Kono Subarashii Sekai ni Shukufuku wo! 2

And now, I, the contrarian buzzkill present to you, Kono2ba: A middling, even less funny, and overall lower quality product that actually wants to be taken seriously at times. It fails by its predecessor's standards and it makes me feel like Kazuma. I'll grab the rotten tomatoes...

*SPOILERS FOR KONOSUBA 2*

I'm gonna come clean. I do not like Konosuba. The first half was really funny but the second half was so stale and infuriating that I would not be looking forward to any more. Hell, I only came back due to the fact that I follow all franchises I've seen, even the ones I dislike or ... hate. Even still, one can't deny that Konosuba had some novelty and genuine laughs, as well as a lot of heart. Kono2ba on the other hand, is a middling season that ends up being a downgrade in almost every way imaginable. It's more of the same things that made the second half of season 1 vastly inferior to the first half, only with some badly done plot, and a surprising amount of people seek to agree that this is at least inferior to the first season. Now, why the buzzkill viewpoint? Is this season as bad as I say? Well, before I get pelted like an Eris cultist, let's find out, shall we?

STORY: 3/10

Ideally, I wouldn't even try to rate the score of a comedy, as they tend to have stories that take no precedence and that are mostly episodic: a platform for the rest of the episode. However, this season actually tries to make us take this seriously at points and even reminds us that there is a central plot and not just a background for our characters to do whatever in. That means, I must take it into account. I'm a monster, I know. Even still, with this we can conclude that this ain't no "How I Met Your Mother".

Episode 1 has got to be the most simultaneously dull and aggravating first episodes to any anime I've seen to date. Presents everyone acting uncharacteristically douchey (which is a surprise given how awful some of these people are). Logic fore episode 1 is tossed aside as people make purposefully rash and assholish decisions for conflict that gets resolved at the episode, albeit with Kazuma getting the short end of the stick in the end, which is a common theme for this anime, but I'll get back to that. Some of the reasonings behind plot points, such as a member of the Demon Lord's generals surviving an explosion, or the Axis Cult being the worst people ever to their Goddess, or those same people finally worshiping her again and giving her a brand new power (God Requiem), are so damn plot convenient that they hurt. The Drifters level tone-shifts only make things worse, like in the most climactic moment of episode 10. They also like to make us have emotional moments in which we're supposed to feel for a character or see someone die, only for that to be revoked rather quickly, which sours everything. In the finale, Kazuma and a hot springs overseer are dissolved by a sludge monster that gets frozen, but we never see how they got set free and revived (since that would kill them both and we would need to see them getting revived, but Kazuma remains in the show but the other guy isn't seen again). There's that Darkness family subplot in episode 4 that amounts to nothing after all the buildup from the past 2 episodes.The last 4 episodes are spent on a bad Axis Cult arc that hardly does any progression aside from taking down another bad guy and then returning to status quo, because that's what a story meant to progress needs. Progression isn't mandatory to any real stretch in this series, as that is not a major problem like many claim. Even then, the series progresses more than many give it credit for. However, given that the first half is largely just a rehash of jokes that got old in season 1 and season 2 is largely this aggravating detour, it makes me want to opt out.

CHARACTERS: 2/10

Even in a comedy, having your characters be static, one-dimensional characters that only get "flandarised" (or having their main personality quirk get taken up to new extremes while being their only personality trait) over time is a bad thing, and will get on people's nerves, and boy did it ruin everything for me here...again. Let's start with Kazuma. Poor, poor Kazuma is never allowed to win. That is the golden rule. It's annoying to see the only sense of reason and human decency be the ultimate punching bag. He's even more observant this time, bur rarely does that come in handy. Sure, he's a but of a spiteful prick, but when you consider the toxic shits around him, can you blame him? Megumin is still a one-trick pony with a thing for explosion magic. Now, she also gets sexualized occasionally and is now as much of a prick as the rest of the group, especially towards Kazuma, because the only likable character isn't allowed to win. Yunyun (introduced in the OVA) is her hopeless and childish rival who doesn't serve much lurpose aside from being made fun of and having a backstory that, while tragic, is forgotten just as quickly as it was brought up. Darkness is the same as always, but with a little more antagonism towards Kazuma, and her shit was as annoying as ever to the point where it gloriously aggravated one of the villains in episode 5. Sena, the prosecutor that arrests Kazuma in episode 1, is an annoying lady who constantly shouts at him for everything and does nothing because we need an obnoxious authority character. The lord in episode 1 is just your stereotypical sleezebag ruler. Wiz, luckily, is still alright, and has a genuinely badass scene in the finale. Hans is a mediocre final villain, but his reasoning for wanting to fuck up the Axis Cult are reasonable; they are the most horrid, pathetic, stupid, and obnoxious people on the planet, just like their goddess, Aqua. Plus, they hate Eris because we gotta torture an actually decent person more because it's totally funny! Vanir, the villain in episode 4 who survives due to the convenient reasoning of being able to have multiple copies of himself, is an actually entertaining villain and eventual side-character. Now, to what really killed everything for me, above all else.

Aqua is the worst character in this show by a long mile, and is one of the most unlikeable bitches I've ever seen in fiction. This vain, worthless, problem-causing, obnoxious, pompous, stupid, and pathetic brat gets even worse here with how much they ramp up her stereotypcally bitchy attitude. They even lampshade all of this, but since character development (and, to a lesser extent, plot development) isn't allowed here, the bitch only gets worse with each passing episode. The only reason she helps out the obviously awful and disgusting Axis Cult, they worship her. The only reason she does decent things is because she hopes for benefit. She is the main source of Kazuma's suffering and it was never, ever funny for me. A stereotype of a bitch taken to an extreme that gets ramped up even further this season than last season. Luckily Eris is still tolerable and a safe haven for both myself and Kazuma, but she gets constantly shat on as well. I also hate how in the beginning of episode 1, after trying to help Kazuma not get arrested, and they are threatened, both Kazuma's "friends" and "guild colleagues" rat him out with absoluyte lies and totally betray him. This show often tries to make it seem like the tetrad of party-mates are friends, but they're played for deception to fuck over Kazuma because making a flawed yet decent person suffer for literally everything has got to be funny. You see my problem? The likable and actually decent people are always shit on, and the one-dimensional pricks only get worse and are just a bunch of obnoxious stereotypes in a fantasy world with different classes that they suck at. It's even worse here since they repeat each character joke at nauseum when they were already dry by the end of the first season, so there was a complete dearth of new comedy.

ART: 6/10

And now for the elephant in the room; the main point of division among the Konosuba 2 viewers. Studio DEEN handled this anime once again, and here's what I have to say about the visuals. The characters look far inferior, with how they handled going off-model. I get that they did this in order to make the characters even more expressive during jokes involving their reactions, but they should've did what season 1 did and reserved that for those moments exclusively instead of making it the default design. It doesn't even help out those moments well due to how they don't often fit with the actual emotions the characters have during reactions. The characters are rarely off-model and it becomes really jarring and bad to look at, with the benefits being outweighed by the negatives. Hell, it even effects enemy animals to a lesser extent. Action scenes aren't well-handled either when involving Darkness. I get what the team was trying to go for, but where Klasky Chupo (the studio that did Ren & Stimpy, Duckman, and Rugrsts) could pull it off, this studio can't. There are some fantastic animation moments and on the whole, the 2D animation is about on par, but when the rest of the visuals suffer, boy does the value of this fade.

If that wasn't bad enough, there are a decent amount of moments with bad CGI involved, such as the bad CGI horses in episode 7 and 8, that one moment of bad CGI water in episode 7, or the CGI sword jabs against Vanir in episode 5. Season 1 never had nearly as many moments, as sporadic as they are here. Sure, some of the nice magic and level up effects are still in display, but not done so enough to help counterbalance all of this. The explosions are still cool to look at, though, and the interior backgrounds can look nice. Still, not enough to save all of this.

SOUND: 6/10

Again, the OST isn't anything interesting or memorable. They take way too long to add some new tracks, but those new ones are actually pretty decent, an are some of the emotional tracks used for the moments of tension and sadness we're supposed to have. The OP, "Tomorrow" by Machico, is a decent OP, is somewhat catchy and nice, and is much better than the first season's OP. The ED, "Ouchi ni Kaeritai", is an ok enough ED, and is slightly better than the first season's ED. This is just about the only improvement this show has, and even then, it's not a big improvement, as the music is still overall, meh.

ENJOYMENT: 3/10

After loathing the first episode of this season, I wasn't sure how this season could make me feel anything other than bitterness.I was sorta right, but there were a few jokes here and there that I actually liked, such as Kazuma using his magic against people (for either new and satisfying digs at his douche allies, or for call backs to the better season 1 jokes) or Darkness landing on her neck after reveling in the lovely and rowdy pain she was in. That one actually made me bust. All of the other jokes made me feel aggravated, however. As stared constantly, I hated seeing actually decent people such as Kazuma get the shitter by everyone constantly. Along with all of the other recycled jokes from season 1 that were stretched way too thin this time, as well as the Axis BS, and every moment with Aqua, It wasn't a pleasant time. I was also groaning at how poorly they handled scenes that we're supposed to take seriously as plot and character moments, like when they are revoked just to give Kazuma another walloping. I didn't hate is as much as episode 1 made me think I would, but it was still a bitter experience that I don't want to go back to.

OVERALL: 4/10 RAW SCORE: 38/100

This season was a middling mess of a sequel that embodied everything I hate about Konosuba while taking itself more seriously, and bring an overall inferior product in terms of quality and production. I can only look back at this with cynicism and say that I am actually tired of Konosuba in general, as well as all fantasy "trapped in a fantasy game" light novel adaptations this show parodies. I'll give it one thing, though: it made me respect Season 1 a bit more. Well, with all that aid, I bid you adieu.

My rate may seem to low because I found the art good (pretty normal actually), but...I don't really care about the art.

About the show :
I kinda enjoyed the beggining of the first season, it made me laugh a lot.
But it gets annoying, bcz it is just more of the same over and over again, nothing new happens.
The same situations, the same jokes, you don't even need to watch it to know what will happen, there is never a surprise or anything like it
It gets really annoying, I got tired of the jokes, the same jokes over and over and over ... again...
I watched till the end just bcz I don't like dropping shows, but... I don't really recommend it.
You can just watch the same episode over and over again and it will be the same as watching the 2 seasons.

There's a trend in anime where, a series may receive a fantastic and highly acclaimed first season, but then a second season is released that is a mediocre cash grab made for the sole purpose of selling Blu Rays and making a quick profit. The second season of KonoSuba is a prime example of this trend.

Synopsis:

Since this is a review of the second season of KonoSuba, I don't feel any need to give any backstory or a summary of the plot, since you've probably already seen the first season.

Story:

The story in this season is pretty much nonexistent. There's literally nothing done to further the ... party's goal of defeating the devil king. For the majority of the season, Kazuma and crew pretty much just wander around, accepting quests, coincidentally stumbling upon the Devil King's generals, etc. If you've seen season 1, they pretty much use the same formula, here. Kazuma's party accepts a quest, difficulties arise caused by the "unique " (read:problematic) personalities of each of the party members, there's a few "haha" moments and the episode ends.

Also, this season has a horrible habit of recycling the same humor from the previous season. After awhile, the jokes just become stale and lose all comedic value that they once held, which is in part due to the fact that the characters never actually break OUT of character (more on this in a minute).

Characters:

Just like how the plot is directionless, so are the characters. You have your NEET otaku (who happens to be a pervert), your dimwitted goddess who causes trouble for the party, your masochistic crusader, and your chuunibyou mage who just loves to cast explosion magic. While this lovable party did well in delivering comedy through their unique personalities and interactions with each other in season 1, it just wasn't enough to keep me engaged this time around. For one, they NEVER break out of character. While some may praise the series for this, for me, it made the comedy seem stagnant and utterly boring. In my opinion, there's only so many times you can laugh at the same scenarios that have already been done numerous times before. To remain fresh, the comedy needs to change and constantly reinvent itself, which is probably the largest reason why I think this season failed.

Art & Sound:

If all of my above complaints weren't enough to drive home the fact that this season was mediocre, there's also the sub-par animation quality. The first episode, especially, was horrible in terms of animation. Throughout the season, there were numerous off-model shots, low overall detail quality (this can be seen in cities and scenery shots), and character faces were just "off" at multiple points in the series. Oh, and did I mention the nightmarish CGI horses? Because there's a few of those.

The sound was...nothing to write home about. At the very least, the OP and ED songs were quite good.

Overall:

If there's one word that I can use to describe how I felt about the second season of KonoSuba, it would be disappointing. I had hoped that I would see some sort of plot progression, and that the humor would reinvent itself in a way that would prevent the comedy from becoming stale. But alas, this wasn't the case. In the end, I give Kono Subarashii Sekai ni Shukufuku wo! 2 a 4/10.

I came into the second season of Kono Subarashii Sekai ni Shukufuku wo thinking that it would pick up from the first season in its story development and possibly an encounter with the devil king would happen, or even just a reveal of who this devil king is. To my disappointment, none of the above occurred.

STORY: 3/10
The story continued to be pointless, more pointless than the first season as we already have been introduced to the main characters. What began to bother me in the end was how much of a constant pain the complaining of Aqua began to become, resulting in the anime ... being a serious displeasure to watch. This could have been avoided if the story line actually progressed, but the only thing that progressed was the debt that the main characters were in. The constant completion of meaningless challenges only to be able to repay the debt, which would then become greater because of Aquas stupidity quickly became a boring and incredibly repetitive story line. this ultimately led to my disliking of the anime in general. the story is basically a budget version of sword art online but they never get to the boss.

ART: 6/10
The artwork in this anime was average with not an immense amount of detail used, which is expected. however there were no times when the style changed for dramatic effects like what happens to Saitama's face in one punch man (definitely a must watch). occasional changes in lighting and the simplicity of the artwork led to chibi like designs that had a moderately comical effect. Overall the artwork in this anime was fairly well created, no fancy designs for anything, everything was fairly simple.

SOUND: 7/10
The sound in this anime were average, I personally didn't focus on the sounds too much, but they were reasonable and fitting for the events that occurred throughout the anime. appropriate music was played during certain scenes, but it didn't add another level to the anime in any way, it just set the scene better.

CHARACTER: 5/10
The characters in this anime were highly underdeveloped, and could most definitely been expanded on. What disappointed me was the irritability of Aqua, which mostly contributed to my disappointment in the anime. All Aqua did was just complain about everything, sabotaged the ideas that Kazuma came up with whenever they were in a pinch, and would come through at the last minute with a power move that would solve the dilemma, leading to her demanding Kazuma to worship her. This was repeated almost every episode, and quickly irritated the actual crap out of me. The other characters were okay, but they all were too underdeveloped and made the anime not as engrossing as it could have been.

ENJOYMENT: 4/10
Enjoying the anime quickly became a difficult task as there was nothing that resonated within me as the viewer. Nothing made me sit on the edge of my seat wanting more. The continually whinging and whining of Aqua was so incredibly irritating I began to intensely detest her presence in any scene, especially the hot spring city. overall the lack of development and Aqua made this anime quite hard to enjoy

OVERALL: 5/10
This anime could have been very promising. However, after watching both Sword art online, and No game No life, this anime was very underdeveloped and resulted in no measurable progression towards defeating the Devil King, which was the whole point of the anime. A fatal flaw in the anime was the incredibly irritating nature of Aqua who NEVER shut up EVER, FUCK. if she was replaced with another character that was more reasonable, I probably would've rated the anime a 7 or 8, but she was pure cancer, and that I cannot forgive. Overall, if you are really bored, you can watch this anime, but it is seriously not worth it, so don't watch it

WARNING SPOILERS PLEASE DONT READ THE BOTTOM PART OF MY REVIEW IF YOU HAVENT WATCHED THE ANIME!

Overall 4/10 bcs i got very disappointed in the story and character development but still enjoyable if you looking an anime with great comedy and art

Story 3/10,enjoyment 7/10:
The first season are awesome and if you guys are coming from s1 and excited to see more adventures and comedy of this anime well you will be satisfied just like in s1... But the story are real crap and losing its way... Maybe bcs of how popular the s1 they make this anime more focused on comedy,more harem,ecchi(i dont like harem ... or ecchi but the comedy are funny) and thus the story from s1 arent really continued... This season feels like some ova episodes with great comedy to enjoy with just little bit story development... So im still recommend to watch it...

Character 5/10:
I cant describe it well but in short The characters around the main character are lacking of identity.... but if you just focused on comedy this wouldnt be a problem...



BELOW IS SPOILER SECTION WHY I RATE THE STORY 3/10




The ending are really disappointing... The ppl in this anime world always feared the great,powerful,unbeatedable devil king and his servants even for the high ranked adeventurer,noble clan fear them too.. But from what we see in this second season the ppl,adventurer in that anime world are all happy and almost lived with no fear of devil king... And is this devil king is really "powerful,unbeateble,ruthless,evil"? Well i think they should change his title to not so great devil king or maybe the retired devil king...

I know that this is a comedy anime but wiz getting angry and help those guys fighting her former comrades are just too weird... The devil king and his servants in this anime are like a total joke,weak and useless... Even if wiz turn to be a good ppl but she's still one of former devil king servant and she make an neutral agreement that only valid if they(devil king side) didnt kill anybody... Lol so wiz are so strong that she can make an agreement like that to the devil king sides? And now one of the servant that they defeat joins wiz and helping that boy get rich? So this devil king is actually weak and treated like a joke? That their servants that easily quit and change sides even make an agreement and help the opposite sides with no fear? I know that this is a comedy anime but at least dont just throw away the story that built up in s1 just bcs the anime got popular and ppls gonna like this as long there's some ecchi,harem and comedy... first season was an awesome,funny anime with great story with not too much ecchi and the second one just telling about a daily life of an neet adventurer surrounded with pretty girls living his everyday life that full of jokes and some ecchi scenes but with no real stories...

Having seen season 1 and loved it, I couldn't wait for season 2.
The first season had me laughing a lot, sniggering a lot more, and even a couple of guffaws.
The second season got an occasional smile. I think in all 10 episodes there were maybe 4 or 5 jokes that were funny.
Good comedy is about good material and good delivery. Neither angle was covered in this sequel season. The characters were established season 1, but seemed to crumble into a kind of brown paste in this season. The art work was just really bad. Sloppy keyframing leading to sloppier animation.
Bitter disappointment ... really.
I gave the sound a 5 because I always try and skip the music. Its in Japanese, with a sprinkling of English and usually nothing at all to do with the story.
With season 1 I couldn't believe something so good ended with just 10 episodes. With season 2 I wish it had ended sooner.

I assume the English translation of Kono Subarashii Sekai ni Shukufuku wo! 2 is "God's Resting on this Wonderful Laurels".

In terms of comedy, KonoSuba S2 has more of what S1 offers. Which is both good and bad. Comedy through failure was core in making the first season such a hit and most of the second season was just that: comedy through failure. It’s the same food in different packaging. Some will like it. Others won’t.

Where the first season subverts our expectations and kept us guessing, making for a very fun ride, the second season is to some degree one note and predictable. Where the first ... season continually pokes fun at the many isekai tropes, the second season opted to ride the “Darkness is a masochist” stick so hard.

Instead of finding new ways of interaction, like a certain bath scene in the second season’s second episode, S2 sticks to what is safe: the same old character defects already exploited in S1. Aqua’s dumbassery and Darkness’s masochism are especially grating because they keep falling back to it for the humor even if it’s been done to death. Yes, the cast of KonoSuba are a bunch of likeable failures who bumble their way to victory most of the time and it’s part of their charm. Asking them to lose their defining character defect is changing the nature of the show entirely. The problem isn’t their defining character trait. The problem is that the show relies on it too much instead of introducing inventive interactions and concepts.

The villains introduced add virtually nothing to the show. Heck, Verdia’s dead and done and he still managed to funnier and much more interesting with less than a minute of screentime. And since the villains and the background characters add so little, the main cast is left to carry the show’s comedy. In the case of Aqua and Darkness, they failed spectacularly.

And while S2 didn’t have a time jump like that one time on S1, the continuity feels more jarring. The comedy breaks the narrative a lot. Certain events and plotpoints tend to get nowhere. I don’t want to spoil anything so just observe Darkness -she is by far the biggest offender. It’s amazing how stagnant her character is in spite of everything that occurred since the first episode of S2. There are a lot of interesting ways they could have taken her character with everything that happened so far buuut noooo they stuck to the same old gag.

tl:dr I ragged on Darkness so hard she orgasmed, repeatedly.

Overall I enjoyed the first season because as crazy as it was, there was some form of danger, with them just reviving the main character every couple of episodes and it becoming more and more fan service than actual comedy I dropped the second season out of disinterest, and overall a poor continuation of the first season. We have to be able to acknowledge faults without making the same excuses that many people use for anime of a like wise style, "It's not meant to be serious or make sense or be good" If we were to go by that judgement I'm sure the original ... live action Dragon Ball Z movie would have had a great reception.