The Rising of the Shield Hero Season 4

Episode 8

I wasn't expecting Shield Hero to pull out the “this isn't even my final form” tactic during this extended boss fight. I know it's less of an alternate form and more that our cast was just taking down a clone before fighting the real one, but that's all that was going through my head. This is definitely the most well animated episode of the season so far, so at the very least things are pretty to look at even if everything is a bit basic. The giant snake hydra was a little uninspired from a design perspective, and I was looking forward to it evolving into something bigger once we hit the halfway point. But it turns out that it's true form is just bigger and purple.

Despite the monster being fully CG, there was some good teamwork and coordination with our main cast. Seeing them all try to simultaneously take down the heads in order to put the creature down and try to locate where the core was pretty. Technically everyone was given something to do at some point except for Atla, who is arguably really getting on my nerves at this point. I don't like that she is still belittling her brother after he just went through a power up, and she's really acting a little bit entitled in areas where she shouldn't. Maybe she'll go through an arc once she gets her own beast transformation, which apparently Naofumi can just assign to other people now, so maybe it's only a matter of time.

Speaking of Naofumi, I want to know what the plan is exactly. I was legitimately concerned over the fact that it appeared as if Naofumi had done a complete one eighty on what the plan was. Remember, the whole reason why he's in this country at all was to make a case about how Raphtalia wants nothing to do with being emperor. They want the beast assassins to stop randomly trying to kill her, even though that only really became a problem recently. Once our cast got here, Naofumi talked to the revolutionaries as if they were all on the same page, toppling the current emperor to put Raphtalia in charge. Because Naofumi never clearly communicated anything to the cast or the audience, I thought the writing had just changed its mind suddenly, and I was just supposed to go along with it. You might be thinking that's a bold assumption to make, but the show has done that numerous times already, and even once or twice during this season, so arguably anything goes. Naofumi even makes a passing comment during the boss fight about how Raphtalia is going to be in charge soon and this was not in the presence of the revolutionaries which makes me think that this is all part of the end goal.

Thankfully, the end of this episode makes it clear that Raphtalia doesn't need to assume the position of emperor once their job is done. Naofumi is very much just using the revolutionaries to further their own plan, but what exactly is supposed to happen if Raphtalia decides not to take up the mantle? You would basically leave a foreign nation without its main form of government after staging a revolution which is incredibly irresponsible. Sure, the people in charge are clearly bad and the show isn't interested in political nuance, but that's still messed up right? Does Naofumi know that the show will solve the issue for him once he gets to that point, or is there more to his plan that he's not telling us? It really does read as though Naofumi doesn't mind the idea of Raphtalia being put in charge but wants to leave the decision up to her, even though it was made clear a while ago that that was something she didn't want. But now, after that look on her face at the end, maybe she will take the position or at least consider it in order to help her people.

If the show wants to be about Raphtalia choosing her own life of freedom or shackling herself down to a political position that she does not want for the sake of other people being free, then that could actually be really interesting. There is a solid basis for that even if the way the show got here is completely contrived. There are two problems with this, though. The first is that I don't have ANY confidence in the show's ability to pull off a story like that. I barely even know anything about the people that are in charge. Maybe the previous arc about getting a boat in the other country was supposed to be foreshadowing for the political intrigue going on in this arc but considering how that one ended, it doesn't give a lot of confidence.

The second problem is that I have no reason to believe that Raphtalia would be a good leader. Outside of that one episode in season two where she fought for her own independence and became a hero, she has barely done or said anything since. If there's one funny bit of irony about this arc, it's that the constant focus on Raphtalia really emphasizes how little her presence has become since season two. I'm trying to sit here and remember how many lines she might've had in the past two seasons and it really doesn't feel like a lot despite still being one of the poster children for the franchise. She has always been passive, quiet outside of small bits of jealousy, and even when she did have her moments, they revolved around her ability to stand alongside Naofumi. She has exercised next to no leadership or diplomatic skills whatsoever, so even if they have to take down the bad emperor that's making life difficult for the beast folk, I have no reason to think that Raphtalia would be a better leader from a political standpoint. Hell, Sadeena would make a better emperor because she at least has a vague idea of how the land works.

So while there's not much to this episode outside of that fight, it does get me thinking about where the show exactly is headed. The show lays down the foundation for other combat encounters going on as the snake hydra was not a unique scenario and the plan is moving forward. I hope the show doesn't lock in and be strictly combat focused though because I think it needs to address all of these issues that I am bringing up.

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The Rising of the Shield Hero Season 4 is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.