A Destructive God Sits Next To Me and Grew on Me

• Genre : Comedy, Slice of Life, Supernatural, Moe
• Episodes: 12
• Studio: EMT Squared

 

Every young person just wants to have a successful high school life. And for most that means keeping your head down, not attracting too much attention, making a few normal friends and getting good grades. If you’re lucky, maybe you’ll meet a special someone! Doesn’t all that sound nice and reasonable. Surely just a normal student life isn’t too much to ask for. Well it is if you happen to be sitting next to an all powerful god of destruction who’s only been stopped from annihilating the entire world by the fragile human shell he is currently trapped in. And now both the shell and the god have decided to become your best friend! If that sounds like a nightmare, rest easy. It’s not happening to you. It’s happening to Seri Koyuki, and things are going to get a lot weirder.

I was looking for a comedy. I like those. Something a bit like Saiki K. or the Daily Lives of High School Boys. Quick and easy jokes to make me giggle at the end of the day. Nothing too emotional or dramatic. And for some reason I thought Destructive God would fill that need. I’m not sure why I thought that. I literally based myself entirely on the cover art.

One thing you might notice pretty quickly from looking at these screencaps is the familiar art style. The very rounded features and exaggerated cuteness. The soft but saturated colours with fades for hair and eyes. The excessive shininess of everything. I have seen this specific style a lot on female characters but less often on male ones. It doesn’t really change anything! I happen to like this style.

Aside from that the production is competent but standard. Voice acting was good and the actors seem to be genuinely having fun, even if they didn’t necessarily turn in award worthy performances. The backgrounds are simple, the characters are often chibified but they both look pleasant. There is a surprising amount of movement in the series and it’s fluid although uncomplicated.

Really, the screencaps will give you a very good idea of what you’re looking at here. These are more true to the experience than for most anime.

This is a Slice of Life anime, so there’s no single story to concentrate on. In many ways, A Destructive God Sits Next To Me reminded me most of Gabriel DropOut. Similar high school setting and very similar characters although instead of actual demons and angels it’s chunnis who think they’re demons and angles but that’s functionally the same.

I should say that it took me a few episodes to get into it. I would say that for the first 3 to 4, I had labelled the show as ok. Not unpleasant but ultimately basically forgettable. And I’m not saying that’s an inaccurate description but something happened along the way. I don’t know when or how but by the middle of the season, I started to really dig the show and I was really looking forward to watching a few episodes in the evening.

If I had to really find a reason for the change, I would say the characters eventually got fleshed out enough that their interplay and personalities became engaging in a way they just weren’t at first. Or maybe I just got worn down by cuteness.

A Destructive God Sits Next To Me is exactly a CBDCT show. It has all the same staples and tropes as a CGDCT series but with boy characters and some adjusted sensibilities to account for a different target demo. For instance, the fanservice focuses more on the emotional depiction of the characters than on close ups of their swimsuit parts. There’s elaborate glasses and suits, instead of bikinis and short skirts, but it’s a fairly aesthetic change. In the end it’s a bunch of boys doing silly things with some occasional jokes, some lightly emotional moments and a decent amount of BL insinuations.

Once I got into the groove of it, I started to enjoy the ridiculous and wacky characters for what they were and I found it a pretty great way to kill some time. It’s not going to be the type of series that reveals the deep truths of the universe to you or anything like that but we all need some fluff from time to time, don’t we? I think so. Let me try to bottom line this one for you.

A Destructive God Sits Next to Me is not a great show but I found it much better than what other reviews led me to believe and I would have watched more if it had been available.

Favorite character: Tsukimiya (of course)

What this anime taught me: So everyone has those types of friends, huh?

“In alcohol’s defense, I’ve done some pretty dumb stuff while completely sober too.”

Suggested drink: Cerberus

• Every time Hanatori is being “cute” – take a sip
• Every time anyone says Gestöber – take a breath
• Every time Koyuki dies – pour some out (not on the carpet, your mom will get mad at me)
  
• Every time Tsukimiya takes a pic – take a sip
  
• Every time Seiki gets angry – take a deep breath
  
• Every time Hanatori cries – get some tissues
  
• Every time Hibiki hurts someone – take a sip
  
• Every time Seiki gets creeped out – sympathize
  
• Every time Cerberus gets saved – cheer
  
• Every time Mogami is suspiciously enthusiastic about accepting punishment – don’t think about it too hard
  
• Every time Tsukimiya is effortlessly great at something – take a sip
  
• Every time Miguel comes out – cower in terror
  
• Every time Hanatori sings – clap
• Every time Utsugi disappears when Mogami  is looking for him – take a sip
• Every time Tsukimiya opens his eyes – you’re going to need a gulp

 I never had so many people ask me the name of an anime as when I put these screencaps on Pinterest. Here are a few for you