Review: Bakuman 2

Bakuman Second Season

It doesn’t seem like all that long ago since Bakuman’s first season ended, and I personally really enjoyed it. At heart, it was an energetic show about two youngsters achieving their dreams, getting the girls and having their own bromance as they became accomplished manga artists. Series 2…does nothing new. It’s exactly the same. And I really enjoyed it.

Infact, I could say that it’s a direct continuation. Characters enter the show, and characters leave the show, as our pair climbs the ladder of JACK to get an anime adaptation, marry and live happily ever after. Throughout this season they undergo an editor change, have Takagi’s high school “crush” appear as a successful novelist, get married to Miyoshi, end up in hospital and watch as Eiji rises even higher than he has before, becoming a celebrated manga artist to the point where he gets TV appearances. There..isn’t much I can say about Bakuman beyond that.

It’s a show about dreams, and it’s energetic. It follows two very likeable male leads and a large cast of characters, some of whom you’ll like and some of whom you won’t care for at all. It’s fun, it’s got a unique twist on romance that may appear weird but works rather well and it’s got some very strong slice-of-life. If you’re looking for slice-of-life or some passionate guys(lol sounds wrong) then you don’t need to look much further than this. But since it’s a continuation, common sense says that you’d check out Mimi’s review of the first season before you watch this season. :b

    

Bakuman 2 Episode 25

Votes and Charts

Whew, they FINALLY got 1st place with their revamp of Perfect Crime Club(now called PCP), sending +NATURAL to 8th place, firing up mainly Eiji but their other rivals. A pretty perfect end for S2, since i’ll imagine S3 will be about the serialization and staying at Number 1.But that’s a very odd preview…indicating that things are about to spiral downhill for them. But nothing much really happened here, apart from the new assistants coming in…but it’s too early to tell anything about them.

Bakuman 2 Episode 24

Expression and Imagination

You know, i’m glad that someone had the balls to stand up and say “Hey, letting this talented duo disappear from our magazine” is a really stupid thing to do. It’s basically like saying that their life comes down to 7 people sitting around a table deciding if they prefer Perfect Crime Club or +NATURAL. Anyway, because someone finally stood up for them, they didn’t loose the vote afterall, and the votes swung in their favour.

After a barrage of phone calls, they finally come clean with Nizuma about aspiring to him all this time, and bring their fated battle into play. But not before an English perfomance of “We Wish you a Merry Christmas” from non other than Miho; complete with a flashback of their memories. If i’ve known anything about flashbacks, it often means that something is about to happen, yet this is the show which likes to prove me wrong and then prove me right the next episode. So who knows what it means~

Anyway, this results in an editor change, where Miura takes +NATURAL, and Hattori gets Perfect Crime Club. I’m glad to see Hattori back with the duo, as he was always my preffered one, but…there will obviously be some strange feelings at first, even though they’ve wanted Hattori back all this time. Especially when Hattori decides to break the ice by saying that the vote was 4 to 3 in favour of loosing to Nizuma. But following on from that, Hattori gets straight down to the picture and compares the talents the duo has and what they lack.

However…Miura doesn’t get the good end of the end. After a rather…weird talking to from Nizuma and a furious talk from Iwase,you can’t help but feel sorry for him.

Bakuman 2 Episode 23

Win and Lose

The second season of Bakuman is getting nearer its climax every passing episode, and it appears to be focused on the Perfect Crime Club manga that they’ve been creating, but the big question is if it’s going to be enough to get them back into JACK and rival Nizuma Eiji.

The episode starts out with a rather large extract of the first chapter of this Perfect Crime Club, and I have to admit that I got hooked. The idea of perfectly tailing someone and stuff is petty, but it’s almost like that didn’t matter. And when they add the heroine, a young detective, into the mix, it becomes obvious that they’ll pass.

Even though the fact that they were going to pass was obvious from the outset, they managed to create a really good sense of drama and tension in the meeting and how the meeting runs longer than ever, running hours past when it would originally end, and with things boiling down to a vote on if Ashirogi can beat Nizuma.And even then, the only thing left is for it to fall into the hands of the Chief Editor. But then for him to fail them…I never saw that coming. Is the climax going to be about finding a new magazine to draw in, then?

Bakuman 2 Episode 22

Hint and Best

Aplogies for the very late posts, but real life caught up with me lately, and Mimi’s being Mimi…and doesn’t think she should work if i’m not working. :L

How do you find out what someones alterior motives are? After Hattori turns up and explains everything, Ashirogi gets slightly suspicious of what he’s truely up to…so they decide to tail him for a day. Personally, i’m not really sure what I think of the idea of our male leads essentially stalking someone in their daily life just to figure things out…but at least it brought the ‘romance’ that’s plaguing the series for a while to light, and that even Hattori has a stalker.

If anything good came out of this episode, it’s the fact that our male leads finally came up with a new idea to write about. The idea that they’ve got is to have someone who can perfom a “perfect crime”, and create “I didn’t see that coming!” comedy styled moments. In doing so, the lead character forms a perfect crime group, and the rest writes itself. I kinda want to see a little more of it, but at least they’ve gone back to something fun which I like, much like Detective TRAP was.

Bakuman 2 Episode 21

Selfishness and Advice

I’m surprised. Miura’s the one who comes up with this, and it’s one of their better ideas. It’s not anything dark or anything strange, but it’s a typical mainstream fantasy. And i’ll be honest, when I heard Miyoshi describe Stopper of Magma, it sounded a lot like Letter Bee. In this episode, they’d also tried to make a serialization based strongly on Money and Intellegence, and that failed. And then, to my surprise, Stopper of Mamga failed. Ashirogi have left themselves with one chance to get back in JACK, but is everything the way it’s believed to be?

With the revelation at the very end that Hattori wants to assist Ashirogi, as he always has, the original duo of authors return to the guidence of their original editor. The obvious “calm before the storm” episode, in my opinion.

Bakuman Episode 20

Love and Denial

Every comedy has some form of catchphrase or a mascot character. And followed up by that news comes the news that NATURAL+ is getting fought over for animes, films and drama adapations. If that wasn’t enough, we get another bomb dropped from Hattori, as he passes the message along to Ashirogi that Eiji isn’t reading Tanto, and isn’t even interested in it.

Everything keeps building up around this bombshell, as Takagi’s wedding draws closer and closer, and he’s going sleepless nights trying to think of what would make it good. Things keep building and building until the wedding, where Mashiro and Hattori finally have a face-to-face conversation, where Hattori tells them straight up that Tanto is, in other words, terrible. It is almost like it’s been planned, but the night after, Eiji appears on TV and publicly announces that Ashirogi are his rivals.

I mean, that’s probably more than poor Mashiro can take, what with him shouldering the weight of this on his own. And who does he confide in but Azuki? The two finally have a straight forward conversation, and they even admit that their relationship is maturing and growing.

Everything in this episode came down to essentially proding a bomb until it explodes.It took way too long, but everything finally accepts that Tanto isn’t what the two should be doing, and they move on with a deadline of “Equal Eiji within 3 committees or you’re out of JACK”

Bakuman 2 Episode 19

Fate and Star

Alex: Timeskips are pretty good, and pretty sweet. We go from getting permission to marry, which did actually feel awkward and entirely un-needed, to the New Years Party where Nizuma and the rest of the editors turn into assholes for no real reason…especially Hattori. He pretty much trashed all my opinions of him, even though he was just trying to get them to work hard in his own way. I don’t believe in cruel love D:

And then we get another time skip to the first assistants arriving, the author of Buisiness Boy and some new guy. We then move onto Kaya and Takagi getting a place of their own, and we slowly get to see the stress adding up to poor Takagi. We then move swiftly on to Otters 11 getting it’s anime adaption, and the release of NATURAL+, the new rival manga.

Even I had to admit that the plot was good, and much better than anything else i’ve heard in Bakuman. And then the Nizuma Eiji effect takes place, as everyone buys JACK up..it’s like this is just people trying too hard to make Ashirogi and everyone else look bad.And then for Tanto to rank fifth..loosing to both Crow and NATURAL+. I dunno. Something about our duo doing gag manga still feels wrong. Especially with Iwase saying “I liked the Takagi with talent”. Ouch >_>

But yeah, Tanto’s not doing so hot. It’s good with kids and gets praised for it, but comedy can never stand up to solid plot. I’m glad that this second season is really starting to take off, with Ashirogi getting thrashed in almost every aspect..and when Nizuma says that he isn’t reading Tanto, it’s a clear sign that it’s time to go back to doing something good, guys! >_> /really enjoying Bakuman, oddly

Bakuman 2 Episode 18

Complaint and Roar

Alex: (Sorry i’ve been so busy, the reason will probably become clear soon)

So…here we have an episode basically focused around the drama which was obviously going to happen now that Nizuma is doing 2 manga in JACK. It was…slow. Not saying it was a bad episode, but I just don’t really know what the big point of it in the long term was. All that was worth noting down was that Ashirogi and that novelist got serialized. Which was obvious.

Bakuman 2 Episode 17

Special Relationships and Hometown

Alex: Hey Takagi, i’ve got a marriage registration form for you today; even though things could go really bad for you today.When the episode starts like this, it’s almost like it’s following on the strange vibes from last week.

Anyway, now that the serialization meeting has passed, things turn into a bombshell. Time of Blue Leaves from Aoki Koi starts, thanks to the panty shots. Buisiness Boy Kenichi is ending, breaking up Naki and his female assistant’s relationship, and…Ashirogi doesn’t get serialized. One thing leads to another, and it turns into Nakai’s emo rantings as he gets rejected by both girls, as he plans to head back home and nobody is willing to help him after he’s been such an ass.But obviously, everyone turns up to see him off because they’re all good people and friendly people, even though he leaves anyway.Oh well.

So whilst our heroes are having drama tiem, Hattori and his new project are blazing ahead, with work that’s really impressed anyone he shows it to.However, there is one problem. She has no artist. So the big reveal this episode is Nizuma getting on the side of Takagi’s rival in the art. So, that really sets the scene. Nizuma and the novelest vs Ashirogi Mutou in a direct rivalry.