Mushoku Tensei is praised as an amazing kinda-psychological anime that is supposed to show character growth and a redemption story. Sometimes, all someone needs is a second chance at life. A blank slate to start over and improve themselves, and show others not all hope is lost. Yet we run into two big problems with that narrative throughout the show.

First, while Mushoku Tensei is supposed to be focused on the MC achieving growth through self-improvement, many times he achieves "growth" through power fantasy instead. There are scenes where he actively works upon his flaws and traumas, mainly his fear of the outside and incapacity of empathy, and both are handled quite seriously, and are overall executed pretty well. But there are also instances where the only reason he can get up in the world is thanks to luck. Rudeus is shown to be a naturally gifted mage, so powerful he can cast spells without even incantations. What happened to self-improvement, exactly? This sends a completely opposite message to the one the show supposedly wants to send. Apparently, you can only move up in the world and achieve growth as a person if you happen to be naturally talented, and he had no hopes in his previous life anyways because he wasn't naturally talented. It is true he trained a lot to harness that talent, but the message is the same. You need to be naturally talented to be able to grow, if you have no talent forget being behind in the race, you aren't even part of it.

Perhaps more infuriatingly, the other time this power fantasy bullshit happens is so that he can one up a side character, Eris. Eris is a young energetic tsundere girl that wants to train her physical prowess to the point she can comfortably defend herself and reach up to Rudeus's level. She is shown to be training day and night against Ruijerd, a battle hardened warrior, to achieve this. So what happens when she finally becomes strong enough to match Rudeus? Rudeus gets the power to see slightly into the future thanks to some loli demon he found in some random back alley, and is now able to take on Eris in hand to hand combat even though he is appalling compared to her when it comes to physical capabilities. What's the point of this? Not only does it again imply Rudeus needs natural talent and bullshit superpowers to match up to others and not rigorous training and growth through self-improvement, but it also puts down Eris for no good reason. Literally what does this achieve?

Second, Rudeus doesn't improve upon his main flaw, his perversion. Normally you'd expect this would be the primary focus of his self-improvement process, considering it is the thing that got him kicked out of his house and eventually lead to his death. But his perversion is never treated like a serious flaw like his fear of the outside or lack of empathy. Instead, his perversion is used for jokes and gags. Now I'm not a particular fan of this type of humor, but it's not an instant turn off for me considering I also enjoy the Hachikuji scenes in Monogatari. However, for a so called "redemption story", you'd expect this aspect of his to also be treated with the respect and seriousness it deserves. But it is never shown to be a bad thing. Rudeus never reconsiders his actions, or lands himself in trouble, or faces any consequences. He never grows. From the outside, he is just a brat after all. I watched the show hoping this would finally be tackled, some character would finally flip out against him similar to how Paul scolded him and that led to him considering others emotions, but no.

Minor spoilers ahead. At the end of the second cour Eris is shown to be very emotionally confused and she makes advances on Rudeus. Remember, Rudeus is 40+ years old. Eris is 15 at the time. This is his chance. His chance to finally overcome his perverted lust, to deny her advances, and to finally start taking his perversion and pedophilic tendencies seriously and treating it like his other flaws. This is it.

And he sleeps with Eris, a confused, defenseless child, a child any responsible adult would be trying to steer in the right direction, after hearing the line "I want to have your kittens, meow".

This is when it finally dawned on me. This isn't a redemption story. It isn't about Rudeus taking steps forward to rid himself of his previous mistakes. In fact, he has actually become a full-fledged child predator, far beyond the line of no return, using his young appearance to deceive the people around him so he can touch kids. Also he has the audacity to cry after Eris wakes up early the next morning and leaves him to focus on her own training. "Waaah the child I groomed for years has decided to stay away from me, oh poor me :(((".

The message of Mushoku Tensei isn't that sometimes all a person needs to improve themselves is a second chance at life. It is that the MC was never really in the wrong anyways, and it was the world's; "le society"s fault. It was the world's fault he wasn't talented, it was the world's fault he could never overcome his traumas, it was the world's fault for not allowing him to touch children, it was the world's fault he got kicked out of his house for watching kiddy porn. And this world is an ideal one where he can have all the op superpowers and sexually or verbally assault all the children he wants, children that "wants to have his kittens". He doesn't need to grow or change, the world needs to change for him (for the most part, at least. It is true he experiences growth when it comes to the aforementioned fear of the outside and lack of empathy, but more on that later).

Mushoku Tensei is a wish fulfillment and power fantasy anime, even more so than the most infamous ones like Redo of Healer in my opinion. Sure, it has pretty animation, great side characters and nice world building, but it is no "psychological redemption story". In the authors eyes, there is nothing for Rudeus to repent for, as none of it was his fault or "bad" in the first place. There are only two times he improves himself, overcoming his fear of the outside and coming to terms with his lack of consideration for other people's feelings, both of them are not his fault and are rather a result of the social ostracization and bullying he faced. But never once does he repent for his most obvious flaw, and that growth is always shaped in a weird way as if to imply it's again the world's fault he couldn't improve in his previous life because there wasn't anybody there to support him. Even though he made no attempts to reach out to others in that life, and only has a support group now thanks to his natural talent as a mage and the fact they aren't aware he is a pedo thanks to his childlike appearance. It also helps he has good looks in this life. Again, it seems the show is more focused on wish fulfillment than actual growth, and the anime is sending the message that unfortunate people in this world who were born with no talents, no looks and got mercilessly bullied have no hope other than getting isekaid into a world where they do.

This anime could have been an easy 9 if it actually focused on growth and redemption, and if he wasn't gifted everything he wanted. So why is my score like a 7 instead of a 3? Because, when you look at it objectively, even though the main narrative and story are pure isekai garbage, the rest of the show fucking slaps. The side characters are all interesting, the world building might be the pinnacle of medieval fantasy isekai worlds, and the animation is superb. I won't get into it here because all of those have been discussed to death already by needlessly long video essays, but I pretty much 100% agree that these aspects of the show put it leagues beyond most other isekais. I just wish it was also a redemption story, or at least was like "Lolita" where the MC never truly learns from his mistakes, but his actions aren't treated like they're okay or acceptable either by the people around him or the author. If you still want to watch the show despite all of this, feel free of course. I myself will probably watch the next cour. But know that there is no redemption story or coming-of-age story to be found here.