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Sorcerous Stabber Orphen: Battle of Kimluck Review

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It’s time to take a look at Orphen season 2, not to be mixed up with the season 2 to the original show. This one delves into the Kimluck battles and I’m always still curious at how the novels played things out. The events in this show compared to the first one are just so massively different on every level that it’s pretty interesting. I am glad that Azalie gets more to do in this version though as she is easily one of the standout characters. It’s a fun show but considerably weaker than the first one mainly due to some slow pacing with new characters that you’ll find it hard to care about and Orphen’s main plot being a little hard to buy into.

So the gang are finally arriving at Kimluck. This is a place that is incredibly dangerous for sorcerers aside from those who are already within the kingdom but Orphen has to go there anyway. Azalie was interested in the place and that’s the best lead that he’s got. Plus, he’s Orphen, what can these guys do to him? Well, he’s about to walk into a situation that’s much bigger than he was expecting as there are some mysteries involving the origins of the dragons, the origins of the sorcerers, and even the legendary sword from season 1. It turns out that pretty much everything has roots within Kimluck and Orphen won’t be able to use his true powers anymore after being traumatized during a fight with one of the villains. Can he escape these tunnels alive?

The heroes are stuck in the tunnels for quite a bit after being betrayed by one of the locals. Of course Orphen did say they couldn’t trust anyone here but the gang ends up following their lead anyway so the warning pretty much didn’t matter. At the end of the day I suppose if they want to find the secrets of this place it’s not like they have a whole lot of say in the matter anyway. This leads into the weakest aspect of the film though.

See, the characters are stuck in this underground passageway where the water could come flooding in at any point. This means they can’t really blast their way out or it could cause a cave in. Usually Orphen could at least try some kind of spell but here’s the kicker. So Orphen murdered this one guy who was in his way because he used too much power accidentally. Orphen blames himself because even in the life or death situation he thinks he should have been able to hold back and just knock the guy out.

I have a lot of issues with this, one of which being that this guy was trying to murder Orphen and had a bunch of steroids so he was moving very fast. Orphen was nearly the one who died there. Even beyond that, Orphen doesn’t strike me as someone who would be traumatized so easily like that. In this world magic is based on your emotions so while he is in a fragile state like this there isn’t a whole lot that he can do. I find it hard to buy into personally. It’s also to such an exaggerated level where he is down in the dumps for almost the whole season from that point.

It’s a shame because Orphen’s usually a lot of fun for being such a confident main character. He’ll talk back to anyone and fight with the best of them. We don’t get to see that version of Orphen for very long here. So I can safely say that the murder guilt plot was just bad. It doesn’t help to enhance the story in any way and instead only serves to hold it back. If you had to do this kind of plot then I think it needed to be a bystander. For example, Orphen didn’t hold back enough and his attack murdered an onlooker or something. That would make a whole lot more sense for why this incident would break Orphen.

Okay so that plot wasn’t great but the show does have a fantastic climax. Azalie’s always a lot of fun like I mentioned before because she’s the tough rival for Orphen. Their relationship is a bit different than the average rival one though as she was also a mentor to him. He doesn’t even know what her true goals are here but she tends to find herself in dangerous spots most of the time. While he did beat her that one time, she is always portrayed as being far more skilled than he is.

This also seems to be the case in the climax as we finally get to see them team up against Quo. Now granted, Orphen is nerfed for the whole guilt thing from before but Azalie is definitely doing the heavy lifting here. The magic fight is a lot of fun because we don’t always get to see these large scale battles in Orphen. The series typically ends up being more about adventure and world building which are both good as well of course but sometimes you just want that big fight to end things off with and the show manages to deliver on that.

The final fight has some super forms and a lot of strategy as well. Quo’s battle style is rather fun as he has a solid defense and offense but isn’t really able to use them at the same time. In that respect it’ll remind you of a video game as the characters have to try and hit him with perfect timing before he resets. There’s also a very memorable part near the end where he pulls out a gun. It’s always very impressive when the villain just pulls out a gun in any kind of show where there are super powers because you just wonder how useful it can possibly be. Well, it comes in clutch here that’s for sure.

In general I thought Quo was a rather fun villain. At first he is more of a minion who just takes orders so he didn’t stand out but he finally realizes that the whole thing is nonsense and makes a move later on. With his level of abilities it makes sense not to just meekly follow orders and the leader did seem rather crazy with how he would murder off his subordinates for no real reason. Quo at least tried to have an honor code and thought he was doing the right thing. Throw in his super forms and he may be the most memorable Orphen villain aside from the clone doll in season 1 or Azalie if she still counts.

Salua is a returning character from season 1 but he definitely does not look very good here. So he was taken down off screen by the Kimluck church and the best you can say for him is that he never talked no matter how much they interrogated him. I’ll give him credit for that but that’s about it. Considering that he was a death instructor who gave Orphen a tough fight in season 1, he’s treated like fodder in this season. He gets wrecked in every fight and just can’t seem to hold his own against everyone. He constantly looks to Orphen for help which tells me that he doesn’t have a ton of confidence in his own abilities either. It’s like without his special sword he’s not as tough as he once was.

In this verse the power levels don’t go too high yet so I get that he has limits but he does not look impressive in the slightest. Volcan and Dortin don’t get a big role in this season but I was cool with that. They’re the comic relief characters who will have a fun scene once in a while but usually don’t really do anything to enhance the scene. They just slow it down and you wait for them to go away. They’re traveling with Azalie for most of the season which is a change of pace but even then they don’t do anything.

Cleao’s role isn’t huge as the main heroine either but she still manages to be helpful quite a few times. It really helps that she has Leki (I always think she’s calling him “Lucky” though) around since that little dragon type creature can take almost anyone out. It’s not always a get out of jail free card but it does work quite a bit. Cleao also isn’t opposed to getting into the field and trying to swing at the enemy either. She has a lot more energy than you would expect and so she’s a lot of fun.

Definitely a big improvement over Majic who I’m still not sold on. He at least tries to fight in Orphen’s place at times here while Orphen is unable to deal any damage. That said, he’s still ineffective at almost all points so it doesn’t feel like there’s a lot of improvement there. For every step forward he takes, he seems to fall backwards almost immediately. I look forward to the days when he becomes someone that can be counted on.

Childman’s dead by the time season 2 pops around but he still gets a whole lot of hype. For example he is the only sorcerer to ever break into Kimluck and then escape with his life. We also get a flashback where he is the chosen one able to meet the god who broke away from the other gods to deliver the power of the dragons. The guy really got around so in a way it’s too bad that he couldn’t have fought more in the present before being taken down. I’d have liked to have seen more of his skills.

For example, could Orphen really beat him in a fair fight? It seems like the answer to that may be a no. At least Orphen still has the cool title of being the Razor’s Edge. It’s brought up constantly and I do like it as a title. It’s just got some gravity behind it and makes him really sound like a tough customer. I am still a big fan of Orphen so when he’s not down in the dumps he is usually coming up with some good lines or solid fight scenes.

Madchen is one of the main new characters here. She fights for the resistance and opposes the will of Kimluck. Naturally this means that her whole squad is murdered in the opening episode and she spends the rest of the show getting styled on by all of the villains. In particular the worst appearance for her is when she tries to assassinate Carlotta who is asleep in bed but fails. Of course we learn that Carlotta was awake and would have easily bested Carlotta but it doesn’t help Madchen’s hype. Really the issue for Madchen is that she’s a normal human with a sword who has no magical enhancements. That is really not going to take you far in this kind of show. At least she is on the right side so maybe one day she will get a power up.

Carlotta’s an interesting villain but it’s hard to say exactly what she is thinking. She enjoys being a villain for sure but is quick to walk out on the main villain when the tides turn. She’s just looking after herself but you have to assume she may lose her wealth if she isn’t careful about being so openly rebellious. I’d like to see more of her because there is some potential here but I get the feeling she won’t be returning as the heroes leave Kimluck for good.

Then we have the Pope who is at the head of this and there’s an interesting twist about him. He’s not just some old guy in the chair but can actually fight. The doll in that place may or may not even be the real guy although I like the idea that it is. It’s hard to get a read on him. At first glance he seems like some insane villain who isn’t planning for the long game but maybe there’s more to him. He’s still more interesting than Name who is the villain that only exists to traumatize Orphen.

Name starts rambling on about the Church of Kimluck and trying to be of use to the place. The guy is completely brainwashed by the church to the point where he fills himself with steroids so that he’ll die but is fine with it. He even starts questioning Orphen’s resolve and messing with his mind. I would have liked if Orphen had just laughed all of this off but unfortunately he takes it pretty hard the whole time. The guy is surprisingly skilled so he does last quite a bit. I’ll at least acknowledge that he is powerful considering that the guy’s only human. Those drugs really did the trick.

There’s not much more to say about Azalie as I already explained why she’s so much fun. She has Orphen’s confidence but with an even higher level of skill. She’s always mysterious about her intentions but at the end of the day she still does help Orphen out when he’s in trouble. Azalie’s like an anti-hero in that sense as she is quietly helping Orphen out at every turn. I wouldn’t be surprised if she is leading him somewhere or has some kind of grand plan in the end but we would probably need more seasons for that and I’m not sure what the odds would be on this getting a season 3.

As for the plot with the gods, it is interesting in concept but right now it’s hard to care too much. The series tries a lot of worldbuilding throughout but I’d say it’s just not all really connecting quite yet. We have dragons, gods, humans, sorcerers, and they all mix together with the origins. It seems like it’s possible that the other gods may intervene at some point but what would that really do with the plot? Who knows so we’ll just have to wait. It was impressive that the girl behind the door survived being choked by a god for many years but since they were partially in the other dimension and partially in the real world, I guess this was due to being between realms. I have to say that being choked for years sounds like a pretty awful experience though.

So if they want the gods and dragons (Or they may even be the same thing with how regal the dragons here are. It’s like they’re an elevated life form) to be relevant then I really need season 3 to make this more of a focus. With Sorcerers effectively being humans who have some of the dragon blood within them, I wonder if that means we could get some super forms in the future. I’d definitely be down with that. For the animation, the show looks pretty solid as you’d expect. I liked how vibrant everything was in season 1 and that continues here. I would say it looks just as good and while most of the show is pretty low key so the animators don’t get to show off, the climax is able to go all out.

As for the soundtrack, there aren’t any real new themes that I can remember but it was decent. None of the tracks really stand out in particular. The ending is decent enough and the opening’s good. I wonder if it’s some kind of remix because the opening sounds like one I’ve heard many years ago but it could just be that it’s the same band or something. The visuals in the opening are a lot of fun though and while it may make you think that the show is more action packed than it is, it certainly serves its purpose of getting you hyped to see what’s coming up next.

While the middle of the show may not be the strongest, ultimately Orphen is able to continue to be solid because it did have a strong start and ending. The intro where Orphen shows up to save Madchen and fight off the dolls was a good way to start things off and I already talked about the climax. The show also makes for a pretty easy watch because it’s an upbeat fantasy adventure. I’d also say there is a good amount of replay value for the title as a whole because the writing and banter are good. So while this didn’t match season 1, I would be pretty hyped for a season 3 if we ever get that.


Overall, Battle of Kimluck doesn’t ultimately end up matching up to season 1. Mainly I’d say this is due to the Orphen guilt plot and the underground episodes just not being very exciting. I want to say that way more happened in season 1 than 2 and maybe that’s partially because it was pre arc but the pacing was always on point. Season 2 can be more of a slow boil leading up to the final fight. It’s still a good show though. The writing is on point and I do like the character cast as a whole. The graphics are good and the music is solid enough so that has all of the makings of a good show. It doesn’t make any big mistakes either and will leave you hyped for season 3 to see what Azalie is going to do next and what all of this lore is leading up to. If you want a good fantasy watch then this is up your alley.

Overall 7/10

Sorcerous Stabber Orphen Review

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After watching all of the Slayer seasons, it was time for a slightly more serious take on the fantasy genre. By “slightly” more serious, I mean that this one is very somber and dramatic for the entirety of its run. (Ignoring the sequel series/season) You can tell that this is the tone that it is going for as soon as the first opening plays. It’s catchy, but the images are also quite sad. It depicts a barren wasteland and a solitary hero who must wander through life on his own even when his friends are near. His mission is a fire one and the stakes are high. It’s a fun series even if one of the characters goes through a personality shift a little too quickly at the end. (Azalie)

A long time ago, Orphen was taught magic at the Tower of Fang. Things went well for a while and Orphen became one of the strongest magicians in the world, but his mentor (Azalie) became greedy with power and used a mystical sword to stab herself which transformed her into the dragon, Bloody August. The Tower of Fang decided that she must be eliminated which caused Orphen to leave on a mission to save her and to defeat the Tower of Fang if necessary. On his travels, he ended up meeting up with a kid named Majic and a rich lady named Cleao. Majic gets involved in the quest because Orphen decides to take him in as an apprentice (For a good amount of money of course) As for Cleao, her family owns the legendary sword that transformed Azalie in the first place so Orphen decides to take it back. Cleao follows him so that she can take the sword back once he’s done with it.

The sword isn’t powerful enough to change Azalie back to her human form though so Orphen needs to find a few relics to amp up its power and allow him to cast the spell. Is it that easy though? A lot of complications occur and naturally the Tower of Fang aims to stand in his way. Along the way, Orphen softens up a little with the group, but for the majority of the series, he’s serious business through and through. He can’t relax until the mission is complete.

Orphen’s plot is pretty engaging and this first series builds up a lot of the universe as we learn about the current status quo. The Tower of Fang seems to be the only ruling body in the world or at least the main one by which all others look to for advice. I wonder how they got such a high rank since the group doesn’t seem all that tough. If I could change one thing about the show’s plot, it would be that I’d like a better resolution at the end, fight-wise. There wasn’t really a big fight to end the series surprisingly and Orphen never got to have a big fight with Childman. Even fighting Azalie in her final form would have been a blast to see as the student surpassed the mentor. Unfortunately, all of these fights never got to happen which was a little disappointing. The series had a good amount of action in its run, but I feel like all anime should end off with a big fight. End on a high note right?

Orphen’s the lead of course and he makes for a good one. He’s completely focused on the mission so he rarely humors his comrades on their comic relief subplots. He’s an excellent mage so he rarely ever loses a fight. He reminds me a little of Train Heartnet although he is typically in denial a little more. Azalie isn’t quite as selfless and nice as Saya was in Black Cat. It’s still a noble goal to save her of course, but he certainly bites off a lot more than he can chew here. Regardless, Orphen’s tough personality and ace combat skills make him a great lead.

Cleao’s the main heroine and she always means well. Unfortunately, she’s not much of a fighter. She gets into arguments with Orphen quite a lot, which ultimately help him not get too focused on the mission to the point where he’ll lose everything else. When a fight starts, Cleao’s glad to try and help even if it’s only a little. It’d be great if she could learn a spell or two, but Cleao is certainly charasmatic so she’s got that going in her favor. The group needed an energetic character in the mix for the good banter and contrast that it brings. She owns Leki, a magical dog of immense power who comes in handy quite a bit. This also ended up helping Cleao a lot since Leki is immensely powerful and can blow away most opponents with ease. When Leki grows up, he could even end up being stronger than Orphen if the bigger versions of him are any indication.

Then…we have Majic. Unfortunately, he’s a bad character. He’s one of the main comic relief characters of the series and a running gag is that his magical abilities are terrible and seem to never actually improve no matter how far the series ends up progressing. One scene towards the very beginning of the series doomed him though even if it was meant as a quick comic relief scene. Majic uses his spells to make a mirror next to where Cleao was bathing so he could watch. It’s a pretty despicable act and while Orphen put an end to it, it shows that Majic definitely has no standards. It’s a quick scene and Majic never does anything like it again, but there’s no way that he could be a likable character after that. When you’re in a small group on the road, you have to be able to trust your partners. After an act like that, there’s no way you can really trust Majic so it’s good to see him fail at performing spells for the rest of the series.

Volkan and Dortin are the other comic relief characters. Volkan always acts as the voice of reason against Dortin while Dortin forces him to come along anyway. Dortin is like Hercule or other comic relief characters who always talk a great game before getting wrecked. It works really well for Dortin though and he is easily one of the best comic relief characters of this type out there. He gets most of the best lines in the entire show and the banter between him and Orphen helps to make the series so enjoyable. Typically, any scene with the two of them is going to be pretty good and a lot of Dortin’s schemes are fun even if they’re doomed to fail. I don’t really care for Volkan, but then again, I typically don’t care for the “straight man” in jokes or the serious comic relief character. It just doesn’t work for me at all and destroys the point of a comic relief character.
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The whole show is really about saving Azalie so she has a big role in this. For the first half of the series she’s essentially mindless. Not completely as seen when the dragon turns into Childman and he still has control, but it is hard to see what her plan is. Later on, we find out a lot of startling plot twists about her. The sword transformation may have not been how she planned it to go, but she was aiming for power for all the wrong reasons. She always wanted Childman, but as he was a reasonable mentor, he placed the friend zone card. That’s what Azalie wanted vengeance and she ultimately ends up taking over Childman’s body.

From there, she freezes one of the Fang members, tries to destroy Childman, and also breaks the mind of one of the Elders. She is a complete villain through and through, there’s no way to get around that. Despite all of this, everyone treats her as a likable hero by the end who just went a little off course. You can make a plot like that work such as Cardfight Vanguard where Kai went around doing quite a few evil things before being taken down, but it has to be gradual. In Orphen, this turnaround is just about instant as soon as she is essentially defeated and Childman is turned back into a baby. Also, we learn that she essentially becomes the boss of the Tower of Fang in the sequel series. She never gets to pay for her crimes of murder and assault in the slightest.

Don’t get me wrong, Azalie makes for a great villain, but it’s incredibly hard to buy the fact that she is now a “hero.” It’s not that easy and quick to switch sides and especially not when we see her being evil for quite so long. All it took was for Childman to remove the friendzone card from the table, but it’s way too late for that. So, while Azalie is cool, I think that the end plot development simply did not make any sense by the end. It could have been handled better.

Childman is Azalie’s mentor and seems to be generally considered as the strongest magician in the world. His abilities are quite high and it is revealed at the end that he could even have defeated the Bloody August if he had wished to do so. I don’t like this guy though because he is supremely annoying. All along he wanted to save Azalie as well, but he just decided not to tell anyone and as a result, he made no real progress in his quest. Either way, he would need some artifacts if he wanted to do anything, but he never got any of them and then Azalie took his body with ease while Childman was in awe of her. He really could have handled the situation 100x better than he actually did. I respect his power, but that’s about all.

Hartia is Orphen’s childhood friend, although you could barely tell from this season. Hartia acts like a friend and tries to act as a mediator between Childman and Orphen, but it’s tough since Orphen wants nothing to do with him. It also doesn’t help that while Azalie was in Childman’s body, she kept incriminating herself and Hartia intentionally to further widen the wedge between the friends. By the end, Orphen and Hartia had some all out battles with each other. Hartia could certainly have done a better job of explaining things at different points, but in the end the fact of the matter is that he chose the tower over Orphen and that’s probably at the heart of Orphen’s grudge. I like Hartia’s superhero identity even if it certainly doesn’t help to smooth things over with Orphen. He’s actually a lot stronger than he lets on.

Flameheart is one of the main villains and he is the first opponent to flat out defeat Orphen before the fight was interrupted. He may not be the coolest villain around, but he is quite powerful. He meets with a bit of an anticlimactic end though as he made the same mistake as Azalie as he tried to grab the sword. I suppose that the sword is just hard to resist. I’m not really a fan of this guy though and he does do a lot of whining when things don’t go his way. Good villains have to keep their calm and activate a backup plan when things don’t go well.

The show has some mild fanservice towards the beginning and the end. For the end it’s mainly through the astral projection of Azalie appearing for no real reason. It’s her astral form, but it is still overused quite a bit and Cleao also gets some towards the beginning, but by and large Orphen manages to dodge this trap for the most part. There are definitely a few filler esque episodes, but they’re typically not bad. At the very least, filler helps you appreciate the real episodes a whole lot more.

Power Level wise, I’d place Orphen the character above several magicians like Dr. Strange and Lina Inverse (Definitely a close fight though and composite Lina could be another story with her Sword of Light) but physically he is around human level which can hurt him against fast opponents. As a series, Orphen is fairly realistic despite the magic so it wouldn’t rank too high next to other anime titles, but I’m sure that we’ll be getting some power ups as the franchise goes on.

The soundtrack for the show is pretty good. We have a solid opera theme that plays for the big moments like when the Bloody August attacked the Tower of Fang. It was a great scene I have to add as it came out of nowhere and was pretty unexpected. Who would have thought that the big villain organization would be taken down so suddenly and in the span of around 2 minutes? These guys talked such a big game, but they crumbled in the end. There are quite a few other good battle themes in the series as well. Both of the openings are also quite good with the second one having better action scenes, but the first one probably encapsulating the themes of the show a little better. In the end, I will actually choose that one as my favorite for this series.

As for the animation, it looks pretty solid. Especially when the high budget scenes show up, there is a noticeable difference. The colors are nice and vibrant and this is especially useful for the action scenes. Even when the budget is normal though, the show looks very clear. Naturally, the sequel series looks a lot richer with detail, but this one is definitely solid. There are even some illustration type shots towards the beginning of the series which are always fun. As long as they aren’t spammed of course, but that’s not the case here.

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Overall, Sorcerous Stabber Orphen is a solid show. It’s definitely one of the more somber anime that I’ve seen in a while at times, but there is no shortage of comic relief characters, which keeps the atmosphere fairly light at well. The animation and soundtrack hold up very well and fight scenes are solid as well. It’s an all around solid show and one I’d recommend to all fantasy or action fans. If you like good banter a lot, but are not necessarily an action fan, I think you can still enjoy this show quite a bit as well. I’m just about done with the sequel series so you can expect a review for that as well fairly soon. It opts to drop the serious angle so it’s more of a lighthearted adventure which works well enough in its own right, but it is definitely different.

Overall 7/10