A young noblewoman named Charlotte Evans flees her house after being betrayed by her betrothed and harassed by her family, and ends herself in the hands of Allen Crawford, a misanthropic magician known as the Dark Lord who dwells in a solitary mansion deep in the forest. When he hears Charlotte’s sad story, he discovers a new calling: giving her a crash lesson in all things sinful, from late-night feasts of cake and ramen to sleeping in till the day, from dressing up in cute dresses to fun-filled days at the beach. Allen is determined to spoil Charlotte with every imaginable enticing delight.
I believe this is one of those anime that is intended for a specific audience, and anyone who isn’t part of that subgroup of anime enthusiasts is unlikely to enjoy it.
I mean, I understand what’s going on. This is a lovely and silly story about a crazy nice and unselfish girl living in the forest with an evil-in-name-only Demon Lord. She is so broken that she doesn’t understand how kindness can be aimed at her, and he, in turn, feels so sad for her that he’s eager to make her happy—in this case, by making her do all the things she missed out on in life.
This entire story is meant to be heartwarming fluff. The concept is borrowed from a variety of villain stories, while the real story has only one repeating storyline pattern—Allen tricking/blackmailing Charlotte into enjoying life and developing some self-esteem. I believe this is the type of show that people watch when they are tired of life and just want to see nice things happen to those who deserve it.
As you might have predicted from the foregoing, despite my fondness of villainess stories, I found this one tedious. The jokes were predictable, and the characters were too one-note for me to care about. It’s not that horrible. It’s simply not for me.
Giving the Disgraced Noble Lady I Rescued a Crash Course in Naughtiness didn’t give me much to work with, aside from its ridiculously long title. It’s never a good sign when I’m having trouble getting into a show so much that my mind starts to wander to concerns about its voiceover mixing and sound leveling. But really, out of all the episodes I watched today, either my sound equipment went utterly crazy for this one, or someone in the sound booth needs to double-check their knobs and levers. The performance verges on parody because our primary heroine, Charlotte, is already voiced with such uncertain wispiness and breathiness that it sounds if her lines were taken straight from recordings, made on an old brick Nokia phone made a lot of the episode genuinely unpleasant to sit through, for me.