Name: I wished I could've loved this show.
Item: Ranking of Kings
Rating: 58
Author: R2R

I wished I could've loved this show. · Waifora

/anime/113717/ranking-of-kings

It started off really strong, it tear me up when beat-down-Bojji tried to lift the sword but my favorite emotional moment is when Hiling shouts to get a response from Daida, I absolutely loved that scene. And while not as strong, I liked the rest of the first half too. It slowly placed pieces for a grand payoff.

Spoiler, click to view

You have, Bosse in prison while Daida finds a lonely girl within his father's... domain (let's use that word for a second) while, Domas & Hokuro follows Bosse's orders & investigate the underworld gates where they meet the other party, Desha with his "Order of underworld" starts to infiltrate Bosse's kingdom with an aim of eliminating, Miranjo who released a few underworld criminals among whom is a mysterious immortal with a very eerie feel to him & are going to use them to kill, Hiling with her bodyguard Dorshe who decided to rebel against the king with her small group, all while Bojji & Kage started to march towards the kingdom with the help of Despa. And we aren't even talking about a few unexpected entrances like Bebin, Gigan & Mitsumata.

It carefully placed all these characters at promising points of the story with the right amount of suspense & potential surrounding everyone. But how it fell apart so hard is honestly disappointing. I don't hate this show but I just couldn't fathom the amount of illogical things that kept on happening in the second half.

Spoiler, click to view

When Ouzen invaded the town, why the hell were there still people around when they saw how dangerous he is? During the Domas & Desha fight, I honestly couldn't tell if I should find it funny or if I should find it emotional, and it wasn't until the music kicked in, I started to find it serious. There are many of these head scratching moments later on. At one point in the first half, Bosse (in Daida's body) asked the mirror to show who's the strongest person, and the mirror shows Bojji. The second half made this very confusing, so Ouzen can kill Bojji but not Bosse, Bosse can beat Ouzen but not Bojji but again, Bojji can beat Bosse but almost gets killed by Ouzen and the mirror says Bojji is the strongest... It makes very little sense, unless you consider plot armor as strength. Ouzen drinking that big snake's blood is just unecessary shock. We already know he's no human & how sadistic he is, that scene added nothing but poor shock value & to fill time. A lot of unnecessary scenes existed only to fill time at many moments in second half, especially during the Ouzen fight. That whole Bojji & Bosse fight, while I appreciate the ground breaking animation, I couldn't take that fight seriously. I don't understand why they suddenly decided to exclude Daida & straight up bought Bosse. Bojji even runs on his arm and flies into the air just to land a few hits on him, I understand it meant to be metaphorical (or something like that) but I honestly couldn't take the fight seriously or how it fits into the story's logic. And what is with that marriage proposal? If Daida said "I'll protect her", then it would've made sense considering him being a Royal & all but No! He directly said he'll marry her.

The second half seriously lost a lot of emotional strength it initially had in the first half. Bosse's anger during his kill spree is the only moment where I could relate somehow due to Miranjo's absurdly brutal flashback but everything else is just cheap or even straight up boring. I couldn't start to hate the story but it kept on falling apart. If it wasn't for WiT's honest work, I would've really ended up hating this and I'm honestly, really glad WiT took up the project and continued with it. The fairy tale-esque OSTs & fight choreography are amazing, probably some of the best of 2021. But all of it didn't matter when the story kept on falling apart.

#Conclusion As I said before, I honestly don't hate this Anime nor anything that makes me emotional even for a minute. I value them. The story could've been great with all its promise but it just couldn't keep it up. A Promising first half, great production and a very very disappointing second half. I really wished I could've loved this show.