One Punch Man Season 2, Episode 1 Review

It finally happened! One Punch Man Season 2 has officially begun. A second season can introduce equal measures of joy and fear in fans. There’s the potential for getting more of what you love… but there’s also a chance expectations aren’t met. This season of OPM is more of a wildcard than others as well, especially considering the studio change. Studio change can affect things from animation style and quality to the actual production timeline, which will dramatically affect the late parts of a season. So, just from first episode impressions, a tentative guess in overall season quality can usually be gleaned.

I do think this first episode did a good job in plopping (what are probably) “the big questions” into viewers minds, as well as setting up pieces that should lead to good character building. Saitama’s friendship with King should be interesting, especially considering that the only character we consistently saw talking to Saitama was Genos. The points of conflict (while a bit tell-don’t-show) were clearly stated, so the lack of ambiguity should help drive the season forward.

While it’s certainly too early to make deep commentary on the story, I can at least make some initial observations on the animation. One of the things that jumped out at me initially was the higher use of airbrush-type texturing/gradients. (There’s not much reason for that besides an aesthetic preference though.) The addition of Jojo-like onscreen sound effects was also a change I liked. I felt it added to the over-the-top nature of the show. That being said, if this is used as a substitute for strong shot composition and sakuga, it wouldn’t be an equivalent exchnge.

There was also a higher usage of 3D models… to various effect. See, the thing with the anime industry and 3DCG is that you can very easily say “the action was great, but besides that it was awkward” and it doesn’t matter what show you were talking about. This show is not an exception. During action scenes where there’s a lot of movement and fast cuts, I would say it serves as an enhancement to the dynamism in a scene. However, it’s used in a bunch of other places that just feel lazy. For example, Sonic walking out of the Hero Organization HQ as a (very stilted and awkward) 3D model and the fact that almost all of the buildings and background elements (such as furniture) were obvious 3D models. I’m not trying to be a snob; I understand that anime is done on a budget and cutting quality in certain places is necessary. But as someone who started watching anime from the early 2010’s and 2000’s, it feels as if this blatant corner-cutting makes a piece lose soul. I’m not saying the original didn’t use any 3DCG (pretty much every 21st century anime has), but at least they did a good job of blending it into the environment and causing less immersion breaks.

Keep in mind that first-episodes tend to look better than others (especially second-episodes) because the budget is fresh. So overall, a decrease in quality (possibly with the exclusion of the last episode or so) should be expected. This isn’t great for a show so well regarded for its animation, but hopefully J.C. Staff can either continue to utilize and optimize their style and create a followup worthy of Madhouse’s original season. Here’s to crossing fingers that this season doesn’t go the way that Psycho Pass 2 did!