- Titles: Kono Healer, Mendokusai
- Genre: Adventure, Comedy, Fantasy
- Episodes: 12
- Studio: Jumondou
Alvin is a great adventurer. Great is sort of a relative term. But he is a veteran…rookie. Apparently, that exists. And he’ll impress you with how surprisingly weak he can be. But he’s not a bad guy. He tries hard at times and he really wants to be an adventurer. And now he finally has a party of sorts. With Carla the Healer at his side, he can take on the world. At least we think she’s a healer. So far she’s only cast curses but she says she knows healing spells. And if she doesn’t end up killing Alvin, this might just work out to be a great thing.
Wow, people did not like this show. It’s a goofball comedy fantasy with no fanservice and traditionally shows in this niche don’t do all that great with western anime fans so I’m not entirely surprised. Still, I think I have discovered a way to make this show more enjoyable for a lot of viewers. I might be a genius.
Production
Don’t hurt me Healer is a modest anime. No frills, no creative leaps, and nothing much to write about with regard to production. At least there wasn’t anything wrong with it. Like the art never got so inconsistent that characters don’t quite look like themselves. I can name a couple of anime guilty of that. And the backgrounds, although pretty plain, had a nice evocative feel. It was alright.
Now the voice acting was great, but I’m actually going to go into that a bit later.
Story & Characters
As I said, Don’t Hurt Me, My Healer is a goofball comedy. Sure, there are little fantasy adventures that Karla and Alvin go on but they aren’t all that important. It’s a vehicle for more or less nonstop jokes. And of course, if the humour doesn’t work for you, it’s going to be very difficult to get through Don’t Hurt Me, My Healer.
And this is where I think I’ve discovered something. I started watching Don’t Hurt Me, My Healer very soon after the original run was over. Not all the episodes were available dubbed yet. At this point, the show had a pretty bad rating on popular anime aggregator sites and I was expecting to drop it after a few episodes. The only reason I gave it a chance at all was that the synopsis had originally piqued my interest and a reader mentioned it in the comments in a more positive way. So I wanted to see for myself.
Like I said, this was quite soon after the original run and that’s important because all those raitings on AniList and MAL were, for the most part, coming from American and US viewers who had watched the Japanese version of Don’t Hurt Me, My Healer.
I’m about to say something I don’t think I have ever said before, and I never thought I would: You should watch this anime dubbed.
I don’t have any side in the dub vs sub debate. As far as I,m concerned, for 99.9% of shows I think you should watch whatever way you enjoy most. But in this particular case, I have to make an exception.
You see, the humour in Don’t Hurt Me, My Healer hinges a lot on subversive responses and delivery. It’s not exactly jokes per se but characters react or say things that you wouldn’t expect given the situation or the way they say things is what is supposed to be funny. I tried both the subbed and dubbed versions and I have to say, it’s the type of humour you need to hear. It just doesn’t work at all when it’s written down. Without the exact timing and intonation, it pretty much all falls flat, every time. Personally, I found the difference staggering.
I enjoyed Don’t Hurt Me, My Healer, I giggled at it quite a bit and found it a pleasant time waster. I like comedy more than most but still, my experience was drastically different from people giving it 1/10 or calling it unwatchable. However, I’m pretty sure I would have been bored to death if I had watched it subbed. You need to watch it in a language you understand.
Now I’m not saying that everyone who dropped it originally should go back and watch it dubbed. It’s not a completely different show or anything, but it makes more of a difference here than it would in another show. At least in any other show that I have watched. And I do honestly think that at least part of the audience who were less than thrilled with Don’t Hurt Me, My Healer would have enjoyed it more dubbed.
That’s my two cents.
You might like this anime if:
You like nonsense fantasy comedies.
My favourite character:
Oomunekuma – I want to have dinner with her!
Suggested drink:
- Every time Alvin gets mad – sympathize
- Every time Karla s full of herself – raise your glass
- Every time monsters are helpful – take a sip
- Every time Karla cries – take a sip
- if it’s not sincere – spit it back in the glass
- Every time Karla is outraged – take a sip
- Every time Alvin is embarrassed – offer him a drink
- Every time Karla calls Alvin a baby – take a sip
- Every time Karla attempts to be reassuring – brace yourself
- Every time Karla tries to wink – take a sip
- Every time Karla wants to cook Kinoko – get some snacks
- Every time we hear the longest-lived creature speech – raise your glass
- Every time there is a mention of Alvin’s face – pretend you didn’t hear
I save all my screencaps on my Pinterest and you can find more there if you are interested. But I still like to show you a few in the post. If you’re like me, screencaps are something that really helps you decide to watch an anime or not.
Honestly loved this show, I think the dub makes it as well. Especially with comedy, I think a lot of people don’t get how severe the more ‘boring’/direct translation of subs can really rob the mood. So usually in a flashy action anime, you have the action, you have the excited voices, even if the text falls flat, it’s fine. This isn’t that sort of show, and there’s a lot of wordplay and such.
It’s not for everyone, but it’s extremely dedicated to it’s own sense of humor with the paragraph-long episode titles, Carla’s inability to make a “marketable kawaii face”, monsters being nice, etc.
Any show with a main character named Alvin should have a Simon and a Theodore. Dave is optional.
Ok then
I enjoyed it well enough, but it’s a bit of a one-trick pony. Still, I don’t think it deserves one-star ratings. I’d have dropped it.
I don’t watch dubs if I can help it; I do watch them if that’s all that’s available, but never otherwise. I doubt it’d make a difference for me; I’m so used to subs that they don’t even register anymore.
Oh you would be surprised. I’ve only watched 5 or so dubbed anime in the last few decades and most of the time I don’t register the sub. I wouldn’t have noticed it here either if I hadn’t made a direct comparison. But for a lot of people, information taken in visually is processed differently.
That’s a good tip! I watched the first few subbed episodes when it first came out, and I found the anime a little annoying, but I never tried it dubbed. With some series it totally makes a difference! I’m going to try it out. Thanks for sharing a very helpful bit of info!
I’m curious to see if it changes things for you?