When it comes to anime, there are three tags that make me groan without fail: Isekai, Light Novel, and Ecchi. Can you blame me? They’re like the three horsemen of the apocalypse, just missing their last friend Harem, but that’s a whole other story. My point is, it doesn’t have to be this way. For some reason, in the 2010s, the isekai genre exploded, no doubt thanks to shows like Log Horizon and Sword Art Online, where the RPG foundation was laid out, and apparently, never stripped off, even for settings that don’t warrant it. You thought tacked-on RPG elements in your action games were bad? Now it’s happening in anime.
Anyway, isekai’s newfound surge in popularity, as well as the realization that it takes almost no effort to get your shitty anime novel published, meant that hundreds of high school schmucks wrote up their biggest garbage fantasy over a weekend, inserted their personality into the main character, and hired the cheapest hentai artist they could commission to draw tits and ass every fifteen pages or so before getting it published. A lot of these happened to be isekai. Why? Cause it’s cool, of course. In 80% of cases (as far as I know, the proportion could be greater), there’s literally no point to a story being isekai. The main character gets warped to a medieval fantasy world after dying (or not), and just like that, they never see, bring up, or even think about their old life, family, or even that show they never got to finish ever again. It happens in even the more “realistic” ones, and it’s a trait that never fails to piss me off. You have such a strong premise as being reincarnated in a totally different world, and you do absolutely nothing with it. As far as the story is concerned, the main character could just as easily have been some dope on the street in the isekai world who tripped and fell into the Fountain of Overpowered Magic and Cheat Abilities.
I’ve set this all up so I can talk about the one thing I think Isekai Smartphone does genuinely right, as well as… everything else. However, this isn’t a negative review in the slightest. Truth is, I actually love Isekai Smartphone. But it still sucks.
Our protagonist, Mochizuki Touya, is first seen in heaven, having a nice chat with God, who explains that he accidentally dropped a lightning bolt on Touya and killed him. How that can even happen is beyond me, but this is where Isekai Smartphone is leaps and bounds above its cousins: That’s all you get. No flashback showing exactly what happened, not even a small glimpse at what Touya’s previous life may have looked like. He doesn’t die while saving a girl, and he never mentions mom and dad, or anyone. It’s excellent. You already know that Smartphone isn’t going to ever bring those things up again, so honestly, who cares? For so long, isekais have fooled you into thinking such things matter by presenting them to the audience at the start, where it could just be cut off from the episode and the viewing experience would be exactly the same, unless you’re going to use that to throw in a gag, à la Konosuba. The fact that Touya has no setup is all you need to know; it doesn’t even entertain the notion of wasting time in something that doesn’t concern what is about to ensue: God tells Touya that he can’t return him to his world, but instead offers him life in a different world of high fantasy, where he can bring only one possession from his past life. A book? A photo of him and his family to keep and cherish? A porno mag? Well, no. Obviously he wants his smartphone, otherwise it would be called Isekai wa Porno Mag to Tomo ni. Now, God felt SO bad for this guy that he also equipped his phone with infinite battery life, infinitely fast and omnipresent Wi-Fi (or 5G; it’s God we’re talking about after all), and a full, super-detailed satellite map of the isekai world. And if all that wasn’t enough, he gives Touya said Overpowered Magic and Cheat Abilities, along with perfect affinity for every single magic element, and his phone even adapts to his new powers, letting him use it as an X-ray visor (yes, to peep on girls and look at their BUTTS and BOOBIES), an anything-sensor, and even a teleportation interface and attack magic rerouting device. Well all right then, time to go on a great adventure with lots of cute girls and defeat the Demon Lord! Uh, about that…
Yeah, Isekai Smartphone has no plot. Demon Lord? Get real. This is an extension of the one thing this show does right: Touya just wants to fuck around, and he won’t let any plot get in the way of that. At every step of the way, Touya’s days of goofing off are interrupted by a what’s-his-face character who wants him to go on an epic quest to fight off an army, or kill a dragon, or retrieve a treasure, or whatever. Touya’s answer: Teleport instantly to his destination, kill everyone in two seconds, and return triumphant, as if to say “Cool story bro, but I don’t care.” His reward: a brand new attractive girl for his harem, which includes characters whom I’ve come to know as Oreimo and Touhou. If you’ve seen the show, you know who I’m referring to, de gozaru. My man just wants to do whatever the hell he wants with his girlfriends with no regards for the script; it’s amazing. Of course, all of this brilliance takes place in the most generic, uninspired, unoriginal, cookie-cutter, sterile, any other word there is for bad and unoriginal, medieval fantasy world with RPG elements, where the magic doesn’t make sense, the lore doesn’t make sense, the settings don’t make sense, and just about everything that can potentially make sense, doesn’t. And that’s on top of having an art style that could most accurately be referred to as “anime,” and a soundtrack which I’m at least 100% sure was composed by an AI. It’s an awful-looking and awful-sounding show, but because of its nonchalant, almost dismissive tone, it manages to save the setting, because let’s face it, even the main character doesn’t care.
Truly, I think this approach to storytelling, world-building, and character development is the saving grace of this show. Other isekai shows fail hard by taking themselves too seriously with near-apocalyptic stakes, with protagonists who are far too invested in the plot for how much they’re actually involved in it, as well as downright embarrassing displays of pretentiousness in the form of meaningless political allegories and esoteric video game lingo. Ironically enough, Touya might just be the most realistic isekai hero. The character who by any other stretch of the imagination is meant to represent the epitome of lazy, uninspired, generic, bland leads in this sub-genre turned out to be the most relatable. Who wouldn’t just wanna have their own fun with overpowered cheat skills in a fantasy world filled with attractive teen girls? Ditch all that sentimental, world-ending crap and throw it in the trash; I just wanna chill with my girlfriends. It all rests on Touya and how he makes the isekai world his bitch just for the sake of it, and personally, it could not be more entertaining.
It's so strange. I'm supposed to hate this show. It has everything present in every other show I hate, yet the way it's basically winking at the audience the entire time flips my opinion 180 degrees, right back to loving it. I recognize how awful it is, and I gave it a 1/10 on my list for consistency, but man, this is worth a watch, simply for the ironic laughs this can achieve out of you.
27.5 out of 38 users liked this review
