edit: the image i used for the author might not be them. i could only find one other source that used the same image and it's the only real face that comes up in a search. i got the impression while watching that it might've been written by a woman and didn't question it at the time. golly, my first "viral" video! i want to mention that this channel is primarily about learning to draw, so if that interests you i recommend checking out my other videos! secondly, there are things i want to either clarify or correct after reading thru the comments: 1) Frieren may not be OP depending on your definition... which is why i have a section titled "why she's not really OP". regardless I felt she would make a good example to examine the trope through. 2) i misinterpreted the scene of Frieren translating the book. it had been a full 4 years when Heiter collapsed meaning she did actually give herself a reasonable amount of time to translate it. my initial interpretation was that, although she knew Heiter was near-death, it would make sense if she still overestimated just how much time he had left as 5 years would seem like 5 days to her. 3) in light of this, it may not be accurate to say that Frieren would allow her own apathy and sense of time to become a handicap for her, although i think it would make her more interesting as a character. 4) it's not quite accurate to say that Frieren doesn't care about combat magic, seeing as how she created the modern version of zoltraak and has a hatred towards demons. what i should've said is that she learns combat magic out of obligation rather than enjoyment which makes sense as, from what i've seen, the series focuses more on relationships than combat. 5) i'm not saying Frieren doesn't strategize, just that one could argue she only strategizes now because of the losses she experienced in the past. 6) it's been pointed out to me that Frieren not having a spell for finding lost items does make sense as she doesn't have many belongings that are valuable enough to her to hang onto, which is what gives Himmel's ring its significance. 7) i still think season 2 of OPM is boring. (no i have not read the manga) 8) "shonen failing to promote collectivism" is admittedly i line i threw in there without giving it much thought - a lot of the appeal of the genre is the individualism aspect. it would've been better to say that BJE "promotes collectivism in comparison to a lot of shonen". it just bothers me when shonen choose to have large casts of characters but don't make good use of any of them despite having a million episodes to do so. whew, that's a lot of words.
Congratulations on your first breakout video. It was well done and you earned the grace of the Algorithm. Your responses to the general comments are pretty good too. I think that next season will have two flashbacks that make it more clear why she doesn't have some spells you would really expect her to have. Your comment about combat magic is accurate and I believe this is why she limits what Fern is allowed to use for combat.
I am reading the Manga mostly for the epic battles. Or at least I hope the plot will somehow end into those. Couldn't give less of a f°°° if Fern will bloom maidenly for Stark or if he will fall for her too. But the subtle pace of the story makes it only more enjoyable when we finally get to the cake parts. 🍰
you make a good point about the large casts with no purpose, i'm reminded of MHA where people say that there are many different stories and motives behind every character, but the thing is some of the characters we couldn't care less about. i wouldn't say shonen fails to promote collectivism, more that some shonens promote collectivism incorrectly in a way that detracts from the viewing experience. this is all my conjecture of someone else's words though. congrats on your first breakout video
Everyone be like Frirens OP, then you remember Seirei exists and thinks Friren is weak for her age. And the exchange between Seirei and friren hints the Demon Lord was not fooled by suppression and without her team Frieren might have lost that fight.
@@braddl9442 Serie is awesome, whenever I see her in the intro I start smiling, but there’s a lot of variance in the effectiveness of mages depending on their opponents, like how Übel killed the Sense clone in the second trial to become a level(?) one mage, just because of how their different magics interacted. I think Frieren also once said that even for an incredibly skilled mage, a skilled warrior, if they had the advantage of surprise, could pretty easily dispatch a solo mage. So everything is subjective. At the same time, I don’t think Serie will die, just because of the sheer amount of mana she has, which she can use to protect her body like Frieren did in her murder of Draht, or as an attack like Solitar uses
Frieren studied Heiter's texts for four years before he suddenly collapse from sickness. Right before that Frieren was trying to tell him that deciphering the whole text would take less time than she anticipated. After that point we didn't get any information on how much time she actually took to finish the translation so it could have been days, weeks, or a few months, though it was made clear that she sped up her effort on that last stretch. Upon completion she confronted Heiter about the text not having anything to do with immortality, and she didn't just ask him politely, she literally dropped the papers right on top of him. This means that she was a bit pissed about him lying to her about it. On his grave Frieren told Fern that he outsmarted her, tricked her to staying long enough to help train Fern into a mage. None of these infers that Frieren was taking her sweet time, she genuinely needed five to six years to complete the task in a reasonable manner (read: no overtime) and it wasn't until the fourth year that she realized that she could finish it sooner. Furthermore, in her perspective five years is not such a long time. If she were taking her sweet time she would have done it in 50 years. Frieren has accumulated a millennia of experience and training, but not to a level where she's so powerful that she knowingly handicap herself.
My interpretation of that scene was that she was going to tell him that the text probably didn't actually have anything on immortality or resurrection in it. It would make sense that she'd figure that out long before actually finishing, and her expression seemed to suggest something a bit more serious than just "Oh I can just finish this faster than expected." But then she got interrupted by his collapsing and his poor health and such was far more important.
@Aqua_Wren I checked the manga and while she voiced her skepticism at the start she only confronted Heiter about being duped after she finished the translation. Heiter of course knew (or rather, correctly guessed) that the book had nothing in it that contain any immortality spells but he counted on Frieren's interest in curious items to get her to stay and she basically confirmed that the ruse worked. The grimoire was written with image ciphers, meaning that to be able to read it you'd have to decode it first and that's what took her over four years to do. Once that's done the whole manuscript can be translated and copied in probably a matter of days. She couldn't possibly know the whole content of the book prior to finishing the cipher. Of course she may have had her suspicion at the time of Heiter's collapse but that suspicion was only confirmed after she finished the work, which she did because she promised him that and who knows maybe there could really be something useful for Heiter's health in it. Either way she was not taking her time, she still finished the cipher at the rate that she was capable of and not a moment more.
I think it was perfectly reasonable for Frieren to not have a spell to find lost objects, because up until this point she didn't have any objects she cared enough to find if they got lost. That whole episode includes a section where the finds the ring and has some memories about how she got it and who she got it from and NOW it means something to her, after losing all of her companions and forming a new group and learning to value them. NOW she cares if it's lost and she wants to find it, but that was new to THIS episode. It's part of her growth as a character where she no longer views everything as disposable or ephemeral.
She is learning that the lenght of a life is not measured in years, but in the number of memories and the emotions that are the origin of those memories. She was reallly storing those memories without understanding the emotions attached, and now she is discovering and understanding those emotions.
and the fact that they've established that "folk magic" is generally rare. They got incredibly excited over a cleaning spell because its useful and rare despite being a relatively mundane concept, most likely because of how obsessed mages are with spectacle in the show.
But on the other hand, it would be reasonable for her to have acquired that spell at some point in the past, whether as a reward for helping someone or as a requirement for completing another task she took on. Then again, it's entirely possible she only started helping out people to learn all these very mundane spells in the last 80 years and previously was only acquiring ancient magic and spell. Or that spell was simply a fairly recent development, along with newfound age of peace after the Demon King's defeat
An alternative theory is that she lost items in the past, but instead of using magic to find the items, she just searched thoroughly and laboriously until she found them again. We know in the beginning episodes that she is willing to search for six months to find the blue-moon weed flower. She wouldn't need to use magic because she doesn't have a sense of urgency.
You mention there's enough action that you don't get bored by dialogue, but there's another thing that keeps the viewer from getting bored by dialogue; the dialogue isn't boring.
To enforce your point. There's some anime that managed to succeed in that where they have an episode was mostly just dialogue between characters. A good one of note is Fate/Zero's The Banquet of Kings episode.
Exactly. Dialogue is only boring if it's poorly written. In Frieren, that's not the case. The dialogue is as good as the action, because both are written well, artistically visualized, and masterfully voiced.
I feel like the reason Frieren doesn't necessarily feel 'overpowered' in the show is because the main conflict in the show is not about being a strong mage. The conflict rather being the regret within Frieren and her attempting to grow. In this sense Frieren is not overpowered at all, being flawed and having made many mistakes in the past. If the show was purely about beating demons it would pose a definite issue as the writers would need a way to create tension whilst having Frieren be an 'easy solution' to the problem (I feel like the writers of Jujutsu Kaisen ran into this issue a lot with Gojo). The thing creating tension in the show, however, is not the battles but the growth and actions of the characters around those battles which Frieren has no easy solution to, thus allowing the writers to create tension freely without having to make odd workarounds.
This is exactly it. Frieren is really good at winning fights, but that doesn't make her "overpowered" when the core conflicts and challenges she faces are not combat-based.
it's similar with OPM. Saitama is OP in the sense that he's physically the strongest being in that universe by far...but the main conflict for him can't be solved with power. In fact, his power is the cause of his conflict. So even though it can go into a power spectacle when we see his power, it's not even the main point of the story. The man is depressed, and that's not something you can one punch away. Overpowered is relative to what the goal and conflict of the story is. A character who can teleport at will is OP in a story where the main conflict revolves around traveling. Gordon Ramsay is overpowered in the realm of cooking (and even then he's not absolutely OP), but take him out of cooking and plop him into a story where he needs to hunt and forage to survive, and his cooking prowess does him little good. People made the claim that Shikimori in Shikimori's Not a Cutie is overpowered, but she's not. Sure, she's physically powerful...but this isn't a shonen power fantasy where that actually matters. Her physical strength doesn't help her with the main point of the series, which is relationship-based.
Tbf one of the arcs coming up is basically a battle manga arc and even there Frieren doesn't feel ridiculously overpowered, she feels appropriately powerful Maybe that's because of the enemy that's also ridiculously overpowered but even the side characters aren't relegated to pure fodder stalling for time waiting for Frieren to do her thing, it just goes to show that the writer is honestly really goddamn good when something that isn't supposed to be the focus get's focused on and it ends up being more than on par with the rest of the manga
Many times they do try handycapping frieren too. I dont think It works even tho i dont think frieren is actually op in her verse(but for different reason). Like when its said her mana detection stops for moments, or when they say they dont really know everything about flight or about soul track or currently on the manga where she said If a warrior was close to her and surprise attacked her shed die easily etc. I feel like those were silly things to add bcs in theory that all should be possible to her bcs shes so strong, theres also that random flower thatd have killed her too☠️. but the real reason why i dont think shes op is simply bcs theres characters that beat her, she said humans have beat her before, serie and demon king are both leagues above her, hero of the south is also much more powerful, solitar was equal to her, frieren couldnt even imagine herself defeating macht before learning How to counter his magic etc Edit: even the strongest enemy she easily defeated(meaning aura). Frieren herself said shed been dangerous If she didnt use her weighting thing so frieren herself is like stronger than aura but not that much. In verse frieren is like around a great demon in strenght
@@oilalalabla9211 it's also why she needed a party of people who were equally as powerful as her in their own ways in order to defeat the demon king. She couldn't do it by herself.
You are wrong about her combat magic. She just thinks that basic attack spells are enough to defeat modern mages. She knows Nuke spells of every element.
This is true. Frieren decided to not use these gigantic blasting magics because Himmel disapproved of them. Basic attack and defense spells serve her well enough.
@Bhoddisatva It's not that Himmel disapprove Frieren using powerful spells, it's just that one time against Aura because the demon was using corpses of fallen warriors as her henchmen and he didn’t want their bodies to be damaged, so he asked Frieren to be more considerate in fighting them (hence her using a spell that turns them back into inanimate corpses with no damage done)
Her handicap makes sense on a human psychological level. We are known to succumb to our own success and not try as hard as we used to. Feeling safe and comfortable, less effort often gets put into life.
Oh yeah. Effort is usually not the goal. Some people have ambitions to become the strongest/best, insanely rich etc and will continue to do it even if they seem to have achieved the goal (take any of the most rich people - having so many billions is not enough, need to work to get even more). However, others are not like that, I know I am one of the others. Putting in too much effort into everything kills the enjoyment, so why do it if it is not necessary? Especially since diminishing returns kick in. I guess same is with Frieren. She is extremely strong (not the strongest, but close) and she does not have the ambition to become the strongest and she does not seem to have financial troubles, so why overdo it?
@@Pentium100MHz personally I think it is a lack of direction/passion... why bother being the best at one specific thing? she could always wait a few thousand Years and do it then. there is a complete lack of any passion for these things because even if she genuinely wanted to do something it really makes no difference if she does it today or in an eon for now. and the show is about showing her why she is wrong to think in such as nonchalant way
@@GeorgeTheIdiotINC why bother being the best at all? And I don't mean just about her.Sometimes its good enough to be, well, good enough. Diminishing returns kick in when you try to be the best, so, unless you really want to or it is needed (for example professional sports), IMO there is no point to spend that much effort. By the way, she seems interested in collecting spells so I cant say that she is without direction. She does not have to work for a living so she can be more laid back and take it easy.
I dont think she was slow on translating the immortality spell because she didn't want to push hersslf. I think she just wanted to spend more time with Heiter, and already knew it probably wouldn't work.
@@someoneinasia Na thats not what she was but at that moment she actualy try to catch on with what she missed, she realised that her lifestyle is actualy making her missing a lots of good moment and that her group was the best friend she ever had and she regret to not have spend more time with them, its literaly the starting point of the anime, she goes for a 50 years trip, and shee see her friend dying because of that and decide to kinda settle. The thing is that she is herself a bit oblivious on her own feelings, because of her elf beeing that live nearly forever apparently they are all kinda apathic, it would make sens that people with massive longevity would be less emotional to be able support the blows life can throw at you
@@someoneinasiaWhile I don't think she intentionally slowed down translating the book, I don't believe she was in a rush to do it earlier, either. Spending time with Heiter, getting to know him and training Fern... all of these were worthwhile ways for her to spend her time. A huge amount of her journey is learning to spend more time on relationships with other people, so she was fulfilling her central quest even while she was working on the book. If she wasn't happy to be living with Heiter, she would have finished earlier.
i didn't say anything about frieren not being happy living with heiter and fern. i'm merely saying the intent is not the same as these guys are saying, frieren in ep.2 was not such socially/relationship capable person who notice subtle details like they were thinking. the person these guys were talking about isn't frieren.
She gathers spells through grimoires or being taught (Flame), other spell casters dedicate huge amounts of time to develop spells, in some cases their entire lives. She doesn't seem interested in developing her own spells because, for her, the fun of being a mage is the journey of collecting them. So if she never found an item locator spell, there is no reason for her to have it. Especially since it seems like she is pretty willing to part with precious items after a period of time. She hordes a lot of items, so it might just be a minor inconvenience if she loses an item or two. I don't think it's a flaw in the magic system so much as a flaw in her way of thinking. She has all this time and could be making her own unique or useful spells, but she chooses not to.
Agreed. The spells Frieren has are just the ones she finds. Even when given her choice of any spell by Serie, she declines, opting instead to just continue browsing the world.
Technically the 1 spell she helped develop the most is Soul Kill, (aka the 1 spell she uses for combat and forces Fern to use only for combat) but it was a united effort of magicians, but Frieren did most of the heavy lifting.
Frieren has worked on decoding spells, incorporating them, honing them, and countering them. But she doesn't work on inventing new spells much, sure. I think a huge part of that, though, is that spells seem to be best created by people who already are expert in whatever they're made to do (i.e., they're reflections of their creator's personalities) and there are so many people working on making new spells that Frieren cannot learn them all any more than a person can watch all of Netflix. Struggling to make spells would take time away from learning dozens of others. I would not be surprised, however, if we get to see Frieren come up with an original spell as the result of the journeys she's been on, as a capstone to the story. Something, perhaps, to do with Memories of the Lost.
@@NStormRiderthe most she came to an original spell is that one time in the manga. She just decode and nullify a very powerful spell by a demon that no other mage did, even serie. I think her specialty is to analyze spells and make it her own.
I want to also mention that Frieren is a strong combatant when serious because she has an unrelenting hatred towards demons. Because demons are just monsters at their core, she was forced to learn to fight. This was evident in episode 7 where she was ready to kill in the blink of an eye at the sense of a demon in the city. While she is not as passionate as when she learned to fight demons with Flamme, it is very clear that she will never hesitate to fight when she needs to as shown against Draht in the jail cell. This is most likely the reason why the Hero's Party prevailed in the first place. Even in the peaceful era, we learned that it was because of Frieren that combat magic evolved significantly, teaching humanity about Zoltraak and helping them learn its intricacies. Her wisdom makes her OP, and she doesn't ever care to show it off. We don't even get to see her fight completely seriously yet and she is shown to be above and beyond her era. She even sparked interested from Serie after 1000 years. Frieren is a great example of an end-game character playing in the mid-game. She is OP because of what she has done to get where she is, not for the sake of being OP.
Frieren might be the strongest combatant of her era, but it’s likely she was only in the top tiers of previous ones. The Demon King was likely the preeminent power of previous eras, or at least near the top - it seems unlikely the Frieren would have been able to take him on herself without the help of her party. Similarly the Hero of the South, as well as Himmel and the rest of her party were also likely near the peak of strength during their time. So really, in the era of the setting Frieren is really mostly the strongest because everyone else up and got old or died. The only exception is really Serie, though it’s never discussed whether she and Serie fought or not. Granted that they don’t get along but given their mutual connection and affection for Flamme I doubt it, combined with the fact that they seem to avoid each other somewhat.
@@bahnankhayre9534All of the them are like the best in their genre. Heiter is also implied to be the best goddess magic user because the goddess liked him.
She learned magic to kill demons and there are almost no elves because the demons killed them all seeing them as a threat and the lack of desire to breed
The demons hunting them is half of the equation. There were never a LOT of elves to begin with because, as Frieren says, they just don't have a drive to multiply like humans. Over time, their population was likely at least sizable due to their long life, but when you wipe out 95% of the population in a short time, they can't recover because they don't grow fast enough as a race. We also don't know if Frieren and her view of not caring at all is normal or average along the elf reproduction spectrum. She was very young when her village was wiped out, a true child, then she was raised by a human, and then spent time either alone or with shorter lived races. It's possible that she's not entirely correct and other elves could have more of a drive to have kids, likely no where near humans and dwarves, but more than Frieren. There is a lot we don't know about the world and I'm looking forward to learning more.
Demons, humans, dwarves, other elves... anyone that disliked an elf enough to murder would slowly erode the populace of any species that does little to reproduce.
The problem I have with this video is that it assumes that Frieren is a battle shonen series. It's not. The main conflict most of the time isn't "can Frieren defeat the bad guy". Moreover the anime/manga spends a lot of time establishing how eclectic and patchy Frieren's spell collection is thus justifying her having some odd magics, such as the bird catching spell (which doesn't even resolve the conflict on its own, just enables a sloution). If one watches this show or reads the manga "getting bored" between fights then they are likely not the target audience for this series. Frieren thrives on its peaceful and emotional scenes which are punctuated by the action, not the other way around like in a traditional battle shonen.
The problem with Frieren is that it has no actual point or goal. It was literally created as a story to waste it's audiences time. Its the Seinfeld TV show of anime - the focus is not on key decisive moments or critical plot points but instead focusing on small and pointless details in a story. Did Frieren clean a statue with cleaning magic? Lets spend half an episode on that. Did Frieren plant flower seeds at a cemetary? Lets spend an episode doing that. Did Frieren wake up early to see the sun rise or clean a beach? Lets spend 2 episodes. Did Frieren want to date Himmel but never did? Let's spend 20+ episodes on that. It's a bad story. ON PURPOSE. It wastes its viewers time. ON PURPOSE. It has no actual point or theme. ON PURPOSE. It goes from one boring situation to another boring situation. ON PURPOSE. It's characters are monotone, slightly irritated, emotionless and bland. ON PURPOSE. There is no danger or action because Frieren uses overpowered magic to instantly win all situations. ON PURPOSE. Is that peak fantasy? I don't think it is. It's kind of trash garbage from my point of view. But i guess everyone disagrees. This is truly what "peak" fantasy story telling looks like.
@@centripetal6157imo it takes a similar stance to OPM though to the less extreme in the since that yeah it’s more of a squeal it’s after the main battle has already been fought
@@sanicinapanic4264 i haven't really seen OPM but from what i can tell the action is 11/10 - it has excellent action and battles. Frieren on the otherhand doesn't focus on battles or fights. In Frieren an epic battle with a big threat demon goes "no i have more mana, i win" or Zoltraak magic is spammed over and over. Frieren has extremely lazy and basic writing. Choosing to focus the story heavily on whether Frieren did laundry or if she cooked soup - stuff that is largely pointless and irrelevant to the story. Frieren is honestly the most frustrating show to watch. Its a show about nothing. Even the "appreciate friends" theme is loosely ignored several times by Frieren.
What you said about Saitama is inaccurate he too begins to develop friends and form connections and starts to rediscover why he became a hero in the first place and why he still wants to keep being a hero. Much like frieren he is not a stagnant character but instead one who grows and evolves through his story
THIS. Clearly, this youtuber isn't a manga reader. How much control saitama has in the manga, especially that huge fight that broke the anime Internet.
@@vanhoras3082 ??? Certain things take different times for different people. And who really is taking longer? Frieren’s current story has multiple time skips by 4~5 years. In contrast the whole of Saitama’s story hasn’t had as much time. Not to mention Saitama is only ~25, while Frieren is literally 1000s of years old. Which begs again, who really took longer?
@@D4ng404 If people take a long time for change and the whole time period is shown in between then yes, the freaking character is perceived as stagnant. It's not really about the actual time passing in the story but about the time the reader needs to take to see the progress. Frieren develops fairly quickly and steadily from a readers point of view and it's pretty much constantly in view during the whole story. I have not read or watched one punch man so I will not comment on it's pacing or character development but the author of the video fairly clearly stated he watched 2 seasons of the anime, did not like the second and that he felt the character was stagnant what he has seen of it. If you want to debate that point of view, use that timeframe as reference and how far away he would be from seeing a steady character development.
I really loved that about Shield Hero when it first came out - the idea of the main character being unable to fight for themselves, but rather has to rely on others to fight for/with them. That series brought a whole new perspective to making battles feel like no one person can do everything. It really sucks that Naofumi had to get what's basically one of the most cop-out abilities ever that makes it so the whole premise just falls apart.
I think there's been a *few* moments in Naruto where that *was* something that happened, one example being Naruto and Sasuke working together to trick that assassin from the Mist Village way way earlier on, but yeah, it just... the power creep set in.
@@davidpotts7116it's still team battles(if you are talking about the curse shield he barely uses that and it doesn't do much outside of being a def buff)
Frieren is apart of the narrative trope I love called "The retired Badass" or "The returning War Vet". That's why it "feels" different than other powerful characters in anime. Another manga/anime i love that's similar is "A Returner's Magic Should Be Special"
With the last two EPs (25+26) we got a glimpse of Frieren's true power, which is completely on another level from anything we've seen so far. She might have been bested a few times in the past but she is still alive to tell the tale, so it's possible that she let herself get bested or that she felt like it wasn't the right time or the right place, like with the sealing of Zoltraak whom she killed 80 years later, when humanity has developed defensive techniques to easily overpower him. I think the only mage alive that could best her is probably Serie, which is no big surprise as she was Frieren's teachers teacher and probably lived for longer than Frieren.
Another kind of sad detail about the setting of Frieren is that apparently the Demon King made a concentrated effort to exterminate Elves from the world, presumably because they lived even longer than demons and could reliably amass more personal power. Elves aren’t just dying out because they lack reproductive instincts; a long time ago, it seems that they were getting along just fine by forming deep platonic friendships and consciously choosing to have children. But after over a millennium of being targeted by demons, they’re unable to bounce back.
It would certainly take a concentrated effort among those few remaining... and re-population doesn't seem to be a major goal of theirs for their species. Possibly because they have become so disparate that they don't really think of themselves as a unified species anymore. Just individuals that happen to also be elves.
I feel a lot of this video gets close to Frieren but then fails to realize WHY Frieren is the way she is. Like part of it is you're just not caught up (since Kraft is indeed not the only elf we've met per some more recent episodes). Part of it is misunderstanding her passion. Frieren DOES seek out spells relatively relentless. She just happens to be excited at the NEW spells she gets. Why does she use Zoltrak over any of her other spells? Well, its new to her. She clearly has more aged battle magic (since Zoltrak was still being studied as they went after the Demon King). Even her weakness and losses are explored but it relates not to a lack of strategy but her inability to adapt to new human 'metas'. She's outlived the inception of human magic and every iteration of it grows stronger while its basically a blink of an eye for her. She is absolutely 'overpowered' and it is more or less spelled out that not even first class mages have the ability to fathom her. Its just she has too many blind spots to innovation since it happens far quicker than she can internalize so someone might 'get lucky'. The real reason Frieren isn't OP is because her status as one of the greatest mages does not SOLVE her problems. Her magic can't help her develop empathy.
Note that she also doesn't put her training into combat itself. That's a huge factor. Her training was more in building, and suppressing, her mana pool to have as much raw power hidden in plain sight as possible. That allows her to slaughter demons without much difficulty because they will always underestimate her and she will always be more capable than they are ready for. As such, she has massive mana, allowing for nearly-unbreakable defenses and overwhelming basic attacks. But it appears that her combat skills largely end there. It's less of adapting to new "metas" and more that everyone has a specialty that they know better than they know other things. And when there are enough specialties, your scissors suddenly finds a lot more varieties of rock that may beat it. In the past centuries, there were fewer opportunities for humans to develop magic that far because of the perils of everyday life. Since the fall of the Dark Lord, that became possible for perhaps the first time (since before the Dark Lord, if ever). She isn't a specialist in strategy (though she certainly has picked up a lot over the centuries fighting against various demons and traveling with various people and especially Himmel, but again is unlikely to have focused on developing that skill much). Even her fight against the clone was more about her knowing her own limits and capabilities because that is something you absolutely must know if you are to survive in a dangerous world. So she knows what it takes to defeat herself because that's something she must think about and know how to counter, rather than particular training in strategy. So, she is justifiably OP, just not in the way that most people view most OP characters. She trained for centuries to prepare for the most deadly battle in the world: The Dark Lord. An opponent that even the single most powerful character we've seen, who DOES view magic as for combat and power first was unable to handle. The setting is taking place after the fight of all fights has already occurred, and she was part of that victory. She's not OP in the sense of "power levels", she's OP in comparison to the average situation. There is possibly no single demon left that can hope to match her raw power and most humans won't have the talent/resources or live long enough to reach her skills/power/knowledge in general. If she were to be in a one-on-one fight against any of the other top-tier mages, human, elf, or otherwise, or possibly against someone as physically mighty as Eisen, she might well lose. But those battles aren't the focus of the story, and it would be against other characters that are comparatively OP anyways.
@@JarieSuicune ya she's basically Goblin Slayer. She's 100% fine tuned to kill Demons, fighting humans or elves is a completely different skillset. She can and will beat them, but it won't be as easy as killing demons. She, like all nearly immortals, will also not realize the changes and new magics, or how to utilize them effectively. Luckily her reserves and capabilities are so vast it will rarely matter. She is built to withstand a war of attrition w/another mage.
I'm sure Frieren does have a spell for locating things. But it probably only works on unpaired socks. Or maybe it only locates rodents by highlighting their footprints. Spells in this world are so hyper-specific, and Frieren has pretty much never cared about accessories until a few years ago, so it makes sense that she wouldn't have a spell for locating lost accessories.
@@TheLordNoodles I like to think the spell she used to restrain Denken and Laufen was actually a spell for binding trees, and then I like to imagine Frieren's delight at finding an actual use for it.
Frieren not having a spell that would be convenient while having other spells that are convenient is not as much as a contrivance as you may think. Sure she is over 1000 years old, but given that there are literally countless spells, its inevitable that there will be holes in her repertoire. This is compounded by the fact that we know she cares more about the process of seeking spells over learning the spells themselves. As for her not knowing a spell to locate lost items, I reject the idea of that being absurd, it actually makes a lot of sense. That ring, and perhaps her earrings, are possibly the only objects she has an emotional attachment to. Frieren of all people would have no reason to specifically seek out such a spell, therefore her having the spell or not is purely chance. So if you wanna talk about people conveniently having a spell, how 'bout the merchant that just so happen to have that very spell right when Frieren happens to drop one of the only items she would care to use the spell for
i could have made it clearer but yeah the merchant having the spell right when she needed it is also what i meant by “convenience”. her not having many items that are of value to her is a good point tho that i hadn’t considered!
It’s not as much of a convenience if you think about it. This merchant is specifically someone who deals with artefacts as stated in the beginning of that journey. Still felt a bit forceful.
What'd be the ironic part is if the spell is actually like household common and she just never learned it somehow(apathy can do some wacky things). I've not yet watched the anime though, so I'll hand you a grain of salt for that idea.
I do find it wild that people even complain about Frieren's OP:ness given this story takes place after JRPG adventure (and pretty direct dragon quest homage iirc) and whom of us didn't grind our party to level 100 even though it wasn't probably even neccessary.
It is absolutely wrong that she (paraphrasing) "only learned combat magic to protect herself", she learned combat magic to kill demons. She despises and hates demons, it was the initial uniting reason that lead her to being Flamme's apprentice aside from being a powerful mage and being insightful enough to know that Flamme was incredibly powerful in spite of hiding her magical aura. The reason Frieren gets excited over simple spells was simply because of it being a hobby of hers, but you learn its a recent hobby, something she really only picked up while journeying with Himmel and their two friends on their quest. She admits prior to then she was rather apathetic and taking on the such an interest in collecting even the most mundane spells help prevent falling back into her apathetic ways, and it was Himmel's wonder at Frieren's magic that inspired her to take up the hobby. Furhtermore, if you pay attention to the various mundane spells she gets, it's largely with the intention (clearly planned by herself) that it'll help resolve an issue she knows she is going to come across--a prime example being when Fern is complaining about Frieren picking up a silly spell like cleaning rust, and then they arrive at village Frieren lead them to, cleaning a weathered and worn and rusted statue of Himmel. There's a nuance to her actions continually having an intent behind them aside from simply being her idiosyncrasies. But furthermore, even the style of magic she utilized and learns, such hiding one's magical aura and the adaptation of the Kill spell, her designs as initially taught to her by Flamme, has always been to kill and eradicate demons, which is then reflected with Fern when she falls back on everything Frieren had taught her when facing off with a demon for the first time.
4:50 just to clarify Frieren says she's been beaten 11 times by mages with LESS mana than her, so that doesn't include mages who beat her who had more mana than her, which would probably be a smaller number but there are mages with more mana than her like Serie, and when she was younger with less mana there were probably more
there's a handful of characters that even have the same amount of mana and some of those characters wouldnt fight her, already dead, or she wouldnt fight them.
I wouldn't really say Frieren is a "procrastinator" in the sense that we use. The whole point of the series, as far as I understand, is that there is literally no difference to her between spending a day or a year on anything. So it's not that she avoids work or puts it off until she feels the deadline approaching, because she has no concept of time in the first place.
Not so much "no concept of time" but rather there is no ultimate deadline (emphasis on the "dead"). She has the ability, resources, and literal time to take the time to do things at a comfortable rate. So why would she rush herself? She spent hundreds of years living a simple life while building and suppressing her mana for the whole purpose of being able to fight the Dark Lord, she wouldn't just jump onto the fast track and start "living it up". Instead she just kept living the way she had already been used to. Another way to think about it might be that she, and maybe many other elves, recognize that relative immortality is a LONG time. If you rush to do/collect/learn/etc. everything that there is... you are in for a VERY boring eternity. Like, "will do anything no matter how terrible, just to end the boredom" type of awful. Though, there is a fair point that she has little-to-no concept of how time affects others. She's not concerned in tracking it because there is likewise little-to-no point for her to do so. It's a real question how humanity would be like if we had lifespans that push 1000 years as well. (If one considers the Bible, it gives an impression that early peoples did have lifespans in the hundreds of years... and that the vast majority were so wicked that the only solution was to wipe the slate clean and start over with the few good people that were in Noah's family. Whether or not that had anything to do with lifespans is unknown, but it is also implied that the lifespan of humans fell drastically to decades rather than centuries.)
9:02 If you look at an individualism index for countries, that ranks countries from 0-100 from collectivistic to individualistic, you will see for instance the US ranked at 91, while China and Korea are respectively 20 and 18. Japan, however, is around 46, right around the middle of the world. Japan often gets lumped in with the rest of the East Asian countries as collectivistic, but in reality they are well balanced between collectivism and individualism. Even going back to ancient times Japanese stories have as a central theme the conflict between an individual's desires vs their obligation to the family/lord/society. By contrast American media tends to presume that going against the crowd and following your dream is the right choice (while many collectivist societies presume the opposite). So I wouldn't say that anime try to promote collectivism but fail, but rather that they try to show the pros and cons and collectivism and individualism.
interesting! i think naruto popped into my head because he receives a lot of “plot armour” without doing much to deserve it but that perspective does make sense
@@blearoyd I am solidly sure he'd have been dead several times over without the interactions he's had with those around him. One of Sasuke's techniques had dealt with a Mist Village assassin early on when they'd been protecting that engineer that was important for building a single fuckin bridge, and while I haven't seen the entire anime(thanks for watching ahead, *Mom*), I have heard of at least one time that Sakura had to restart his heart because it had stopped and he was infact dying/dead(pretty sure I've seen the scene in a short, but I turn my brain off for those, scrolling through trying to sleep or find a hook to go down a rabbit hole). All that aside though, yeah, there tends to be more one on one fights and switching out rather than straight up teamwork, especially later down the line. Kinda sucks to see a good story fall into that rut, but far too many do it anyway. I have to wonder why/how that happens.
@@mdbgamer556As a Naruto fan (and totally caught up) I can say... I see more teamwork in it than many people will admit. It's just hardly ever (if ever?) "c-c-c-combo!" teamwork, because that's stupid and boring after one time. Teams in Naruto are meant to be balanced and provide more than one skill. Like the Fighter Mage Healer standard of some classic fantasy settings. The thing is... a lot of the fandom obsesses more over the fights than what the story is actually about: relationships. That's how it started (both literally and in the one-shot that came before), that's how it ended. And not merely "who pairs with who" shipping, but real interactions and relating with people.
The author writes great characters and settings. You even feel sorry for some of the demons because they are in over their heads and their flaw is that they'll never understand humanity. As Flamme states, Frieren is a mage for a peaceful era and she ushered in that era. Her job was to kill the Demon King and she and the other heroes succeeded. The rest is just her learning to change the world a little like Himmel while enjoying the journey.
Great characters?? I sincerely hope that's a joke... Frieren is the stereotypical overpowered boring main character from every single anime, since the first anime was ever invented. Every other character is a rip off or straight copy from other anime shows. It literally is as generic as possible - elves, dwarves, dragons, ghosts, demons... Wow, how "great" and "original" of a concept in a fantasy show.
@@centripetal6157 And, you missed the intent of the artist. You will be proven wrong by subsequent events and history. I'm no art critic, but I know that this is great art. Madhouse did too! They picked this manga because they recognized how good it was. I hope your perception improves.
@@johnmoore8599 They picked this manga because it was popular. Thus viewers would be greater. This show is nothing special. Its 99% filler episodes and flashbacks. All designed to waste the viewers time as much as possible
The fact they spent a few episodes strategising how they can k-ll "Frieren" and it felt satisfying just shows how well written this story actually is. You'll never see them do this to the OP female characters in the modern western shows.
And how the fight ended not quite as expected despite the planned setup, so good! Also cemented just how terrifying she really is if cornered and forced to actually dip into her more dangerous powers. (As the video compared, when Saitama finally pulled out a Serious Series Punch we realized just how far above all threats he really is, no wonder he can't get a decent fight! Sure, Frieren has no desire for combat but the last thing any sane creature that wants to live another day should do is force her to need them dead.) I think that's why she keeps a policy of "just use standard spell attack, focused and powerful" rather than a variety. Master throwing a stone and you can always defend yourself. And that's all you should ever have to do if you are a good person. Other techniques are only for truly desperate situations and not to be used for anything less.
Spiolerish As the maga goes on, you see more and more flashbacks with the hero party you see them asking if she knows particular utility spells that she doesn't know at the time. Most of the spells she gets very excited over are ones mentioned. It seems to all but directly say that Frieren hasn't spent much time searching for little spells prior to joining the hero party. It even directly states she because so interested in silly spells following that party's praise of a few that she did know.
@@EkoBahamut after pretty much only learning combat magic from Flamme, yep. One flashback directly stated that she did spend some time with other mages 600 years or so before the story starts tho... I think she may have made a play for the Demon King and got severely beat down around then without even getting close, which is why she is so apathetic about assisting Himmel at first.
Correct in the flash back with Flamme she said she wanted to kill all the demons and her goal was always to kill the demon king. Plus given that fact that she is call “Frieren the Slayer” because she killed the most demons then anyone probably it’s pretty evident that she used her time to hone her combat skills. But like you said after her time with the hero group she found a new found love of more mundane spells.
We are lead to believe that at first but the most recent flashback she states that the joy of learning spells is in the journey. This predates her involvement in the Hero party by almost a thousand years. Thus implying she's always found joy in collecting mundane spells.
@@ryanlarkin9783 at the point of Flamme's death she only 'somewhat' loves magic. A mere 50 years caused that feeling to degrade, and then she went into isolation. While it is clear she wasn't completely isolated between Flamme and Himmel, it is clear she wasn't being a spell collecting loot goblin. Of all of the magic we have seen her use, only the tracking spell in episode 2, the bird capturing spell in the first exam, her seal on Qual, and the dancing golem are unaccounted for as to when they were learned. She almost certainly also knows the map spell and the fire lighting magic Fern uses, and these would be unaccounted for also. Every other spell we are informed as to when she learned it OR that she didn't know it when adventuring with Himmel. The majority of her (used) magic has been learned recently.
Something important to note about Frieren is not to judge her strength and weaknesses by her actions, but instead judge them by her in-moment degree of determination to fight back. It is often stated that Frieren is a mage of peace time, not war. It's the entire reason Serie (spoiler) doesn't pass her in the test. Frieren deliberately seeks out peace and avoids any and all combat, unless it is specifically demon related. When you see Leinen get successful attacks off and cause a degree of physical harm towards Frieren, it's not because she isn't powerful enough or lack the strategic mind to defend, or is too slow to react. The entire reason is that she simply can't be bothered to fight, unless there is no other way. She downright disregards people who pick fights with her even when she gets injured, because she doesn't care for fighting in a general sense. Fighting, to her, needs purpose, and she may let herself be in a state where she could lose a fight, simply because she isn't motivated to truly partake in it. She's OP af, but she lets herself be vulnurable due to her inert character trait of not desiring fights whatsoever, so much so that she will let herself endure physical harm and still not fight back unless her life depends on it.
7:19 That spell was for lost jewellery and we learn that you cant just make spells up you need to imagine them Frieren cant imagine finding a lost jewellery because it means so little to her so she could never visualize finding something that which has no meaning but as time goes on and in this scenario she finally values something enough to utilize such a spell. Not to mention she would've never even looked for such a spell because she just doesnt care to.
Everything in this anime is done right: perfect comedic addition, not exagg battles yet still gives goosebumps, faithful to goal story, and the flashbacks are done so perfectly it hits right in the feels.
"She learned combat magic not because she wanted to, but because she need to protect herself on her long journeys" I disagree. From her flash backs with Flamme, there was a scene with the older Flamme 50 years after they first met and she mentioned that all Flamme really taught Frieren was combat magic and how to use magic for revenge (against demons). I think it is important to note that while Frieren has not changed her apathetic personality through out the entire show regardless of era, her hatred and desire to eliminate demons has always been present. Flamme believed that Frieren is the mage to defeat the demon king, and defeat him she did. However, the magic that truly makes Frieren happy has always been the ones outside of combat, this is also influenced by Flamme, and also Himmel. I think that Frieren has already a strong knowledge of combat magic, way before she met Himmel. And is because of that knowledge that she shows more interest in other magic outside of combat, and also because of her own personality.
Frieren not having a spell to find lost items actually makes perfect sense. You said it yourself. She's apathetic. She never became attached to anyone, but after losing Himmel that started to change. It makes perfect sense to me that she wouldn't have a spell to find a lost item, cause why should she bother?
7:00 actually that entire argument defeats itself. Traveling along she will have some spells fitting the need of the moment and other times she does not. She isn't (liker her mentors mentor) a walking grimnoir (yet). She clearly gathers any curious spell you can find and she has A LOT of time to do so and those spells are anything but combat related. She is versatile in her spellcast ings. Even "useless ones". Meanwhile she also clearly didn't find all spells yet nor is it her goal. She just roams the land and picks up whatever seems fun or useful. So how is that "plot reasons"? I'd say its the opposite. She has a certain bandwith and that is applied when possible. That's all. Is it plot convenient for a warrior to carry a sword/armor? Well then anything is "plot convenient".
No annoying shouting, no power of friendship, no power explanation and blabbering, she just lets her power and qualities do the talking. She embodies that silence can talk the loudest.
I don't think you get how time works for Friren. Translating that book in 5 years was Friren working at a break neck pace. The series starts with Friren taking a brief vacation of 50 years.
To answer your question on the elves of the Lord of the Rings universe, they tend to only have one generation of children, if they have any, but they are definitely not aromantic, as elves tend to form deep bonds with each other that last thousands of years, and sometimes with humans, to the point where some elves, such as Arwen and Luthien, are willing to give up their immortal lives to bind themselves to their human loved ones that they may die with them, and they have children who essentially have the choice to either embrace their elven or human sides. They do seem to be asexual almost by necessity though, only having a single generation of children through their entire immortal lives, or perhaps elves lose the abilitiy or desire to reproduce after having a few children. It's not really elaborated on.
I think what makes a good "OP character" is by having their power come with a similarly powerful disadvantage. In Frieren, her power stems from her long life of study and training. But that same longevity also causes her to stuggle with other, shorter-lived characters, which is a core conflict in this anime. Another example, my personal favorite OP character has the power to manipulate time, but that same power also causes her to lose her sense of reality. Similarly, other characters might come to distrust the OP character and their power, leading to additional conflict.
The character is Max Caulfield from Life is Strange. However, here I am referring to an unofficial Fanfiction novella called Better Then that elaborates on her time powers further. Thanks for the interest. I swear I posted this a week ago, but it seems YT doesn't like hyperlinks to Archive of Our Own, so you'll have to look it up yourself. Sry. ;)
Serie once said, Frieren's inefficiency breeds weaknesses in others, while Flamme claimed Frieren to be a mage of a peaceful era. She doesn't seek power, nor does she look for specific spells, so her not having the detection spell for lost trinkets - which is extremely specific - honestly checks out, because she just learns what comes her way naturally. Heck, when Serie gave her the option to learn whatever spell she wants from her a thousand years ago, Frieren declined with the reason that searching for new magic is the most important part of being a mage for her. Frieren is lazy by human standards, whimsical to the point of being frustrating, and utterly oblovious when it comes to subtle human emotions. She refuses to learn from obvious mistakes when it comes to seeking out new knowledge - see mimics - and delights in picking up the most impractical things others would discard as garbage. At the same time, she is incredibly kind in her own way, possesses a wealth of knowledge nobody outside of her own race could ever dream to rival, and is the best hands-off teacher any mage would be able to find. If I had to sum her up in one word, I would call her a scholar, since her main objective in life is to learn through peaceful cooperation. That's also why she frustrates Serie so much, who comes down to a competitive fighter (aka the classic op character), still mentally stuck in a war for survival against the demons
a bit of my understanding which may or may not a correction and a bit of spoiler. Frieren learn combat magic not because she needs to be just strong enough survive a journey. she learnt combat magic to defeat the demon lord. she did hate demon enough that she wants to learn combat magic to kill them.
So, I came across this anime randomly and have it on in the background while I work, but I am a huge LOTR nut. Elves in LOTR don't lack the drive to reproduce. They don't reproduce as prolifically as other races, but they do grow. Originally there were around 300 elves in the beginning of Arda (Earth in LOTR). About 120 of them travelled to Valinor, a continent that was the home of the Valar (Gods/Angels) and the home of the two trees. When the Elves were created, their souls were tied to the level of magic that existed in the world, also known as the music of the Ainur (who the Valar are a part of). Their problem is that as time goes on and the world grows, the innate magic of the world is diminishing, which means they will diminish too. The central conflict in LOTR is because they tried to fix this problem by using the rings of power. There's a reason why Rivendell and Lothlorien are so beautiful compared to other parts of Middle Earth; the rings of power that Elrond and Galadriel wear preserve the realms they live in, allowing the innate magic of the world to carry on and for them to survive in Middle Earth without diminishing. The reason why the Elves are so sombre is because the fate of the One Ring is also tied to the other rings of power. When it is destroyed, the preserving presence of the other rings of power will end, meaning that the elves must leave Middle Earth to journey to the Undying Lands (Valinor). While that seems like an incredibly lengthy explanation, it glosses over a ton of details which make the whole story make a lot more sense. LOTR has a prequel called The Silmarillion which chronicles about 50000 years of history in varying details. Most Elves don't have apathy because of their life spans, but because of their history. The First Age in Middle Earth had the most going on because the Elves were at war. The stories are fantastical and amazing, filled with magic, villainy and heroism, much more than the other ages even though it was only 500 years long. Frieren is a different take on elves compared to LOTR, but it still fits. Both are very entertaining in their own ways. :) @blearoyd
I liked this anime because it was so goddamn wholesome for a change. A story about regret, self discovery and growing up, making changes to yourself because you saw what was important in life. And the fights are some of the coolest I’ve seen. Animators went ham!
Frieren has a few OP characters. Land, Ubel, Stark and Fern are OP. Frieren has many flaws but she is very strong. The story does tell why humans can be strong, they learn quick.
The way I see it is that she doesn't actively look for specific spells and just learns it as she goes. She knows that she can't keep everything she finds, so it's easier for her to let go of things. Imagine being a 1000+ year old pack rat. Yes, it was a "just so happens because plot" moment, but I wouldn't call it absurd as she didn't actively look for something to find things she isn't really stressed about keeping or losing. But it builds on her character about realizing the sentimental value of items...
Elves in Lord of the Rings are not overtly sexual but they are nonetheless, in Lord of the RIngs we have Arwen having i belive 3 children with Aragon, Baren and Luthien and a whole legendarium full of Elve Dynasties. I just dont think Tolkien due to his religious background highlights this component in his legendarium and stoties in general but to call elves a-sexual is kind of a stretch. His Maja on the other hand most definitly were so Sauron, Saruman etc while theire bosses the Ainur did marry each other so who knows.
I kind of disagree. It really depends on the couple and person, those examples you mentioned had a relationship with a human. There are also cases like Feanor, who was quite passional and hot-headed, who had like six children, but even here those six children were born over the course of a milennia. Galadriel has lived >8000 years and has only given birth to Arwen's mother, similarly Elron being >6000 years old only had three children with his wife over the couple milennia they lived together. One would argue that the elves have lower fertility, but the examples you mentioned make an argument on the opposite direction. IMO while not fully asexual the elves do not feel and act on their desires with the same passion as the humans do, they are usually more detached and live their lifes in slow motion for human standards.
Thats is 100% true but it does not contradict my point. Having a low sex drive is diffrent from being a-sexual. Tolkien was also a stricly catholic man and i doubt the views on sexuality especally for the time he lived in deviated far from the church doctrine which is stricly heterocentric. @@asthor93
Tolkien himself said that elves only had sexual desire during certain periods of their lives when they were capable of having children. So it's more like they do have a "regular" sexual desire, but only at specific points in their lives when they're ready to have children. Also, the vast majority of elven families we see have two to four children. Feanor, the overachiever, with his seven sons is said to be unprecedented.
interesting. Wonder how close that is to Frieren, i mean there was a elve population big enough to sustain villages at least so they must have had at least a sex drive wonder if that workes the same, which opens up the question if Frieren herself is past that state of her live or if Childbearing Elves are really really old even compared to her. @@UrielAngeli147
@@lysandergorisch1969 I suspect Frieren is the equivalent of an elven teenager, and her explanation is the version of the "stork"story given to young children. Except she never had any elders to tell her better... not for the past thousand years. And I rather hope elves in Frieren are true immortals. We don't see enough of those in non-Legendarium fiction, probably because it's very difficult to pull off convincingly.
Frieren - a full delusional illogical character concept. You cannot get op with that mentality. It's just too reality detached. For someone so "op" she really struggles with understanding something simple as emotions
Dude Frieren killed Bazart the Throne before she became Flamme's apprentice. She was the strongest in her village. Are you sure she wasn't a strong combat mage before she became who she is right now? And did we forgot that she likes those practical magic just because Himmel will compliment her for getting new fun spells? I don't think she focuses on practical magic because she is interested in practical magic, but because of her character arc. Hence that is not a reason why she's not really OP.
Not a manga reader, but Frieren seems like she is OP done right because she doesn't fight or have a need to fight. When it comes to magic and spells, she absolutely is OP. She has a spell for just about everything it seems. And her knowledge about the world and her life span allows her to be as carefree and non chalant as she is. She's OP done different...
Frieren is very well written, beautifully animated and a good blend and balance of character/story development, action and provoking an emotional connection to them via through empathy at times as well as sympathy towards their regrets of the past. I simply love this anime so much and highly recommend to anyone who is looking for a somewhat sophisticated, serious show but that also has a lighted hearted, humorous approach to some of the interactions between characters and everyday life moments of their camaraderie with each other. One of the best anime shows to come along in years 😊
This entire show is copy pasted from other standard fantasy shows and standard anime tropes. The only difference is that the big bad evil guy was defeated before the story began... Thus making 99% of the show pointless and filled with flashbacks or "memories" - In other words, the show has no purpose except to waste the viewers time - which it does with 26+ episodes that are slow, boring, unimportant... The story is as generic, basic and unoriginal as possible in any anime show.
@@centripetal6157 bruh, bruh, we get it, you're an edgy and reductive contrarian. Wow, totally unique and special. What an incredibly important person you must be. But if you hate something this much, why spam roughly the same comment 50x under one video? Make your point once and move along.
@@centripetal6157 incorrect. You are authoritatively declaring your opinions, which most obviously disagree with, to be 100% factual and implying that everyone else who thinks differently is deficient or stupid in some way. Like damn, it's fine if ya don't like it, dislike it, even hate it, but when I'm not keen on some piece of entertainment, I simply watch something else. It's pathological to rant on and on at people. Just go watch something you like dude.
8:27 "Feats of strenght are not necessary to progress the plot" F*cking thank you, i absolutely hate all the videogamey isekais and battle shounens that are filled with senseless fights that doesn't progress the plot at all, sometimes entire manga chapters of completely useless artwork and power explanations that the plot doesn't care about
1:45 I don't think she avoided pushing herself rather than just not seeing a reason to do so. Imo Frieren's whole character is about taking all the time in the world for little things because she literally has all the time in the world and fails to grasp or understand that other don't. Her realizing that is what drives the entire story.
It’s almost like we have known what makes writing good for a long time and the dweebs that usually write OP characters don’t know how to write so the characters they make are shallow beyond their premise of being OP.
Frieren is not OP because in this universe the power balance hangs in a rock-paper-scissors mechanic. I think she would be overpowered if she was able to overcome this and beat opponents she shouldn't be able to beat. Especially having read the manga, she's never able to beat opponents who counter her, and there's even those who outclass her that she is not able to beat without help. Definitely very strong, never OP.
I only need to watch 2 episodes of One Punch Man to realize the author has trapped himself with a series that will fatigue really really fast, because the story basically skips Saitama's character development and the whole thing becomes not really about him. He's nothing but comedic relief and the last resort, and the author must turn to the wide array of characters to tell stories that are honestly not that engaging, because we already know when all else fails, Saitama will fix it, most likely comedically. But in Frieren's case, I had no idea she's an OP character, not until Aura, at least. The story is about her journey to appreciate life. With how the story began, it was implied that it was going to be smooth sailing, and the fact that she's OP just reinforces that further, telling us that everything was going to be alright, so we can just sit back and enjoy the journey with Frieren and her friends.
for all we know, Flamme mostly taught Frieren combat spells so she could fight demons; and after her death, Frieren spent most of her time training alone until she joined Himmel's party. she also says she started collecting spells after himmel complimented her about these (in particular the spell to summon a field of flowers she learnt from Flamme in the first place), which means she may have been collecting all kinds of spells for barely 80 years at most. in that regard, Frieren not howing to summon a lost object makes a lot of sense to me.
1:04 - 1:14 ...did we read/watch the same show?Saitama is slowly learning to enjoy life more and slowly develop a social circle of friend he didnt use to have.He also learn that there is always more to aim for than just strenght.King is one of the rare character saitama actualy enjoy the company of because they are two side of a same coin and because King can still beat his ass at playing video game.Heck,saitama even ask king for advice at some point. Abouth the teamwork in naruto thing...it realy didnt fall that flat if you think abouth it,its just that reality happen.Having decent teamwork while being relatively weak can still help with fight you wouldnt otherwise win alone (like the Zabusa one for exemple or sakura and old lady chiyo vs sasori)...but its undeniable that sometime people might just grow so much that some of their teammate could become a liability in combat instead of helping with the fight...kinda why sakura is a medic most of the time,the strenght training Tsunade gave her was mostly to defend herself so she doesnt get killed while she heal someone.Heck,the main point of the strenght of the hundred seal is to prevent yourself from dying and in doing so,boost the chance of saving your allies.
Frieren is in the top 10 strong characters in her world? For now yes, but she is not an op char like in other shonens, she is more like a counterweight to bring balance in the battles against strong enemies. A battle of mages is a rock-paper-scissors match but extremely complex, someone extremely fast can beat her, that's why demons fear the Hero Himmel and didn't make a move till he died.
You can't say 'top 10 strongest characters' because, as u say, it's not that simple. She could lose to someone less 'powerful' than her because they counter her.
@@TheRealAstro_ yes and no, you can have a top by mana pool, skills and spells(if the character is a mage) but going by that way you can't say Grausam is stronger than Macht in a general balance, even if Grausam can defeat Macht.
@@TheRealAstro_she still top ten. goku lost to krillin in the past that doesnt mean he taking another L. And even if she takes another L from one of the 11 mages they all lose to macht and solitar, since they just get outclassed. you cant use a one off occurrence to say she's not at the top of verse when she dealing with the strongest sage and his +1. she cant beat someone that counters her or mage that battle hardened. But the 99% of the characters that counter her lose to macht or solitar, and we see a battle hardened mage lose macht. But frieren still beats macht and solitar.
I'll push back on Frieren not having magic for lost items. For her, until relatively recently, basically everything was a transient existence compared to her. She only needed the lost item magic because she grew to confer sentimental value on the ring she almost lost.
Calling frieren op is kinda incorrect in my opinion, it’s like calling luffy op because he steamrolls the entire east blue without much challenge, we’ve only really seen frieren in the starter areas despite the fact she’s an endgame character.
What is different and special about this fantasy anime is that it tells a journey of growth, and it's quite odd if you put it from Frieren's perspective, because she lived more than a thousand years: you might think that she could have seen and experienced enough but this story intends to show you how she still has a lot to learn, not in terms of magic (where she's a master) but in terms of relationships. After losing her former human companions, she starts to realise how precious they were and regrets not spending more time with them after defeating the Demon Lord (she comes back after 50 years to watch together the meteor shower as promised, but didn't even think how much valuable time she lost since it's a such a short period of time for her). She doesn't want to repeat the same errors and starts to become passionate on the other people (which is totally clear when you see her persistence in recruiting the priest Sein). I never imagined to need such a slow-paced and relaxed anime, the episodes go by unexpectedly quick, they are enjoyable and never dull or boring even when there is no battle involved. And since you are not expecting any upcoming fights, because as you stated this story is not about power and strenght, the first serious showdown in ep. 9-10 was surprisingly thrilling and exciting (and the music by Evan Call is such a delicacy to our ears). Tha author did a brilliant job by writing and drawing this manga, because she managed to present an OP character who doesn't need to show off, has her faults and whims even as an elf, and still has room for growth and character development. Too bad the anime is coming to an end now, but they will make another season without a doubt in the future, considering the success.
Frieren doesn't have a spell for locating lost items, or many other mundane practical things, because she was isolationist until Himmel came along. She effectively sat in one place once Flambe died. She's only been looking for these spells since she joined his party, and she couldn't literally take any amount of time to do things, or look for things back then, because they wouldn't let her beyond a certain point. Sure she would pick up a fair number of spells as the opportunity presented itself, but that's still a tiny fraction of the time she has been alive.
I mean this as politely as possible but a lot of this is bad analysis, it really feels like you had a perspective and just went to read that in what your watching. She didn't nonchalantly skim over zoltrak she helped engineer it, her own version is specifically engineered to be more effective against demons. She does strategize pretty much constantly you see that in the current testing arc where her first move in pretty much every instance is to gather information to strategize. She spends her entire life suppressing her mana to gain an edge against demons, due to a specific hyper effective strategy she spent hundreds of years perfecting. Likewise it feels silly to say strength is overrated or just a happenstance when frierens hatred of demons comes from them slaughtering everyone she knew as a child. Her strength, like her age is something that alienates her from everyone else its a central part of her character. She also wasn't self centered, her life and existence led her to be someone who deeply struggles connecting with anyone, much like her mana her capacity to connect to others is something she had to develop and it gave her a new perspective, it wasn't just like her being selfish.
admittedly i wrote the script just a few hours after watching the first 20 eps so a lot of it is based in first impressions, and i agree with most of what you've said here! but i wasn't saying frieren doesn't strategize, just that one could argue she only strategizes now because of those losses she experienced in the past. and self-centredness isn't necessarily intentional or malicious - i see it as a natural side-effect of spending a lot of time alone. frieren simply doesn't think as much about others at the start because, as you said, she's alienated from them
4:35 frieren is also a talented mage even before meeting flamme, i think i remember her saying she was the strongest in her village and she was shown to be the only one who survived from the attack. So she actually have fewer rivals even if she met an ordinary elf.
I believe what Flamme comments on is her POTENTIAL. She was still definitely a child at that point and she had lots of talent and potential. but not a lot of training. She beat the demon on instinct instead of skill and it almost ended her life, she was exhausted and injured, compared to Flamme who we see drop the "little ol' me?" bit and wreck several high power demons like it took more effort to make an omelet than win the fight.
Great video and very insightful. i hope we get more of this series, it has been very enjoyable and connecting in a real world sense. i have even seen it mentioned that "it is not often that eastern and western audiences gravitate this well towards a shared culture and interest". i find this to be somewhat true as almost everyone seems to love the vibes of this show for much the same reasons the world over, and as a result we have even seen some amazing memes about it from different cultures too :)
Frieren learned combat magic because she plans on killing all the demons at some point in her existence. She specifically created a demon killing spell, so she doesn't just use offensive magic for protection. She just prefers learning new spells and having new experiences over a fixation on demon killing.
The lord of the rings are literally immortal. Their souls are immortal, so they have families and stuff but they tend to have that family forever so maybe not many new families I think their recycles
I barely even agree that Frieren is "OVER"powered. She is very powerful, but not "I win this because bs bs bs I am stronk!" She lost to Qual a mere 80 years ago. She couldn't beat him - they had to seal him away instead. She could've lost to Aura had she not fallen for Frieren's deception. And going into episode 25 spoilers; Fern is confident that she could beat Frieren. Now we'll have to wait and see if she can actually 1v1 Frieren, or if its part of a larger plan.
She learns different small spell's because of her master influence and since she finds enjoyment in learning about more about magic. But she has powerful collection of combat spell's as show on ep 21 and 25.
No, she is overpowered in the same way Gojo and Sukuna are overpowered. It is just that this world has A LOT of Gojos and Sukunas running around. She is not alone at the top of the Verse, but is OP for the rest 99.9%.
I like your mature approach to topics without the fragrant voice over / over hyped excitement on the subject. Much more consumable and doesnt give me a headace. Feels like im having a conversation with a normal person casually in a room. It's nice.
Her motivation is to get many “interesting” spells as many as possible so she is looking for new spells not to get stronger as other leads. These lead to decieving her use when fighting. To win, you need both knowledge by learning and skills by practicing which her already master both due to long life. The point of “handicap” is to practice fundamental. She is training this fundamental for thousands years not because it is strong but it is easy and fast to use in the real fight.
Lord of the Rings elves are weird in a lot of ways around romance and sex because Tolkein kinda puts a lot of his ideals that he considers rare to impossible for humans into them. Long, drawn-out chaste romances, followed by marriage, and only THEN one child every few hundred years tops. There's also the fact that if they die, they practically respawn in Valinor, but can no longer leave. (which means a monogamous elf wouldn't seek new relationships after a spouse dies, because the reunion is effectively a matter of time.) (Yeah Tolkein's catholicism is pretty subtle in the main stories itself but it REALLY warps a lot of the world's background lore.) Frieren is a lot simpler, various forms of asexuality are just the most common orientation elves have, rather than that being heterosexuality, like it is for humans.
I disagree that Frieren not having a spell to locate lost objects is absurd. The entire point of the episode is to show her growth as a character. Her not having a spell to find lost objects signals to the audience that she has never before had something precious enough to her that she cared to find a lost object, despite being a person who loses things.
I disagree with the notion that Frieren not already having the spell for lost items is ridiculous. She and the other mages have done pretty well at explaining the magic in the setting for example her travelling around looking for magic that can come from dungeons and dragons hoards or what she specifically calls FOLK magic and we see that a lot in how little villages in the middle of nowhere have simple magics passed down for ages. As well as that, they do a good job showcasing how specific and granular magic is, my favorite example being that they found the spell for creating shaved ice but didn't have the spell to create the syrup. It could very well be that she has magic for finding other types of items but the one she got from the jeweler is specifically lost ACCESSORIES.
Feels like someone rethought the concept of Eleminster from D&D, and they did it remarkably well. Didn't just reskin him, but completely rethought the concept and created something new and special put that in a different world and took a different angle at the story.
A few things: 1. Frieren loves magic, however she spent multiple hundreds of years not doing much adventure to collect new spells. She was indecisive and felt like her time has past and had it not for the Hero Team, she wouldn't have a need for the finding accessory spell (it's also a folk spell not a grimoire). 2. She only begins to intensively collect new folk spells after the journey with the hero after seeing how much people appreciate her spells. So give or take it would be however long ago Himmel died plus 50 years of promise and 10 years of their actual adventures (60 + however long ago Himmel died at that point). I think the magic system works well, and Frieren not knowing lots of spells despite living for 1000+ years makes sense because she is only recent spell collector.
