KiritoNarukami

The second season of Hibike! Euphonium

Loved the first season and of course loved the second!!!! I feel like this season is much less about Kumiko and Reina and more about the other characters, as you see them much more. So if you’ve seen the first, the second WILL NOT disappoint!!

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Story:

Continuing from last season our favorite band club make it to first place in their competition and were selected to represent Kyoto in the Kansai Competition! The story is much like that of last season, lots of drama between current and some past members. There is a massive amount of character development for everyone but I’ll talk about that later on. It is amazing, how KyoAni can fit all this emotion and drama in a mere 13 episodes and still make it feel well-paced. There was never a rushed moment, and this is because KyoAni uses a lot of “buffer scenes”. “Buffer Scenes” are scenes where nothing happens, it’s literally just a scene of a river flowing, or the characters sitting in silence. When watching anime there’s a lot going on from watching the animation to listening to the voices and music. And our brains sort of need this buffer space to process the story. There’s a whole science to it but that’ll take too long, anyway KyoAni does an excellent job with having just the right amount of buffer space and that makes the story feel much more meaningful and not rushed.

Artwork & Animation:

KyoAni, doesn’t play around with art and animation, my friends. Every little detail is taking into account, even a quick two-second scene of sink was drawn to the smallest of detail. KyoAni just improves year after year, and it’s not hard to see why they are one of the best studios around. Th backgrounds are full of the life you have an understanding of foreground, middle ground, and background. Be it the street that you’re on, to the river below, and the rest of the city beyond. You experience every aspect of the location that the story sets you in and that really pulls you into the story.

Character(s):

We get loads of character development for all the members that we are familiar with, but we also get to see Mizore and her troubles. Just because she’s quiet doesn’t mean she doesn’t have problems of her own. But the most heartbreaking would be Asuka’s TAT. We also see more of Kumiko, who is usually the bystander who tries to avoid involving herself in these dramatic situations yet she always seems to have a hand in all of it, ironic. From Kumiko’s standpoint she is able to see both sides of the story, as she is also the narrator of the story. We do gets some more Kumiko x Reina, but only in the first half so don’t get your hopes up.

Sound (OST & Voice Acting):

Tomoyo Kurosawa delivers yet another amazing performance as Kumiko! I just love the slight awkwardness in the her voice because we all know Kumiko isn’t very open about anything. Everyone also did a great job breathing life into the characters. The OST is magnificent, as I’m a big fan of classical music, I love hearing the Kitauji Band play their concert piece and all the practice sessions. And to actually be able to hear what Taki-sensei is telling the students to fix in their performance is crazy, that’s a lot of music recording you have to do and someone has to intentionally mess up. That’s a lot of work, but it makes it feel that much more authentic. Well done Kyoani *slow claps* Well done…

Enjoyment:

I loved Hibike from season 1 and season 2 got even better!! I’m hearing some things about the light novel still continuing, so maybe in the distance future there could possibly be a season 3? Let’s hope so!!

Overall: score 10

Let’s be honest anything KyoAni is a 10/10 for me!!! (Well….except Air… I don’t know what happened there….).