Animisery – A Blog About Living Miserably with Anime (Among Other Things)

Well, this show has only maybe three more episodes to go before it wraps up but I really wanted to just make a blog post gushing about the fun I’m having with it! It’s mostly due in part because every time I bring it up then I’m met with blank stares, outright silence, or a hearty portion of disinterest but screw it. It’s my blog and I’ll hype what I want to.

Side note: I realized that I have a tremendous difficulty with the word “bureaucrat” upon typing it over and over. I don’t even want to share how I butchered that word or you’ll presume me to be REALLY REALLY simple. Rationally my brain knows that the word is just “bureau” and “crat” which are two words that I’m quite adept at spelling (I mean you can’t stop me from using the word crat over and over and over) but combined? I’m cooked. Brains are weird.

Firstly, as is the trend in anime and all its associated media these days, the title is a synopsis which is great because I don’t have to dote on one myself. A bureaucrat has become a villainess and we can assume that he was a dad originally and possibly we might even be bold enough to presume he was reincarnated. Japan, you’ve done it again. That, from what I have gathered trying to peddle this show to my friends, may seemingly be a turn off for some. That said, the dad in this show is an absolute adorable goofball of a man who loves his family and his otaku interests way much more than to ever think of having impure intentions. In a lesser show, the dad Kenzaburou might have taken a moment to inspect or take a purview of his female body in a scene that would’ve been groan inducing or quite possibly push folks away. Kenzaburou, however, is a man that doesn’t have such intentions and is just trying to make the game he’s trapped in go the way that he saw his daughter play it. The man has an interest in his daughter’s hobbies; I CANNOT hate on him at all.

I’m sure that if you’re reading this then you can surmise that this show is in that recently popular genre of fantasy where a character from our world is transported to an “otome game” world where they’re usually the villainess or something of the sort. There’s a solid amount of them right now including my favorite, My Next Life as a Villainess, so what does Bureaucrat do to attempt to reinvent the wheel? Honestly, not too much outside of Kenzaburou. The world is a bog standard generic fantasy magical academy setting and the main character ends up having a super extra special power that means everyone loves them. We’ve seen this before in some capacity yet Kenzaburou and his dad-isms are what kept me from turning the show off for good. He is always comparing his situations to his time as a peak otaku including resetting games until you get what you and trying to balance his interests with work. It’s another unoriginal aspect to the show (“this is just like a video game!!!”) but the fact that Kenzaburou is a dad participating in these events are what propel it from being another lesson in tedium.

The other characters are just cookie cutter as plain as you can be plot elements to set and forget. The heroine character Anna Doll is a perky genki girl who loves Kenzaburou as the villainess Grace Auvergne for everything he does. Even as he tries to push her away by being a proper villainess, it just comes off as tough love and only makes her love Grace more. Kenzaburou is oblivious to the charms he’s producing and never makes any kind of move though so his innocence in the matter is safe and secure. There’s also a menagerie of trope laden bishonen boys to fawn over Grace-Kenzaburou such as the prince of the kingdom Virgile Vierge (if anything looks dumb spelling wise then please assume it’s not my fault) who is engaged to Grace and acts aloof while falling more and more and the hotblooded bodyguard to the prince Lion Auguste. There’s a few other boys who all want to have a seat at the table to say “Grace!!!!” but I don’t particularly care about them and neither should you because this is the Grace and Anna show and the anime won’t let you forget that.

There is a twist to all of this though that provides a little bit of extra charm to this show and I’ll go ahead and reveal it: Kenzaburou is in a coma and his family can see how he lives in this new world courtesy of the very game that his daughter is obsessed with. What that means is that his family are constantly watching Kenzaburou whip out his dad knowledge and nurture these fictional characters and consequently groaning as he inflicts on them what he did in the real world. It’s a little heart warming to see his family take the time to reminisce on his behavior as they watch him perform the same acts again. He’s a dork and his family knows it and it tries to lean into comedy at times but I only laughed so much at the antics.

The show so far is not offering much in terms of originality. All of these aspects so far have been done before (even the TV thing was kind of done in “Endo and Kobayashi Live!” although not to the same effect) and with possibly greater aplomb. That said, they didn’t have Kenzaburou and he is your selling point and what is going to be your do or die for this show like me. Had Kenzaburou not been himself then this would’ve been easily disposable anime for me to drop at episode three and forget. Kenzaburou, however, is what separates this from being mediocrity so far and I’m waiting for the next few episodes with somewhat baited breath. I don’t know if this show will have staying power to even get another season but I’m having fun and that’s what I seek out from anime now. I want to have fun and forget for a minute and From Bureaucrat to Villainess is doing just that to great success. If you’re not familiar with the otome isekai genre then this is probably a good starter as it plays some tropes straight as it tries to subvert other. It kind of only proves my own personal philosophy on media that if you have a great main character then you can get away with a lot. I don’t know if he’ll be as delightful as my beloved Bakarina from My Next Life as a Villainess but Kenzaburou hasn’t let me down in these eight episodes so far.

I hope you’ll give him a chance but thanks for reading regardless! The anime is on Hidive if you do want to give it a shot. The ED is an absolute treat! Never before have disco suited dancing salarymen been so captivating (at least in the year 2025 so far).

Thank you for reading this! If you’ve watched the show then let me know what you think in the comments below or feel free to recommend to me your favorite seasonal of Winter 2025! I’d love to hear from you. If you want to hear me talk about anime then feel free to go check out my podcast, the Anime Brothers Podcast (episode 200 and beyond), on wherever you get your shows. Thank you again! I hope we talk soon.