Rudues Greyrat, the protagonist of Mushoku Tensei is quite controversial in anime fandom. He starts as a terrible person, and that aspect of him sticks in the mind of the fan. Why some fans hate Rudeus so much?
Why do people hate Rudy so much?
This is a comment I wrote under this Reaction to Episode 5 of Mushoku Tensei listing all the reasons I can think of. (I thought it could work as an article.)
1 ) Isekai is usually a Power Fantasy with a Self-insert protagonist. In most cases, you're supposed to imagine yourself in the place of the Isekai protagonist... Inserting yourself into Rudeus though is a very unpleasant experience. (At least, this early on.) He's someone who deals with his flaws constantly, and his flaws are of the social/relational aspect that most fans escape from to fantasy stories in the first place.
2 ) There are people like him in real life, and they're best described as a ”waste of Oxygen" so, unlike Isekai protagonists who murder people or act evil, his type of flaws hits closer to home, and the reader/watcher is supposed to be sympathetic to him. Some people can't be sympathetic to $&# offenders.
3 ) A matter of perspective: Do you see Rudeus as a 40 years old man? Or do you see him as 7 years old boy? Seeing him as an old man talking about doing this and that with young girls is uncomfortable, and the anime constantly reminds you that there's a 40+ yrs old man inside, by the inner voice and the flashbacks/imagery. (I'm able to disconnect between his old self and current self on the fly, but some people can't.)
4 ) He tried to groom Selphie. He's (arguably) trying to groom Eris at this point too... I don't consider what he's doing grooming, but it's a hard thing to define, and people have various levels of tolerance to such things. (He did say he'll make Selphie his ideal woman: A huge red flag.)
5 ) We see his thoughts without any filtering... You probably had some depraved thoughts too in your life, right? But people don't say them... You hear all of his thoughts, good and even the depraved ones out loud. Even if he never acted on them, (like many of us.) That's why there's a huge disconnect between how the audience sees Rudy, and how people in that world see him.
6 ) The show is popular even in the mainstream. That's not the target audience. And as a rule, mainstream anime fans are harsher than niche anime fans. (Just see the comments under each popular shonen anime.) Some people just like to hate on the Popular.
7 ) People like me defend Rudeus A LOT!! ...This may be our fault, but when something is defended, it implies that the accusations are proportional to the defense's strength. Some people just think that Rudeus is worse than he actually is, because of this.
But what I love most is what the author said that:
"I have no issue with criticizing Rudeus at the beginning stage, and it's up to you to decide whether you don't want to see the story because of that."
"With that said, if there's someone like Rudeus close to you and that person were to have even a slight change of heart and try to start over, I sincerely hope that you won't abandon them on the spot." --- Rifujin na Magonote
What do you think?
If you're interested in more of what I said above, you might like reading my other achrchieved comments: "On Rudeus Greyrat" and "I've been there... Rudy." and also A Problem when animating a Light Novel.
- First image is made with Canva. Second image is taken from Mushoku Tensei's Manga's first chapter.
I don't think the issue is with Rudy, doesn't matter if he's a pervert, these are character flaws and they don't make you hate a character on their own. What matters, however, is the presentation, when Rudy is rewarded with fanservice scenes that are blatantly drawn to look appealing, and the viewers are allowed to project themselves onto him and enjoy the moment, that's the problematic part.
That's just my subjective take on it though, personally I don't care much about fanservice scenes, I'm kinda numb at this point, nothing can make me feel uncomfortable, it's just I can't defend the writer (and the whole staff for that matter), they totally deserve to be called out.
In short, hate the writer, not the character.
I wish more people had your take on it.
I'm numb to the fanservice too, (and I understand the reason they went for that presentation in the two extreme cases they did so.)