Anime Review: "Beast Tamer"

Pretty sure that if you used both hands, and feet, to add up all the isekai series that came out in 2022 you’d have to have at least one friend to help you. ‘Beast Tamer’ which just finished airing last season was certainly an anime of 2022. In this anime, the eponymous “Beast Tamer”, gets kicked out of the hero’s party for being the weakest link, since he doesn’t contribute much in combat. He just does ALL of the legwork, scouting, packing, hauling, etc. He’s basically their scout/errand boy, but they kick him to the curb because he’s “holding them back”. He gets his revenge by building himself a harem of monster girls chosen from the ultimate-species: cat-girl, dragonoid, a couple fairies, and a fox (not a spoiler because they’re all in the credits). I suppose taming monster girls is at least a step forward from buying up slave girls, but still, premise-wise, having the protagonist literally owning his fellow adventuring nakama is kinda weird. Even if they all join of their own volition, because they come to respect and love him, it’s still a strange basis for an isekai.

I had a couple big problems with this series. That’s why I rate it 4/10. The ‘beast tamer’ owning his party of monster girls isn’t really one of them, I just think it’s weird.

The series was really, really forgettable. I finished watching it yesterday and held off writing the review for it until now, but at time of writing this I don’t think I can remember the names of any of the characters… Also, the use of “The Hero is an A-Hole” trope in here gets beaten to death to the point I’m left wondering how anyone would ever think this guy and his companions are the ‘chosen ones’. It would have been one thing if they’d just gone away right at the beginning so we can move, but the fact that they come back, over and over, continuing in their comically rotten ways was borderline Team Rocket level (except without even a shred of lovability).

The anime felt unoriginal, which isn’t really an original thing to say about it I’d imagine, so I’ll just end this review here.