Hot on the heels of the last showing from the franchise with Wit Studio's initial 2-cour season back in Fall 2017 to Winter 2018, with a few OVAs in between of 2016-2017's Hoshi Matsu Hito a.k.a Those Awaiting a Star and 2021-2022's Nishi no Shounen to Seiran no Kishi a.k.a The Boy from the West and the Knight of the Blue Storm, it took 5 years just to see the continuation of the main series, which adapts the imcomplete College arc of Volumes 10 to 14, now under Wit Studio's ex-staff who would go on to form Studio Kafka. And it's a hefty, long wait that, quite honestly, didn't fascinate me much as how Season 1 did with all of its fantasy elements, now traded in for the boring school shtick.
The general consensus was that Season 1, for its time, was one of the pivotal premiere shows for the already well-established Wit Studio, which did the Shingeki no Kyojin a.k.a Attack on Titan franchise to critical acclaim. Everything, from the worldbuilding to the visuals and animation, it was all top-tier for its class back in 2017-2018. Of course, we would not see the continuation of Chise and Elias's relationship grow until this Spring season, now that we have dived into the College arc, which presents a few highs, but many lows.
New to Season 2, are the College students as Chise attends school to find a way to remove the Dragon's Curse that was inflicted on her left arm just the season prior. In the prestigous Sorcerer institution where there's nobility and talking cats for supervisory room masters, Chise is not only looking for advice because of her cursed arm, it's that her tendency to sacrifice for people is getting too high and hot, so the hopes of attending the College is a way of examining that trait as well. But the step into the College lurks new people, challenges, and no shortage of enemies that come Chise's way as her, Elias, Silky and Ruth calm down for the moment of the former's search for a treatment, that feels every bit as spiteful as Season 1, though a bit less refined.
With Wit Studio's ousting comes Studio Kafka, along with a different staff team, now under director-cum-series composer Kazuaki Terasawa, brought from the most recent 3-episode 2021-2022 OVA series, that Season 2 feels every bit the same as per the OVA. Not to say that Studio Kafka didn't do a just job, it's just that the College arc in the manga was kind of a downturn on Kore Yamazaki's part when she was creating this portion of the manga and asking for a 12–13-episode series just doesn't quite fit the narrative enough, let alone twice that if the manga ever did progress in the 5 year gap ever since.
Not gonna lie, the OST is kind of a downgrade of sorts. Again, I'm not saying that both JUNNA and edda did a subpar job for the songs, it's just that 5 years is quite a substantial time for a highly revered sequel like this to come out, and by then, most of us would've already moved on to far better songs than these. The emotions are still there, but the direction is kind of lost.
Nowadays, the dry spell for old classics to be resurrected from the dead, can only be attributed to one thing: either it's a cash-cow of sorts, or one that gets better progressively (i.e. Vinland Saga Season 2, which Wit Studio once helmed, and MAPPA did it justice and more) that justifies expanding its presence. And unfortunately, this franchise landed on the former side of things, in that all I've seen so far is just decent-paced plot that moves like Season 1, but I didn't feel like there was a solid conclusion to await from adapting the manga.
Thankfully, the 2nd Cour of the much-anticipated sequel is to arrive in the Fall, so this incomplete story still has aways to go. For now, lavish in the manga while you can.
