I grew up watching anime, but in recent years, I really fell out of love with the genre. It probably came with age, and my realization that most anime is kinda gross? It pushes some weird ideas. I don’t like seeing non-consenting women being sexualized for “jokes”.
I decided to watch Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End on a whim a few weeks ago. The show is about an elf who has lived at least a thousand years, and could probably live forever. On a whim, she decides to go join the Hero’s party for 10 years to defeat the demon king, succeeds, then returns frolicking around. She meets up with her party 50 years later and witnesses the death of the hero, lamenting that she didn’t get enough time to know him. And why should she? 10 years to us is give or take 15% of our lives — 10 years is 1% of her life.