By: Peggy Sue Wood | @pswediting

I didn’t expect to be writing this kind of post about The Rising of the Shield Hero, but Season 4 was a pain to get through.

This used to be one of my favorite shows and is one I have found genuinely engaging in the past. The premise is very interesting to me and I love most of the characters as well as the way it occasionally pushed beyond standard isekai beats with its story. I am a frequent consumer of what I lovingly refer to as “Isekai Trash,” so this was a rather unique series and favorite of mine in early seasons. I’ve written about the manga/anime a few times, I’ve discussed it many times with friends, but I’m not sure I can return to watching a Season 5 release with any joy in my heart at the moment because of how much I hated Season 4.

In my opinion, Season 4 was the worst yet. Episodes 1–7 are just slop. Not just slow, they are painfully disengaging. The pacing drags without the benefit of meaningful character development or narrative payoff and the central idea seems to be around the tiger children, whom I have grown to hate.

Sincerely: whoever thought audiences wanted to spend extended time watching Atla Fayon (the female, tiger child character) fawn over and hero-worship Naofumi for episode after episode—what are you doing? It doesn’t add depth, it doesn’t move the story forward, and it actively undercuts any sense of growth the series had in earlier seasons. If anything, it makes the world feel smaller and the character dynamics more shallow when you have so many other things to work with in this series. It’s also just disgusting to me. This goes well beyond “girl has crush” into territories that make me uncomfortable.

I hit Episode 6, paused, and didn’t come back for over two months, and months more before I could write this review. That’s not a great sign for a show I used to follow eagerly.

Part of the problem is that the series seems to have lost confidence in what made it compelling in the first place. Earlier seasons thrived on Naofumi’s outsider status and the tension between distrust, survival, and reluctant community-building. Here, those elements are flattened and it is not, in my opinion, because of the location change to the beast-folk nation(s) where the Shield Hero is adored.

The emotional stakes in the series are not building up in this season, making them feel completely absent in the first half of the season and then very rushed in the second half of the season (so, like, pre-episode 7 or post-), which made the conflicts hold 0 meaning for me.

To be fair, things do improve after Episode 7. The latter half of the season is, at least, watchable. It’s fine but not good and that’s the most frustrating for me because it feels like erosion.

Look, this series had a hard start in general. Season 1 was not appreciated in major media, and a lot of anime YouTubers and reviewers took a look and disagreed with that opinion. It got better reception later, and in Seasons 2 and 3, it has had relatively alright-appeals. Some parts are slow and boring, others are very engaging.

Personally, I felt like the Spirit Turtle Arc in Season 2 was a dud, but it gets better. Season 3 had its own ups and downs. However, Season 4 was just down to me. Rather, it was horrible and I can’t seem to let that go the way I did before.

At this point, I’m honestly not sure how I feel about a potential Season 5. I’ll probably watch it but the excitement is gone at this moment and that’s the biggest disappointment of all.

If you watched Season 4, what were your thoughts? Did you finish? Did you hate it? Did you love it? (I have concerns if you answer yes to that last one, but okay…) Let me know in the comments below.