*Note: This review contains major spoilers for The Water Magician.

As someone who has seen more isekai anime than they can count, watching The Water Magician is a uniquely baffling experience. At its most basic, it's built on the premise of an isekai genre-savvy protagonist, Ryo, being reincarnated in a fantasy world. Because of this, he views everything through that lens and is let down when things don't go as they would if this world followed all the usual tropes. But while this is admittedly the show's greatest strength, it's also its greatest weakness.

For the viewer, avoiding the usual clichés means that the show often bucks expectations. The issue is that doing so often makes for a much more boring anime. Take the whole Great Tidal Bore arc of the show. For several episodes, we get a buildup that something odd is happening in the local dungeon. This all culminates in a massive battle where the monsters break out of the dungeon, and every adventurer is needed to repel them. In any other anime, the hero would either be on the front lines—or arrive at the last moment to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. In The Water Magician, Ryo literally doesn't even show up. Is it surprising? Yes. More realistic to not have the protagonist at the center of everything? Sure. But does it make for a fun anime? Nope.

On the other hand, later, when the majority of the supporting cast is trapped deep in a dungeon and on the edge of total defeat at the hands of a Demon Prince, Ryo does show up. He then proceeds to kill the big boss with almost no effort in two attacks. Does the anti-climax buck the expected trend? Yes. Does it actually improve the anime in any way? No.

Yet, it's not just anti-climaxes—we also get the exact opposite. There's only a single battle in the entire series where Ryo seems even remotely in danger—and it comes completely out of nowhere. Ryo is simply walking down a street when he encounters an “akuma.” This turns into a fight that only ends in a draw due to a cosmic time limit. There is no buildup for this fight, no foreshadowing, and no satisfactory explanation for how and why it happened, even after the fact. It is the biggest, most tension-filled battle in the show, and it happens suddenly in the middle of the fourth episode.

The only action scene in the entire anime that both twists the standard formula and actually works is the final fight in the show between Ryo and Oscar. This is because the “unexpected twist” is actually the logical culmination of Ryo's entire character arc throughout the whole series.

What makes Ryo a legitimately interesting character is that he sees the entire world through a fictional lens. He sees himself as an isekai protagonist. Thus, it stands to reason that the people he encounters are NPCs, and their problems are quests. This makes him largely detached from the world he exists in. Even Able, the person he's closest to in the fantasy world, is simply a party member—one of his favorite characters to be sure, but nothing beyond that. This all comes to a head in the final battle, where a case of mistaken identity results in Ryo and Oscar battling it out.

Once Able arrives and explains the misunderstanding, things should calm down—and would in a normal isekai story. However, Ryo doesn't really care about Able's explanations. Oscar hurt some of his favorite characters—the roommates he's spent the last few months living with. It doesn't matter to him that continuing the fight—much less killing Oscar—would lead to a war between two countries. None of that is real to him. All that matters to him is his feelings. Those are the only things that are real.

He even threatens to kill Able—and almost does so before he realizes that Able is willing to die to avert a war. Ryo only stops fighting because he doesn't want to kill his favorite character—and because Oscar backs down first. And what's most terrifying? The next time he and Able meet, Ryo is as chummy as normal. He sees nothing wrong with what he did—sees no reason for Able's opinion of him to have shifted in any way.

Honestly, this exploration of Ryo as a character is fantastic. It's easily the strongest aspect of this anime. Step-by-step the anime shows us that our protagonist is as dangerous to this world as any villain. He is a dangerous psychopath with godlike powers. While generally laid back and optimistic, should he ever feel personally slighted, he would let the world burn without a second thought. Yet, at the same time, he is the only hope for this world. Meanwhile, Able, the true hero of the anime, is tasked with somehow reigning in this walking weapon of mass destruction. It's a great concept to build a story around. It's everything else that's the issue.

Of course, “everything else” also includes the animation. While not unwatchable, the animation quality for this anime, especially in the action scenes with many characters, is below average. Character designs are off, movement is stilted, and character models are reused. The best thing to be said about the animation is that it doesn't constantly fall back on budget-saving tricks and actually tries to show the fights excitingly.

The music, on the other hand, is average—except when it comes to the opening theme. The song is catchy, and there are some truly beautiful visuals to match, which unfortunately contrast with the look of the show proper.

All in all, The Water Magician is proof that subverting clichés just for the sake of it does not make an entertaining story. When there's a point to it—like in anime's final climax—it can be quite interesting. Unfortunately, all the other instances detract from the story being told—undercutting any excitement that would have been there in a more traditional narrative framework. Add on to that sub-par animation and a largely one-note extended cast of characters, and you have one fantasy world that's not worth visiting.