While humanity is celebrating the defeat of the Demon Lord at the hands of a lone human hero, the Demon Realm is preparing for the contest of a lifetime where they will decide the next Demon Lord.
Demons from around the realm show up to test their might, but among them marches one lone human – Helck.
Although Helck shows his indomitable might in the three months of tournament fights, he also shows his compassion to his opponents while proudly proclaiming his hatred for humans, winning over the crowd.
As Helck becomes the favorite to become the next Demon Lord, things don’t sit well with Red Vermilio, one of the Four Heavenly Kings of the Demon Realm. She believes that Helck has other motives and decides to uncover what he is plotting. However, something sinister is building in the Human Kingdoms…
Helck was pretty good when it was just the one joke, but the fact it dared to have more plot than just that made Helck great! If you are looking for more anime recommendations like Helck, then head on down below.
Anime Like Helck
For Fans of Humans and Demon Kingdoms
I’m Quitting Heroing
After using his immense power to save the world, Leo finds that there is no place for a powerful hero in a world at peace. Being too strong to remain in human kingdoms, he seeks a job in the Demon King’s Army, which he defeated and is in need of rebuilding.
While the army has many problems, Leo’s power is boundless, but he finds that the demon king who is actually a queen has kinder motives for world domination than he expected.
Both Helck and I’m Quitting Heroing follow powerful human heroes who leave the human kingdoms and go join the demon army following the defeat of the Demon Lord. However, unlike Helck who left for ideological differences, Leo was forced out of the human kingdoms because, as a hero, he was just too powerful to let stay.
While both Helck and I’m Quitting Heroing start off pretty light about the hero becoming friends with several demons, I’m Quitting Heroing isn’t quite as light-hearted as Helck. A number of the back stories are quite crushing and it focuses on how humans often cast aside and persecute people with too much power.
Essentially, both Helck and I’m Quitting Heroing focus on showing that demons are pretty okay people while humanity is actually the filling the villainous role.
Chillin’ in My 30s after Getting Fired from the Demon King’s Army
Dariel is a dark soldier in the Demon King’s army – or rather, he was. After the son of the previous demon general took over, he swiftly fired Dariel for a lack of power and supposed usefulness.
Set adrift, Dariel rescues a girl from a monster in the woods and she takes him to her village. There, he discovers that he wasn’t actually a demon, but is a human – and an incredibly powerful one.
Now he pays the village back for all their kindness by helping them out.
Unlike Helck that is about a human hero heading towards becoming the Demon Lord, Chillin’ in My 30s is about a demon peon getting forced out of the demon army by nepotism, but finding out he was actually a human all along when he integrates into human society.
Helck and Chillin’ in My 30s are fantasy-set anime, but don’t actually take themselves very seriously. Both series enjoy a lot of comedy, but also do have an actual serious plot that they are exploring in between the jokes. Chillin’ in My 30s is more focused on the main character’s origin, his adventures in town management, and helping build the relationship between humans and demons – both of which are just trying to live their lives.
Like Helck is just the nicest guy, Dariel is also both a nice young man and wildly overpowered when compared to his peers.
Welcome to Demon School, Iruma-kun
Iruma Suzuki has had a tough life. His parents are irresponsible, so he must work to earn money to take care of himself. One day, he discovers that his parents have sold him to the demon, Sullivan.
Afraid at first, he relaxes when he discovers that the demon merely wants a grandchild. As Sullivan is the headmaster of the demon school Babyls, he enrolls Iruma.
However, Iruma soon discovers that as the grandchild of Sullivan, he is now expected to take the throne of Demon King.
Both Helck and Welcome to Demon School, Iruma-kun are anime series about human main characters that end up integrated into demon society where they hate humans. However, they go about things in entirely different ways.
Welcome to Demon School, Iruma-kun is more about him hiding being a human and comically failing in such a way that he appears very powerful. Unlike Helck, Iruma isn’t actually particularly strong, the demons just think that he is.
While Welcome to Demon School, Iruma-kun has more of an arc-based shounen anime style storytelling, like Helck, it is a more comedic anime most of the time with some more serious moments. Like Helck, the demons in Welcome to Demon School, Iruma-kun are also less menacing than usually presented in anime.
For Fans of Super Strong, but Silly
Mashle – Muscles and Magic
When a person is born, they bear a distinctive mark on their face that denotes that they have magical abilities. To maintain the magical integrity of the world, those without the mark are swiftly exterminated.
Mash Burnedead was born without a mark or magical ability, but he was taken in by one weak mage and raised away from society in the forest. While he lacks magical skills, Mash has honed his physical strength to superhuman levels by working out everyday.
When Mash was discovered in the forest and his peaceful life was upended, he decides to go to magic school to become a Divine Visionary, a person that the whole world recognizes for their supreme skills, in order to protect his family.
However, while being magic-less in a magic school seems like a pretty indomitable obstacle, Mash’s muscles are capable of feats that seem just like magic.
While fantasy-set Helck and magic school-set Mashle are two very different settings and plots, they have similar main characters. Helck is indomitable in physical might, but the nicest guy you will ever meet. Mash is indomitable in might, but comically deadpan and solely focused on where his next cream puff is coming from.
Helck and Mashle are about super powerful main characters that are innately silly in their attitudes. However, they both also manifest plots outside of the comedy. The big difference is that Mashle is occasionally more of a shounen-style action anime, but neither forgets to go right back to its familiar, lovable jokes.
Cautious Hero – The Hero is Overpowered But Overly Cautious
In the divine realm, Gods and Goddesses are assigned worlds in peril to summon heroes to guide on their quest to save those worlds.
The Goddess of Healing, Ristarte, is assigned a difficult S-class world and told to pick a hero to defeat the Demon King. While her choices are underwhelming, one low level hero with super stats catches her eye!
Seiya Ryuuguuin is indeed a powerful hero, but he also has the problematic quirk of being overly cautious. His desire to stay on the safe side, over-preparing and over-training for all encounters, is a source of frustration for all.
Unlike Helck, Seiya in Cautious Hero doesn’t start off overpowered, he just quickly becomes that way due to his obsession with training in an effort to comically over-prepare for any potential situation.
However, like Helck, Cautious Hero follows some of the most comically flawed and just plain fun fantasy characters you will ever watch. What Helck is parodying in the classic “hero and demon lord” fantasy anime scenario, Cautious Hero is parodying in isekai.
Both Helck and Cautious Hero are unexpectedly good fantasy comedy anime carried by silly characters. Yet, one surprising thing they also have in common is they also get pretty serious in the plot on occasion.
Bofuri – I Don’t Want to Get Hurt, so I’ll Max Out My Defense
After receiving an invitation from a friend, Kaede Honjou starts playing the VRMMO game New World Online as a character named Maple.
However, in her desire to not get hurt, she puts all her stats in Vitality. This makes her move very slowly, unable to use magic, and get attacked by even the smallest creatures. However, it does allow her impenetrable defense, and the gear she finds while wandering grants her a one-hit counter skill.
And so, her adventures begin.
You know how Helck often beats opponents overwhelmingly with a smile on his face and then helps them up afterwards? Maple in Bofuri is exactly that sort of cinnamon roll as well. However, instead of overwhelming might, she just has indomitable defense that often turns the power of others against them.
Although Bofuri is set in a VRMMO, it maintains that light-hearted fantasy vibe to it like Helck occasionally has. The big difference is that Helck can get rather serious at times and while Bofuri gets serious when it comes to tough battles, but it never has the same sense of darkness that Helck injects when his smile stops.
Level 1 Demon Lord and One Room Hero
Ten years ago, the hero Max and his adventuring party defeated the Demon Lord. While defeated, the Demon Lord slumbered to regain his power, but in his haste to face Max again, wakes up in a small body opposed to his once-fearsome form.
Despite this, the Demon Lord goes to the human world to see what his arch-nemesis is up to only to discover that the mighty hero Max is a layabout in a one-room apartment with a terrible reputation as a sleazebag in the human world.
Both Helck and Level 1 Demon Lord and One Room Hero start out as one of those “one joke” sort of anime series. The joke in Helck is that he is so strong, nice, and likable that a demon general thinks he is up to something sinister. The joke in Level 1 Demon Lord and One Room Hero is that the Demon Lord is cute and the hero is a scummy shut-in.
Yet, both series actually evolve good serious plots above those singular joke setups. Furthermore, both of those plots involve a shift in the politics of the world and how the characters are trying to prevent deadly war from breaking out in their own ways.
Both Helck and Level 1 Demon Lord and One Room Hero are often light-hearted and comical, but do have moments where they take things seriously.
For Fans of Comically Flawed Characters
Konosuba
On his way back from buying a new game, Kazuma Satou died a pathetic death.
However, he awakens before the Goddess Aqua who gives him two choices: go to heaven or reincarnate into an actual fantasy world. Naturally, the gamer picks the fantasy world.
Now, Kazuma must deal with defeating an evil demon king, useless party members, and paying living expenses.
A good part of the comedy in Helck comes from how unexpected the characters are based on their looks or reputation. Konosuba was built on just that, but done in the overdone isekai setting.
Both Helck and Konosuba are comedy anime where many of the characters are often comical or comically flawed. However, while Helck has a singular plot that it progresses, Konosuba is often adventure-based with no firm ending in sight.
Furthermore, while Helck is often more wholesomely light-hearted, a not small part of the comedy in Konosuba comes from the characters being scummy or degenerate.
Kemono Michi
Shibata Genzo is both a professional wrestler and an animal lover. One day, he is summoned to another world by a princess. She makes the mistake of asking him to rid her kingdom of these evil beasts.
Instead of doing that, Genzo suplexes her and heads off to start a monster pet shop.
While Genzo in Kemono Michi isn’t as indomitable as Helck, he has that same big heart of gold that immediately endears you to those characters.
While Kemono Michi is innately different as an isekai anime about a wrestler that decides to open a pet shop instead of slay monsters, it is, like Helck, very much a comedy anime. Both series follow big, beefy guys who are the nicest people you will ever meet until you threaten something important to them.
Outside of the similarities between the main characters, comedy in both series often comes from how unexpectedly odd the other characters around them are. They are all subversions of common fantasy character tropes.
The Legendary Hero is Dead
Far to the north, the Demon Lord used Hell’s Gate to invade the human realm. However, he was stopped by legendary sword wielding hero Shion and his companions.
While the portal was sealed, the seal was incomplete and now with it weakening, the demons have begun to attack again. Worried about his village, the young perverted farmer Touka Scott dug a series of pitfall traps for protection around town. Unfortunately, legendary hero Shion finds one of these traps, falls in, and dies.
Trying to cover up the accident, Touka buries the hero secretly in the forest. While that was to be the end of it, Touka’s soul is taken from his body and stuffed into Shion’s rotting corpse by Shion’s companion and necromancer, Anri Haynesworth. Now, he is forced to travel to Hell’s Gate in order to attempt to seal the portal for good and save the world.
Both Helck and The Legendary Hero is Dead are set in standard fantasy worlds, but they don’t tell standard fantasy stories – they parody them.
Both series are built around heroes not being what people expect them to be. In The Legendary Hero is Dead, the hero is dead and the guy in his body is kind of a comically scummy degenerate. Unlike Helck who is super powerful, the hero in The Legendary Hero is Dead was powerful, but the guy currently in his body is super weak.
While Helck explores more of a kingdom-wide intrigue plot going on in the Human Kingdoms, The Legendary Hero is Dead is based around the various adventures had on a journey. So the plot is often more random and location-based.
Both series are comedy anime, but neither anime completely neglects plot either. Furthermore, sometimes serious moments in that plot are solved kind of comically, but not always.
Do you have more anime recommendations like Helck? Let fans know in the comments section below.
