If you've read my Hibike! Euphonium 2 review, you know that I love an anime that can make me cry, and I especially love an anime that can make me cry alongside it. So, by reading the title you might already know where this review is going but that doesn't mean I'll stop writing, because when I came in to Uma Musume Season 2 after a couple month break between having seen season 1 and now, I was just expecting another fun anime with some cute horsegirls following their dreams, and instead I ended up watching a story about shattering dreams.

I say "story" instead of "anime" because this isn't just another piece of Japanese animated fiction. Like a lot of gacha-based series, the characters in this series are based on real things - this time it just happens to be racehorses. I'm telling you this little piece of trivia not because I think it's cute or original or anything, obviously not, but instead because I think it's important.

Concepts like this are explored often, other series like Azur Lane and Girls' Frontline tread the same line, with characters based on warships and weaponry of the past, and they tend to connect characters together based on the existences they're built around, such as Enterprise and Hornet being sisters in the series. In the same way, Uma Musume connects characters like this, Teio looking up to Rudolf in the series is a nod to the fact that in real life, Tokai Teio was the son of Symboli Rudolf. However, unlike many other series that have this concept, Uma Musume doesn't stop there.

Again and again, our heroine of this season, Tokai Teio, was backed into a corner. Again and again, she had to keep fighting. Breaking her leg three times throughout this series wasn't just a means to keep the plot moving, but the true story of Tokai Teio, the racehorse who kept fighting. After breaking his leg multiple times, he continued to race, and even when everyone thought he was done for, he continued. Does that remind you of anything? Tokai Teio is my favorite character in this series, and she has been since season 1, but watching her run, break apart, run, break apart, run, break apart, and then break down hurt me more and more.

We watched as McQueen, Turbo, Kita, Trainer, and everyone else lost themselves because of the loss of Tokai Teio on the racetrack. Watching her choose to give up once and for all was a breaking point not just for the characters in the series but for me as a viewer, as this was the first time I really cried. I cried alongside everyone else who cried.

... This was the FIRST time I cried.

I was still crying when Twin Turbo managed to win the hardest race of her career just to prove to Teio that anything could happen as long as she didn't give up. I didn't even realize I was crying until Episode 10 ended in fact. I honestly thought that would be the most devastating moment. I honestly believed that from there, Teio just had to keep being herself and I would already adore this series.

Then Episode 12 happened.

It wasn't a show about racing anymore. It wasn't just another slice of life or CGDCT anime anymore. Instead, the drama from this series made it one of the saddest things I've watched play out on a screen. It wasn't until McQueen fell that I felt my heart sink alongside her. It wasn't until tears fell from McQueen's eyes, not until McQueen screamed out, both in pain and in despair, not until I read just two sentences that I really cried right then and there. "I... can't run anymore. I can't keep my promise to you!" was painful. However, what followed it up was even more painful, somehow. Somehow the words that started this review made emotions flood over me, emotions that I never expected from a series like this.

I felt like I was crying for the last 23 minutes of this series after that. The entire last episode I felt tears on my cheeks even during scenes that made me smile and cheer, and when Teio crossed the finish line and everyone cried while calling out her name, I did too.

Every episode it felt like my emotions were running out of control at times. Watching Rice Shower give up because she felt like the world hated her, and watching as the world slowed down for a moment every time one of our stars got injured - each and every scene just made me feel a different sort of pain, a different sort of joy. Uma Musume Season 2 isn't anything like its predecessor. When before Uma Musume was a sports anime disguised as an idol anime that made you want to smile and cringe at times, this side of that same series somehow became one of the tensest dramas I've seen all year.

And yet... through everything, we never saw anyone give up. McQueen, Rice, Turbo, Nature, every single character who faced that wall in front of them... and especially Tokai Teio never gave up. Teio was saved by the people who cared about her, and she saved everyone who she cared about just the same. One girl who struggled again and again paved a way for others to follow, and she's never going to let anyone slip by her again. Why?