Anime Reviews: Blue Exorcist Episode 11 – Demon of the Deep

Introduction
I consider myself a nice person. I’m not quite snarky enough to consistently write bad reviews for your entertainment. And really I feel that my role is more to tell people about good shows, books, and comics they should be watching or reading. But sometimes I find my hand forced, and the full force of my snark comes to bear.

Also, since I like you, I’m not going to torture you with a long plot summary before I tear into this episode.

Plot Summary
Rin, Izumo, and Shima are at the beach, on a squid grilling mission. Izumo almost drowns and is saved by a young boy (oh lord…). She then learns that the kid’s father went out to fight the Kraken.

The sea turns black, announcing the Kraken’s attack. The main characters, who take a backseat to Gary Stu, try to fight the Kraken, but to no avail. Then Yohei’s (the kid) dad shows up and reveals that the Kraken is not an enemy.

Ah, how delightful. So everything was literally a waste of time.

My Opinion
This episode sucked. I can’t believe it followed so shortly after one of the best episodes. And as far as I can tell it’s the only full filler episode in the entire series. Black Cat is so good that it draws viewers in. Demon of the Deep then undoes everything the prior episode did, and chases off the new viewers, waving a pitchfork.

First off, the kid, Yohei. Why is it always little children in filler? Is it meant to be a self insert for the audience? It doesn’t even matter anymore if a little kid character is actually well written, they’ve been used so often in terrible, terrible ways that every little kid filler character sucks by association.

Anime writers, if you want to write a filler episode, focus it around the main characters. Give them a problem to solve that actually matters. Using a filler character to introduce the conflict is a crutch no self respecting writer should rely on. I could make a list of filler you should watch for reference. Actually…I kind of like that idea.

If you liked my review, Watch the Episode Here

One comment

  1. I liked this for Kraken, my favorite mythological creature of the sea. I was greatly disappointed to find out that it was not even a demon worth defeating. That was clearly a waste of an episode, animators.

    I agree with your thought on fillers revolving around little kid characters: What is the point in it? It makes it boring when the filler focuses on some other character we viewers will hardly even bother remembering.

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