I have been saying for years, but, there are three light novels (and adaptation) who are overrated : Shield of hero (except for the first 5-6 episodes), classsroom of elite and Solo Leveling. Both three LN and anime should be rated about 3-4/10. They are that bad.
In regard to Solo Leveling, I have tried the LN, the Manwah and the anime. The LN is so boring, you wonder how this got so much popular. Even the first episode with the double dungeon are nothing special.
Solo Leveling's author is unable to write a single interesting character. He's unable to write a single intersting conversation. You know how a character is interesting ? By giving him some quirk, some interesting stuff. But, in Solo Leveling, everyone is serious all the time. Male character are badly written, but, female character doesn't even exist in this anime. I bet the author he's afraid of writing female charater. In the first 9 episode, 99.9% of screentime was with male character, and the only thing Cha, Hae-In has said was : I refused an offer to join another Guild.
Great dialogue, dude. Amzaing dialogue. Her seiyuu is one of my favorite but she barely talked ! At this point, female character talk less than Komi-san !
Lee, Joo-Hee is basically crying or saying Sung-san with different intonation ! Very profound !
And her sister has not a single interesting line either. It's basically "Oh, I'm afraid to have my weak brother in dungeon" (but still go to school)", to "I was Sooooo afraid", to "Oh, you got taller"
Author has no talent to write any character. Well, I guess the only decent character would be Song, Chi-Yul. Dude at least wanted to protect his team.
Author has also no talent to write a scenario.
Just look at every "plot" :
- Main Character is the weakest but somehow can still manage to pay for him, his sister, and a full-time hospitalisation for years. You know how much cost an hospitalisation a day ? To be able to pay one would mean SJW is in the top 5% earner of the country. Wouldn't that make more sense if her mother would just contracted the disease and then he had to go... as a noobie and it's his first dungeon ? (if you argue that he would not have been to survive the double dungeon because he was not prepared, well, sorry, bowing to a god doesn't need years of prepatation).
- Then, he joins a team, who tries to kill him. But, the reason is the weakest ever. I mean "Yeah, we are going to kill you, because we don't want to pay you". Dude, no one asked you to give them 2 million in the first place. Luckily, opponents are at his level,
- Then, he joins a team (notice how amazing he managed to survive years before and now every single dungeon he joins, sill at E-Rank, would have killed him) who also tries to kill him and luckily opponent is at his level.
Fight are so great, they are basically : SJW is losing, get full heal, win. It's basically an episode of Charmed where they are losing before the advertisement and then they win.
"Oh, How smart am I to keep my full health recovery on stand-by", no one said ever, except Jin-woo.
And since SJW can get infinitely stronger, there is no reason to speed up by going into dungeon without knowing the danger, he could just keep leveling and get 3 points each day.
Solo Leveling is written by an author who can't write character and plot. The only thing he can do is try to come up with situation to get fight out of nowhere.
I have been thinking : In regard to anime about conquering dungeon, is there anything better (well, actually, so much better), than Solo Leveling ? Well, there is Danmachi. Epecially season 4. But, even then,
Danmachi has actual fight where the character is in trouble (minotaur, higher ranking adventurer, deep floor, Juggernaut, floor boss...)
Danmachi has actual interesting character (Lion, Ryuu ; Arde, Liliruca ; Freya)
Danmachi has actual strategy to win fight,
Danmachi has actual waifu and 75% of screentime is women who are actually useful, I mean, please compare Ryuu to Cha, Hae-In... How come they have both 2000 favorites...
Danmachi has actual progression (character and strengh) which seems rewarding and not given by doing sit-up or running around.... Just compare Bell Level 1 and Level 4,
Danmachi is just fun with actual interesing character, lot of waifu (well, maybe a little too much ^_^'), stressful fight, no mechanic to destroy any tension, they actually have to survive a whole season in the deep floor when they are on the brink of death and NO ONE SAVE THEM, no stupid mechanic like "Ok, full health" or "oh don't worry, I have a teleport stone" or "Oh, you killed my brother, don't worry bro, I'm coming in two months, yeah, so you can get stronger, how convenient, right" ?
SLW may we worth a quick look for fight but then you realize there are nothing special. Author can't even come up with good abilities to make fight interesting. When you have My Hero Academa where there is 50 heroes with interesting abilities, Naruto/Bleach/One Piece where there is 30 people with interesting abilities, and in SLW we don't even get one interesting...
No waifu, No interesting plot, No interesting character, No interesting ability.... No good OST (at least I didn't notice one), Average fight which loses a lot of tension because of game mechanic, convenient fight which are always at the right level so SJW win... 4/10 (and I'm generous but I reserved my 1/10 for Classroom of the elite). |