First Impressions / Goblin Slayer

「往きて、還りし」 (Yukite, kaerishi)
“There and Back Again”

There and back again indeed. From killing even more Goblins (I know, hard to believe) to teasing some more about greenskin origins and hey, even a bit of Sword Maiden confession for spice, Goblin Slayer certainly knows how to end an arc on a high note. It may be the same food for another day in a row (the university student in me feels the pain), but with flavours like this can you really complain?

As highlighted a few times before Goblin Slayer’s focus not just on battles but the tactics involved and used is one of things keeping me loving this show. Have a mass horde of goblins running at you with some tough frontline support? Well better think of a suitable strategy because the usual one won’t work. It’s intriguing watching this sort of pre-fight strategizing play out because it adds a bit of depth to an otherwise straightforward process. We obviously know our party is going to win (well, most of the time), but keeping the manner of it different from prior fights ensures the interest and entertainment remains. Of course Goblin Slayer will beat the goblins to a pulp (it’s his reason for living), but he’s going to be doing it slightly different each time. The imagination at work here in setting up these simple situations is something a few fantasy series can learn from, because if there’s one thing which grows boring after a while it’s watching the heroes win in more or less the same manner every time.

Of course the big thing this week is not so much Anvil Elf learning to add falling debris into her banned tactics handbook, but the things at play underneath all that goblin slaying. Sword Maiden for example apparently orchestrated the whole situation in the first place, giving the goblins the means to actually travel into the sewers via the mirror and setting up her familiars (at least, I think the mirror guardian was also a familiar) to protect the mirror and prevent the goblin menace from getting too out of hand. And why go to all that trouble? To apparently show how dangerous a threat the goblins actually are. Given how we’ve seen the general populace and adventurers treat goblins it’s not that surprising someone with the Maiden’s history would go to such lengths, but it’s somewhat surprising and a little questionable considering everyone here by now knows what those little greenies are capable of. Not like Goblin Slayer cares too much however; as long as he can slay goblins all is well, and Sword Maiden certainly met that goal and then some, even her the methods were a little less than maidenly.

As for the future, well, I think we know what our greenskin terminator has planned. The mirror might be gone and easy access to the goblin homeworld eliminated, but if there’s one thing you can bet on Goblin Slayer it’s that there’s always another plan in the works. When it comes to goblin slaying no one bests our armour boy, and with three episodes left there’s plenty of time to further that mission of a goblin-free world.

 

Preview

58 Comments

  1. The beholder was put there by the evil sect, not Sword Maiden. They had control of mirror and they had other plans for it besides goblins before Heroine took them out. All Sword Maiden did was try to direct blame for the killings in town onto the goblins to try and make someone understand her fears. Her alligator was there on patrol before all this started, too, hence why people scoffed at the idea of giant rats in the sewers.

    The only thing she really did wrong was lie a little, and given how she rightfully thinks people will outright laugh at her for being afraid of goblins, I really can’t be too mad. Plus, she’s adorable in the sexiest way ever, so that helps.

    Aex
    Reply

    1. And since they skipped it I’ll add that Sword Maiden knew as much as she did about the goblins in the sewers because she shares senses with the alligator. She’s never been to the sewers since a goblin was found it the town, she’s too afraid.

      Aex
      Reply

      3. @Azalea23 You must be pretty sheltered if you think the premise isn’t amazing jerk off material. The only thing holding it back is there is 10 minutes of Swordmaiden taking Goblin dick.

        Altecmn
        Reply

      1. He kills goblins reeaal good.

        And also he’s kind of gorgeous under the armor even if we never get more of his face than a bit of jaw, but mostly it’s the goblin thing I bet.

        Guile
        Reply

      2. No, it’s not. That image is just artistic licence from the bard in episode 2: Goblin Slayer saving a stereotypical pretty blonde princess probably attracts a bigger audience.

        And yet, I’m sure the similarities are intentional from a meta point of view.

        A common staple of stories in this world is “adventurer saves girl and they end up together”. But the bard’s story had a twist, and the end basically foreshadows the scene between SM and GS in this episode:

        “The rescued beautiful maiden leans into our hero. However, he is the Goblin Slayer. He is sworn to wander the land, never to settle down. The princess reached out her hand, but only grasped air.”

        Mistic
        Reply

      3. It was mentioned on the page for the last episode that Goblin Slayer is an emotional anchor for many of the females on the show, especially Sword Maiden. Sword Maiden is still experiencing post traumatic stress disorder (dreams, mostly) about her abduction, torture, and loss of eyesight at the hands of the goblins when she was 15 years old. The reason Sword Maiden is all over Goblin Slayer is his emotional fortitude when it comes to goblins; never underestimating them, nor scoffing at their threat, but dealing with them in a determination role.

        Also, we’ve now seen the lengths the Demon Lord will go to get goblins as foot soldiers for his army, and throw the entire continent into chaos. Even setting up a permanent Gate mirror to the goblin homeworld to allow them to cross over and threaten even the most pacific of towns.

        jhpace1
        Reply

    2. This season should be volumes 1 and 2. All this arc of water city is all volume 2 from LN. From the beginning and what is expected to be the last arc of the anime, will be all volume 1.

      Shadow074
      Reply

      2. What the Doom Marine/Doom Slayer did to Hell (especially if you read the lore in Doom (2016)), Goblin Slayer would do to the goblins’ homeworld if given the chance. But for now, GS probably has his hands full dealing with goblins in his world.

        Incognito
        Reply

  6. I’d figured Goblin Slayer’s “Goblins are from the moon” story was just some folksy tale he’d picked up as a kid that stuck with him, but that’s definitely where the things are coming from after seeing through the portal.

    qwert
    Reply

    1. No. This anime adaptation is not making a good work explaining many things, because, they have changed the order of some events. The mirror was connected to an old ruins that were already visited by Goblin Slayer and his party, as a payment to the Elf Girl for helping him in a the last arc in the novels/manga, that will be the next arc in the anime. So no, the Goblins are not coming from a parallel world. They are probably some kind of spawns of some dark god who is also playing with the dices with the other gods.

      Jon
      Reply

  7. It’s annoying how confusing her explanation came out in the anime. It’s not incredibly clear regardless, but the implications about the evil cult being involved in the murders are at least a bit more solid when it comes to the other media.

    Ultimately the problem Sword Maiden faced was that with the Hero having laid waste to the evil cult, there was no driving force behind the goblins, who were just left to do their own thing down in the ruins below the city. Sword Maiden couldn’t resolve it on her own, and her own trauma about goblins meant that just knowing they were down there was slowly gnawing away at her sanity. Thus she called for the best exterminator of green vermin imaginable – because no one else would take the threat seriously. And if they realized how much if was affecting her, fewer people would put their trust in her as well.

    I doubt even the evil cult realizes how badly Sword Maiden is traumatized by the goblins – and in the end, they hopefully will never find out.

    RuneGrey
    Reply

    1. I really like this show a lot (to this point, it is my favourite for the year) but I think it would be even better if they could put out 30-minute episodes. I like how most of the episodes have both intense combat and non-combat developments. But even with slowing things down during his tet-a-tet with the Maiden, it could have used a bit more time to tell the story. The battle would likely have benefitted as well if it had another two or three minutes of run time. This differs from many shows which waste great gobs of time (especially those that insist on ending every episode with some form of cliffhanger).

      Mockman
      Reply

  8. I like how there’s a few ways you can interpret Goblin Slayer words towards the end with Sword Maiden of “Not Knowing Exactly how she feels”. As some people had pointed out it could mean he doesn’t understand the feeling for fear Sword Maiden has towards goblins as for him it took the form of hatred for the entire goblin race.

    Another way of interpreting it was he saw his entire villages destruction at the hands of goblins and what sword maiden had to go thru with the goblins as different (which in some ways is true) both came to realize the horrors goblins represent but in different ways. (For SM goblins became a trauma, for GS being powerless to do anything as goblins came attacking).

    Devastator001
    Reply

    1. I am personally leaning towards your second interpretation. GS knows what goblins do to women in particular since he’s witnessed what happened to his sister, but he acknowledges that his experience is not the same as SM who had personally gone through it. As such, he says he cannot save her in the way she’s hoping for, aside from doing what he does best: killing goblins.

      AshScar
      Reply

    2. I also think it’s the second interpretation. Goblin Slayer in effect was sympathizing with what Sword Maiden went through, he could relate via his own experiences, but not the way she wanted him to. He only promised to do what he is fully capable of, which is slay goblins—beyond that it’s up to the Sword Maiden to find her own salvation.

      Pancakes
      Reply

  9. Sword Maiden clearly said that the mastermind is demon lord’s minions. She just lied about those assaulting in town was because of goblin when it was actually minions of demon lord.

    HoHo
    Reply

  10. So.. And i think even in the Manga it did not exists. How saved Sword Maiden from the hands of the Goblins. I bet the Hero.. So this unknown Hero so far… Will he have some Screentime in the Manga or Anime? Or is he or she never mentioned after the Demons Lord killing?

    Worldwidedepp
    Reply

    1. Well there’s a new goblin slayer side story LN covering Sword Maiden’s event 10 years ago when she was still a bishop class and I think it also covers how she escaped from the goblin cave.

      The current Hero though is the Haruhi/Yuuki expy bakc in episode 7.

      Devastator001
      Reply

  12. It’s intriguing watching this sort of pre-fight strategizing play out because it adds a bit of depth to an otherwise straightforward process. We obviously know our party is going to win (well, most of the time), but keeping the manner of it different from prior fights ensures the interest and entertainment remains.

    I agree with this feeling. Even as a manga reader, it was still thrilling to watch their preparations: you know they have a plan, but you don’t know what the plan entails.

    All in all, the series feels like a D&D game, and I think that’s the reason of the dissonance some people are feeling. After the first episode, they expected the tone to be dark and gritty all the time, only to find out that there’s comedy, and fun, and quests don’t need to end badly as long as you have a competent party and a good plan (although encounters are still bloody). It’s not just GS and company: Priestess’ original party paid for their overconfidence and lack of preparation, whereas a similar but more balanced group of newbies triumphed in the background of episode 2 (GS even lampshaded that he wasn’t worried about them after hearing about their mission and line-up).

    Goblin Slayer is not a gritty Deconstruction of D&D, but a dark Reconstruction. Characters have titles instead of names, adventuring is first and foremost a business, boringly invincible heroes exist but are not part of everyday life, and bad preparations or sheer bad luck can lead to horrifying consequences. But it doesn’t mean that the world is a crapsack dystopia, especially if you don’t rely exclusively on Goddess Fortune to decide your fate. In that regard, Goblin Slayer’s theme (“He does not let anyone roll the dice”) has echoes of Machiavelli himself:

    “I compare fortune to one of those great rivers, which when in flood covers the plains, sweeping away trees and buildings, bearing away the soil from place to place. Everything flies before it, all yield to its violence, without being able in any way to resist it. But although its nature is like that, it does not follow therefore that people, when the weather becomes fine, should not make preparations, both with canals and defences, so that in
    the future the rising waters are directed away, and their force is not so unrestrained and dangerous. It is the same with fortune, who shows her power where courage has not made preparations to resist her.”

    Mistic
    Reply

    1. Thinking on it reconstruction is probably the best way to describe this, the show isn’t out to send a message or be overly vocal, it’s here to live a story and have some fun along the way—i.e. the usual setup for any D&D campaign. If it’s dark or gritty in spots it’s because the moment or setup suits it, not because it’s the sole aim of the story. This IMO makes the show stronger because it leaves space for all the comedy and “slice of life” moments adding personality to the characters otherwise lost with a focus on grimdark. Pretty much the definition of simple yet effective.

      Pancakes
      Reply

  14. ♫ “The road goes ever on and on
    Down from the door where it began…” ♫

    Well, that wasn’t exactly a “rematch” between Goblin Slayer and that Goblin Champion, in a conventional sense. More like the fantasy equivalent of Sousuke Sagara’s brand of combat pragmatism. (No wonder High Elf Archer was as exasperated as Kaname Chidori after all that.)

    https://randomc.net/image/Goblin%20Slayer/Goblin%20Slayer%20-%2009%20-%20Large%2028.jpg
    And in case the hints in the previous episodes weren’t enough, here’s a flashback of Sword Maiden’s past ordeal in gratuitous detail.

    https://randomc.net/image/Goblin%20Slayer/Goblin%20Slayer%20-%2009%20-%20Large%2031.jpg
    That being said, I hope this won’t be the last we’ll see of her. I sense she’ll still have a role to play in Goblin Slayer’s story…

    Incognito
    Reply

    1. depends in how many of the “original” Demon Lord slayer Group Heroes are still alive

      She is 1 of them, are the others still there or did they got “Missing in Action” over the time? Also was she the only female of this group and so on

      Worldwidedepp
      Reply

      1. There’s a side story prequel coming for the light novel and manga iirc, that covers Sword Maiden and her party. Not sure what happens to most of them after their victory over the demon lord, but Show Spoiler ▼

        AshScar
        Reply

    3. She is quite the complicated woman. Eerily beautiful, possessed of a noble demeanour, calm and collected, forthright, courageous, a great and accomplished leader… and yet terribly scarred both inside and out, a prisoner of her fears, able and willing to say anything to achieve her ends, but unable to achieve those ends with the assets she commands. She is cool, aloof and unapproachable in public but in private, or alone with her hoped for knight, she is feminine, warm, open, and maybe even clingy. Laurels to her seiyuu for wringing it all out of her so well. And darts to the hardened heart that left her sobbing and alone on the ground at his heels.

      I’ll add that the moment with the Priestess in the corridor was nicely done as well. She’s waiting patiently, appreciative that he is willing to deliver a report on their results to the head of her church and their sponsor, unaware of what was said by either party inside, which was probably beyond her experiences to even imagine.

      Mockman
      Reply

  15. https://randomc.net/image/Goblin%20Slayer/Goblin%20Slayer%20-%2009%20-%2016.jpg
    Nice strategy, Goblin Slayer: using the Goblin Champion’s own hammer-assaults to kill the smaller goblins who get in the way.

    https://randomc.net/image/Goblin%20Slayer/Goblin%20Slayer%20-%2009%20-%2019.jpg
    I swear High Elf Archer needs an efficent quiver (extradimensional storage for arrows), or even a magical bow that makes arrows or retrieves non-targeted arrows.

    https://randomc.net/image/Goblin%20Slayer/Goblin%20Slayer%20-%2009%20-%2010.jpg
    Man, that’s a scene right out of Aliens (1986) with the autocannon sentry guns. This is why archers learned to curve their 1st shot high into the air and straight-shoot their 2nd shots: to land at the same time.

    jhpace1
    Reply

      1. Its not too bad though since the actual LN is much further so the anime do have materials to work with. Its just for us manga readers, anything new the anime throws will be new stuff to us. But as mentioned they did skip one major arc in the manga which they’re saving for the season finale of the anime. So I doubt the first season of Goblin Slayer will actually show manga readers any new content.

        YanDaMan
        Reply

  17. As much as I can understand, the gate mirror was left in the sewers by evil sect, later it got abandoned due to Heroine killing Demon lord and throwing the organization in disarray. Somehow, goblins on the other side of gate figured out how to use it and started tricklig into sewers. Sword Maiden was the only one who took them seriously, but on the other hand she could not deal with them personally due to her PTSD. So she recruited only warband that specialzies in goblin-slaying (it seems the specialization starts rubbing off on the rest of the team – look how the anvelf did not even bother to add bringing down entire ceiling on the goblins into index tactica prohibitorum.
    Beholder was probably left by evil sect to protect the mirror, and for some reason it let the goblins pass (orders from his masters?). Crocodile was sent by Sword Maiden to keep the goblins in check at east until proper exterminator arrives?

    ewok40k
    Reply

    1. Close enough to the manga, from what I’ve read above. It’s not perfect (how did the goblins drag a twenty-foot-long wooden boat from the sanctuary room to the sewers without disrupting all those pews), but it looks like you got the gist of the matter.

      jhpace1
      Reply

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