Overpowered Protagonists Done Right

I Love Overpowered Protagonists!

The anime market these days is over-saturated with titles of overpowered protagonists. It's a well done cliche' most of the time. In this broad scheme there exist popular titles like: Dragon Ball Z, Fairy Tail, and even Sailor Moon if you think about it. The Isekai genre is almost entirely comprised of an overly power and often underestimated protagonist.

Fans like these types of shows because it's nice to see the good guy molly wop the bad guys into oblivion. It's fun to see the bad guy who has been talked about for episodes lose his absolute mind trying to land one punch on an impossible enemy. I like to imagine myself in the position, which is why I watch anime alone (as if watching with someone were an option, lol).

There's a Problem Though...

With an over abundance of these shows it can leave writers with a lazy plot and characters that fail to engage the audience. Enter: Wiseman's granchild, The 8th son, are you kidding me? High school prodigies have it easy even in another world, and Bofuri. Yes I like all of those anyway, and yes I realize they're hot garbage.

I'm not saying that they're all garbage of course. One punch man, mob psycho, and Overlord come to mind when I think about anime that can deliver on all fronts. But these anime are fewer and far between.

That brings us to the anime in question today.

The Daily Life of the Immortal King, or Pinyin: Xiān Wáng de Rìcháng Shēnghuó, is for lack of other less accurate words: incredible.

I'm gonna break down the anime into several parts that I think each deserve their own section so you can know exactly what you're getting into:

Music

The openings and closings for season one are individually composed pieces, and the music used in each episode can be attributed to the studio BiliBili. The pieces are well thought out and go with the animations in spectacular fashion. It's always nice to have a kick drum thumping with heavy foot movement or sword swinging, etc.

The coolest thing though, is the opening for season two. It's haunting and brilliant at the same time. I won't spoil anything here, but it will tie in nicely into a few of the episodes as most anime intros tend to do. This one however ties in better, (you'll know what I mean when you get there).

A sidenote on sound: The studio does a really good job at blending action with adequate sound effects. Bags are crunchy and water falls on concrete. If that sentence made sense to you, then you know exactly what kind of sound effects to expect int his series.

On top of this, the hero's theme is an excellent piece and is a contrast in form against the feel of the anime. The rest of the anime can be categorized into light-hearted and airy, and while the protagonist's theme is still of a bright heart, it is filled with triumph and brass, and rhythm. It bleeds into an effect of heart racing when it starts to play.

My biggest complaint about the music, is that it's hard to find unless you can understand Mandarin, and even then I've seen reviews online saying that the hero's music is difficult to get a hold of. I have yet to see any OST released.

Music: 5/5

Animation

I'm admittedly an animation snob. You can have no plot, but if you're pretty to look at I'm going to love it. You can have very creepy subtexts but if I could feel like I'm a little high while watching I'll still recommend it, (looking at you, no game no life).

That said, The Daily Life of an Immortal King is nothing short of excellent. In season one it has an art style reminiscent in parts to Sword Art Online. I'm not an artist, but I'll try to explain. They use a blended style of thin lines and crisp motion. They take the time to fully animate backgrounds, characters that aren't in the story, and interactions between physics in a realistic way.

Then, you have the fight scenes. If you're a big fan of fight scenes, this is an easy anime to recommend. It's reminiscent of fight scenes from Mob Psycho. It's flashy, it's high strung, and the colors tend to explode a little bit. In season two things take an even more dynamic edge with a few 3D renderings.

If you're an animation snob like me, please, for the love of all that is good and holy do not skip the extra episode in season two titled: The Director's not Home" It is the most meta piece of awesome that I've stumbled across in quite a while.

Animation: 5/5

Characters

I separate characters from plot for a few reasons. The characters are usually in the plot, and not the other way around. The other reason is it'll be in this section that we talk about a few elements of the story that are hard to place anywhere else.

The main characters are as follows: Wang Ling (Protagonist) Sun Rong (Protagonist) Guo Hao, Chen Chao, and Froggy 2.

Character Development

The series doesn't lack when it comes to decent character development for all of the characters. They all feel well rounded with interesting quirks and abilities that don't get overshadowed. If there's any character that makes shifts that don't entirely make sense it's probably Sun Rong. Don't get me wrong, she far surpasses other anime's who don't put any effort into character development- and depending on the episode she really does make the series whole. However, she's used as a little bit of a fridge.(If you don't get that, just look it up)

Character Interactions

This series is slice of life in parts, so the character interactions are pretty good compared to other anime in which the only interaction you have is during flashbacks or fight scenes, or flashbacks during fight scenes. This part gets full points from me.

Sidenote: The show is funny in parts because of these character interactions. If humor isn't really your thing, then this may not be the anime for you.

Other Characters

This show is flush with people who come in and out of the show, and often times only for an episode or two. I feel as though the way this show is paced, that's not really an issue. There tend to be a few one-dimensional antagonists, but they usually don't last for long enough to be considered worth the time it would take to develop them.

Characters: 4.9/5 (Not a fan of fridging anyone. Again, look it up)

Plot

Here's where things get tricky. It's slice of life/action, so as far as plot is concerned, it exists, but every once and a while it's hard to keep track of. I'm not going to cut off any points for it being what it is though.

Without spoiling anything, the plot is this: Wang Ling is super strong, but he just wants to live a normal life. The world he currently lives in makes it hard to do that. Imagine having super speed and having to constantly try to maintain a normal walking speed. But all your friends are into running. And the entire world is into running. And you keep getting into track meets because that's what everyone else is doing.

The plot is actually really beautiful and endearing, if not a bit abstract and out there. It's not as out there as Neon Genesis, but it's also not going to slap you across the face like Dragon Ball Z, with constant rewinding and characters explaining exactly what's going on.

This is an adaptation of a novel, and as far as I can tell they stray pretty far from the source material. There's one part I can think of particularly that made me scratch my head - if you get there and you think "wait a second, what?" then it's probably that part. However as a whole it flows pretty nicely and that part really doesn't make or break the series.

If you're looking for plot holes you're probably going to find them, but if you're into enjoying the ride, then I can recommend this one for the plot as well.

Plot: 4.5/5

Overall

I watched it over like a two day span, and had a great time watching this. If you're a fan of Mob Psycho or One Punch, you're sure to love this. If My hero or Dragon Ball is more of your cup of tea, this might take some effort to enjoy.

My Final Score: 4.85/5 - Definitely Bingeworthy