Wise Man's Grandchild follows a normal boy, called shin, getting into an unfortunate accident, causing his death. He reincarnates as a baby in a fantasy world, in which after another terrible incident he is stranded without his parents. He gets picked up by a powerful warrior, and through his teachings Shin learns that he is incredible powers. After he is turned adult (15 years old), the grandparents of Shin decides he is finally fit for the real world. Tiny problem: Shin doesn't really know how the world works, as his grandfather never thought him other then magic. Thus Shin gets into a magic highschool and has to learn about the customs of the world, which he does so easily because the actual focus of the anime is that Shin is fucking OP. He can do everything better then everyone, and even invents new magic. This attracts the attention of other nations, thus Shin gets into a political landscape with many people going after him.

I applaud you if you could read the last paragraph without falling asleep by the second line, you are a stronger man (or lady) then I am. The Wise Man's Grandchild is an isekai, and boy is it an isekai. It is a power fantasy, about a misfit boy with an extremely generic personality but still has unimagineable powers, thus everyone wants to be his friend and his enemies want his powers, but they fail because the misfit boy is so goddamn powerful. The plot synopsis read like the starter kit for every isekai ever. It follows the tropes very closely and it has very little original bones in its body. Especially the attempts at "self-awareness" falls so flat it is embarassing.

But there is something with the Wise Man's Grandchild that makes me enjoy it more then I should. And it isn't just because I am an "Isekai trash" that enjoys any isekai regardless of quality. Isekai Cheat Magician only came 3 months after Wise Man and fucking despised that anime, even though it has the same generic tropes as Wise Man's Grandchild. So what makes Wise Man's Grandchild so enjoyable?

I think a big part of my enjoyment comes from the fact that even though it is a generic isekai, it feels like the author somewhat cared about it. It has all the aspects of a generic isekai, but it feels like its goal wasn't just to make the protagonist a self insert, but also to make the isekai feel like a good time. The constant new introductions of the increasingly ridiculous powers of Shin never stops being funny (both ironically and non), with Shin also learning others his powers to others. There is positive vibe from this anime that keeps me engaged, even if it has some dark scenes.

Since we are talking about dark scenes, I want to mention that the story is surprisingly engaging. Ofcourse, I could sit here and pick apart any nonsensical or stupid part in the story, but as a whole I think the story has some nice twists and ideas that get expanded on just enough.

Also, and I can't stress this enough, there is actual romance in the anime! Yes, it has tons of cute girls to make it look like a magical harem anime, but these girls aren't there to be the love interest of Shin, they are just their own fun characters. Shin actually falls in love with one love interest, and throughout the series they actually get together and start to develop their relationship. There is barely any chemistry, but it is something!

Despite my praises, I still have some definite problems with this anime that aren't just "hurr durr generic". The characters are very hit or miss. The comedy feels like it runs in circles and never really goes beyond giving me a smirk. I like the animation and it has some nice sakuga, but the character design is so weak. Each character looks like the default skin when you make your own character in SAO. My personal biggest problem is with the anime is its ending, which honestly completely ruined my goodwill I had for this anime. Like I wanted to throw my computer in the sink for how many eyerolls I made during the last episode.

The Wise Man's Grandchild is on a technical level a bad anime. It has more flaws then it has postive aspects. The Wiseman's Grand Child is on a personal level an okay enjoyable anime. Maybe it is due to lowered expectations, the positive vibe tricking me into liking it or that the good aspects shined harder due to the negative ones, but I can say for sure that I don't regret watching this show. Even with its godawful ending, the Wise Man's Grandchild is a big "good enough" from me.