DESCRIPTION

CAST

MANGA ActionNa Honjaman Level Up
ANIME ActionOre dake Level Up na Ken: Season 2 - Arise from the Shadow
MOVIE ActionOre dake Level Up na Ken: ReAwakening

REVIEWS

• 

  jahver

  10/100
  Bland, overproduced slop designed to go viral

  Solo Leveling might be one of the most embarrassing, confused amalgam of power fantasy tropes and self-insert garbage to ever come out of South Korea. It’s a completely worthless experience that even the most uncultured viewer will get absolutely nothing out of. The question of the day is why A-1 Pictures expended so much of their time and resources into essentially polishing a turd; every second of top-notch storyboarding and animation would’ve been better spent enhancing a more competently written and directed series. Perhaps the blame lies on its slavish cult following - despite its severe failings as a story, as some people (and presumably AI-generated social media posts) will tell you this completely outclasses every piece of modern fiction despite it being the inverse of observable reality. The more likely explanation is that South Korea’s media conglomerates want to take another swing at breaking into the ever-lucrative world of anime, despite just about every prior attempt to adapt the worst manhwa slop Webtoon has to offer being one unmitigated disaster after the other. Regrettably, no amount of fervent online shilling can make this show a bearable experience.

  Solo Leveling is the story of Sung Jin-Woo, a mopey, incompetent loser who finds himself gifted with the power of RPG mechanics after a near-death experience; he is the only one of a group of supernaturally gifted humans called hunters who can “level up” or get stronger than the rank that was arbitrarily bestowed onto him. Jinwoo goes from being the “weakest hunter of all mankind” to one of the strongest within the span of a few episodes, and the glaring issue with the story almost immediately becomes obvious; there’s going to be zero tension after a certain point. After the first 2 episodes of the show, almost nothing is shown as a challenge for Jinwoo. His toughest battle’s over in five minutes. Around halfway through the season Jibunwo stops being a self-pitying cretin and transitions into a borderline sociopath. His original motivation of raising enough money to save his comatose mother is almost non-existent, rendering him a cold and unrelatable Gary Stu with no motivation aside from gaining power. You’d think with this rapid metamorphosis into an entirely different person being thrust upon our hero, he’d have some sort of introspection about how he’s changed. But the most self-awareness we ever get from the series is a halfassed Nietzsche quote.

  Perhaps Jinwoo’s most unlikeable quality is how he seems to hold a grudge over the most asinine things; most notably against a 60/70-year old man for not carrying Jinwoo to safety during the first encounter in the dungeon that granted him his powers; when said man is fatally wounded later in the season Jinwoo’s only response is, rather than “I need to help you get medical attention!” like a normal person, but rather “You need to survive no matter what, how else can I keep blaming you?” What the fuck is this mindset? As if that wasn’t enough, the story even presents the idea that Jinwoo’s been bullied his entire life for being the weakest hunter in history, but only one instance is ever shown onscreen through a flashback - his teammate tells him to stop being a liability and get behind the others after he gets injured during a fight - less bullying and more showing concern for someone who is clearly not qualified to be there at all. All this seems to do is, rather than reinforce Jinwoo’s bizarre complexes, is raise the question of why he can’t just find another fucking job.

  On that note, Solo Leveling tries to enforce a message of self-improvement and “believing in yourself” which falls flat because Jibunwo has everything handed to him by sheer coincidence and he’s the only one in the world who can get stronger. He wouldn’t have started working out and trying to become a more competent hunter had he not lucked out and pleased the statue deity. His physical transformation is the funniest thing to me because the writer has clearly never worked out in their life; if they did, they’d know that doing some pushups and light jogging does NOT make you taller or change the structure of your face unless you’re taking fucking tren.

  I genuinely have next to nothing to say about any of the other characters, because nearly every single one that appears only exists to service Jibunwo. His love interest is an insufferably timid copy-paste of Orihime without any of the charm, relatability or humor Kubo would’ve endowed her with; every time she’s on screen, she’s either trembling in the corner and crying like a scorned child because fighting low-level WoW enemies is apparently PTSD-inducing, insufferably shrieking like a fisher cat, or smiling vacuously. She’s inept when it comes to healing people, her sole purpose in the story. She’s not even good at being a demure tradwife for the self-inserting audience, because she’s a whiny bitch who passive-aggressively insults Jibunwo after his transformation (“you used to get hurt so much it was annoying!”) yells at her parents for caring about her well-being, and has to rely on everyone around her just to accomplish the most basic tasks that anyone else would have no problem with. Her tremendously grating voice acting does her portrayal no favors, either. The writer seems to at least realize how awful a character she is because by episode ten she gets written out of the story.

  Jinwoo’s simp Yoo Jinhoo or whatever only exists to follow Jibunwo around and larp as a hunter, as he is a literal trust-fund kid who gets to sit back and watch professionals handle everything for him. then act like he contributed after the fact. I do not see why anyone finds him likeable, as much like everyone else who isn’t Jinwoo he does absolutely nothing of value. Jinwoo’s sister and the other hunters are so one-note and static that the anime has to cut back to them having mundane conversations just to remind the audience they exist and will, hopefully, do something later down the line. Every other background character exists either to suck off Jibunwo and remark on either how much of a weakling he is before his transformation, or how cool and awesome and attractive he is afterwards. The antagonists are either your standard fantasy monsters, or villainous hunters who turn comically evil at the drop of a hat. All you’re left with is a cast of increasingly difficult to distinguish names and faces that serve no purpose other than to explain the rules of the world to the audience. There’s also a guy named Hwang Dongsuk, which is really funny.

  The world of Solo Leveling is, safe to say, so piss-poor at justifying its own existence that even after twelve episodes I couldn’t find myself buying it for a minute. So there’s portals to a fantasy world that spit out monsters, and there’s people with latent magical abilities that form teams to fight them as a professional career. Sound simple enough, even a series as narratively dysfunctional as RWBY could pull off a premise this simple. However, it overcomplicates itself. Every hunter only has one set rank and can never grow more powerful through training. This deterministic angle infects the series with this ugly brand of cynicism and kills any pretense of the “work hard and you’ll get stronger!” attitude the show wants you to believe in. There’s also hunters who kill other hunters, which begs the question of why they’d waste their time and risk their lives killing the only other people capable of keeping the world safe for a little more cash. Even worse is the fact that the hunter organization recruits convicted felons with latent powers to fight the monsters in their home turf. Not exactly a great plan but throwing hardened criminals into the meatgrinder is a better alternative than making the Average Joe do it. You’d think, right? But the hunter association makes criminals fight alongside the civilian hunters who only do it to pay the bills, most notably the lower ranked hunters and ONE singular B-rank supervisor; this would instantly stand out as a logistical nightmare to anyone with a functioning brain.

  Additionally, the party system is extremely poorly thought out even on a conceptual level – having poorly trained civilians doing your work for you is already questionable, but afterwards they report everything to a supervisor afterwards who believes the recounting of events of the mission at face value and doesn’t engage in any further questioning or research. No sane organization would approve of something like this, especially with how unqualified the average hunter is shown to be at the start of the series; Jinwoo’s team goes into an obvious trap in the first episode, and predictably they all start dropping like flies. Rather than stay composed and try to find a way to overcome their predicament like you’d expect professional monster hunters to do, they all start screaming like little girls and dying in increasingly comical ways due to their lack of cooperation, leading to the encounter where Jinwoo gain his looksmaxxing powers. The dramatic hook of the first two episodes is portrayed as a tragic massacre, but it’s impossible not to laugh at how they all get steamrolled so easily. To add insult to injury, there are also S-ranks, who are the strongest but they’re seemingly never around when the weaker hunters are in danger. An inspector for the organization also states that S-ranks could pose a threat because they are essentially so strong they are above the law, but he makes it sound like there wouldn’t be any enforcing the law at all. None of this makes any sense, it’s all peripherally defined and therefore it fails at even being a self-insert story because you intrinsically could not self-insert into a world so poorly thought out.

  The show’s only saving grace is the technical competence of the fight scenes; everything else is abysmal. The direction is all over the place. Most conversation scenes are just shot reverse shot, and there’s no cinematic diversity. Anytime something interesting is going on the scene will suddenly cut back to some inane conversation about something the audience has already heard between side characters the audience has no reason to care about – episode 5 cuts from the middle of a fight to Jibunwo’s sister and some random hunters talking about stuff that was ALREADY EXPLAINED IN THE SAME EPISODE – this scene has zero reason to exist, it doesn’t even introduce new characters, I genuinely do not understand what the thought process is with these moments. Furthermore, characters will state things they should already know to each other, such as their teammate’s backstory, just to make sure the audience knows. The writers behind Solo Leveling seem to be under the assumption that “show, don’t tell” is merely a suggestion.

  The opening animation seems to be a perfect indication of everything wrong with the series – it’s a visually cluttered, incomprehensible mishmash of characters, location shots, and disorienting fight scenes that tell you nothing about the show itself while some guy raps in Engrish over the blandest Hiroyuki Sawano music you can imagine. Speaking of Sawano, he couldn’t be phoning it in any harder with the soundtrack, and it brings me no pleasure knowing how he could do so much better. His distinctive arrangements don’t fit the show at all, and nearly every track sounds indistinguishable. Outside of the manufactured sakuga scenes made to go viral on Tiktok, Solo Leveling is incompetent even in an aesthetic sense. Saying that the anime captures even an iota of the original webcomic’s artistic prowess would be an incredibly generous assessment. Every episode is plagued by characters constantly looking off-model in background or group shots and sometimes even in closeups.

  Solo Leveling is Crunchyroll’s desperate new attempt at launching a flagship title, and perhaps there’s something to be said about how a company that’s spent its lifespan trying to commercialize and depreciate an entire medium is funding and promoting such a sterile and blatantly mass-produced series. What webtoon companies call “entertainment”, I call the violation of an art form. At the very least, the show’s aesthetic failures reflect its own failures as a story; it’s ugly, intrinsically cynical, and dishonestly presenting itself as something profound and grandiose when there’s nothing about it that justifies the portrayal.

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• 

  befalt

  23/100
  A hype dispenser that forgot to level up its noob-tier writing.

  This review contains spoilers.

  **〈 𝗜𝘁 𝘄𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗺𝗮𝗸𝗲 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗳𝗲𝗲𝗹 𝗹𝗶𝗸𝗲 𝗮 𝗻𝗲𝘄𝗯𝗶𝗲 𝘀𝘁𝘂𝗰𝗸 𝗶𝗻 𝗮 𝗵𝗶𝗴𝗵-𝗹𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹 𝗱𝘂𝗻𝗴𝗲𝗼𝗻... 〉**

  ---

  Video games have been a massive part of my life for as long as I can remember. Whether it be building massive dirt houses in Minecraft, spending countless hours grinding in Metin2 or playing Empire Earth for half a day without taking a single break, these moments are something I will cherish till the end of time.

  **And it is that sense of unfiltered marvel, never-ending curiosity, world-bending control and non-stop fun that countless anime and manga (or, in this case, [manhwa](https://anilist.co/manga/105398/Na-Honjaman-Level-Up/)) have been effortlessly and desperately trying to replicate, yet to no avail.** As a result of their clumsy and unsuccessful attempts, the video game genre in animanga has morphed into a disgraceful, repulsive laughing stock that is synonymous with paper-thin characters, one-dimensional plot, repetitive action, laughable developments and a general lack of wit.

  Why am I even bringing all this up? Well, the answer is pretty obvious: **_Solo Leveling_ is the textbook example of how egregious the concept has become and how low the writing can sink when sucking off the main character is the only thing it has going for it.** It is beyond infuriating, but anyone with a working keyboard can say this much. To really grasp what it does wrong, I need to put on my imaginary diving suit and dive deep into the absolute abyss that is the anime's narrative.

  

  But, hold your (sea) horses just yet. Before I venture into these crushing depths, I need to go over the positives first. **Yes, despite my low score and extremely negative stance on _Solo Leveling_, I must admit that it is not completely devoid of merit.** There are three elements worthy of commendation for their quality, albeit their positive effect on the series is overshadowed by the vomit-inducing odour of the other components: the voice acting, the action sequences and, more or less, the production values.

  Although I rarely mention voice acting in my reviews, in this case, it is pretty much mandatory. While every actor involved in the project brought their A-game, __[Taito Ban](https://anilist.co/staff/151336/Taito-Ban) went above and beyond and crushed all the expectations.__ His visceral screams, delicate whispers and chilling talks are so fantastic that listening to his performance was pure joy and I could barely hide how in awe of his talent I was during every episode. **Even if the script he was supplied with is awful on every level, he poured his heart into the role, and I have nothing but respect for him and the rest of [the seiyuu.](https://anilist.co/anime/151807/Ore-dake-Level-Up-na-Ken/characters)**

  **When it comes to the production values, the situation gets a little bit more hectic, as they are simultaneously impressive and inconsistent.**

  __While the visuals are insanely energetic and bombastic during the numerous fight scenes that take place in the show, they are completely lifeless outside of them.__ The character designs are uninspired and boring, the colours are horrendously bland, the background art looks generic beyond human comprehension, the art style does not come even remotely close to the art of the source material (which is its biggest strength) and it looks very unimpressive, the animation fluctuates between being fluid and smooth like butter and chaotically rigid and stiff, the lightning is lifeless, the editing is mostly solid and the camerawork is pretty inoffensive as well. **Overall, our eyes are either treated to a zany and zappy showcase of talent and passion, or a tiring and tasteless blend of colours, shapes and figures, which does not instil excitement in the audience one bit.**

  Thankfully, I have nothing but praise for [Sawano](https://anilist.co/staff/103509/Hiroyuki-Sawano)'s soundtrack, __as his tracks make every moment in which they appear ten times better.__ It is genuinely impressive how much energy these simple tunes carry on their backs, and _Solo Leveling_ desperately needs them to be in top shape to squeeze as much excitement out of its fight scenes as possible. **What more can I say, really? The man just does not miss.**

  On the topic of action segments, they are the last component I can say is well-executed, well-organised and packs a wallop. **Although their quality varies from one encounter to another, it is safe to say that they are at the very least competent in what they deliver.** Take, for example, the fourth episode's clash between the protagonist and the snake boss. Despite some of its weirder moments here and there, it is a really decent watch. On the other hand, the showdown between [Jin-Woo](https://anilist.co/character/129928/JinU-Seong) and [Igris](https://anilist.co/character/145722/Igris) that takes place in the eleventh episode is absolutely terrific on all fronts, __as the visuals and the soundtrack amped its batshit crazy energy to a whole new level.__

  **And, Thank God these scenes are this cool-looking because everything that leads up to them is, to put it politely, horrendous and tedious as hell.**

  

  Firstly, there is the story, and it is quite a doozy. __The entire premise of the series revolves around the sudden appearance of otherwordly portals throughout the world, and alongside their arrival, came the rise of hunters, who are, essentially, human beings with access to magical spells and abilities.__ Among them is the protagonist who, in the beginning, is a complete loser, but, thanks to a weird phenomenon, he expectedly ([because the synopsis spoils this development, duh](https://anilist.co/anime/151807/Ore-dake-Level-Up-na-Ken/)) gains the ability to "level up" (i.e. get more powerful with each enemy slain, duh²) __and his reality becomes something akin to a video game.__

  __It is the very premise of the show that is a giant eyesore.__ Why is the basis of the story so weird and out of place? Why does the power the protagonist obtains have to be video-game-based? Why does it have to be here in the first place? The answer is simple: it is much, much easier and more advantageous to adopt a concept based on something as universally beloved as video games than create one entirely from scratch, without relying on the already existing appeal of something. **However, as beneficial as it is to the popularity of the series, it is extremely detrimental to the plot itself as it is horribly implemented, ill-conceived and hilariously half-baked.**

  Think about it like this: one of the hooks of the premise is the fact that contemporary society is invaded by monsters from a completely alien dimension, and people need to defend themselves and their homelands from the invaders by using their newly acquired powers and resources they gather from these portals and monsters' remains. **That alone sounds interesting enough to offer an ample dose of brainless yet charming entertainment.** Better yet, you can grab that extremely simplistic foundation, take it in an infinite number of directions and transform a simple notion into something truly special.

  **So why tarnish it with some gamer-tailored bullshit that does not fit the established setting one bit?** Why blend a reality-based plot with a [YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/) [let's play](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Let%27s_Play) when these two mix together as well as water and oil? A more organic power progression system that does not have to rely on video game gimmicks to "make sense" would have been far more fitting and conceptually sound for the narrative. What if the protagonist got possessed by an ancient spirit or his hunter abilities mutated due to an unknown power found deep within the double dungeon? I think that it would be a lot more exciting and compelling to see than resorting to half-witted RPG-inspired elements that take you out of the experience completely.

  __However, it seems the anime perceives its audience as simple-minded gremlins that eat, breathe and sleep video games, and so we are stuck with this cringeworthy, tacky hogwash that prioritises pandering to gamers over being logical and well-fitting within the confines of the setting and the story.__

  But does it really matter if this whole game-like power is well-integrated into the series DNA when it exists solely for Jin-Woo's sake? Does anything matter when the world, its inhabitants, and everything else are nothing more than his belongings? **This is Jin-Woo's sandbox, and, as you have probably realised, he is the show's most prominent issue by far.**

  He is the type of main character I vehemently hate with all my being. __He is not merely a person who pushes the plot forward through their actions and is the talking point of the series, but rather a parasitic, [Gary Stu](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Sue)-esque self-insert that devours and spits out every single part of the narrative that is not about him and steals screen time and importance from everyone and everything else.__ At first, he is a massive pushover and his fellow hunters make his life hell (of course, in an extremely cartoonish and laughable manner because who cares about nuance, right?). They constantly call him weak, laugh behind his back and remind their colleagues that he is a worthless E-rank goober. After the infamous incident that happens in the first two episodes, the plot literally bends over and lets Jin-Woo dominate it for hours on end. **Regardless of what gets thrown at him, he always emerges victorious with minimal or zero damage to speak of.**

  Is he tired or injured? Do not worry because the epic gamer system (which only he can access and exploit) can conveniently heal his wounds and instantly eliminate his exhaustion. Does an entity that is technically more powerful than Jin-Woo attack him? Haha, no biggie; __he wins no matter how immense the gap between their power levels is, and the wretched creature that dared to treat him as something lesser than a God is humiliated, put into their place and turned into a joke.__ Does the situation seem dire and it appears to be impossible to take care of it? Pfft, the second he arrives at the scene, __the problem disappears in the blink of an eye.__

  **The real question here is: why ought I to give a flying fuck about someone that does not face any challenges, hardships, perspective-altering experiences or personality-defining moments?** I should not because, as a consequence of his ridiculous overpoweredness, the series is utterly devoid of stakes and thrill.

  Whether it be the protagonist's arrival at the test dungeon in episode 4, his attempts to enter the demons' castle, his fight with Igris or his encounters with other hunters (generic bad guys) that were out to get him, __Jin-Woo is never truly in danger because the show always discovers some bullshit way to make him come out on top__... or he merely relies on his godlike capabilities and simply pretends to struggle for a cheap sense of excitement and a shallow adrenaline rush. **At no point during the season's run are the viewers ever concerned about the well-being of the main character nor do they question whether he is strong enough to take on the enemy at hand.** Time and time again, we are shown that he is a massive snowflake who will get whatever he pleases with the minuscule effort put in.

  Sure, in the beginning, he undertakes tasks aimed at making him stronger (though they are absolutely ludicrous in their difficulty since hunters are, essentially, superhuman beings, so doing the whole [OPM](https://anilist.co/anime/21087/One-Punch-Man/)-esque training regime feels like a nasty joke instead of something honestly demanding), yet the whole process is contained and wrapped up in about two episodes. **By the fifth episode, we basically reach a point where the protagonist always reigns at the top of the food chain much like an apex predator, and every entity within his vicinity should bow down to his super shredded physique (which he conveniently gains for no apparent reason) and his totally "badass" powers.** He can proclaim that someone is stronger than him all he wants, but that is true for a brief, fleeting moment; the pace at which his power grows is so asinine that opponents who once surpassed him in strength and ability are now nothing more than a bunch of pawns to him. Whenever he defeats a stronger enemy, the show remains quick on its feet and __masterfully bullshits its way out of the situation by throwing around random excuses__ like "_Oh, he was merely lucky_," "_If he did not dodge this, he would be dead meat_," or "_He barely won._"

  **Such a scenario can be tolerated if it happens once or twice, not when it is a constant occurrence that not even once is questioned or transformed into something more believable.**

  I definitely blame the pacing for this, as it is yet another issue that stems directly from Jin-Woo's presence, but it also makes him somehow worse. **_Solo Leveling_ fails to grant any of its ideas, plot points or characters the breathing room that is necessary for them to develop organically and prosper, which just leaves them dangling like a ballsack.** The episodes are either stretched so thin that they lose their impact (episode 1 and episode 2 are a great example of this because, for some unknown reason, the double dungeon incident is bogged down by the horrendous exposition dumps and clumsy, awkward attempts at worldbuilding) or they progress so quickly and contain so much cramped content that they feel too overstuffed (we do not need to learn about the [Jeju Island](https://solo-leveling.fandom.com/wiki/Jeju_Island) expedition when the protagonist is in the middle of a fight; this merely ruins the already non-existent tension even further). __Of course, the rapid growth of the protagonist does not help the situation one bit, as each and every episode raises the bar higher and higher as if the show wanted to conclude the entirety of its content in a measly 12-episode long season.__ However, knowing the source material, I know that this is merely [the beginning of the long and drawn-out showcase of Jin-Woo's supposed amazingness](https://anilist.co/anime/176496/Ore-dake-Level-Up-na-Ken-Season-2--Arise-from-the-Shadow/), and soon his package will grow so big the other personages will be forced to suck it 24/7.

  _Ah, right, I need to talk about them as well..._

  **Truth be told, there are no other characters here.** Sure, it is a factually incorrect thing to say since, as you can see on [_Solo Leveling_'s page](https://anilist.co/anime/151807/Ore-dake-Level-Up-na-Ken/characters), there are plenty of other hunters and non-hunters within the story. However, even though they have different names, faces, abilities and whatnot, they hardly classify as living and breathing beings. They are just a bunch of toys the protagonist plays with, human-shaped obstacles he needs to overcome, figures that he needs to surpass in prowess ASAP, background fillers, exposition-spouting machines, yesmen that love every fibre of his being, moustache-twirling, zero-dimensional evildoers who are introduced only to be soundly defeated by him, and female orbiters that exist solely to be his love interest and have nothing else to say or show. It is painfully obvious how little all these different "people" (can hardly call them that when their personalities, motivations, goals and ideals do not exist) matter in _Solo Leveling_'s eyes, and it is frustrating how mistreated, underutilised and poorly written they are. **Why even introduce a slew of characters when you are unable to make a single one of them feel like a human and not a cardboard cutout?** So that the self-insert protagonist is constantly validated, praised and commended for his actions and strength or doubted and underestimated just so he can prove the "haters" wrong? That seems to be the case here, and __I cannot stomach this unhealthy, off-putting circlejerk__, and, trust me, it will only get worse in future seasons.

  __Of course, the dialogue mirrors the quality of the caricatures that deliver it.__ It is riddled with bizarre and awkward exposition dumps, repetitive sentences that constantly remind the viewers how great the protagonist is/how weak he used to be, and hilariously inept statements that either:

  A) exist solely to trick the viewer into believing there are stakes present (e.g. "He is much stronger than me!" or "I only won because I was lucky!")

  **or**

  B) attempt to breathe life into its cast but fail miserably since actions speak louder than words/a few sentences murmured under one's breath hardly constitute apt character development (e.g. "The stronger I get, the more I feel something inside of me falling apart.").

  **The dialogue is truly as nuanced and subtle as a sledgehammer, and listening to these atrocious lines makes the already piss-poor experience somehow even worse.**

  **All of these factors come together to form the ultimate reason why I genuinely dislike _Solo Leveling_: it is boring to an absurd degree, and watching it all happen in front of me was incredibly unpleasant.** Although I never discuss my enjoyment in my write-ups because I deem it unnecessary (my arguments already spell it out for the reader), in the case of this anime, your enjoyment is more crucial than the story or the characters. It, essentially, defines the show's worth; **Jin-Woo and his crew pray day in and day out that you will forgive them for their sinful flaws and enjoy their antics from start to finish.**

  If _Solo Leveling_ is the type of series that lives and dies by the hype and entertainment value, then, naturally, as someone who was not charmed by the one-dimensional protagonist or the fundamentally atrocious foundation on which the plot stands, __I did not find any enjoyment here__. The fight scenes might look awesome and have insane tracks attached to them, but they evoke as many emotions as reading the ingredients on the back of a bottle of chemicals you picked up because you forgot to bring your phone to the bathroom. The production values might be impressive when the situation calls for it, but I do not appreciate any of the elements that constitute them, __I would much rather chew on a copper wire than watch the first episode again__. The main character is such an aggravating snowflake that observing the constant glorification of his character makes me want to pull my hair out.

  **There is absolutely nothing engaging here, and I could not find a single thing to be excited about. No stakes, no consequences, no thrill and no fun—that is what _Solo Leveling_ amounted to.**

  

  _Sigh..._

  Before you stab me with your pitchforks and burn me at the stake for this blasphemous write-up, let me clarify that this is not a ploy to dissuade anyone from watching this show. **If you genuinely sense it will be a great time, then I urge you with all my being to give it a go and see for yourself how much it is worth.**

  That being said, it is quite obvious how I feel about it as a whole, so I will spare you the long-winded conclusion I envisioned in my mind and keep these closing remarks as short as possible.

  To sum it all up, **_Solo Leveling_ embodies the idea of mindless entertainment to a tee, and its fate depends heavily on your ability to shut down your brain and let your eyes and ears have all the fun.** If you are able to do that, then this one will be a total blast. Otherwise, well, the series will be as pleasant as sticking your head into a washing machine, turning it on and cranking up the spin cycle to the max.

  And I reckon I do not have to tell you which one of these applies to me...

  _I am getting dizzy..._

  ---

  **〈 ...𝗽𝘂𝘇𝘇𝗹𝗲𝗱, 𝗹𝗼𝘀𝘁, 𝘂𝗻𝘀𝗮𝘁𝗶𝘀𝗳𝗶𝗲𝗱 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗮𝗻𝗴𝗿𝘆.〉**

  Continue on AniList
• 

  personnel

  20/100
  A Showcase of a 9 Year Old Playing With Action Figures

  PLEASE DO NOT HARASS ME ABOUT THIS REVIEW. AS A MATTER OF FACT, PLEASE DON'T HARASS ANYONE WHO PUT OUT A NEGATIVE REVIEW ON THIS SHOW. I AM JUST PUTTING OUT MY PERSONAL OPINION ABOUT THIS ANIME BECAUSE I AM REALLY PASSIONATE ABOUT WRITING THIS. SAME APPLIES TO THE PEOPLE WRITING NEGATIVE REVIEWS.

  ---

  Solo Leveling has been an extremely popular piece of media before it got an anime adaptation. It was one of the most popular manhwas when it was still releasing chapters, and I was one of those people who read it while it was being released. I know the entirety of this story as I have caught up to it on every release since circa 2020-2021. And my thoughts? Fucking hated it. Yeah, I was an OG hater.

  Why did I watch the anime adaptation then? I wanted to see how this would get adapted, and hatewatch it, to be completely honest. And have my thoughts changed? Just slightly for the worse. This still fucking sucks. This still kept all of the problems I had with the manhwa when it was still releasing. This is so extremely overrated that it isn’t even funny.

  The story is extremely predictable. Sung Jin-Woo is labeled “the weakest hunter,” and then BOOM. He becomes extremely strong the next second. He now has some sort of neuralink chip planted into his head where he can now see a game menu. Who could’ve seen this coming? Not me. Not anyone, at all. Look at me in the eyes right now and tell me this isn’t just another variant of Kirito. Another Jesus-kun. Another Gary Stu. You just can’t. This mf also has no personality whatsoever. Anytime he’s in a bad situation, you can so easily predict what will happen next. Every episode literally goes by like this:

  1. Jin-Woo is in a seriously dangerous situation! Whatever will he do!
  2. Oh no, it seems like he is severely injured and will give up!
  3. What? He has regained his strength back and started to fight the one dimensional villains!
  4. Level up! Level up! Level up!

  Any episode that seems to “build” and “thicken” the plot, is just ultimately thrown away, because what do you really expect from this series when it only focuses on how badass Jin-Woo is during his fighting scenes? This show literally thrives off of hype to keep the viewers entertained, and I do not mean that in a good way.

  For all the other characters, I really don’t care about them at all. Like literally. I don’t have anything to say about them. They are just literally all cardboard cutouts. They’re just there. They don’t do anything other than either obstruct Jin-Woo on his journey, or just glaze him. Hae-in is one of the decent characters in this show, but she’s just there to serve as a romantic interest to Jin-Woo.

  The animation is alright if I’m being honest. A-1 Picture’s animation style isn’t particularly my favorite. All of the faces for the character designs look basically the same. What I really liked from the manhwa is Dubu’s artstyle, which was probably the only part of the manhwa that entertained me. The fight directing was not the best, especially the spider episode. There were some parts here and there in the anime where the action scenes looked somewhat decent.

  The music is probably the only really outstanding thing about the anime adaptation. Hiroyuki Sawano, the legendary man behind the AOT, Kill la Kill, and other popular anime was chosen to conduct the OST to this anime. The music piqued my interest in this otherwise bland show. I am going to go on a bit of a side tangent here, but I like to think of this as crinkle fries, my least favorite type of fries. They are extremely bland, but taste somewhat decent when you put condiments onto it. That’s how I feel when Sawano’s music starts playing. He actually carries this garbage show. I don’t know how they got him to conduct amazing music for this.

  The OP and ED were pretty good as well. I was surprised at how TxT was put on the OP (Is this the first time a K-Pop group was put onto an anime?). The OP was extremely catchy, and it probably still hasn’t gotten out of my head at all, and I don’t see it getting out of my head any time soon. I absolutely loved the shit out of the ED. It went extremely hard, and that might be just one of the things that I always looked forward to while watching the anime.

  I like to think about Solo Leveling as a 9 year old kid playing with action figures. They are holding Batman and Superman. They clash the fictional characters together while saying stuff like “BOOM! EXPLOSION! KAPOW! WHOOSH! ANNIHILATED! LEVEL UP! FATALITY!” It may seem cool to them when they were still 9, but looking back at it as an adult? Uhhh…

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