Let's start by talking about the art of season 2.
I adored the soundtrack, it's definitely worth a listen, so while you read this, go do that or something.
Anyways, like I just said, it's great. The high energy-jazzy feel of some tracks massively amplify the spontaneous and chaotic feel of the fight scenes where the characters are always on the move and adapting their strategies to each other. The slower tracks similarly do a really good job at setting the tone and quickly dropping us off the incredible highs brought on by the faster tracks. It's just a really good soundtrack that is used to wonderful effect to set or reinforce the tone and feel each individual scene.
Similarly, the voice actors did an amazing job at giving life to all the characters. Everyone sounds so genuine, allowing you to truly feel Nobara's determination, Yuuji's uncertainty, Mahito's insanity, Aoi's liveliness, and so on, I really loved all of them, there's nothing more to it!
The art is also really good, however, it does come with a "but" and don't get me wrong, I loved the art. I think all the designs are great, every attack has a sense of power behind it (which is in big part thanks to the great sound design too), the fights feel dynamic (shoutout to the really great use of camera movements), I loved the use of color and lighting, everything looks incredibly fluid, it's great stuff all around! But... during the 6 first episodes, the studio used some really obvious 3D and, during combat scenes, a blur effect to everything that massively reduces readability and also removing a lot of the "oompf" the animation otherwise would have (it also comes back a few times later on in the season), making some combat scenes that could've been great feel very underwhelming relatively speaking.
The story is also really great, but barely anything of note happens. I think this is not an inherent flaw with the show. The man who wrote this story clearly wanted to write a very combat-focused Shonen and the story does fill that roll really well, the fight scenes are great, and pacing is generally also good, but the problem I have with it is that it doesn't try to be anything more than a basic combat-oriented Shonen, which is a shame, cause it has a really cool world, characters and story.
This season has essentially only 3 major plot points that aren't character specific which is barely anything for 23 episodes. This situation wouldn't necessarily make for a bad story, having 3 plot points could easily make for a great story as long as they are well thought out and developed over time, however, the author really doesn't seem to put much thought into the overarching story, as things happen or are introduced only when they are about to be used, which means that only 1 of those 3 points seems properly built up to, but even then, it comes at the very end of the season, meaning nothing much comes of it. That's where I feel the story kind of falters, it's really interesting and has some really cool character developments and plot points, but they are drowned in a sea of combat scenes meaning that very few of them feel fully developed or explored, which is a shame. Still, it's not all bad, the characters feel very dynamic, the few plot points that change the world the show takes place in fundamentally (which serve to progress the world) that we do get are very cool (though underdeveloped to some extent) and the moment to moment story (which serves as a backdrop for combat to take place) is actually very interesting.
Though, the story also comes into the issue of having questionable pacing at times. When the show gives us back to back slow scenes, they flow really nicely, when the show introduces us to scenes that are more intense one after the other, they flow really nicely, but when the show tries to go from intense scenes to slow ones, it doesn't seem to be able to make it feel natural, it just suddenly puts a feet on the break with no warning instead of progressively slowing down, which can get jarring at times.
Apart from that, there's little to note or dislike about the show really. It's a fun and engaging action Shonen with fun character interactions (and characters themselves) and jokes, cool use of the camera and environment during combat scenes, but the story feels somewhat disjointed at times and the last episode is a joke, instantly killing the fast pace the show has been keeping up for almost 10 episodes straight and ending by repeating the exact same plot point for almost 10 minutes straight.
Mid 7, still better than Demon Slayer's Entertainment District Arc. Would've been a very high 7 if it wasn't for that last episode.
32 out of 44 users liked this review