The hilarious isekai The Eminence in Shadow has proven how great its protagonist Cid is with one great joke. This is a perfect reminder of how great Cid's character is for fans who may have forgotten during the break between seasons. After the season 2 premiere, they won't forget his character's brilliance any time soon.

In Season 2 Episode #1, Cid encounters some souped-up ghouls in the lawless city and is seemingly about to be eaten by them until the vampire hunter Mary appears. She tells him to flee and that since the moon is red their time has run out. Cid is so inspired by how cool Mary's words sound that he adopts them for himself, charging around the city saving people and then parroting what the vampire hunter told him. This completely undercuts whatever coolness factor these moments may have otherwise had instead making them hilarious. It also shines a spotlight on some of Cid's best character traits.

The Eminence in Shadow Makes Cid a Joke Which is Good

Cid is a character whose main goal in life is to live out his fantasy to be an "Eminence in Shadow", a master manipulator from the darkness who is incredibly cool. The joke of the show is that everything he says when trying to look cool is actually true, but he doesn't realize it. Since he thinks everything is fake, he can improvise awesome lines no matter what the situation is. His plagiarism in the premiere shows that he will even steal other people's lines if he thinks they are cool enough. This makes him incredibly unpredictable in a hilarious way, which makes him refreshingly the most chaotic part of the show.

In most isekai power fantasy anime, the main character amasses great power and uses it very predictably. This can mean becoming a hero and defeating some powerful demon lord or potentially just using it to become successful in life. This is because these characters fit the mold of one particular story and it would be out of character for them to deviate from that path. Cid is different from most isekai characters however because his motivation stems from wanting to become the cool characters he saw in the stories he consumed during his past life. This allows him to play a different role in each arc and improvise as he does here after hearing Mary's cool dialogue.

The Eminence in Shadow's Protagonist Is More Chaotic Than Other Isekai Heroes

All of this means that Cid is much more interesting than a typical isekai protagonist. He is an incredibly shallow man but ironically this allows him to serve an incredibly deep amount of roles in the story. This is what makes The Eminence in Shadow such a refreshingly funny isekai, as just like its main character it can adopt a variety of different characters and plots in its world while still remaining cohesive.

The Eminence in Shadow Season 2 is available to stream on HIDIVE.