Here it is, y'all. Another fresh plate of mindless isekai fluff served al dente. It's got farming. It's got food. It's got Jojo's references. It's got vampires, ogres, and dragons taking on the form of cute anime girls. Cliche? Perhaps. Substantial? Not really. Boring? As a fellow once said, it's all a matter of perspective.

You already know the drill from the title alone. Hiraku dies from a horrible terminal illness, only to find himself in front of a god. The god of this anime is a Gnostic demiurge, a flawed deity who feels responsible for unfairly handing Hiraku the fuzzy end of the lollipop. So he lets Hiraku reincarnate into whatever world he wants to make up for the mistake. Hiraku chooses farming, which is not typically this god's penchant, but sure. Hiraku was then reincarnated in the middle of a forest by himself, starting over from scratch with nothing but a wooden hoe at his disposal. Also, this forest is actually the Forest of Death, and is a part of the realm's Demon Lord's domain. Meaning that there are countless monsters, ghouls, and baddies waiting to pounce on Hiraku. Turns out that the god screwed up again.

Or not. Let's not get too crazy here; this is a cozy fantasy anime after all. Hiraku is blessed with a farming tool that can magically shapeshift into anything he needs: a hoe, an axe, a watering can, you name it. He does thwack a big ol' demon rabbit on the head to make meat out of, but it turns out that he doesn't need to resort to violence to defend himself thereafter. The other monsters that he runs into are easily rizzed into staying by Hiraku's side. He starts with wolves and a giant fuzzy spider, the latter finding every opportunity to wave a fuzzy arm out to the audience (and yes, I found it cute). And then loads of cute girls of all different varieties (angels, vampires, elves, dragons, etc), along with lizardmen, dwarves, and beastmen, come from out of the woodwork to help Hiraku build a thriving farm village.

With Farming Life's first season being a 2023 release, my mind couldn't help but compare it to a similar anime released that year, the delightful Campfire Cooking in Another World with My Absurd Skill. Some similarities: Hiraku and Campfire's Muhkouda are reincarnated into a fantasy world. They cook. A lot. Some of it is dragon meat. Muhkoda has one dog, Hiraku has many. Nothing dramatic ever happens, nor does anything go wrong. What's different this time around is that Muhkoda was a weak character with an absurd skill, while Hiraku is OP with incredible skills thanks to his magical farming tool. He can dig out reservoirs mostly by himself, tame swarms of bees, and have the world's powerful entities kiss his ring and cater to his every whim. Hiraku also stays confined to his budding farming village rather than aimlessly wandering, which makes things feel a bit more focused than in Campfire Cooking.

I wouldn't call Farming Life in Another World the superior show. A big flaw of Farming is that Hiraku surrounds himself with so many other characters, yet never forms as strong a dynamic with them. In Campfire Cooking, we see Muhkoda and Fel adventure together, fight monsters, eat plenty of good food, and sometimes even bicker like an old married couple when hungry. Fel would beg for treats, Muhkoda would cook, and together they would talk about food while satiating every morsel. You could really feel the companionship between these two. The characters surrounding Hiraku in Farming Life in Another World don't feel as developed and feel like a bit of window dressing by comparison. The masses of cute girls occupying the village are just part of the set, while Hiraku's inner circle is yet another indistinct harem of anime girls. I did kind of like the vampire girl Lu, since she's a weird vampire girl, but it was a default choice at best. Once you get past her bloodsucking tendencies, there's not much about Lu's character that really lunges out at you.

The first half of Farming Life's first season dedicates itself to Hiraku building and expanding his village to attract more settlers. It goes through some fine slices of life as it introduces its main cast and world. The art and character designs are far from incredible, and the characters' faces look a bit flat at times. Doesn't matter. This ain't the type of show that requires fancy animation, so it all does what it should. Having suffered a bit of a dietary relapse while watching the show, of course, I loved the food. Hiraku bakes up some naan right in episode six, which, like, I need twenty boxes of. Right now.

By the time the latter half rolls around, the village becomes mostly complete, and Hiraku is its mayor, meaning the anime has to dedicate itself to events and bits that don't really expand on the plot as much as it keeps it afloat. The Demon Kingdom feels that Hiraku's village poses a threat to them, so they come up with schemes to thwart it that end up falling flat. The village's residents, as moe and innocent as they are, are high-level beings whose power and might inspire terror within the hearts of the Demon Kingdom's men, and it's supposed to be funny. It does get repetitive after a while, and I'm sure that people seeing this on a weekly basis might roll their eyes at this. Fortunately, I mostly binged this anime, so it all went down easily for me. It also helps that Lu giving birth to Hiraku's son towards the end of the cour gives the show a bit of a heart to latch onto.

The dub is good and worth watching for one joke alone. It happens right in episode eight, and it's so good that I won't spoil it for you. But it involves Hiraku talking about women with a dwarf over a beer. The dwarf gives out an answer so delightful and absurd at once, and the dryness in the line delivery is absolutely perfect. It's a hell of a way to cut to the episode's eyecatch, to say the least.

Farming Life in Another World is far from spectacular, but it's not meant to be. It is another entry into the “turn your brain off” genre of anime, and as a connoisseur of such, it worked for me. It's lighthearted, breezy, and something to binge if you've got an afternoon to kill.