Haikara-san ga Tooru Movie 2: Hana no Tokyo Dai Roman

The story started off great, with Benio in high spirits while looking for Shinobu. She was as proactive and headstrong as always. Very entertaining to watch her opening adventure. Unfortunately, her pro-activeness ended quickly.

As the truth behind Shinobu's disappearance was revealed, the plot became extremely predictable and got tiring quickly. The pacing was way too slow in the middle portion of this film. Every prediction I made ended up happening, even the ones I was really hoping wouldn't.

Benio isn't the only one who loses her agency. Things just happen to Shinobu and he's constantly tied up in worry. He's only spurned into action ... by the words of others. The only two characters that actively caused things to happen in the plot were destined to fail by the laws of shoujo. Obstacles were written out too conveniently. The ending did not feel earned.

The first movie was amazing. A beautiful take on how opposing cultures/perspectives/backgrounds can come together and produce something breathtaking. Unfortunately, halfway through the second one, that was thrown out the window.

The one thing I can't stand about the second movie is how they took the concept of death so lightly and just let it be. As if they used death as a convenient way to advance the plot. It's frustrating as hell. The first movie was great, but the second was just so skewed. As a shoujo movie, it's all it's meant to be, and I embrace that element of it, it's great, but ... the way they just toy with the concept of death really gets to me. It hurts.