The summer 2021 anime season continues to roll on, and I’m enjoying sampling all the new shows. One series that’s winning a lot of fans has been Genjitsu Shugi no Yuusha Oukoku Saikenki, or How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom, a kind of “hyper-realistic isekai” series about a government worker who gets summoned to a fantasy kingdom which he must save… by doing boring things like economic planning, smart managing of finances and applying modern forestry techniques. Let’s learn more about the show!
The Story of Realist Hero
After the death of his grandfather, 19-year-old Kazuya Souma just wants to lead a simple life as a civil servant. Imagine his surprise when he’s suddenly summoned to another world, the Elfrieden Kingdom, as their Hero. He’s supposed to be given as tribute to a neighboring nation, but instead, he presents the king with suggestions on how they can reinvigorate their economy and better strengthen the nation of Elfrieden, based on smart ideas from our modern world. The next thing he knows, the king abdicates his throne and declares Kazuya the new king of the land, seeing that he’s the best man for the job.
The anime is based on a popular series of novels that have sold over 10,000,000 copies since 2014. The story got its start on the amateur Shousetsu ni Narou (Let’s Become a Novelist) website, making it similar in origin to So I’m a Spider, So What? and Redo of Healer. Like the second work, it got banned from the Narou website, which probably helped improve its popularity.
As is often the case with Japanese stories, some of the more subtle aspects might not be properly appreciated by international audiences, including the delicious irony of a civil servant — the safest and most rock-solid career you can choose in Japan, and therefore the least sexy — becoming a “hero.” I’m sure this series is very popular with all Japanese working in important yet uninspiring jobs who dream of being summoned to another world where their skills at calculating the annual tax revenue generated by agricultural lands will allow them to save the world.
But is it a “Realistic” Isekai Anime?
While a story based around the irony of a Japanese civil servant rebuilding a fantasy world with ideas about modern economics from our world is kind of fresh — and right out of the isekai playbook invented by Mark Twain 132 years ago — Realist Hero takes this reasonable concept into a somewhat un-realistic place. As the story unfolds, he ends up with a harem of cute human and demi-human girls, despite him already being promised to the princess of Elfrieden.
Believe me, I’m understanding of the challenges anime/manga/light novel creators have in crafting characters we will feel emotionally attached to as fans, and I know that any modern series needs lots of female characters for the main character to interact with, so we can buy figures and obsess about who “best girl” is and all. So I’m definitely not going to criticize Genjitsu Shugi Yuusha for adding a harem element like some other fans might. The best thing I can say is that the existence of multiple girls in the story doesn’t overshadow the enjoyable complexity of the plot, so I don’t see it as a problem.
Which girl will our hero choose in the end? Here’s one option…
Who Should Watch Genjitsu Shugi Yuusha?
Is How the Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom for you? I’d say that if you enjoy exploring the many varieties of isekai anime stories Japan produces for us, then sure. Also, if you like the greater level of economic and political complexity in works like That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime, Spice and Wolf or the “plot” of Maoyu ~ Archenemy & Hero, then this show is probably one you should check out!
Thanks for reading this post about Realist Hero! What anime are you watching this season, and what shows would you like us to cover on this blog? Post in the comments below, or tell us on Twitter!
We love anime games for popular game consoles, and stock lots of region-free games for the Nintendo Switch and Sony PS5. These games are all region-free, so you can play them on console hardeware anywhere in the world. See all the new titles we posted this week here!
