What they say:
Our heroes (read: villains) fight off against one of the Demon Lord’s most powerful servants. Later, when Agent Six accidentally ousts himself as a spy, he needs to regain their trust. He also can’t forget those evil points!
The review:
Content (Please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
As we proceed with the story of this pseudo-KonoSuba, it’s time for another battle against the Demon Lord’s army. Like KonoSuba, the story’s pacing is fairly relaxed. Not much has happened to progress taking over the Kingdom nor defeating the Demon Lord. There’s just lots of fighting and comedy antics. That’s fine for a comedy series, though something to be aware of for viewers who prefer fast action.
The King’s strategist sends Six to fight the Demon Lord’s army. Six suspects that it’s just because he insulted said strategist until he cried, which is just the ultimate form of petty. Six and co go along and fight the army led by Heine. As expected, there isn’t much action to speak of. It’s a strategy game for Six and Alice, who use C4 explosives to take down her golem. What is good about Six and Alice is that there’s no low in combat they won’t stoop to, which provides a fantastic juxtaposition to the chivalrous Snow and other Kingdom fighters. The deconstruction of a knight’s ideals is done to hilarious effects. Basically, every battle discussion is some form of Snow or someone else saying “let’s charge in and fight them head-on like proper soldiers,” only for Six to reply “let’s just blow them up with superior weapons from a distance instead.” Either of these approaches on their own in their own series wouldn’t be quite as strong but they work well together. Once Grimm finally wakes up she manages to paralyze Heine and of course the way Six gets his evil points is to humiliate her in front of both armies by taking risqué photos after taking her magic stone that she uses for power.
Since the strategist’s plan didn’t quite work, he tries bribing Snow to fabricate evidence that Six is a spy. Of course, Snow doesn’t buy into it until she overhears Six and Alice talking about Kisaragi and, coincidentally, being a spy! What’s actually funny about the fact that he doesn’t say that stuff in Japanese is the fact that it proves all his strategizing isn’t coming from a genius in tactics, but more of a nonchalant, carefree attitude. This is where episode four ends, leaving us on a cliffhanger.
Of course, Snow asks them to leave, and they actually want to, but Six goes Tsundere mode and the princess asks them to at least stay to watch the Kingdom burn since the Demon Lord will be fully assaulting them the next day. Unbeknownst to everyone else, the two of them have planted bombs all over the ground to delay the enemy and set a trap for Heine with her magic stone. Six tries to rack up some evil points in order to stash them in case they’re needed and, you guessed it, he does it by sexually harassing women on the street as “Zipperman.” One thing I hope to see out of this show is evil points not being mostly limited to this kind of behavior. It can be funny from time to time but gets old fast. And often, women are on the receiving end of Six’ bad deeds. It just comes across as typical ecchi anime humor where the main character is a huge pervert. Though there was one funny bit of a not-KonoSuba moment where one woman actually wants Zipperman, and thus Six is not rewarded any evil points as a result.
One other hilarious bit comes from right before the attack on the Kingdom when Six (seemingly) randomly receives evil points after an explosion goes off in the distance. It’s implied this was a result of Heine falling for the trap Six and Alice placed earlier with her magic stone. They just thought she was too smart to fall for it so to them, it was random. This caused a distraction while the princess attempted to show off her only magical ability and caused a classic example of “do it again, I wasn’t looking.” Dumb joke, but never fails.
We’ll have to wait and see until next week to see how the rest of this situation unfolds. The Demon Army got tired and retreated but they’ll be back. Six’ future is still in question since he was outed as a soy. Overall, most of the jokes are landing, though they have the potential to get old if the series keeps up this kind of method. It could end up dragging down the series creatively if a good portion of the humor is reduced to perverted antics. So far it still hasn’t quite escaped its predecessor’s shadow but still manages to hit most of the same marks. It’s funny, and ultimately that’s what matters.
In summary:
Though slow and a bit bogged by some of the humor and desire to make this show another KonoSuba, Combatants Will Be Dispatched continues to offer up laughs. If you’re looking for flashy action or deep writing, you won’t find it here. Though you’re not supposed to look for it here. What you’re supposed to look for is wit, good humor, and maybe a bit of heart. You’ll find it’s mostly here, but may not stay in sight for long.
Grade: B
Streamed by: Funimation
