The Beginning After the End: A Crown That Never Shined

In a year overflowing with breathtaking manhwa adaptations, The Beginning After the End was supposed to be the next crown jewel—an emotional isekai epic with a powerful lead, deep world-building, and a fanbase that had waited years. Instead, what we got was a hollow crown—one that looked shiny from afar but crumbled under the weight of its own hype.

And fans? They noticed.

👑 Arthur Leywin: A King Without a Kingdom

Let’s start with the heart of it all—Arthur Leywin. On the pages of the manhwa, Arthur is layered, conflicted, evolving from a prodigy into a protector, torn between his past life’s royalty and his current life’s trauma.

But the anime?

It strips Arthur of all emotional gravity. His expressions are lifeless, his inner conflict glossed over like an afterthought. The internal monologue—the very spine of his character—is butchered into hollow one-liners.

Fans didn’t see the King reborn—they saw a soulless self-insert with no charisma.

🎬 Animation That Felt Like a Draft

There’s no easy way to say it: the animation looks cheap. What should’ve been grand magical duels, dragon-flight moments, and heart-shattering flashbacks ended up looking like cutscenes from a mobile game. Characters barely move. Magical attacks lack force. Important expressions are completely off-model.

People online aren’t calling it “underwhelming”—they’re calling it “straight-up embarrassing.” Especially considering the manhwa’s detailed artwork and emotional paneling, this anime feels like a rough storyboard that got rushed into airing.

⌛ Pacing Like a Broken Clock

Episodes move at a frantic, uneven pace. The early chapters that needed time to breathe—Arthur’s childhood, his growth, the emotional bond with his parents—are fast-forwarded like filler scenes. Meanwhile, irrelevant conversations are dragged out for entire scenes.

This uneven structure kills any emotional momentum. Fans who were waiting for the build-up were met with narrative whiplash.

The story feels like it’s tripping over itself—rushing to show its best cards without letting us care about who’s holding them.

🎵 Music and Sound: Flatlines and Filler

The soundtrack doesn’t soar—it snores. There are no memorable tracks, no sweeping orchestral moments that elevate scenes, and worst of all, no sense of rhythm with the visuals. The emotional beats feel like they’re playing in an echo chamber.

Voice acting? Inconsistent at best. Arthur’s voice lacks the gravitas fans imagined. And for a protagonist with two lifetimes worth of weight on his shoulders, he sounds like a bored intern reading from a script.

💬 What Fans Are Saying Online

Let’s not sugarcoat it—people are furious.

“It’s like they took one of the best manhwas and just didn’t read it before animating.”
“Even flashbacks feel like filler.”
“I’ve waited years for this? They butchered Arthur.”
“Every episode makes me miss the manhwa more.”

Reddit, forums, and Discord are flooded with fans venting disappointment. And they’re not nitpicking—they’re mourning a lost opportunity. What should’ve been a Solo Leveling-tier adaptation turned into 2025’s biggest anime letdown.

💡 So What Went Wrong?

1. Animation Studio Inexperience
   The chosen studio clearly lacked the budget or know-how to handle a fantasy-heavy world like TBATE.
2. No Emotional Direction
   The emotional core was gutted. Key scenes were restructured or skipped, robbing the story of its weight.
3. Rushed Timeline
   Trying to fit too much into 12 episodes ended up destroying the natural arc of the story.
4. Fanbase Misread
   The creators underestimated how much fans cared about nuance—not just action scenes.

🧊 Final Verdict: A Cold Reign

The Beginning After the End anime feels like a kingdom built on fog—promising from a distance, empty up close. It fails to honor the depth of its source material, opting instead for a soulless, speed-run version of greatness.

There’s still time for Season 2 to fix this. But right now, fans aren’t just disappointed—they’re hurt.
This wasn’t just an adaptation.
It was a betrayal of expectations.