18 months after its first season, Jigokuraku returns with the sequel. There’s a backstory there – this was clearly intended to be either a split or straight two-cour season. But the production was an absolute clusterfrick, not uncommon at MAPPA (though perhaps less so now than in the recent past). This series is yet another popular part of the Fujimoto Tatsuki diaspora – Kaku Yuji was one of his endless army of assistants to achieve fame in their own right. The manga ran for thirteen volumes, so even with another cour fitting in the whole series will require some trimming. But I suspect that’s the plan.
To be honest there were a lot of details I didn’t remember. There have been a lot longer waits between seasons, but Jigokuraku was a series where my commitment tended to wax and wane pretty hard. I did think the last few episodes were pretty good though. We start with a clumsy but thankfully brief recap, then get a sequence with a couple of new Yamadas – Shugen and Jikka the most important – meeting with the Shogunate and being assigned to head to Shinsenkyou to continue the elixir hunt (and check on their silent predecessors).
Back on the island, Sagiri and her group are hunting for Gabimaru’s party. He – sans most of his memories – and his team run into the Aza brothers. While there are a couple mentions of cooperation, that’s clearly not something Choubi has any interest in. With his supposed mastery of Tao he considers himself to be invincible now, and Gabi isn’t at 100% thanks to his mental confusion. They set about ripping each other to shreds as their supporting casts pair off to do battle (or avoid it).
In sum, then, more of the same pretty much. Brutality is the stock and trade of Hell’s Paradise, so the blood and gore here is not remotely out of character. I’m not going to make any assumptions about which side of its oeuvre the series will lean into this round. Nor indeed about whether the series will be part of the coverage schedule for me this season. Both my interest level and the volume and quality of the competition are yet to be determined. But Jigokuraku is capable of being compelling, so I’m certainly not closing any doors.
