girls Archives | 100 Word Anime

Contrary To The Title (Is It Wrong to Try To Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon), The Girls Seem To Be Doing the Picking

Posted on January 28, 2021September 30, 2021 by Karandi

Maybe that’s why it is called “Is It Wrong to TRY to pick up Girls In A Dungeon?”

Three seasons in and so far our protagonist Bell Cranel has managed to assemble himself quite the harem – even if he’s more or less acting oblivious to the attention of the girls around him. With the exception of Welf (his trusty blacksmith) and the occasional attention from male gods, almost every character who really interacts with Bell on any kind of regular basis is female.

Not bad for a character who in early episodes couldn’t even speak around his hero, Ais Wallenstein. However, realistically Bell didn’t actually pick any of these girls up. Almost all (outside of Haruhime who was rescued in season 2) most definitely went out of their way to pick Bell up.

How many characters try to pick up Bell in Is It Wrong To Try to pick Up Girls in a Dungeon?

Starting from his goddess, Bell has been the one getting picked up. In Hestia’s case, it was more like she came across a discarded kitten and took a liking to him. We find out that Hestia set her sights on Bell when she saw him getting rejected from joining other familia’s on arriving in the city. Hestia, being something of an outcast herself, empathised with his plight and reached out to him, making him the starting point of her familia.

Of course she also aggressively pursues a more romantic relationship despite Bell’s frequent protests that she’s his goddess. But Hestia isn’t the only goddess in Is It Wrong to Try To Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon who has her eyes on Bell as Freya has been watching over Bell’s growth since his arrival in the city.

Hestia reiterates her goal of having Bell in her familia - DanMachi — ^{Hestia knows that with Bell you have got to be direct.}

When you throw Apollo’s unwanted attention in season 2 and Hermes ongoing surveillance into the mix, you do have to wonder just what it is about Bell that is getting all these celestial beings so interested and there’s definitely a few points in his favour that Hermes reveals in dribs and drabs as the story progresses.

However Bell’s popularity isn’t limited to the divine.

Affiliate Link

Mondo: The Art of Soundtracks (hardcover)

After saving his life in the dungeon, Ais takes an interest in the white haired adventurer.

Whether it is seeking him out to apologise, teaching him to fight, or helping out when Bell’s goddess is kidnapped, for someone from a familia that isn’t exactly on friendly terms with Bell’s goddess, Ais finds a lot of reasons to stick around. Even in season 3, where certain choices drive a wedge between Ais and Bell, ultimately the power of being the protagonist kicks back in. But again, it is Ais reaching out to Bell.

Despite Bell’s clear infatuation with Ais, he sees himself as too far beneath her to actually make any kind of move. He certainly isn’t trying to pick her up. Just being in the same vicinity as her is kind of enough for him.

Then we have Lili, the tsundere supporter who joins Bell early on his adventures into the dungeon. Again, she approached him. She offered her services as a supporter and to accompany him, and she did so with the absolute desire to rip him off and ultimately leave him for dead in the dungeon. While Bell being a genuinely nice human being, and a little bit of a sucker, ultimately won her over, Lili is again the one making all the approaches.

Lili and Hestia exchanging words - not an uncommon event - DanMachi — ^{Lili knows you most definitely have to speak your mind.}

Syr as well at first approaches Bell with some reasonably underhanded motives. Working at the tavern she approaches Bell to get a promise that he’ll dine there (bringing money to the business). She later uses him to help with chores around the business. While Syr does genuinely seem to like Bell, making him lunch baskets and taking him with her as she visits places that are important to her, Syr is most definitely calling the shots.

Affiliate Link

Mondo: The Art of Soundtracks (hardcover)

Throw in Eina from the guild, Mikoto, Lyon, and an overzealous Amazon and Bell’s got every type of girl hanging around him and perfectly happy to risk their life if he needs it.

Which kind of makes you wonder just what is going on here. I mean, Bell is cute and all but the sheer amount of female attention is a little crazy.

Bell being attacked by an Amazon - Is it wrong to try to pick up girls in a dungeon — ^{Not just one goddess – this is the kind of attention Bell doesn’t need.}

Then again, it is all kind of business as usual for a male power fantasy story. Bell’s on a quest to become stronger and in the process he, in some way or another, saves the characters around him. Some of them he saves from physical harm but a lot of them he is saving simply by being a decent human being. Though, where DanMachi moves away from standard power fantasy is in Bell’s basic appearance and physique, even his mannerisms. This is not Ichigo who will call someone out on their BS (Bleach) but rather a protagonist who seems relatively cute and harmless – just don’t pick a fight with his familia.

Whether they are infatuated with his drive, his growth, his power, his bashfulness, or his genuinely polite demeaner, each of the girls has a reason for hanging around. Individually they are all reasonable enough though it is the excessive number that pushes this into the realm of fantasy and the sense that this is all just escapism. A sense that is only reinforced by numerous sequences of the main female cast bathing, including a hot-springs in the dungeon sequence.

The DanMachi girls having a bath - pure fanservice — ^{Yep, episode 1 of season 3 and they hit the fanservice button – definitely back into DanMachi.}

While Bell initially wanted to meet a girl in the dungeon, and did in fact meet Ais in the dungeon, he isn’t really trying to pick them up. He doesn’t need to. Although, he does not have a really big mansion with lots of spare rooms. I wonder how big his harem might get before the story draws to a close.

Images used in article from:

Is It Wrong To Try To Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? III. Dir. H. Tachibana. J. C. Staff. 2020.
DanMachi 2nd Season. Dir. T Hideki. J.C. Staff. 2019.
DanMachi. Dir. Y Yamakawa. J.C. Staff. 2015.

Help Support 100 Word Anime This Spring Season 2000 × — _{Donate to the blog.}

Thank-you for reading 100 Word Anime.
Join the discussion in the comments.
Karandi James

Release the Spyce Episode 5: My Mentor is Amazing

Posted on November 6, 2018December 29, 2018 by Karandi

They are really hammering this mentor-student relationship point. Last week we focused almost exclusively on Mei and Fu and this week we shift back to our focus on Momo joining the team and her relationship with her Mentor (and does anyone else find it a little creepy how often Hanzoumon is just kind of hanging around where Momo is. Throw away line or not about mentors always being near their students doesn’t make that less stalkerish.

However, the episode this week focuses on the girls following up a lead so they actually do something that looks spy like as they infiltrate a lab. Only it kind of looks like the lab is a bust and they end up getting distracted with some petty criminal gang trading drugs. This leads to a fight on a train with the drugged up woman from a few episodes back and they really pushed this one for credibility.

Stronger and tougher I could buy, but biting through a knife and catching bullets in her teeth is just a little bit extreme. Not to mention, Momo’s attacks did nothing. After all the training she has done I somehow doubt she’s that weak. And then the mentor comes into the fight and quickly ends it. It kind of feels a little anti-climatic given I can’t imagine what would actually hurt Hanzoumon at this point.

Still, if you want your feel good moments, Momo getting to celebrate her birthday, spending some quality time with her friends from school and with the spies, both give a little bit of cheer to this otherwise fairly by-the-numbers affair. I was wondering if they would figure out they’d been sent on a chase with the drugs but of course Hanzoumon is on it. After all, she’s amazing.

Release the Spyce Episode 4: It’s All About Mei and Fu

Posted on October 30, 2018December 29, 2018 by Karandi

You know, there are secret organisations afoot, drugs being traded, human experimentation, and all kinds of weird, but for whatever reason this anime feels that spending an episode dealing with the mentor-student relationship of Mei and Fu is the absolute best thing it can show us. This episode really does make it clear that despite the trappings of a spy story, at heart this one just wants to be a cute girls in a club kind of thing and the only real difference is occasionally they face life threatening situations.

That doesn’t make this bad, but it does mean that the threat and the spy side of this story really aren’t to be taken overly seriously. I mean, who cares about all of the secret agent type stuff when there are household accounts to balance?

If it seems I’m being a little snarky it is probably because I don’t know that either the audience or the characters gained anything from this episode. I mean, sure, Mei and Fu go through a bunch of stuff, end up fighting, after that gets Mei hurt on a mission Fu moves out, but then they reconcile and take down the random token drug dealer Fu had spotted earlier in the episode. Fu realises that her mentor does appreciate her and they all live happily ever…

Wait, why did we need a whole episode to come to that realisation?

I’ve described this show as average, and realistically it still is. But the bottom line is it isn’t a particularly compelling cute girls in a club kind of thing nor is it a very competent story about a team of female spies, so what we’re ending up with is a tepid serving of both genres and it makes for a viewing experience that is kind of good enough but not particularly memorable.

Release the Spyce Episode 3: It’s All About the Team

Posted on October 23, 2018December 29, 2018 by Karandi

I was really hoping for more than a work as part of a team and play your part kind of resolution to Momo’s troubles starting out as a spy. I mean, it makes logical sense that she needs to work as part of the team and follow her orders, but it just seems like in the process of getting us to this resolution they jettisoned all of the training that she did last week and took her back to more or less square zero.

Outside of that minor complaint though, this week we get a series of missions from the team as they close in on small leads of their enemy and work their way up the food chain. Despite Momo’s repeated blunders, the team succeeds at gaining what they need each and every time, though the ease of these missions makes more sense when you realise the enemy seems to just be playing them and waiting to see if the traitor’s information is actually reliable.

I do think the villains are going to run out of minions if they keep turning all of them into drug test subjects, though that’s a minor worry in a world set up as implausible as this one is in the first place, so not the biggest issue going.

One thing the show does right is it remains energetic, it keeps things moving, and the interactions between the characters are still pretty fun. All and all, this show remains enjoyable but also pretty average from the plot point of view. Still, average is good enough as long as it is entertaining.

Release the Spyce Episode 2: Preparation Is Key

Posted on October 15, 2018December 29, 2018 by Karandi

There are a few moments in this second episode that caused me to raise an eyebrow. The explanation that the word ‘spy’ might come from ‘spice’ which is complete and utter rubbish no matter how you look at it and the show throwing out there that it is just one theory doesn’t make blatantly wrong information any easier to swallow. Then there was the ‘no honey’ symbolising a life devoid of sweetness password that really just felt they were laying things on really thick.

However, outside of those couple of moments where I was left shaking my head, the second episode of Release the Spyce is actually fairly fun. Okay, the OP is headache inducing and I won’t be watching it again this season (way too many bright flashes), but otherwise I’m done complaining and want to talk about some of the positives.

Momo, who last week was a really wishy-washy and kind of dull potential protagonist, really stepped up this week. She makes the decision to become a spy and she works really hard to achieve that end. That said, she hasn’t had a complete personality transplant, it is more she’s got something she’s determined to do and so she is moulding herself in the direction she needs to go to achieve it. Stretching the training and test period over a couple of months rather than the usual week or ten days characters have in these sorts of shows really works in the episode’s favour as it allows Momo’s transformation to feel a bit more real (even if it is still fairly quick).

I also really just liked the range of training she was subjected to. This wasn’t just physical training but also involved detecting deception, avoiding attack, being able to get close to others, it really felt like they intend to do a range of spy like activities though so far we’ve only really seen them infiltrate and fight. Hopefully these skills get used in later episodes because that could be really cool.

We don’t learn a lot more about the other characters, but the group dynamic is really nice in this episode and I’m looking forward to spending more time with these girls as the series progresses. We also get another couple of scenes with the potential villains who are of course plotting so I guess now that Momo is all trained up we’re going to have some sort of conflict to deal with.

This show isn’t amazing, but it is so far pretty entertaining and hopefully it continues to be fun.

Release the Spyce Episode 1: Is Eating the Spices The Same As Releasing The Spyce?

Posted on October 8, 2018December 29, 2018 by Karandi

Let’s not even ask whether or not we’re confusing herbs with spices as I’m sure there was some cross over at some point in this opening episode of Release the Spyce. Anyway, I didn’t have much in the way of expectations going into this which is probably good considering it is fairly average in most regards, but it was still a pretty fun watch and worth another couple of episodes.

The episode starts with an all girl team infiltrating a high security facility with way too much ease, however when they go to leave they are suddenly surrounded by robots. A munch on some spices later and the girls go to town with a nice array of weaponry and destroy the robots, the one guy who runs in to stop them, and then they head on their way. However, they notice a girl on the other side of the river who can amazing see them. Its a fun and energetic opening though fairly standard in its execution and only the fast pace, music and bright colours are really keeping the energy going, but that’s actually enough.

Jump to the next day and we meet Momo, our pink haired shy girl who wants to be a police officer but freezes in dangerous situations. She in high school of course and is about to make some new friends. She isn’t a great protagonist by any means but again the pacing and everything else in this show helps to keep things moving. I did do a double take when she just suddenly licked the girl she essentially just met and the other girl just kind of thought her sense of taste was good. Not exactly how you should react to being randomly licked but whatever.

Anyway, Momo has great eye-sight, smell and taste and apparently that’s going to be helpful so she’s recruited into a super secret group that have been around since forever and are fighting some evil organisation (there was an exposition dump here but I kind of just nodded a long and all the names). As always, you would have to wonder how effective they actually are if they haven’t won after all this time, but cool we have our protagonists who have some villains to fight and in the mean time we have some reasonably energetic fight sequences of girls versus robots. We can go with this for a little bit.