Honestly, Goblin Slayer does not impress me one bit into what it is looking to achieve, and I understand that a lot of people would buy it and praise Goblin Slayer, but I'm not one of those people.


Story: 1/10.

The story is not complicated, and the characters get as much depth as their names, which is none. Like many reviews have said before mine, this story will just follow the revenge story of one dude that "specializes" in killing goblins. His revenge path is justified, but what it isn't is the fact that he is the only one out of all the villagers to react in this way to the goblin menace.

In fact, the whole setting can't stand on its own when you stop to think even just a little about it. Just to stick with the villagers, it makes no sense that they wouldn't try to defend themselves on their own when the goblins have been there for more than a generation.

This threat is not new to them and out of all the villagers, the story wants to make the readers believe that only one person was brave enough to defend them against a constant threat. This would be a treated as a nitpick if the tension caused by the battles of the story was actually a good focus to follow instead of boring me to the point I can't even enjoy seeing the Goblin Slayer be a badass. And why is there no tension whatsoever in the story?

The answer is quite simple: the combats will go about the same way over and over again. The Goblin Slayer will always get to a place, he will order people around and then take all the glory. Rinse and repeat. Now, if this repeating sequence was played in a comical fashion like the combats of Saitama in One Punch Man, I might find it quite comical as long as it is used sparingly.

But the series wants to be serious and dark all the time, trying to "light up" by using cheap gags that simply don't work for me instead of creating a lighthearted tone.Therefore, I have to judge it for the kind of dark fantasy it wants to be. When my interest was worn off by the absence of tension, I tried to focus on something else that might be interesting only to find myself further disappointed by the series.

I’ve heard some people praise the world-building of the series, but it honestly is nothing even worth mentioning. As I stated before, the setting is nonsensically dark and there is no progression worthy to be mentioned and here's why.

The things we know for certain in chapter twenty-seven are more or less the same we know in the first four chapters: goblins are bad, Goblin Slayer is a certified badass, the rest of the adventurers are either greedy and corrupt or useless. The only thing that changes about the adventurers is that some are only doing something praiseworthy when the Goblin Slayer is around to tell them exactly what to do.

This brings into question their worth as individual adventurers and their personal motivations to put up with the Goblin Slayer's plans. It's like they are unable to have any critical judgement of their own. The only "progression" on a character level that is visible is Goblin Slayer's increasingly greater status among the rest of the adventurers even when he’s paired up with characters of his level of combat.

Which brings me to my next point: The Goblin Slayer is not that different from other self-insert power fantasies found in other LN protagonists. He will always win, he will always be one step ahead of the pack no matter how unlikely it is and he will always be the boss.

Hell, even gods can’t possibly control this character because he has to be a special because of his tragic backstory. We can’t have themes such as predetermination or destiny to ever go against the protagonist, can we?

There can’t be anyone else to rise up like the goblin slayer because that would make him less special and show that his motivation doesn’t differentiate him from other villagers that would most certainly train to become become goblin slayers themselves after surviving a goblin raid.

And of course, no characters can ever show more intellect nor combat abilities than the Goblin Slayer because then he wouldn't have a reason to order them around, right? He would be the one who would perhaps be asked to stay on the sidelines because he’s too reckless.

We can’t have our protagonist ever be in the wrong, can we? After all, what kind of badass faces the disapproval of his actions other than to dismiss it as cheap and recurring gag? I can’t think of a single black swordsman that decided to do something that had real and permanent consequences for everyone involved and marked the turning point of a major arc of any manga.



Art: 4/10.

Nothing impressive about the art. It looks like your run-of-the-mill LN inspired kind of character design. If anything, they make the style work for the monsters, the battles and the shocking scenes which is a use for that kind of style I have not often seen.

However, good battle scene fluidity and good monster design won’t make up for the tedious repetition of the flow of the battles. Nor it will make up for the shock factor the series shamelessly rubs on the reader’s face.

I have read gore manga before, I have seen rape portrayed in fiction before and Goblin Slayer uses both of these things with the tact and understanding of angsty fourteen-year-old trying to make his story interesting by any means.


Enjoyment: 1/10.

I’ve tried to give this manga the chance to prove that it could be enjoyable even if it was just for mindless action.

But it can’t even make that work out and, to compensate, it relies on spamming the shock factor, but that technique is in itself a poor tactic to keep a shallow interest in the story.

I tried to grab onto the world-building, just to find a ridiculous setting and a static world knowledge that reveals the poor thought and care the author put in this story.


Overall rating: 3/10.

I can’t say that Goblin Slayer didn’t try to make its battles somewhat interesting and make its main character different from other fantasy protagonists.

However, it tried to do so by setting up an unnecessarily dark story without even taking the time to make the action varied and interesting nor making the characters more than nameless tropes. This is not the right way to make a story stand out for the right reasons.

If anything, it just highlights the story’s shortcomings when the magic of the badass protagonist and the shocking gore wears off.

I tried to find something to justify the time I put into reading the all the chapters available to me, but I honestly found none.

It was a waste of my time and I don’t plan on continuing losing my time when I can read something a bit more entertaining with its mindless action or its world-building/characters/plot.