OP Sequence:

Not only was Fumetsu no Anata e the most difficult show to rank in 2021, it was probably the most annoying as well.  That sounds odd to say about a series which cracked my top 10, but it’s undeniably my truth.  To Your Eternity was almost unbelievably inconsistent – the best eps were stellar (the premiere possibly the best anime episode of the year), and the worst truly execrable.  The Gugu arc was superb start to finish, the Jananda arc never better than mediocre (and usually a lot worse) and everything else somewhere in-between.  That adds up to a very vexing anime experience.

So here we are again, with another season I can only guess will likely follow the same course if history is any guide.  It’s changed studios – Brain’s Base lost it even as they picked up Golden Kamuy from Geno –  and directors.  I don’t have much history with either Drive or director Sayama Kiyoko, but as with GK the common thread is that the adapting writer (in this case Fujita Shinzou) remains the same.  And as with GK the series seems amazingly unchanged on the production side (they even retained the same OP as the first season).

If this is a show of extremes, the S2 premiere was one of those “somewhere in-between” episodes.  It was quite odd in fact, a bit meandering and narratively awkward in the sort of endearing way this series often is.  Given that Fushi is an immortal a timeskip is nothing surprising – I suspect it won’t be the last.  This one is about 40 years, and finds Fushi living alone on a deserted island (apart from two years touring the oceanic food chain) in an attempt to avoid getting close to anyone and draw the Nokkers’ attention away from humans.  His only companion is his Creator, who as usual lacks in the social graces and isn’t shy about offering unsolicited advice.

When the Observer tells him the Nokkers are rampaging and killing humans in a village on another island, Fushi resolves to go – and though the Observer tries to talk him out of it, one suspects he’d never have told Fushi if this wasn’t exactly what he expected.  A visitor arrives first, though, a nine year-old girl named Hisame (Kusunoki Tomori).  She announces herself as a member the the guardians and as Hayase’s granddaughter – and eventually raises the bar to reincarnation.  She also, oddly enough, has a Nokker – Hayase’s Nokker –  living in her arm.  It seems as if the guardians have become a religion with Fushi as their God, which is obviously a bad idea on so many levels.

Is this moeblob really Hayase’s reincarnation?  Well, the Observer seems to think so – and he introduces a new term to explain it, “Fye”.  Hayase was obsessed enough with Fushi to migrate to her own granddaughter’s body, I suppose.  Eventually Fushi and the guardians make their way to the village in question, where the crisis has ended, though not before the death of six residents in the Nokker attack.  A pair of doctors show up and the woman warns Fushi that the guardians just want to “own” him.  She also has an immunity to poison (which Hisame puts to the test) and eventually reveals that she’s none other than Tonari, 40 years older but still pretty spry.

I confess I had a little PTSD attack when the word “Jananda” was uttered – the scars of that debacle still haven’t healed.  I didn’t like Tonari one bit then and I won’t lie, it’s hard to be impartial about her now – I hope she’s not a lingering presence this season.  I’d be lying if I said I know what to expect – I haven’t read this far into the manga and if any series was ever unpredictable it’s Fumetsu.  I still like the vibe here very much – it’s weird and quirky – and both the premise and the protagonist are outstanding.  But this is one of those devil in the details series, and the nature of those details is anybody’s guess at this point.

ED: “Roots” by ～