Goblin Slayer

Episode 4

After that full episode of setup for Goblin Slayer and his new party, it's time for the series to finally get back to its titular activity. This episode also sets about establishing the working dynamic between these characters and how they'll continue to associate moving forward (if their presence in the intro is any indication). It's pretty interesting to see how a solidly-built party all contribute to the dungeon-crawling, as opposed to the opening episode's “Goblin Slayer is a singular badass, watch him go to work”. The characters all have their own magic systems and fighting styles supporting the team, which provides a flavorful variety to otherwise procedural content for most of the episode.

‘Procedural’ was definitely the term I kept coming back to this week. Goblin Slayer may have extra party members to account for, but he's still very much going by the pragmatic playbook that gives him his edge. Even with additional help in tracking the goblins and navigating the temple they're holed up in, there's still that sense of methodical planning to minimize the potential for screw-ups and casualties. There are a few refreshing snippets where it's floated that the Slayer's senses for these activities can be thrown off by things not aligning with his perfectly-practiced scenarios, such as the difficulty of tracking Goblins in a man-made structure as well as special issues when the big boss ogre comes out. But overall there's still a sense of watching the methodical massacre from the first episode play out again, just with guest stars this time.

The party members themselves do contribute more flavor in this situation. Chief among them is the Elf Ranger, who gets to retread Priestess's role from the first episode as the inexperienced adventurer who winds up shocked and traumatized at what real questing looks like. It once again begs the question of how nobody but Goblin Slayer himself seems to know what goblins are actually like, but as long as all this gritty violence is going to be the show's main commodity, it makes narrative sense to have a more naive character react to it.

Honestly, the main problem is how the show seems to be lacking confidence in presenting those devices. There was decent tension and build-up to the shocking flash of violent and sexual content in the first episode that made it so effective, but now the script seems unsure of how to economically deploy that content. The discovery of the elven sex-slave works decently, which is good since it's the main catalyst to the Elf Ranger's reaction through the episode. But then the show immediately goes for a cheap fake-out to try to sell us on the idea of the Goblin Slayer being a dangerous, unpredictable maniac.

Beyond that, there is a sense that the new party members are ‘safer’ than the expendables from the first episode, but that doesn't stop the ogre they fight at the end from constantly threatening the ladies with sexual violence. It almost seems like the show feels obligated to remind you how serious it is, but it doesn't take long for that type of content to stop being shocking and just start prompting eyerolls. Finally, the episode ends with the elf reiterating the same lesson of “I thought adventures were supposed to be fun, not violent and depressing” that Priestess already learned back in the first episode. A show like this should regard its audience enough to expect them to understand its thesis statement without restating it constantly.

I'm similarly unsure of the later parts of the episode. The very pragmatic way the team slaughters the room full of goblins is pointedly uninteresting from an action standpoint, which in turn makes it interesting in a different way. The idea that adventurers who charge in for glory will get massacred while the ones who play it slow and smart will come out on top has been hammered on endlessly, but this particular demonstration of the theme works. I've certainly had points in D&D campaigns where my teammates and I tackled challenges this way. The Goblin Slayer's ultimate trick for beating the ogre is less impressive to me. On paper (literally in this case) the idea of keeping a teleportation spell linked to pressurized ocean water that you can use to cut enemies in half is a pretty neat ‘hack’ of the in-universe magic system. In practice however, the explanation is the only part that's clever, since it otherwise plays out as Goblin Slayer just whipping an instant-win spell out of his ass when the story needs it. It's a well-explained deus ex machina, but ultimately a deus ex machina all the same.

More than any other issues, however, I'm wondering where Goblin Slayer goes from here. All things considered, this episode seems to be the ‘best’ version of its basic monster-mashing framework, with a more ambitious plot and new teammates added in for flavor. But it also doesn't add much of an overarching plot to this quest framework or suggest how the characters' actions could be complicated beyond their problem-solving abilities. The show can't hope to get by on just showing us monsters getting stabbed and rape being threatened for the next eight weeks. It's funny that rote repetition of routines is the secret to the Goblin Slayer's success in combat, since that same strategy isn't really helping the storytelling so far.

Rating: B-

Goblin Slayer is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.