Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon: Samishigariya no Ryuu

TL;DR: It's hard to make a movie that is both heartfelt and serious while still staying true to the comedy/slice-of-life aspects. This movie does an admirable job straddling both and ends up with a somewhat uneven tone, making it not as satisfying compared to the anime series (which, to be fair, set an extremely high bar which any movie-length follow-up would struggle to clear). Everything else is the usual rock-solid Kyoto Animation quality, which mostly make up for the flaws - 7.5/10.

The Maid Dragon series is a slice-of-life fantasy with occasional serious dramatic arcs, but at its core is mostly a comedy. The anime series, ... being episodic in format, had no problem managing these contrasting elements and delivered a solid viewing experience. With a 2-hour movie, however, keeping this consistency becomes more difficult, and it's a problem I noticed in this film much more acutely compared to the series.

The story centers around Kanna-chan's difficult relationship with her father, and Kobayashi-san's attempt to both protect her as a fill-in parental guardian figure and repair that relationship. As you can imagine, this is a pretty serious theme, and for the most part the movie handles this deep drama very well, but given its limited runtime and need to still stay true to its slice-of-life comedy roots, delivers multiple awkward jokes after heavy moments which creates an overall uneven tone. On multiple occasions, tear-inducing dramatic scenes are followed with cheesy jokes, potentially giving some viewers tonal whiplash. Lastly, the ending wraps everything up just a little too neatly, which ultimately made the central conflict in the movie cheapened and the drama feel forced in retrospect.

Despite these issues, being Kyoto Animation, the animation quality, voice acting, music/sound, and everything else are all perfect as you might expect from such an esteemed studio. The movie was still an absolute pleasure to watch and did not feel like its runtime. I would still highly recommend this movie to any fan of Maid Dragon, but in my opinion it falls just short of giving the same enjoyment as the preceding anime series, which set a really high bar.

Final score: 7.5/10

For context, I'm a pretty big fan of the parent show. The snappy comedy, great animation, and occasional surprisingly heavy hitting drama just works for me. I really wanted to love this movie as well, and while it wasn't a disappointment, it also didn't have quite the same charm. Comparisons are inevitable, but I'll start with what this movie did well.

The writer(s) took the worldbuilding seriously in a satisfying way, specifically in exploring the relationship between these ultra-powerful dragons and us weak mortals. The cultural and moral differences are front and center, yes, but fans of xenofiction will appreciate that the psychological differences between species ... also get nuanced attention—something only hinted at in the original series. This context helps elevate what might otherwise be a fairly generic plot to something that rewards additional thinking. (Unfortunately, that's a bit of a double edged sword—those ideas might not occur to you until afterwards, leaving you with the generic drama and unsurprising plot twists while watching.)

Another positive: despite its focus on drama and action, the humor that is there works well! This includes something quite remarkable (to me, at least)—the scenes with Saikawa for once made me laugh instead of cringe so hard I want to die. Maybe that was partly the experience of seeing it in a theater with other people laughing too, but maybe the writer is finally learning how to use her effectively?

Now onto a few criticisms. It’s true that many elements received special theatrical-release level attention to look beautiful. However, I found a distracting level of inconsistency between those elements. Even between assets within the same shot, the clashing art styles were jarring enough that I actually had to double check there wasn't a second studio that helped in the production. I’ll also note that the usual (and amazingly good) BGM was largely absent due to the more serious tone of the story, and what replaced it felt lacking in comparison.

I thought the plotting was well set up to get us to that finale, but there was also a good amount of fluff in the middle section that should have been cut or handled in a more meaningful way. This could have freed up more runtime for comedy or slice-of-life moments, like what makes the tv episodes so good! Specifically, Ilulu and Fafnir both got short scenes that didn't seem to serve much of a function to the story, making it feel like they were shoehorned in. I have more thoughts on Ilulu’s part, but that would stray into spoiler territory.

Finally, this is going to be subjective from person to person, but while I intellectually appreciated the movie’s messages and themes, it didn't connect with me emotionally very well. That’s disappointing, because I know the author can deliver powerful emotional beats—like those beautiful moments between Tohru and Elma, or Kanna’s incredible journey with her friend from America in Season 2. Here, though, everything hinges on Kanna’s character, and I was put off by how infantile she was portrayed—seemingly for plot convenience or cheap pathos. In the past, the series made pains to emphasize that she isn't really a kid in the same way human children are, but that idea was mostly abandoned in this story. Our cute, bug-eating dragon girl has always been something of a cypher, so her performance here felt a little too one-note.

Overall, I'm glad I watched it, especially since it was pure happenstance that I checked for a US theatrical release the night before its one-day showing. I'm happy to support the franchise even if this movie only half worked for me. People who are more lukewarm on the series might not get much out of it, but who knows? Its more story-focused and serious tone might actually work better for them, instead.

This is not a comedy movie. This is not slice of life. There are no risque sexual elements. This is a thoroughly sanitized platonic drama about parenthood. A soapbox upon which the writer stands to lecture others about the superiority of their own culture. In fact this notion of moral supremacy is the main driving element of the entire film. All other plot elements are a cheap and flimsy façade to support this singular topic.

It goes like this:

A magic danger will suddenly pop up out of nowhere, and within minutes, a magical solution also pops up and resolves the danger. This same formula repeats again ... and again in the background of the plot, while in the foreground a character will give a speech or a dialogue will ensue for long, music-less lengths of time, regarding their belief in the superiority of their culture.

This is not an exaggeration. If this film was a meal, the main portion would be serious drama with lots of talking and zero music. The side portion would be flashy action sequences, explosions, etc. (without any real danger of course). And a very light sprinkling of comedy on top. In total the comedic elements of the film probably totaled up to about 5 minutes in length, so if you're looking for humor look elsewhere.

Personally, if it's not obvious, I found the moralizing element of the film repugnant. To sum it up as briefly and without spoilers as possible: dragons don't share human notions of parenthood- and the human cast along with their humanized dragon friends, find this evil. It seems arrogant to me for humans to lecture a literal alien species from another dimension about the morality of their parental relationships, when Earth itself displays countless examples of parenthood that are wildly different from Koboyashi's own ideals. Sea turtles as just one example. The film however does not display both sides of this in a neutral manner. It simply repeats again and again this human superiority, and eventually those they lecture convert to their side. Why? Because it's superior of course.

The cheap plot elements, the crying, the moralizing, the long sections of film without music. This is a movie with "forced soul". Not authentic soul as the original two seasons displayed. Style without substance. If you just want something sparkly and flashy to pass the time with, this movie will do that nicely, but if you want genuine substance or humor you won't find it here.