As always, I spot the anime and it takes me a long time just to start up on it, in this case, I had already watched the first episode of the first season in dubbed.
That wasn't impressive enough for me.
After a couple of years, I came back and watched the series in their native language.
Story:
This season of Hakkenden took me on another emotional ride.
To start off with, I love how Shino and Sousuke's trust in each other were put to the test and the result did not fail to surprise me. We followed the main characters around several places in the world they live in, and they helped out many people they met on their path.
I must say that some of the people they encounter had a fate that I didn't expect to see. Another emotional point, unlike the first season, this one had episodes that ended in unexpected and sad ways, tragic, nonetheless.
It felt though as if the last episode got a bit hasty, finishing the story and all and I would've liked to see a longer fight and a more dramatic ending perhaps.
Art:
I love every single bit about the art, so beautiful.
There were so many details in everything, and more specific, the hair and eyes of each character.
Very detailed and they were all unique.
The landscape was just as beautiful and overall, this art style will always remain as one of my favourites.
(A bonus is the beautiful young men)
Sound:
Nice sound and the voice actors did one amazing job.
The ending song though, I could cry over and over because of how emotional it is.
All of the scenes there were shown in it, worked well with the song.
(SPOILER: The song and clips used all pointed towards Ao's feelings about Shino and Sousuke together, that was emotional. It hit me like a bus, that's how emotionally attached I've become to that ending song, and to Ao as well.)
Character:
All of the main characters are unique and has their own stories to tell.
Once again, Shino and Sousuke are the ones I wanted to know more about. Over time, more things were revealed about each character. I enjoy reading into stuff and pointing out details although there wasn't much to point out here.
They all have unique powers and prove to be strong, some individually strong, and other characters, not so much.
Overall:
It took me two days to watch the season from start to finish while trying to save episodes so that they may last longer but that simply did not work. That's how attached I got to it, unlike the first season that took me a week to finish because it was easy to save the episodes a bit.
This season was the one that hit me the hardest in the feels and the entertainment overall.
Some episode endings did leave me a bit in the dark but it wasn't 'impossible' to figure out what the story we were left with was.
Of course, this anime surprised me like most of the anime I've written a review for has.
I took a strong liking to Shino, Sousuke and Ao and they'll always be my favorite characters of this anime.
The anime ended without many questions left to ask so that's good.
I wouldn't mind a new season of Hakkenden but it probably won't be happening anytime soon since the release of this season was a pretty long time ago.
Overall 8/10
