When Banished From The Hero’s Party episode 10 started, I wasn’t expecting the happy reuinion between Ruti and Red we seemed to get. Other than a few awkward words the two more or less fell into their roles of doting brother and younger sister fairly readily except that Red/Gideon has said he won’t return to the party and Ruti is still hiding something from Red (you know, the guy she broke out of prison).
Honestly, the two spending the day visiting the sauna and walking about town was kind of cute and it really just made me want to punch Ares all the more for his getting rid of Red given clearly Ruti needs her older brother. As you see how others respond to her hero blessing you realise just how isolated she is from others and having a grounded and supportive brother around must have been a massive relief.
Banished From The Hero’s Party shows great chemistry between the two siblings.
What might have been an instant sore spot, Rit, turned out to not actually lead to the petty kind of conflict you might see in another anime. Banished From The Hero’s Party definitely addresses the relationship between Rit and Red and Ruti is jealous to an extent but rather than lashing out about it she instead takes a bath with Rit and explains how she is feeling.
Affiliate Link
While Ruti might be blunt, she isn’t petty and she doesn’t even really blame Rit.
For Ruti, having the hero’s blessing has controlled her whole life and her brother is one of the few bright spots in it as she remembers his warmth from even before the blessing kicked in.
I seriously didn’t expect Banished From The Hero’s Party to be as good at nuanced relationships as it has turned out to be when I first started watching it. It seemed just to be a b-list generic fantasy anime and yet it has turned out to first develop a plausible relationship between Red and Rit that has been pretty satisfying to watch and with the inclusion of Ruti they’ve now demonstrated it wasn’t just an accident.
While the plot of Banished From The Hero’s Party remains kept at arms length and at times you have to wonder if the characters really care at all about the whole hero defeating the demon thing, given no one seems in any rush to accomplish anything, at least we’ve got decently developed characters who most of the time seem to deal with things in a sensible manner. You also have to wonder if the demon is actually a threat at all given most people seem to just be living their lives without concern.
I do wonder if Ruti is going to get back on mission given her declaration that she is going to live in town. I know she has another goal other than just finding Red but being close to Red seems to be directing her decision a bit here. I also wonder if Ares and the other members of her party will catch up with her and how that will go. Please let Red punch Ares.
Of course, Banished From The Hero’s Party is only supposed to be 13 episodes so we’ve got three more episodes to really build to some kind of climax and resolve in order to get an ending. Unless we’re just doubling down on the slice-of-life aspects in which case I guess we can just sauna and milk-drink our way to the end of the season and call it though I somehow don’t believe that would be particularly satisfying.
You can read my full thoughts on Banished From The Hero’s Party here.
Images from: ‘Banished from the Hero’s Party, I Decided To Live a Quiet Life in the Countryside‘. Dir. M Hoshino. Studio Flad and Wolfsbane. 2021
Thank-you for reading 100 Word Anime.
Join the discussion in the comments.
Karandi James