The Wolf And The Horny Maiden – ‘The Master of Ragnarok & Blesser of Einherjar’ Episode 4 Review

What’s the show? The Master of Ragnarok & Blesser of Einherjar, Episode 4.

Ah, it’s that show you endlessly compare to ‘Game of Thrones’, how’s it this week? Funnily enough not that Games of Thrones-y, if anything I could compare it to Lord of the Rings moreso!

More of a sideways step than too much of a leap in genre. What about it exactly? Well it’s more this feeling of Yuuto having acquired a harem of powerful allies, the most surprising of which is Chris and Al, the loli twins from last week—turns out they’re not just here to squeal and be silly (which I would have been fine with FYI), they each also have acquired powerful assistance runes that allow for faster travel between places with their horse and carriages. Also the older, ditsier sister Al is something of a sleeper agent who can be ‘activated’ by her younger sister, allowing her to move and strike with the precision of a well-trained assassin!

And how’s that like ‘Lord of the Rings’ exactly? This is Yuuto’s ‘fellowship’ people from different tribes banding together to fight a common enemy—the lightning tribe, led by Steinþór—who we met last week—and his army of eight thousand strong and loyal men!

Feels a bit of tenuous link, but whatever. So this episode is more preamble than main event I’m guessing? Correct, we get a brief teaser at the end of the episode of the scale of things to come as we see Steinþór’s massive army at the city gates and it makes me hope what’s to come will be well-executed enough on-screen.

I know it’s just a copy/paste job but it still looks impressive.

Seems like things are moving pretty quickly, we’re only a quarter of the way through the season? I do admit this story does seem to be moving at a rollicking pace (and commenters on the internet have pointed out it’s already surpassed the first light novel, which for an anime adaptation is quicker than usual). But I’m totally fine with the story and action moving ahead so quickly, as long as what we have is coherent and interesting—which it is. Not only does giving the newly added twin characters some relevance to the plot (beyond harem shenanigans) make their addition feel more worthwhile but even the prerequisite harem shenanigans of the episode are more important here than before.

Oh yeah? Let’s see you try and justify that… So Linnea comes to Yuuto in the middle of the night and strips down, asking again to marry her. And for a brief second he’s tempted—but he confirms what I’ve been assuming all this time, he’s in love with Mitsuki—his childhood friend from back in present day Japan. He then sits her down and explains everything, where he’s from, how he knows so much about military techniques and future technology—and he’s even vulnerable enough to give us some backstory from the previous two years that happened before the start of the series. When he first arrivied, having all this future knowledge made him cocky and big-headed, which led to the death of someone close to him, someone he trusted. This humbled him, made him realise that just because he has knowledge doesn’t mean he has all the answers. He tells her this because she’s insecure about her position as the head of her clan, and it’s an honestly sweet exchange between the two.

Who would’ve thought a silly Isekai harem anime would have one of the best inspirtation quotes of the season!

All right fine, you pretty much justified it’s existence… all though I’m sure it could be argued that she didn’t need to try and jump him in the nude to get to that point. You can argue all you want but you’re not going to change my mind…

As expected… So, how’s this episode rank compared to the others? Dare I say my favourite so far? Not that there’s much to compare to but the show felt a lot more ‘whole’ this week, previous weeks were a bit wishy-washy with certain things whereas here it felt more solidified. I don’t know if this series is going to become too bloated and rushed by covering as much subject matter as they are in such a short span of time. But as it is now it makes for an entertaining time.