Dekisokonai no Monster Trainer

nathandouglasdavis Dec 25, 2021

3

For the first little while, I was enjoying it on a very basic level. Largely because it was easy to read through. It is corny and kinda cringey with how much it emphasizes the whole dynamic of "the weakest of the weakest of the weakest of the weakest is the strongest!!!" (...a direct quote from chapter 10). There's cliched banter, the type you often see in these types of shallow harem stories. And honestly, a large portion of the drama and intrigue within the series stems from the harem aspect, which is probably one among many reasons as to why this series ultimately kinda sucks. As for the fights, Reyn wouldn't be able to overcome the stronger opponents if Sublimation didn't exist in this world. Sublimation allows for weaker monsters to have their wounds healed and gain a temporary power boost if a certain limit of experience points is reached. So the existence of Sublimation coupled with the fact that only Reyn seems to be aware of the loophole that monsters gain experience points faster if they're fighting stronger opponents definitely comes across like plot armor. But the physical stamina, dodging ability, and especially the ability to use the Contracting Bond with multiple slime bodies at once are all results of Reyn and Pem-Pem's relentless training, so it's not as though the fights are entirely determined by plot armor. They also learn some new techniques over the course of the series and there's a bit of creativity in their fighting style and strategies, but overall the fights aren't all that compelling. And in all honestly, this series should probably be rated more as a 2/10 than a 3/10, but I did have some moments of mindless enjoyment from it so I decided to be a tad merciful with my score. It uses blurry gradients as backgrounds a lot. The girls all look similar. Reyn's hair feels overly large. I don't care for the uniforms. And I think the frequent cosplaying and fan-service shots just made the shallowness of the series and its lack of worthwhile things to fill the space with all the more apparent. The dragon's neck and stuff reminds me of a stuffed animal. And the faces of the non-humanoid monsters are pretty bad. I don't think the author knows how too draw animal features, like snouts or eyes, very well.