How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom Part 2

Episode 12

This week's How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom episode brings us back to the head-scratching decisions of the earlier episodes.

There's really no getting around it: I found the first half of this episode bizarre and dull. Excel Walter teaching wife classes to the ladies is an idea that seems to come completely out of nowhere. We've spent multiple plot-heavy episodes engaging in fraught political maneuvering, so I don't necessarily think it's a bad idea to explore more character-centric threads for a little bit, but at the same time there's zero attempt at easing us into the transition here. We just smash cut to wifey classes. I almost wondered if I'd missed an episode on accident in the last week.

Furthermore, we've not been given any indication that there's anything wrong with any of Souma's various relationships up until this point. Putting aside my general apprehension with harem stories, what do the ladies need to learn, exactly? We haven't seen any of them make many mistakes that have upset Souma, and of course they're all over the moon for him. There's a sense that this lesson is supposed to be the sort of proper etiquette instruction that members of the royalty historically received (the echoes of which are still present today). But the framing here is more akin to a big class session with all of them together reading from Souma's mind journal which just feels… weird.

For that matter, who wants this? I know it's a dangerous thought experiment to ask for sense-making here, but I truly have to wonder who would want to sit in a room and have someone's darkest thoughts read out to them in front of their romantic rivals (or romantic peers?). Putting aside how invasive an act it is, I can't imagine wanting to have someone's deepest and most hidden thoughts about me read aloud in front of an audience. It just seems like something that would be terribly uncomfortable for everyone involved (and not to mention the little black books that they get to peruse as well…)

On a more positive note, we do at least get some delightful reaction faces from the ladies of the cast. They get to be a bit more cartoonish and silly and just generally more expressive than usual. That's fun if nothing else. Also, the scene where Poncho returns and has perfected the sauce that will allow for squid yakisoba is a lot of fun. There's some terrific energy in the seiyuu's performances that makes it feel like a real triumph. Lastly, Liscia and Souma simply sitting together and doing nothing but sharing some fruit and warmth is a genuinely sweet scene that stands in stark contrast to the arbitrariness of the weird wife school segment. This, to me, felt real. Love can make even doing nothing together feel quite special.

With all that said, the pacing of the show is starting to get to me. I'm hoping we can get a bit more tension and high stakes in the coming episodes to break up the slow pace we've been on for a few weeks.

Rating:

Grant is the cohost on the Blade Licking Thieves podcast and Super Senpai Podcast.

How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom is currently streaming on Funimation.