I’ll be honest, I did not see any of the promo material for this anime. In fact, I only knew its title and was kind of interested in it. Then the first episode drops, the fall season starts up and so many people are talking about this. Now, remember, The Eminence in Shadow was released very close to Spy x Family and BNHA season 6, and yet, this anime managed to make winds about itself. That is something alright.
So welcome back to another one of my first-impressions articles. Today we are talking about The Eminence in Shadow. I will be highlighting how I felt while watching the first episode and then you can decide for yourself if you want to check this out or not. Do keep in mind though, I will be going over some spoilers. As we are basically discussing the first episode here.
What do I think of The Eminence in Shadow?
Right off the bat, the title “The Eminence in Shadow” or “Kage no Jitsuryokusha” sounds like an isekai title right? So imagine my surprise when I see it in a modern-day, real-life sort of setting. We start off from the perspective of an ojou-sama-type girl, Nishino Akane. She’s apparently a big deal, she works in different shows and stuff while in high school. There is this mysterious classmate of hers, she doesn’t really like since he is always so distant.
Sounds like a set-up to a high school drama right? or maybe even a crime drama? BUT NO! The Eminence in Shadow is an isekai. The episode will lead you to believe that this will be a sort of Batman-style story in the real world but it’s a f*cking isekai! This has to be one of the most elaborate setups to an isekai I’ve ever seen. The only ones that come close to matching it would be Saihate no Paladin and World’s Finest Assassin.
I won’t say anything more about the episode, go and enjoy it yourself. The shock value hit so hard mid-way through the episode man. It was awesome. I hope that The Eminence in Shadow maintains this level of writing throughout the season because we’ll probably never see Akane again but they went out of their way to give her a definitive character, monologues, and even a detailed backstory. If this is anything like World’s Finest Assassin, I am all in for it.
Moving away from the writing a bit, the sound design in this episode was really epic. The BGMs were extremely on point and the ending theme (I think that’s the opening theme though) was really good as well. Far as negatives are concerned, I don’t really like the character designs but art is subjective. And it’s only the first episode so they may grow on me down the line as well. No complaints with the animation part though, that one fight in this episode was really well directed and it was fluid.
My gripes with the character designs aside, this does look pretty awesome.
Conclusion
Well, those were my first impressions of The Eminence in Shadow. I really look forward to seeing more episodes of this show. As I said, it’s pretty rare for isekais to have an elaborate set-up like this. I just hope it doesn’t go downhill like Saihate no Paladin did. Let me know what you guys think in the comments. I will take my leave here, there’s more stuff to write. See ya!
