I loved the first season of Made in Abyss, although it had its hitches it was still an excellent show with some of the best art, characters and tone-setting I've seen in anime.
The Golden City, however, fails to live up to the investment I had in the first season. The art is great and the characters are fine, but the tone feels like it's all over the place whenever the plot deems it convenient. There'll be a scene of Riko having fun through an episode of almost slice-of-life proportions, followed by a massive depressive lore-dump that shatters the mood. I understand that MiA is supposed to be hard hitting but it loses too much of its impact from these misjudged lapses in tone. I had hoped this questionable pacing and tone to be a result of the beginning of an unorthodox story, but it struggles to make up for it in the end.
The end of the second season leaves more questions unanswered than the first, and while I believe it's worth watching if you enjoy the characters, it contributes very little to the journey into the Abyss that the series is centered on.
