The first season of Free! was a fun and emotional romp full of great characters, amazing visuals, great music, and something to say about youthful ambition and friendship-, which is what will stick with you moving into Eternal Summer. Of course, I'll be getting into that, but this season delivers all of that, and so much more of it- all while improving on the dynamics that worked from the 1st.

And friends, Eternal Summer might be a case study on how to make a perfect sequel. it builds on every theme from the first season, expanding one each character's desires and goals, and adding whole new characters with complex stories of their own- but the season doesn't feel like it's struggling to balance any of that, it's all handled with such grace and ease. It even takes the time to explore the little things with the charactyers that were lingering from Season One, and explore our supporting cast a bit more. I still feel that Makoto, Rei and Nagisa are a ltitle udnerexplored, but I was happy to see them make a real effort to dig deeper into them as characters. The supporting case for Samesuka actually had a lot of fleshing out here, and that may have been at Iwatobi's expense, but I quite enjoyed seeing that side of things more this time around. And this season really hones in on the emotion- Haru's breakdown and his subsequent trip with Rin to Australia to recover from that being particular highlights. It was so heartwarming to see Haru and RIn's relationship evolve, as well as Haru's to Maktoto, though this was much more low-key. I also believed I might hate the characters of Sousuke and Momotaro at first, but by the end I really enjoyed them too. Sousuke starts out as a somewhat malicious and enigmatic figure, but his complexity soon shines through, and it's clear that he was simply misguided though he was motivated by his love for RIn, much like Haru is. Momo is a total goofball, but a lovable one by the end. Nitori also deserves a shoutout for how happy I was to see him go from a meek imitator of RIn to someone desiring and eventually achieving greatness outside of his shadow. And, of course, like the first season, it's still really funny even with how emotional and intense the interpersonal drama and sports action gets.Not to mention, it's as beautifully animated as ever, even more so this time around, the last few episodes have a lot of particularly beautiful sunset, water, and nighttime imagery to showcase and it absolutely captures the luster and also the nervousness that these boys feel as they realize that the peak of their high school experience is here and now; and contemplating how they're going to capitalize on that.

I adore this series and I'm so happy that Eternal Summer has struck such a chord with me. I think this show is going to be one of my all time favorites... well, eternally. And reminder, Rin Matsuoka is the best character in all of fiction (With an honorary shout-out to all the other boys. Nagisa is my secret favorite.)