Winter 2022 First Impressions – In the Land of Leadale

Streaming: Crunchyroll

Episodes: 12

Source: Light Novel

Episode Summary: A certain woman on life support loses her life when a blackout causes the power to fail. Yet she awakens again one morning to sun pouring through an open window. Certain things feel very familiar, and she soon realizes that this world is the inside of a VR game called “Leadale” she enjoyed playing while in the hospital, and that she’s embodied the character she created, a high elf named Cayna. When she speaks with the innkeeper, Cayna learns about a few inconsistencies from her time as a player. The seven kingdoms have now become three, following the intervention of the world’s deities. Oh, and two hundred years have also passed since Cayna’s time as an active player.

As Cayna continues to get her bearings, she decides to travel to her avatar’s Silver Tower, a home base where she once kept her items (and also, apparently wreaked much havoc against other players in the past as the notorious “Silver Ring Witch,” a moniker that seems to have survived among the populace). There, the tower’s guardian scolds her for her absenteeism, and notifies her that her “son” came looking for her about sixty years ago, an interesting fact that she files away for later. On the way back from this outing, Cayna saves a man from a horned bear attack and brings the meat back to the village for a grand feast. Cayna still isn’t sure what incarnation of Leadale this might be, but it may grant her a second chance at life in a world that she once enjoyed.

Impressions: The need for escapism is something that I understand, especially having lived through some difficult times (personal and also more general). There are those who have the fortitude to remain passionate in the face of constant political upheaval, discrimination, and personal harm, but I’m not one of those people. I’ve often felt recently that I’m just running on fumes, trying to deal with crises in the most basic way so that I can simply continue to exist. This is probably why I’ve pumped a lot of hours into games like Animal Crossing: New Horizons, because its simulation mechanics offer a way to accomplish reasonable goals (or even to play without making any goals whatsoever) without the pressure of an exact, looming time frame or some authority figure demanding things of you that you aren’t able to provide. It takes place in a golden land where all loans have a 0% interest rate and you can spend all day fishing if you want to. Escapist entertainment can be necessary.

One’s perception of their own life and their ability to navigate it is something extremely personal to each person; so too is their desire to escape it from time-to-time. That’s why I’m a little bit bummed that we don’t get a bit more time with Cayna’s human player before diving right into Leadale mode. There are mere seconds at the beginning of the episode and one short flashback in the middle where we catch a glimpse of her circumstances, and so all we’re able to do is to speculate about the person she was. Perhaps this is by design; the implication that she was “confined” to a hospital bed and “needs” to escape into a game has some broader implications that speak to a misunderstanding of what it means to be disabled or to have a major illness, and I think seeing more of her actual life could either work to clear up that misunderstanding or to confirm an ableist viewpoint of the storyteller. On the other hand, why make this an isekai at all if the references to her life on Earth are so brief as to not really matter? Why not just make this yet another fantasy series with some video game elements?

That in a nutshell is a question I’ve had about several isekai stories as of late – why utilize the mechanic of reincarnation (or whatever) into another life, if the previous life has extremely little bearing on the present? For all the content criticisms I may have of Mushoku Tensei, at the very least its protagonist’s former life and personality are influential on his second chance at life – it’s one of the major points of the story. Perhaps this is something that Leadale intends to address as the story continues; if so then I don’t mind rethinking this criticism. But the story of a long-lived elf waking up after an extended coma (or similar) doesn’t require that her character be an avatar of a human from our world, so I question the choice to involve that mechanic in the first place.

In any case, while this all may seem like harsh criticism on my part, I want to also state that this premiere episode was pretty fun. It’s not groundbreaking (it doesn’t have to be) and its gaming mechanics are a little bit stale (but many RPGs are kind of like that). However, thematically it seems to be the story of someone choosing to do nice things for other people going forward rather than continuing to be domineering, mean player character who hassles others, and that in itself is kind of nice.

Pros: Cayna is a wealth of fun reaction images. While most of the episode’s visual elements are pretty standard and unremarkable, there’s definitely a lot that can be accomplished using some well-timed funny faces.

Cons: There’s a distinct lack of dynamism in most of the shot composition throughout this episode. This isn’t something that normally bugs me, but after such a long string of medium-shots and close-ups, it really started to become obvious. One technique that anime tends to use to “get around” its general lack of character animation is using cool still frames and character poses. It’s something that Orient really put to good use throughout its premiere. Leadale is extremely static and visually uninteresting, except for one brief moment where Cayna fights a bear (which I chose as a featured image for the post). Combined with its bog standard story, this visual execution doesn’t do the whole package many favors.

Content Warnings: Brief shots of a person on life support in a hospital. Fantasy violence (non-graphic).

Would I Watch More? – I wasn’t especially enthralled by this episode – its fantasy and gaming elements were fairly basic and I’m not convinced it needed to be an isekai story in the first place. I probably won’t end up watching any more, though I will reiterate that I do appreciate a series in which the characters are actually nice to one-another.