Sousou no Frieren 2nd Season

I really like it overall and truly think it's a great anime, but there are some things I just don't understand:

It shows them jumping over obstacles and climbing steep, difficult rocks, where one character has to help the other, and so on… but they can fly! They can even carry someone while flying. So why do they still need to put in so much effort to climb a steep rock? Why is it SO HARD to reach the top of literally anything? It gets pretty annoying and doesn’t make much sense.

Other than that, great anime!
I'm reviewing while watching ep3 so I can't say much more ... than it's a good continuation from S1, but S1 had a better pace.

This is a "good" show so far, and I completely understand why it stands out, but it is insane that this can be even considered remotely comparable to anything on MAL top 50 or even 200. Unfortunately, S2 took everything bad about S1 and amplified it.

The vision is fabulous. If Frieren actually achieved its intention of being a calm, thoughtful fantasy experience focused on exploring heartwarming connection against the backdrop of magical wonder I would genuinely rate it a 10... but unfortunately its semi-powerful moments are spoiled by the fact that most of the actual screen time is slop and the writing garbage absolutely devoid ... of creativity, instead speedrunning ever SoL trope. It manages to lack both the depth, impact, and character development of a proper slow burn show, the face-value enjoyment of a fast paced shonen, or the humor of a good SoL... making it mostly dull.

At times it excels at the main goal it is trying to achieve as an exploratory fantasy experience. In that sense it feels like a breath of fresh air. Instead of fighting anything that moves and powerscaling, Frieren's perspective is a reflective one appreciative of the small things in life and her relationships with others, which in this case usually include both delightful fantasy elements and some deeper understanding of human connection. This approach is balanced with gorgeous animation for both scenery and for some flashy fights, while the focus is kept on the bigger picture of appreciating what it means to be alive in the limited time we have. Certain moments in the show blend the wonder of exploring every nook and cranny in a Zelda game with the humanity of Undertale, or wandering around a forest as a child with your friends. There are enough lovely moments like these for this to be overall a solid show, whether it is when Frieren gets excited a minor fantasy detail, or is contemplating what her comrades mean to her, or just when we hit some cool shonen style bossfight.

But here is the issue, Frieren is mainly a slow-paced character driven story, and if your characters suck your character driven story will suck. The potential for a mature and enchanting adventure is generally ruined by a cast of boring 1D or 2D characters with fake depth combined with chains of mainly completely uninteresting side quests that lead to superficial messages. The cast is somehow overly silly yet oppressively reserved. Fern is utterly devoid of personality, Stark is a pushover, Himmel is a bot, and Frieren is generally completely ambivalent to everything. Dynamic characters? Hell no, they remain the same for the whole series and so do their key internal conflict if they have one. They somehow manage to be neither mature and insightful or unhinged and spontaneous, just consistently bland. As a character Frieren's writing alone in certain instances is both powerful and surprisingly comical, but 90% of the time her lack of passion makes for a boring watch. Most of the slice of life style humor is also incredibly unfunny and forced, but most importantly it completely spoils the magic of what this slow burn fantasy could be. Instead of playing to its strengths and exploring fantastical elements more deeply with a cast of realistic characters to convey beauty in the mundane, the show decides to focus on trash dialogue that fails to even touch the surface of conveying the beauty of their relationships, completely falling flat nearly every sentence. Playing into slice of life tropes for a meditative show is a mistake.

Good animation can't save some of its absolutely mind-numbing writing. A whole episode of hiking and sauna sim for the sake of an absolutely superficial message and under 3 seconds of "oh kinda heartwarming"? Going from glowing cave to getting worked up over a date? Meet with NPC ah noble to get sword, aaaand thats it boom an episode? The magic the show has in its best moments is absolutely shattered by the most mindless filler arc writing known to man without the perks of any form of character development or a sliver of emotional intelligence. Why try to blend Konosuba's humor with Made in Abyss's worldbuilding with the emotional depth of Violet Evergarden when Frieren manages to excel at none of them? Taking your time to explore relationships and fantasy only works when the writing for the characters and world are actually thoughtful and good. The slow burn fantasy and adventure letter of love it should be is instead uninteresting slice of life slop in a minimally explored fantasy setting with some nice production.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy this show and it scratches an itch at times, pretty chill watch while drinking tea before bed, but how this could be considered better than a show like Samurai Champloo or Mushishi or Cowboy Bebop absolutely blows my mind. The difference in writing quality alone is absurd, especially with regards to their characters, the exact facet Frieren tries to explore the most. This is like comparing The Very Hungry Caterpillar to Tolkien or Tolstoy. And on another level of cinema are shows which are truly art: a cute "thoughtful"TM clean fantasy animation sim with some flashy action could never compare to the creativity of the direction of JoJo or Tatami galaxy or NGE or Ghibli or Soul Eater, it is not even close. And the fights themselves are at best comparable to any top shounen, and this is arguably less fun to watch. If you are obsessed with fantasy and need something safe and fresh then fine this is your show, but it really stops there. A show that excels at being comfortingly mid in a fantasy world over everything else when it is neither as comforting or emotionally rich as hundreds of other anime should not touch the leaderboard, go get a fantasy themed blanket or something lmao this is by no means a masterpiece and neither was the source material.

Season 2 of Frieren is basically Season 1 but slower and somehow less interesting. I gave Season 1 a generous 5/10 because at least it had the potential to go somewhere. Season 2? I’m dropping it to a 4/10, and honestly, that’s me being kind.

The animation is still great, the soundtrack is still good, and it’s still easy to watch, but the story barely moves, the characters barely grow, and the pacing feels like a snail on a coffee break. Season 2 is essentially a comfort rerun for people who liked the first season but wanted zero risk and zero actual surprises. It’s beautiful, sure, ... but it’s also repetitive, safe, and utterly forgettable, a season that’s content to exist without actually going anywhere.