This review contains some minor spoilers for this season, so be aware of that.

The second season of Shafts adaptation of Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei continues the tradition of the previous one while also pushing the boundaries to its limits. The rather drawn out episodes of the first season are chopped up into 2-3 parts per episode greatly increasing the pacing, so even if you might not like a particular joke it never lingers for too long. The humor continues making fun of and critiquing japanese society and culture, which is why some of the jokes can be pretty hit or miss if you weren't living in Japan in the 2000s. Luckily the cast of extremely over the top characters make the jokes that don't land as well still really entertaining.

Characters

The characters themselves stay pretty much the same compared to the first season and don't get any developement at all. (Which is to be expected as they all are gag characters with a few pre-defined traits and an actual developing story isn't what this show is going for). Nozomu is always in despair, Kafuka is always optimistic, Chiri is aperfectionist and so on. The cast also gets expanded in addition of a housewife student who is introduced in the most ridiculous way possbile. The characters bounce off of each other incredibly well and are always fun to watch. Add an amazing set of Seíyuu's to that and this is what you get.

Structure

As I have mentioned before the episodes are divided into several parts that sometimes adapt a chapter from the manga and sometimes create entirely new storylines. This is in my opinion one of this seasons biggest strengths. You might say that gag characters that always stay the same are going to become really stale really fast, but in this case it's the total opposite. Similar to what they did in Pani Poni Dash, Shaft realized that these characters can be put into pretty much any situation and still offer great comedic value without feeling unnatural or forced. In addition to the traditional parts all sense of "canon" or a "coherent storyline" is completely thrown out of the window in exchange for insane scenarios with Nozomu and the students. The first episode places Nozomu in the shoes of a shady business man trying to scam people, being hunted by some sort of cult and getting turned into a (crab?)man in the process. In another episode an army of aliens attacks the earth and the girls find a mask granting them the power to fight them off evangelion style. Then there's a segment containing the characters in different TV programs on the "Zetsubou Channel", a segment where the voice actors of the characters change everytime they talk, a segment where the animation style constantly changes, a detective story, the housewife character getting introduced basically off-screen in a radio show that plays while we watch Harumi draw her yaoi Manga and so on. These totally different and always surprising moments always keep the show interesting throughout. It feels as if the writers were being given a lot of freedom with the source material and it definitely paid off in the end.

Animation

This might be Shaft at it's most experimental. The presentation gets even more surprising, creative, fresh and enaging this time around. While Shaft already showed a lot of their siganture style in the first season, they push even further in Zoku. Just as they had a lot of freedom in the storytelling the animation compliments that by playing around with different styles and squeezing in as many background gags and jokes as humanely possible. Sometimes it feels like they really just did whatever (in a good way lol).

Summary

If you were a fan of the first seasons humor and are fine with the narrative and animation being a little bit more free than before or you are just a fan of "Shaft-Style" in general, then this is an absolute must-watch.