© AnekoYusagi_Seira Minami/KADOKAWA/Shield Hero S3 Project
While I still think Ren is probably underrated, it was nice to have a catalyst for his character development. One of the biggest things he faced was when he killed a dragon and almost caused a plague in a town because he thought it was a video game boss that was going to show up. He left behind a corpse that could have lasting effects on the environment. The same dragon is brought back as a threat and a defining plot point, more or less fleshing out Ren’s involvement. More direct participation would have been better, because the show is so subtle about it. It would be great to hear more comments from the townspeople about Ren.
As for Wyndia, I have mixed feelings about her suddenly being thrust into the spotlight because I don’t even remember where the character came from. I knew that she had been a member of the Naofumi nation for a while and had experience taming monsters, but the intense concentration she was putting into this almost made me lose focus. It wasn’t nearly as distracting as randomly finding out that her father was a dragon because it made me question a dozen different things, like how biology works. Perhaps there were discussions in the original light novel and we just got the CliffsNotes version of her more significant involvement here.
The connection between Filo, the cursed shield, and the dragon was explained so quickly that I was still wondering what was going on. Atlas suddenly became able to heal despite being considered a powerful fighter. The glitchy game interface is starting to feel unnecessarily annoying since the solution was already there two episodes ago (fixing the curse using a simple debuff spell). I’m glad we’re getting some literal and figurative action after things have been relatively quiet over the past few episodes. However, this episode feels like a subplot that establishes the status quo and the possibilities aren’t fully explored. Overall, things turned out relatively well.
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The Rising of the Shield Hero Season 3 is now streaming on Crunchyroll.
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