In the anime industry, isekai is all the rage and has been for well over a decade. Each and every season, there’s a smattering of titles that seem to be entirely centered on some random shmuck getting transported to another world and getting OP powers as a result of it… or becoming a fridge. It’s become a tired genre by this point, but companies keep on making them with, in my opinion, diminishing results. For every dozen mediocre titles released, at least one stands apart from the crowd, with one of those rare exceptions being Overlord.
I feel that in the West, Overlord never got the attention it deserved. Compared to anime like Sword Art Online and Konosuba, Overlord is much slower-paced and is more concerned about setting up several longstanding plots than the moment-to-moment beats. It has a huge cast of characters to the point where you often forget who some of the supporting cast members are, and the major characters are often fighting against each other for screen time. It’s a series that is not for everyone, but if you love it, you LOVE it.
Needless to say, I’ve been a fan of the Overlord series since the anime debuted in the West in 2015. There’s just something about its slow-paced yet methodically plotted-out story that I love. While the show currently has four seasons, Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom serves as the franchise’s first theatrical film and one that adapts one of the most popular arcs in the series, the Paladin of the Sacred Kingdom arc. I didn’t know what to expect heading into this film and while it may have its issues, it’s a must-watch for anyone looking for some good fantasy action and who has missed following everyone’s favorite spooky skeleton Ainz Ooal Gown.
Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom
Director: Naoyuki Ito
Release Date: November 8, 2024 (Theatrical)
Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom is a direct continuation of the anime, following up on several of the events of the fourth season. For those who are fresh to the series, the story is set within an MMO where our protagonist, Ainz Ooal Gown (Satoshi Hino), is a player who is trapped within his character’s body after the game shuts down. Thankfully, his character is an incredibly overpowered lich and commands a large army of loyal followers, each of whom is equally deadly and dangerous and now each of them has achieved sentience with the game’s shuttering. Ainz’s main goal in the series is to try and find other players in the world and come up with a way to escape, which leads to him attempting to conquer this fantasy world. At the end of the fourth season, he absolutely destroyed another kingdom that he had been targeting since the show’s very first season, and now he’s set his sights on his next target, the isolated Roble Holy Kingdom.
And yet, the film doesn’t follow Ainz or any of his followers. Instead, the film focuses on the soldiers of the Holy Roble Kingdom as they attempt to retake their kingdom from one of Ainz’s followers. The twist, of course, is that they don’t know Ainz is behind the attack, so it’s deliciously ironic when they go to seek his help in liberating their kingdom from the demon and demi-human invaders. Ainz is more than eager to help, always coming across as a gentleman and assisting the Roble Holy Kingdom in their plight, with the soldiers completely unaware that they’re playing into his hands.
As a longtime fan of the series, I loved the angle that the story took, making Ainz more of a supporting character with brief cameos from the rest of the main cast. It allowed for a new perspective and increased the tension ever so slightly. Sure, we know that Ainz is going to win and he’s going to get what he wants, but since we’re not directly in his head or following the rest of his followers, it’s much harder to tell what the grand scheme is. Hell, Ainz doesn’t even know half the time, and finding that little tidbit out was worth a chuckle. However, deciding to focus on a new cast of characters does have its risks, and Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom more-or-less succeeds.
Copyright: Crunchyroll, Kadokawa
Again, the film has an entirely new cast of characters and while Ainz is present for a large part of the film, the two real leads are the head of the Roble’s military forces, a paladin named Remedios Custodio, and a squire named Reia Baraja. The two are diametrically different characters, with Custodio being hot-headed, aggressive, and instantly mistrustful of Ainz because he’s a demon, and Reia, who is quiet and aspires to become a better soldier both for her country and to impress Ainz. Seeing each character’s response to Ainz’s actions and the crumbling nature of their kingdom is fascinating to watch. As Custodio falls more into despair and displays blatantly racist opinions and excuses for why their kingdom is doomed, Reia yearns for strength and sees her position in the army elevated because of her connection to Ainz.
This is where Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom, and Overlord as a series in general, really thrive. It takes its time exploring its characters and the emotional drama they embody while showcasing how harsh this world is. I know I said before that one of Custodio’s defining traits was her racism, but almost everyone in this country is racist towards demi-humans and the film doesn’t shy away from depicting how disgusting the Roble citizenry’s beliefs are. We see how easily people justify war crimes as being acceptable losses and Ainz espouses his philosophy that might makes right. Since Ainz is ultimately the villain of the series we know that he’s not entirely in the right, yet the way the series presents his beliefs comes across as logical and reasonable, which impresses Neia and her developing ideologies.
All of this is rich and great stuff, but it also highlights the biggest problem of the film – its rushed pacing. This film, even though it runs for a little less than two and a half hours, adapts two full novels worth of material. Cuts were very clearly made to the film, which is readily seen in the first half of the movie as these moments are stuffed together. Fight scenes are almost entirely omitted as we’re quickly rushed from character moment to character moment, none of them really getting their own time to shine. In one sequence, we see Ainz preparing to fight an enemy commander, only for the scene to end before either attack as Neia says that Ainz defeated them in a second. At parts, Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom violates one of the sacred rules of cinema – show, don’t tell.
Copyright: Crunchyroll, Kadokawa
Again, I know that this technically isn’t Ainz’s story, but withholding action scenes seems like the wrong approach. It makes the first half of the film feel pretty slow, with the second half containing more action and finally having the audience gain more insight into Ainz’s thoughts. The second half feels more like traditional Overlord, which isn’t a bad thing, but it does make the two halves feel very much like tonally different experiences. You can pretty easily tell where the first novel that was being adapted ended and where the second one began, which does make the film uneven.
For all of the fantasy violence and dark examinations of war, there is some humor to Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom. One of the running jokes that gets picked up later in the film is how Ainz tries (and fails) to impress people with the type of weapon that he gave Neia to use. You gotta love that even though Ainz looks like a creepy skeleton he’s still ultimately just a normal guy forced to pretend to be an all-powerful king, making the moments where he doesn’t know how to react to praise all too relatable.
Then comes the question of whether I can even recommend this film to anyone other than diehard fans. Again, it’s a direct continuation of the series, so would a newcomer even be able to follow along and appreciate what Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom does? I would say yes… to a point. Yes, it is easy for newbies to follow along with the film given how it stars a completely new cast of characters, ones who have also been isolated up to this point from the events of the main series. Yes, the revelation that Ainz was the grandmaster all along is a solid, if predictable, twist that will probably make newcomers eager to learn more about the large scope of the series. But all that being said, the film only works as well as it does because it relies on the audience already knowing several key points, like Ainz’s true goal, how this invasion has been in the works for multiple seasons, and what the ending implies for the Roble Holy Kingdom’s future. Without that context, it all just comes across as “fine” instead of “great”.
Copyright: Crunchyroll, Kadokawa
Make no mistake, though: as a longtime fan, I loved Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom and how it told an effective fantasy war story that was more interested in thought-provoking discussions than excessive violence. The characters are all well defined and the interactions that Ainz has with the rest of this new cast are great. The animation is very polished, as to be expected of Studio Madhouse, and it is probably the most concise evidence as to why Overlord is great. But that acclaim can only be applied to pre-existing fans. Newcomers will still find a lot to like, but this isn’t like Spy x Family: Code White where it’s accessible to everyone, and audiences of all ages can find something to enjoy. It’s a niche film for a niche market, but if you love Overlord, you’ll love Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom.
Now give us a fifth season.
