Dragon Quest Dai episode 6 review: Crocodine arrives

Dragon Quest: The Adventure of Dai episode 6 opens a new arc in the story, and I liked it. The 2020 anime picks up after the death of the hero Avan in episode 5, which leaves Dai to take on the role of the hero himself, and it ends on a boss fight against the Beast King Crocodine.

The story here follows Dai and Popp as they leave the island on a journey that should eventually bring them face to face with the Dark Lord and the Dark King, so they can put them away once and for all, just like almost every JRPG.

Dai and Popp leave the island as the world falls apart

Along the way, Dai and Popp run into a forest with a little girl and end up fighting off monsters. It turns out they're in the Dark Forest. Ever since the Dark Lord returned, many monsters have moved in, bad ones too, and they've taken over the forest.

With the Dark Lord back, the world is in shambles. The world that existed in the first couple of episodes is gone, and now there are real problems. As I noted in my review of episode 5, the damage isn't limited to Dai's island and the places near it. It's all over the place.

When Dai and Popp leave, they leave one of their companions behind with a new character. They don't know they've done it, so that will be something they have to deal with later, and it will tie their destinies back together in the future.

Maam joins Dragon Quest: The Adventure of Dai

The new character is Maam. That's not "mom" as in the abbreviation for mother; it's spelled M A A M. She's her own heroine, drawn with the kind of exaggerated figure that anyone familiar with anime will recognize. More importantly, she's going to be an important character in the story very soon.

We also learn that Maam carries an insignia of Avan. That places her in the line of the original hero's students, and there's more to come on that in the future.

Maam ends up saving Popp from a monster, and at the time it had only just hit me that Maam and Popp is a pun on mom and pop. I couldn't believe I hadn't realized that sooner, and I love it. She's angry with Popp, though, because he abandoned Dai. He ran away like a coward, leaving Dai to face the boss by himself.

Crocodine is a Dragon Quest: The Adventure of Dai original

While all this is going on, the Dark Lord is watching, and he sends one of his generals, the Beast King Crocodine, to stop Dai as soon as possible. He's essentially a video game boss, and he becomes the villain of the episode.

In case you're wondering, Crocodine is exclusive to Dragon Quest: The Adventure of Dai. He didn't appear in the main line Dragon Quest games, as a boss or otherwise. His design is very different from the ones Toriyama created for the games. There are similarities, but stylistically he doesn't look the same at all, and you can tell it's a different designer.

As I've mentioned in previous reviews, the Dragon Quest video game monsters were designed by Toriyama, but the Dai characters came from somebody totally different. So the show has exclusive characters that might look like Toriyama's style but really aren't, and Crocodine doesn't look much like a Toriyama character at all. He still looks cool, though: an orange alligator in armor is a cool idea, and it does sound like something Toriyama would draw.

Hadlar's six legions set up Dai's RPG journey

Crocodine appears in front of Dai and introduces himself as the commander of one of the six legions under Hadlar. Hadlar did warn him about Dai's power, and Crocodine goes straight into battle. He isn't afraid to face this boy, even though he knows Hadlar was injured by Dai in the previous episode.

This part is cool because Crocodine explains the six legions that serve Hadlar. There are six armies of six different monster types spread across the world, and each one has a leader. You can see where this is going: Dai will have to face off against them at some point.

This isn't going to be one of those stories where Dai goes straight after Hadlar. He has to go on a quest, go through a journey and gather companions. It's an RPG. During this montage, we also get a look at some of the great monster designs Toriyama did for the games, and it's very cool to see them early, before they show up for real.

Crocodine's axe and heat breath are accurate to the games

Popp starts talking trash and casts the fire spell Frizz, and Crocodine simply sucks it into his mouth and eats it. We find out that the legion commanders all have specialties that are more powerful than Hadlar. That doesn't necessarily mean they're more powerful than him overall, but based on what Crocodine says, each of their individual special abilities surpasses his. That's how I interpret it.

As Crocodine and Dai fight, Crocodine realizes that Dai is carrying on the spirit of Avan. We also learn that although Crocodine can't use spells himself, he has an enchanted axe with spell like properties. That's straight from the games too. There are certain weapons in Dragon Quest that cast a spell when you use them as an item. I think that started with the second or third game, I forget which.

It can be very useful: if you're facing an enemy and don't want to spend a spell, you can use the weapon as an item in battle and it casts the spell anyway. This is "so accurate to the game it's not even funny." Dai then gets cooked by Crocodine's heat breath attack, which is accurate to the games as well, and he's about to be killed.

Maam's spell gun and the episode 6 cliffhanger

With Dai about to be killed, Maam and Popp show up to rescue him. The cliffhanger seems to be that Dai is about to die when Maam pulls out a gun that can fire spells. She fires one at Dai, and Popp freaks out.

It looks like the spell she fires is either a repel spell or a heal spell, because a blue aura surrounds him. A gun that shoots spells is very useful if you're not a magic user. The teaser is meant to make an audience unfamiliar with the story think Dai is about to get hurt, or that she has betrayed him. That's obviously not the case, because the preview for the next episode shows Dai continuing his battle with Crocodine.

Episode 7 is set to focus on Maam, with her backstory, how she relates to Avan and a real focus on her as a character.

How long Dragon Quest: The Adventure of Dai might run

The show has already introduced Maam as another member of the party, and as the series progresses, more and more heroes will join Dai in his quest to defeat Hadlar.

Based on the pacing at this point, I didn't think this would be a two year anime, as some folks had said. My guess was a year and a half at the most, and probably just one year, around 52 episodes. I could be wrong, because it depends on how fast they adapt the story, but the pacing is much faster than I expected. I said maybe October or December of the following year is when the series could end.

Either way, I'm ready for the ride. Don't sleep on this show. It's really good.