season. After that the story continues around where the first season left off and the goblins slayer squad sets out to rescue a noble girl that accepted a quest to slay goblins that hasn't been heard from in a while. It's a pretty mediocre story that feels slightly rushed ... and lacks explanation at some points. The eventual solution to dealing with the goblins does make sense and was clearly set up in hindsight but not knowing what the characters were going to do for 40 minutes wasn't enjoyable.

The characters are the same as the party in the first season with the addition of the noble girl. The supporting character's attitude towards goblin slayer does seem to change though and it feels like they act as if he's way more capable than he actually is which is a suboptimal development.

The animation wasn't great with lots of cgi and some really dark scenes that required me to sit at a weird angle compared to the screen just to make out the details properly. The voice acting was good enough, the high elf archer sounds cute and the music was okay.

Overall this wasn't the best story and may not be worth watching. If you liked the first season a lot then this may be acceptable but if you didn't enjoy the first season very much then it is likely that you'll enjoy this even less.

This movie is basically evidence that people were wrong about Season 1, and hated on it for no good reason. This movie? This is the one where all of people's criticism is actually on point. Pointless rape, complete dissonance between "dumb fun" and "brooding melancholy", Goblin Slayer being a self-insert. This time: yes, yes, and yes. And I'm so glad it exists, because I already thought I was the one in the wrong for liking S1.

There's simply something missing in it. The characters parrot the exact same phrases and things you've heard before, making it filler in every sense of the word. It's to the ... point I genuinely felt as though the entire story was AI generated (as in you fed the AI information about how dwarves hate elves and Lizardman likes cheese, and now every conversation of every character boils down to those three things) and any potentially new information is skipped (the only interesting memory the 2000 year old elf can muster to remember is following a pebble down the river). Blond girl's flashbacks are probably the only thing that was well-done in the movie, yet it feels so demeaning and sad to watch. We never find out anything about her, which felt like the POINT of the movie. As it turns out, this movie has no point. Every scene of her crying, every scene of her friends being brutally murdered, every scene of her second-guessing herself, every scene of her having an emotional breakdown just become obsolete. Those breakdowns, as justified and sad as they are, are simply annoying to watch because there's no pay-off, they exist solely to make Goblin Slayer look cool (and yes, I think Slayer's character is more than just an edgy self-insert created for the women in this universe to drool on).

What actually, genuinely remains is probably like the ~5 minutes of info dumps about Gods and goblins evolving which can be summarised in a single sentence and is revealed really out of tact, and the admittedly fun, chaotic last act. There's lots of "fun, chaotic" action sequences throughout the movie, but I didn't like any of them cause they neither made sense, nor were fun (and Goblin Slayer is usually at least one of those things). By didn't make sense, I mean both wondering why are they even doing the thing they're doing currently (other than "well, the show's called Goblin Slayer, so, we must throw in some goblins getting slain so that things don't get boring") and that the scenes themselves sometimes were so unrealistic they actually took me out of the story (which says a lot if it happens in a 1. fantasy show, and 2. fucking Goblin Slayer out of all things). The least spoiler-y one I can think of is that at the very end of the movie, Slayer fights against the Goblin Lord, 1v1. Except this time (unlike in S1 where getting him alone required cunning), the Lord literally has his entire army at the ready, but he CHOOSES (yes, the race whose only trait is being cowardly and raping) to fight this dude 1 on 1, despite his army being able to swarm Slayer's party. Now, is the fight cool? Yes. Does it take you out of the story? Yeah. It boils down to whether or not you care. There's also multiple scenes where either side-characters or goblins are dumbed down just for an action scene to happen, which was annoying.

So, it really depends on what you're looking for in this show. If you want fun, pointless action - it's probably your cup of tea. If you're like me and liked S1 for some other indescribable reason, this one isn't for you. But maybe it's worth watching just to see which one you are.