Anime Review
Beast Tamer
Kicked out of his Hero party, Beast Tamer Rein decides to set off on his own adventure, and it doesn’t take long until he runs into the cat-eared girl, Kanade. Drawn to him after being saved from a vicious monster attack, this girl from one of the strongest species—the Cat Spirits—asks to be tamed by him. Now forming a contract with her, his new life as an adventurer begins!
Overall
7/10
Story
6/10
pacing
9/10
6/10
Sound
7/10
Characters
Animation
6/10
Overview
In a fantasy world where the Hero needs to defeat the Demon Lord, a party is formed. A knight, monk, priest, mage, and a beast tamer train to prepare for the fateful day. Now, this is the base plot we have seen a few different times, so what makes this different? Well this time the story is actually about the beast tamer, go figure, who is expelled from the party for being too “weak”. The beast tamer, Rein Shroud, sets off to figure out what he should be doing now that he is no longer in the hero’s party. From here forward he uses his taming abilities to befriend various people to start a new life. While this general concept of a beast tamer is nothing new, Beast Tamer does give us a fresh new set of characters to enjoy as we see how Rein Shroud will make his way in the world.
Story
6/10
As mentioned in the overview the story is pretty straightforward. Rein leaves the hero’s party and then gains his own following while overcoming various challenges along the way. Most of these challenges however all stem from the Hero himself who quickly realizes that Rein is more than just a mere beast tamer. In most cases, Rein is able to defeat/overcome these challenges thanks to the contracts he has formed with various beast girls. This unfortunately leads to a pretty repetitive narrative that is somewhat uneventful. Of course, every show needs some level of powering up but it is a very stair-stepped method with no growth narrative. In addition with the Hero constantly being the villain from behind the scenes it feels very redundant as if there is no greater narrative or antagonist. This does make for an easy watch but it does leave you wishing there was something more.
Animation
7/10
The animation and special effects are quite standard for what to expect now. While this is not a knock on the quality, the big thing is that this show does not lean into any specialized style. If you were to say it had a style it would be a very soft animation style that EMT Squared has down as far as aesthetics. It is a pleasant experience that does go with the softer nature of the story but can easily be lost in the sea of modern anime. It is a shame that the animators did not take more style inspiration from the light novel illustrations. I think this would have really made this show something special.
Pacing
10/10
The pacing of the show is very formulaic. Rein hears about the issue, meets girls, befriends girl,s and then solves the issue. Rinse and repeat over and over. While the basic structure follows this process over and over the clothes of the issue do change helping it feel a bit fresher. But because of this it also struggles to really have a compelling reason to really shift gears in the show to build the story any further. Really the only change of pace was getting our last party member a tad bit later than one would have guessed. Just like almost everything in this show, this makes it easy to watch without worrying about where you are or what you are missing. I am sure that all of this really could have been paced better to also help develop the relationships of the characters good and bad more.
Sound
6/10
It’s usually a mark of a good show if you are able to think of it thanks to its audio alone. Hearing a bass line, a unique special effect, or even an intro that comes straight to mind when you think of a great show. Well….yeah, we may have an issue here. While the intro and outro to the show are solid in our opinion they fall short of memorable. The same thing can be said about general audio mixing, like the story and animation is passable. The only real memorable thing is the voice acting which really helps bring the characters to life.
Characters
9/10
The true saving grace of Beast Tamer is the characters. While their introductions as mentioned are pretty formulaic, the characters themselves are just fun. They are really what drives the show with their interaction with one another and general personalities. This is not a brooding group or one that is particularly diverse but I will come back to the fact that they are fun. Just like anything if you are enjoying them it makes them worth watching if nothing else. Personally Tania is one of our favorite characters in the show who has a great depth to her emotions and presence in the group. It helps that each character has a species that really helps define them and separates them from each other. The one thing we want more of is to see more members of the various species to see how they are truly unique when compared to others like them.
Conclusion
Beast Tamers is a good show that is worth the watch. While there is nothing besides the characters that is exceptional, it is still a great show to put on for an easy watch. It is a pleasant and charming show that offers a great break from some of the heavier-hitting shows that can sometimes get you feeling stuck.