"Split cour" is a term used for shows that take a break between one cour and another. In the beginning, the goal was to maintain the relevance of the anime brand and the project, to complete the work, ensuring a good return for the studio and creators of the original material. Now, the purpose of the split cour is usually sustained to give the studios more time to make the continuation of the project as good as possible. It's normal for this to happen in the industry, and many shows manage to make up for problems and even improve their own story, which as the chapters go on present a higher quality and sense to make the show interesting. 100-man did this. The gap between one season and the next was even longer than usual (6 months), but honestly it wasn't that enjoyable an improvement.
This second season is divided into two arcs, where the first is the climax of the whole show so far. On a Volcanic Island there is a conflict between Orcs and Humans, where Yotsuya and his group face, together with a group of mercenaries, this mission. Torii Keita, the new member, entered the team of heroes as someone nice and more charming than the rest of the characters. Well, this is no merit, if you think that anyone could be more eye-catching than all the girls in the group. By the way, Keita was a boy who had a fight with Yotsuya in real life, before the first season ended. This insertion of the character for the involvement of the two was a good attempt to relate the characters and also to recover what had happened in the past. Speaking of the past, Kahabell was a character reused in the show to enhance the love she had with the protagonist, even though she had spent more than ten years in the fantasy universe.
The arc, even though it wasn't that interesting, was nice to follow. It really had captivating episodes in the middle of a normal RPG story. It was a credit to the effort given by the Maho Film studio for the show. Yotsuya had another internal evolution phase, characters like Kusue and Tokitake improved in performance and the mission was completed. It also had Yotsuya bearing a burden: the weight of having to do cruelty to complete her goals. It's a brave determination and one that deserves attention, as it's a factor that will surely make the show have a conclusion focused on this. It's nothing like "power of friendship." It's more like "if being a monster in this world will make my friends okay, I'll do it without hesitation". On top of all that, the existence of a man controlling a dragon was
The second Arc is more debatable and, for me, has some inconsistencies that hurt the overall story. This time, a Village living has a legend where a land exists that is able to bring eternal peace to its inhabitants, the "New Eden". Meanwhile, the leader of the region uses the very people who live in this village for exploration missions, where instead of really being an attempt to find this sacred land, it is actually a goal to disseminate and even eliminate the population of the village, which is experiencing problems and lack of food and other resources.
Yotsuya then, along with his group and a girl named Jezby (who by the way becomes the antagonist of this mission) and Glenda (the new member, who is a foreigner), leave for this mission destined by the Game Master. Actually, this story is not really incoherent, however the way the objectives were set was not pleasant.
Even though the show tries to leave the Village leader in the position of being guilty for killing many people, he ends the show as a "good man", or at least as being a better person than his attitudes are. Jezby the entire anime gave no signs that he was someone bad, but in the plot twist a revelation happens that even though it is shocking, it doesn't cause the necessary effect to be something important. Glenda (or "Glen" as people usually talk) finding out the truth of this Arc failed to bring a good convenience to the show. And even if it makes logic that the granddaughter of the Village leader and her adoptive father have been infected, this narrative turn was rather anticlimactic and mechanical. It didn't give a favorable and interesting setting, much less manage to encompass and conclude the situation in a beneficial way.
Another thing that didn't please so much either was Fatina. She is still a mysterious character and seems to have ties to the future of the show, about the dragon apparently being the last mission of the story. These were parts that put together another compilation of unnecessary and boring episodes and really didn't hold any interest with me, even if the conclusion of the show was satisfying.
Ultimately 100-man ends this 24-episode set below RPG animes in general, but it did get a small improvement compared to the first season. There were some shameful parts (like the girls doing an "idol" moment early in the anime), but they also had some enjoyable scenes, especially when it came to Yotsuya. Who knew that at some point he could be a cool character to follow. It was an okay season, after all.
