One Punch Man 2nd Season

In the wake of defeating Boros and his mighty army, Saitama has returned to his unremarkable everyday life in Z-City. However, unbeknownst to him, the number of monsters appearing is still continuously on the rise, putting a strain on the Hero Association's resources. Their top executives decide on the bold move of recruiting hoodlums in order to help in their battle. But during the first meeting with these potential newcomers, a mysterious man calling himself Garou makes his appearance. Claiming to be a monster, he starts mercilessly attacking the crowd.

The mysterious Garou continues his rampage against the Hero Association, crushing every hero he encounters. He turns out to be the legendary martial artist Silverfang's best former disciple and seems driven by unknown motives. Regardless, this beast of a man seems unstoppable. Intrigued by this puzzling new foe and with an insatiable thirst for money, Saitama decides to seize the opportunity and joins the interesting martial arts competition.

As the tournament commences and Garou continues his rampage, a new great menace reveals itself, threatening the entire human world. Could this finally be the earth-shattering catastrophe predicted by the great seer Madame Shibabawa?

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Saitama Main

Furukawa, Makoto Japanese

Genos Main

Ishikawa, Kaito Japanese

Garou Supporting

Midorikawa, Hikaru Japanese

Tatsumaki Supporting

Yuuki, Aoi Japanese

Mumen Rider Supporting

Nakamura, Yuuichi Japanese

Fubuki Supporting

Hayami, Saori Japanese

Speed-o'-Sound Sonic Supporting

Kaji, Yuuki Japanese

King Supporting

Yasumoto, Hiroki Japanese

Metal Bat Supporting

Hatano, Wataru Japanese

Puri-Puri Prisoner Supporting

Onosaka, Masaya Japanese

Satou, Souta Producer

Matsui, Chinatsu Producer

Hosoya, Nobuyuki Producer

Fujishiro, Atsushi Producer

Reviews

Jul 2, 2019

CorkMars

Recommended

I really do not agree with all the hate this season gets. I feel absolutely compelled to address all of the people intros review section that hate on this series for ALL THE WRONG REASONS.

Yes, season 1 was a smash hit, it featured Shingo Natsume working in conjunction with some top the greatest battle animators of all time. BUT, I'm about to hit y'all with the facts and explain why season 2 of One Punch Man is better than season 1.

Season 1 was done by studio Madhouse, a studio famous for not salarying workers, and relying heavily on freelancers. Better yet, a studio ... infamous for hospitalizing animators from overwork. Yes season 1 was a grand achievement in battle animation, but at what cost? Animators at Madhouse are literally living through hell and outside of Japan we celebrate this? WHY? Because casual viewers could't care less about anything other than how cool the fights look. Ignoring the fact that the story in season 2 is objectively of much higher quality, the fights aren't even bad in season 2. Season 1 spoiled too many idiots, and now they expect every single production to feature animators working 100 hour weeks while they sit other collective FAT ASSES and enjoy. Sure, JC Staff is not a studio with a great reputation, but at least they have in house staff that they don't treat like complete shit.

At the end of the day, Madhouse couldn't have done a season 2 if they wanted to. It was only Natsume that was able to bring in so much freelance talent (from bones mostly) and he was no longer interested in working on this property! He had better things to do (Boogiepop). SO every one needs to shut up about what could have been and enjoy what we got. Would it have been better One Punch never got a second season? Some manga readers may think so, but I disagree. I'm glad we got to see this part of the story adapted, and I'm even more glad that the animators didn't end up in the hospital from working on it. Before you criticize this season, think a little bit about the work that goes in behind the scenes.

If you like One Punch Man for the fights, you'll be disappointed.
If you like One Punch Man for the story, you'll be happy with this season.

Reviewer’s Rating: 8

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Jul 2, 2019

DarthInvader

Mixed Feelings

*Minimum Spoiler Review*
TL;DR: From convoluted plot to character overload to just downright shitty animation & cba CGI failures,
OPM S2 is not great, but it's not terrible either. It's just okay... If you like comedy that is.
[Story: 6/10 , Characters: 5/10, Art: 4/10, Sound: 4/10, Enjoyment: 6/10]

"I'm a Hero. You did well on your own. Leave the rest to me" - Saitama

2019 is the year of sequels. From highly anticipated sequels like Mob Psycho S2 to SnK S3 to BNHA S4, we are now experiencing delayed gratification at its finest. Major question to ask as a fan of OPM, will its ... sequel live up to the expectations? Will it be a masterpiece or a disaster, given how long we had to wait? Now let's be real, given that sequel ruining studio, JC Staff, is adapting this anime and somehow Chikara Sakurai, an unknown director, is driving this show off the bridge, surprisingly, if you subvert all of your pre-conceived expectations, OPM S2 is not great, but it's not terrible either.

"So basically martial arts is... A way to move around all cool-like?" - Saitama

The story follows our bored hero Saitama, who is so OP that he defeats every monster with, you guessed it, just one punch. How do you take something so stale and make it interesting. It's a parody show at its core. If you've watched enough shounen, you know the good guy will always win and the ugly looking evil monster will always lose. This season the arc changes where the antagonist is a human who roots for the monster and wants to exact revenge on all the heroes who just gangs up on the villains and kills them mercilessly for pride & money. From a parody plot standpoint, it's a refreshing pivot. We finally have a humanized villain who you can get behind in kicking some smug hero's ass. We get to see how corrupt the executives running the Hero Association is and we also get to see how selfish S/A/B/ even C class heroes can be. However, instead of just focusing on this antihero, Garou, they decided to include in the entire cast of Monsters Inc alongside it to convolute the plot even further. I understand the purpose was to act as a foil for Garou, but it wasn't executed well. There's even a mini martial arts tournament arc that really seems unnecessary but it's funny regardless. There were some moments of brilliance following the sage like dialogues from Saitama & King (a highly anticipated strong hero), but with all the one line quit pro quo jabs and unnecessary dialogues to avoid putting effort in animation, it just wasn't cutting it. This is why having a good storyboard director helps big time. If anything, this just showed the incompetence of the studio more than anything.

"There are so many extremely powerful villains in this world. A hero is someone who takes on those villains. Even if they're all alone" - Saitama

Despite the convoluted linear plot of OPM S2, the characters not half as bad in this iteration. We get to meet more characters and more S class as well as A class heroes. We get to see the moral code each of them live by and through that we can juxtapose our main hero, Saitama, and see where he stands. As always, Genos, hyped up as this great S class hero who is striving to be as strong as his Master, somehow never fails to be destroyed by every villain he comes across. Garou also stands out as a really good fleshed out villain and given his past, you are able to feel empathy for him. It's nice. However, you can tell the plot is rushed as we are bombarded each episode with a multitude of characters that we just cba about honestly. If this was a 24 episode anime and we had the chance to really get into the backstories of these side heroes/villains then their actions onscreen would make more sense. Before you complain remember that first season despite being just a 1 cour anime, keep in mind, we mainly followed the adventure of Saiama & Genos. This time, there were many more characters. Aside from that, the seiyuus did as best job they can given the material they had at hand. Garou's seiyuu just gave you that badass Vegeta feel every time he talked. As always, Saitama, said the least but the deadpan deliveries were spot on. Kudos to them atleast.

"If you don't want to get bossed around or mocked by the people around you... You just need to become stronger" - Garou

If there was one thing that stood out to all of us from the first season of OPM, it was the epic animation done by Studio Bones. The story can suck. The characters can be stale. Fans of OPM all just wanted one thing to be done right, and it was the animation. Did JC Staff do justice? Not even close. They just dropped the ball and watched it roll down Mount Fuji and given how much cash the show was bringing in they just wiped their tears from fan criticism with fat dollar bills. Jokes aside, seriously, from an animation standpoint, I was not mad, not angry, just disappointed. Even GoT ending wasn't this disappointing. The show had way too many CGI scenes. They were just never blended in well and the fight sequences seemed so choppy. When they realized they can't do fight sequences right, they started pulling the off-screen fight sequence card to not put the budget in to animating it. How do you adapt a fight driven anime and not have good key animators for it? It was just sad. One upside though, near the end, it seems they hired a good key animator for the last 3 episodes. So that's nice, in a way. Even then, a bad job is a bad job. Aside from the atrocious animation, the background music wasn't bad. It's good. There was no way we will ever trump the first OP song of OPM. However, it's as if they knew that, so they just didn't put in any effort for the OP and ED song. They were not even catchy and just downright bad. Seriously, if you know you can't adapt, then just don't adapt.

"What is evil? What is justice? All those pretty words mean that I should go die because the majority wants me dead! This is absurd! They can all go to hell!" - Garou

Overall, as stated before, OPM S2 is not great by any means, but it's not terrible either. If you can subvert your expectations from episode 1, then maybe you can just sit back and enjoy this anime. It's not that much of a train wreck. I've seen worse. No way in hell was JC Staff going to be able to produce something as good as Studio Bones. No way can an unknown director do the show justice as Shingo Natsume can. Sometimes, you just have to roll with the cards you were dealt and unfortunately, out of all the awesome sequels we are blessed with this year, this had to be the one that just shat the bed. Despite a few redeeming wholesome moments, I don't think I will go back and rewatch this season again. If you want to rewatch, I recommend just rewatching the first season. However, by no means, watch season 2 after watching season 1... Unless you're a masochist. Then do it by all means. Nevertheless, if you've watched season 1, then might as well watch this season. You've waited enough time anyway. So why not watch it and get it over with. Anyways, check it out & let me know later how you like it as well as share with me your favourite quote from the anime! Ciao.

P.S. Thank you for reading. I hope you found this short and supaishi review helpful!

Reviewer’s Rating: 5

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Jul 2, 2019

Stark700

Not Recommended

I wish I could say the sequel for one of the most popular anime of this year to be good. I really wish I could. One Punch Man’s release back in 2015 made headlines with its high caliber animation quality and ultra comical character cast. The manga itself is also very popular. Ask anyone who’ve read the series will tell you that it’s more than just your usual battle shounen. Known for its top notch quality comedy and unorthodox storytelling, it’s a sensation. But this…second season is nothing short of a horror story. It’s the type of horror that scared me to realize how far ... this anime has fallen. What did the second season go wrong?

Well for starters, there’s the change in the staff. Director Shingo Natsume left this season and responsibilities were handed to Chikara Sakurai. One of their previous project was Majimoji Rurumo, a show that probably most people has forgotten by now. One Punch Man has already established itself beyond the anime medium and with a growing popularity, it tries to aim higher. However, fans coming into this season shouldn’t have any high expectations especially if we take a look at the promotional material. While the key visual doesn’t turn heads away, the preview will. With the J.C. Staff in charge of this sequel, this raised a lot of red flags. In respect, the animation quality severely suffers in quality. Rather than a sharp, crisp quality animation with stylish aesthetics, we get static-like power point slides. Maybe I’m exaggerating a bit but this second season’s quality is easy to point fingers to. Unfortunately, it seems J.C. Staff couldn’t handle the job of making this into a sensation again. They already have their hands full with a lot of projects this year after all.

Storytelling itself doesn’t improve much either if we talk about the main plot. Again, I really wish I could say the opposite but this sequel proves itself to be a tragedy. From the rushing of certain content to underwhelming delivery of some of the important fights, I felt no impact from this season at all. Zero. Early on the in season, we also meet Fubuki (Blizzard) who leads the B-Class hero group. At first, I was ecstatic to finally see her gain some relevance. However, the fight between her and Saitama passed like a flash. There’s almost no charisma besides Saitama’s heroic speech and attitude. Even on a comedy level, it didn't draw much popcorn entertainment. Similarly, many of the dialogues this season sounds very scripted. As a manga reader, I wanted to see much more than characters speaking their lines. What I got instead is just words and words coming out in a desaturated manner. Saitama is still the bald caped hero with unstoppable power. The first season captured the magic of his character while this sequel didn’t move the needle. What I mean is Saitama’s fight against adversaries this season isn’t even near the caliber as the previous season.

But it’s not always fair to compare the previous season with this continuation, right? Truth to be told, season 1 did set the bar high. Known for its visual dynamics and ONE’s creative writing, One Punch Man has always done all it could to be its own special series. Here, it’s lost the fire. People made memes out of One Punch Man because it was comically entertaining in a genuine way. Here, there’s worthy made besides weak impressions. Even the hero hunter Garou didn’t make much of an impact. As a foil character to Saitama, I expected his personality to be a bright flair. However, Garou ended up being someone that I forgot easily. Perhaps it’s because the overall directing of the show as several events takes place at once this season. There’s the fighting tournament involving various heroes, the invasion of the monsters, and Saitama living his day as usual as a hero. The joke of being one punched is far over after we’ve seen it so many times. The monsters themselves are hardly worth writing home about. To be honest, does any antagonist this season even contain an ounce of charisma compared to Boros? That fight from season 1 was legendary.

On the hero side, we do have some characters making reappearances. Names like Genos, Metal Bat, and Tatsumaki are a few I’m sure fans remember. Unfortunately, their roles this season has degenerated to little value. New faces like Suiryu brings in some excitement although he can hardly carry this season. In fact, the Super Fight Tournament arc felt like one big talent show of weirdos gathering together. I didn’t feel the stakes were impactful nor did the results feel satisfying. I mean, the show is One Punch Man. Who else is going to dominate this tournament?

Oh how the mighty of fallen is the easiest way to describe One Punch Man Season 2. The first season was a juggernaut that exceeded expectations. Fans still embrace what became a blockbuster. It’s 2019 now and we’ll have people talking again One Punch Man again. Unfortunately, people will quote more from the manga than recommending this sequel. Trust me, One Punch Man Second Season is a mistake. A grave mistake.

Reviewer’s Rating: 4

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