Sometimes I decide to watch random anime movies, mainly because their synposis did sound interesting and like something I would enjoy. And this one, about a group of fantasy heroes being brought into our world and decide to live a more relaxed life did sound like it could have some interesting ideas which is why I watched it back then.

And after recently rewatching it, I can say I still enjoy it...though it certainly feels a lot more like a pilot episode for a show, that was never made, at least to my knowledge.

As said before, the basic idea of the story sounds neat. Four heroes from a dark, suppressed fantasy world being brought into our world and living with a woman running a candy store did sound promising. However the story basically starts right in the middle of it all and there's only one very short flashback scene to establish how they first arrived. So a lot of the conflicts and character developments in this movie are right in their middle.

Not to mention that the story does revolve more around them collecting shards of the Demon Kings, who is now an elementary school girl, former power to make sure it doesn't cause chaos, making this more a "collect them all" kind of story. The story in this movie is just like a short adventure to establish the characters and this world.

The characters themselves are more mixed. I liked that the leader of the group, who was still the most suspicious of the demon king, became a dog and was therefore the most powerless one. She probably has the most character development in this movie, feeling at the end like she definitely changed as a person.

But outside of one of them showing massive disinterest in her duties now and much rather prefer being an idol, there's no big conflict or nothing that really shows them becoming more "laidback" and lazy. Its really just scenes of them liking videogames or lazing around with their leader yelling at them for being shameful now.

The only other interesting character is the demon king turned girl, since at first its not completely clear if she truly means that she wants to redeem herself or if its all just a ruse. Though I do feel like there's definitely more that could have been done with why she wants that and why she suddenly wants to change herself.

There's also a bit about the woman who took them being an artist who has no faith in her own skill compared to her grandma, but once again, it only gets brought up a bit in one scene and then never addressed anymore. Once again feeling like if this was an actual show, this would get more focus, probably would be her conflict and character arc.

The animation was fine. Probably the most noteworthy thing in it is the way the lighting was done in certain scenes. Using strong lighting and helping more with establishing an atmosphere when a scene was meant to be more quiet or more mysterious. It was definitely the highlight of the animation. But other than that the action was nice and the funny moments did get a few chuckles out of me.

So yeah, this movie definitely feels like an episode 0 for a show that wasn't made. Establishing characters and setting, teasing certain character developments and conflicts to get you interested in wanting to watch the show. And if you see it as that, you can definitely enjoy it