Some anime havethe staying power of decades, with the stories even spawning spin-offs that last nearly as long. Other anime last only one season or get canceled before one season is even complete. But a few anime should have ended long before they did, either because the quality deteriorates sharply or because the story changes so dramatically that it may as well be another show entirely.Naruto/Borutois a good example of the first category,Prison Schoolan example of the second, and bothThe Promised NeverlandandHunter x Hunterare examples of the final category. This final category is the most interesting, especially since anime draws from source material, and sometimes the manga doesn’t make the same mistakes.
InThe Promised Neverlanda group of exceedingly intelligent children discover that their idyllic home is a facade for a human farming operation run by demons. They have simply been raised like livestock as a food source for their captors. In the first season the children plan and execute an escape from their house. They do this in 12 episodes. In the second, they do everything else in the manga and then some. They flee into the forests, figure out how to survive, and then are rescued from their pursuers by a pair of demons - in the first episode. The remaining ten episodes deal with year-long time skips, the reveal of an entirely larger government plot, a popular character degenerating into a genocidal rage and returning to sanity, a mythical savior figure, and a complete overhaul of the entire world system.
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What This Means for the Second Season
It is clear to see that the second season of the anime attempted to tackle much larger portions of the story than the first season did. Which leaves the audience with the question, was it worth it?
Would it have been better to simply end the anime on thefinal episode of the first season? It would have ended on a massive cliffhanger that had many fans eager and excited to see the continuation of the story. It also would have ended with powerful visuals, a captivating soundtrack, and a message of hope and human capability. This episode was incredibly popular with viewers and scored an IMDB rating of 9.7.
The Final Episode
Instead, the final episode of the anime left viewers aghast and offended, with an IMDB rating of 2.7. Instead of the beautiful scenery and message of the first season’s finale, the final episode of season two was a glorified slideshowthat encompassed seasons worthof information. Furthermore, it recycled the same finale song from the first season over the disappointing imagery, which felt lazy, even with the bar set as low as it was by the preceding episodes.
Fanswho had read the mangawere even more offended by this final episode as they noticed that nearly all of the images utilized in the slideshow were not only integral story moments that were simply being glossed over, but also that the vast majority of the images were from story arcs that should have been addressed halfway through the season, not simply tacked on to the finale in a butchered attempt at fan service.
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Addressing the rest of season, every single episode in the first season was rated an eight or higher, with five of the twelve being a nine or higher.In the second season, there was only one episode rated above an eight, with the remainder, prior to the finale, being split between sixes and sevens.
A Story Cut Short
Two episodes in the middle create a perfect example as to this rating, in which one of the main three children had descendedinto a homicidal rage, having decided that all demons must die in order to keep his friends safe. He had even acquired allies in this endeavor and attacked population centers with little to no remorse. However, later in that same episode, he is confronted by his friend who uses the power of her friendship to bring him back to sanity, and he is immediately convinced to change course. Additionally, his extremely fanatical followers changed their minds immediately when he instructed them to. This rushed character development left fans reeling and removed all of the gravity and integrity from these characters and their choices, as they instead seemed to float around on a whim.
In all, the second season ofThe Promised Neverlandwas largely hated, earning such epitaphs as “the Promised Convenience” and “the Promised Slideshow.” Fans would have loved to seemultiple seasons of this popular anime, giving proper justice to the characters and complicated arcs that they went through. Instead, everything was crammed into eleven short episodes that left no one satisfied. This meant that an extremely popular and well-loved story is instead remembered as a botched retelling, with some fans even deciding to pretend that the second season never happened in the first place. Perhaps it would have been better to burn out than fade away.
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