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yelpI'm only a few episodes into this show so far but really love it and would recommend. I went into it knowing nothing except that some of my friends liked it, so I had fun discovering the unusual storyline for myself, but I don't think knowing the general idea would have hindered my enjoyment.
The story starts with the defeat of the Demon King, and the victorious adventuring party being celebrated on their return to town. During the celebration, the four of them watch a meteor shower together, and the elf mage Frieren tells the others she knows a place where they can get a much better view. She'll show them, at the next meteor shower in 50 years, so they should get back together then. The humans in the group laugh, but humor her, and she sets off on her own. Her plan for the next century or so is to travel and collect spells, and she says it'll be easier to do it on her own. (In a later flashback, we find out the group suggested she take on an apprentice for her travels, to avoid loneliness. But she refuses because apprentices will always die eventually anyway.)
Fifty years on she returns, looking exactly the same, to find the rest of the party old men, the humans near the end of their lifetimes. When one of them passes away after the promised meteor shower reunion, she reflects that she never really got to know them very well, even though they traveled together for a decade.
Later, the other human near the end of his life has taken on an orphan, Fern, and is worried what will happen to her after he's gone. He manages to trick Frieren (by appealing to her interest in old magical tomes) into staying a few years and teaching the girl magic in her spare time. Frieren finally realizes that it was his goal all along to see the girl cared for—by having her trained to the point that she won't be a liability and Frieren doesn't have much reason not to agree to take her along. I don't think she's noticed yet that he didn't want Frieren to be alone either.
That was the first two episodes or so, and the series seems like it will focus on their continued journeys after this point, with occasional flashbacks as Frieren reflects on the ten years the party spent adventuring together.
It's a really great narrative device. First, I love this thoughtful look at what it means for races of vastly different lifespans to coexist. How Frieren might know intellectually that humans have much less time, but still be shocked to see the actual effects of fifty years on her former companions. It's likely one of the reasons she chooses to travel on her own after the conclusion of their quest: it just seems easier, in general, than staying too long with short-lived humans as they speed through the aging process, watching them fall apart in front of you. Yet despite all the distance she puts on, these targeted flashbacks feel like she's closely examining certain treasured experiences; they really seem to mean something to her, that she still carries all these memories so tenderly even decades on, after half the party is gone.
In one episode, Frieren is asked to clean up a statue commemorating one of the party members, Himmel, and further to grow flowers in the field around it. She has a spell for that, but she remembers that Himmel once spoke of a certain kind of flower from his hometown, and said he wanted to show it to her someday. So she decides that she needs to find that flower and examine it, so she can magic it here. Frieren has always spent her time freely, casually committing years to a passing interest, and has little understanding of why Fern might be frustrated to waste years searching for some flower that might not even be around anymore. But it's also touching that she cared so much about this one moment in their ten years of adventuring, this one mention, that she sets herself to making this happen long after his death.
The narrative also works so well because as we revisit those flashbacks with Frieren, she's also rethinking these experiences, and we're kind of rethinking our understanding of her. She comes across as unemotional and cold as her name, and doesn't understand others' feelings or attempts to connect with her. She's more interested in magic, her hyperfixation, than in people. But we find out that she only started her hobby of collecting spells because the party found her spells helpful. And as she takes useless-seeming spells in payment for her services, spells like growing flowers, or turning grapes sour, she's pleased, while Fern is exasperated. But we later find out that the dwarf in the party, Eisen, loves sour grapes, and when they meet again, there's just the briefest scene of her en-sour-ing a bunch of grapes, and him devouring them with glee. There's a very rare and specific smile she puts on when she collects some useful spell or uses her magic to make someone happy. It feels like she struggles to connect with people emotionally, but she can do so through her magic.
Even though she says she never got to know these people, she still remembers all these things like their favorite food, or flower. Maybe humans pass so quickly and elves seem distant in comparison. But she's also still the one carrying their memories after so long, even the trivial things.
Okay, and one more random thing I really liked from the first few episodes. During their adventures, the party sealed away a powerful warlock. Now, eighty years on, the seal is breaking, so Frieren and Fern go to defeat him once and for all. The history books say the warlock had invented an extremely powerful spell that could break through any defense, and that's why they couldn't defeat him at the time. But when the warlock is unsealed and attacks them, Fern is surprised to find she can block it easily, and says, "But that's just a normal spell." It turns out that in the eighty years the warlock has been sealed, his killer spell, his life's work, has been broadly adopted by humans and just become standard. Defensive magic and equipment developed alongside it, and now it's all just commonplace, and easily blocked. A really clever look at how quickly technology grows, and how something recorded as so powerful by writers of the time might actually look basic today—precisely because it was so amazing that everyone wanted to learn it too.
The story starts with the defeat of the Demon King, and the victorious adventuring party being celebrated on their return to town. During the celebration, the four of them watch a meteor shower together, and the elf mage Frieren tells the others she knows a place where they can get a much better view. She'll show them, at the next meteor shower in 50 years, so they should get back together then. The humans in the group laugh, but humor her, and she sets off on her own. Her plan for the next century or so is to travel and collect spells, and she says it'll be easier to do it on her own. (In a later flashback, we find out the group suggested she take on an apprentice for her travels, to avoid loneliness. But she refuses because apprentices will always die eventually anyway.)
Fifty years on she returns, looking exactly the same, to find the rest of the party old men, the humans near the end of their lifetimes. When one of them passes away after the promised meteor shower reunion, she reflects that she never really got to know them very well, even though they traveled together for a decade.
Later, the other human near the end of his life has taken on an orphan, Fern, and is worried what will happen to her after he's gone. He manages to trick Frieren (by appealing to her interest in old magical tomes) into staying a few years and teaching the girl magic in her spare time. Frieren finally realizes that it was his goal all along to see the girl cared for—by having her trained to the point that she won't be a liability and Frieren doesn't have much reason not to agree to take her along. I don't think she's noticed yet that he didn't want Frieren to be alone either.
That was the first two episodes or so, and the series seems like it will focus on their continued journeys after this point, with occasional flashbacks as Frieren reflects on the ten years the party spent adventuring together.
It's a really great narrative device. First, I love this thoughtful look at what it means for races of vastly different lifespans to coexist. How Frieren might know intellectually that humans have much less time, but still be shocked to see the actual effects of fifty years on her former companions. It's likely one of the reasons she chooses to travel on her own after the conclusion of their quest: it just seems easier, in general, than staying too long with short-lived humans as they speed through the aging process, watching them fall apart in front of you. Yet despite all the distance she puts on, these targeted flashbacks feel like she's closely examining certain treasured experiences; they really seem to mean something to her, that she still carries all these memories so tenderly even decades on, after half the party is gone.
In one episode, Frieren is asked to clean up a statue commemorating one of the party members, Himmel, and further to grow flowers in the field around it. She has a spell for that, but she remembers that Himmel once spoke of a certain kind of flower from his hometown, and said he wanted to show it to her someday. So she decides that she needs to find that flower and examine it, so she can magic it here. Frieren has always spent her time freely, casually committing years to a passing interest, and has little understanding of why Fern might be frustrated to waste years searching for some flower that might not even be around anymore. But it's also touching that she cared so much about this one moment in their ten years of adventuring, this one mention, that she sets herself to making this happen long after his death.
The narrative also works so well because as we revisit those flashbacks with Frieren, she's also rethinking these experiences, and we're kind of rethinking our understanding of her. She comes across as unemotional and cold as her name, and doesn't understand others' feelings or attempts to connect with her. She's more interested in magic, her hyperfixation, than in people. But we find out that she only started her hobby of collecting spells because the party found her spells helpful. And as she takes useless-seeming spells in payment for her services, spells like growing flowers, or turning grapes sour, she's pleased, while Fern is exasperated. But we later find out that the dwarf in the party, Eisen, loves sour grapes, and when they meet again, there's just the briefest scene of her en-sour-ing a bunch of grapes, and him devouring them with glee. There's a very rare and specific smile she puts on when she collects some useful spell or uses her magic to make someone happy. It feels like she struggles to connect with people emotionally, but she can do so through her magic.
Even though she says she never got to know these people, she still remembers all these things like their favorite food, or flower. Maybe humans pass so quickly and elves seem distant in comparison. But she's also still the one carrying their memories after so long, even the trivial things.
Okay, and one more random thing I really liked from the first few episodes. During their adventures, the party sealed away a powerful warlock. Now, eighty years on, the seal is breaking, so Frieren and Fern go to defeat him once and for all. The history books say the warlock had invented an extremely powerful spell that could break through any defense, and that's why they couldn't defeat him at the time. But when the warlock is unsealed and attacks them, Fern is surprised to find she can block it easily, and says, "But that's just a normal spell." It turns out that in the eighty years the warlock has been sealed, his killer spell, his life's work, has been broadly adopted by humans and just become standard. Defensive magic and equipment developed alongside it, and now it's all just commonplace, and easily blocked. A really clever look at how quickly technology grows, and how something recorded as so powerful by writers of the time might actually look basic today—precisely because it was so amazing that everyone wanted to learn it too.
no subject
Date: 2025-04-28 06:39 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-04-29 03:47 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-04-28 07:57 pm (UTC)It feels like she struggles to connect with people emotionally, but she can do so through her magic.
This is such an interesting note! And the disconnect between how she says she doesn't know people well, but also how she remembers and how her old companions do too herself -- given how her old companion still cares about her enough to worry that she's lonely and to trust her with an apprentice... Like, that's a lot to entrust someone with! And also a lot of care for so long apart!
no subject
Date: 2025-04-29 03:49 am (UTC)And yes, her relationship with them is so interesting. There also seems to be an aspect of only knowing how to relate to people through what she can do for them? (Magic.) Which is also kind of relatable!
no subject
Date: 2025-04-30 02:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-05-04 11:41 pm (UTC)