Jibaku Shounen Hanako-kun 2

Toilet-Bound Hanako-kun, the 2nd Wonder — Hanako-kun, Hanako-kun, will you grant my wish for a faithful adaptation once more?

It's been 5 long years since we last saw mangaka IroAida's Jibaku Shounen Hanako-kun a.k.a Toilet-Bound Hanako-kun on the small screen, though we can all collectively agree that it's more on the love-hate side by showing something that is actually quite unique, which is what makes it loveable, but hating it because the pacing went so awfully whack out of order against the source material at the time. And yet, with the MAL numbers being evident, there's no question about it that the series quickly fell off.

Sadly, ... with the sequel being the continuation of said series, that director Yohei Fukui (taking over from Masaomi Ando) and his staff team at Lerche (or Studio Hibari rather, as the parent company) are putting their heads forward to continue the adaptation of the manga and heed no advice by just reshuffling things back to whence they came to restore the pacing for Season 2, does this redeem the overall look of the series? I'd say that the sequel here fixes much of the problems in the prequel, and it has restored confidence that Hanako-kun CAN actually have a decent adaptation.

With Season 2 revisiting Volumes 5 and 6 (where Season 1 skipped to Volume 7 with the Hell of Mirrors arc) then proceeding to Volumes 8 to 11 in coherent pacing for the season's major arc, I'd say: welcome back, Hanako-kun and the gang, it's been a while since you peeps were last seen. Nene Yashiro is still the lovable daikon girl, as is Hanako-kun being the cheeky Wonder No. 7 apparition and Kou just being the complaining dork of justice. New to Season 2 are the newfound school Wonders of Wonder No. 1 of The Three Clock Keepers, which have the power to manipulate time, and Wonder No. 4 of Shijima-san of the Art Room, where reality and fiction blend into one dream-like trance that it becomes the fight of the one entity to save each other amidst the rouse of coercing people into the dream and living out their deepest wishes without the possibility to get out.

Most particularly, I don't know about you, but concerning the story that is Wonder No. 4 of Mei Shijima, the Picture Perfect major arc that covers Volumes 8 to 11 of the manga (that covers the 2nd half of Season 2), I feel that it can be hard to get your head around the dreams and ambitions of the same person creating an alter ego persona depicting an alternate reality if she was alive and well and could live out her deepest desires, only for the real person to falter on life's struggles, which made up an already bad situation even worse. If you do understand, then all power to you. Just the facts to clarify for seemingly the majority who don't quite understand what's going on in the back-and-forth scenarios.

Otherwise, it's the same Hanako-kun that we know and love, with Lerche giving it the adaptation it deserves, maintaining the same consistency as it had back in Winter 2020. And still to this day, Masayoshi Oishi knows what he is cooking with yet another OP song for the sequel, though Season 1's OP will forever be the superior song. The same goes with Akari Kito's ED coming back yet again for another rondo, and I don't know which I like best, but both songs have their own merits and for the same reason that they're good to begin with.

If anything, Season 2 is the redemption that Jibaku Shounen Hanako-kun a.k.a Toilet-Bound Hanako-kun needs but severely lacks the numbers that bring the assumption that mostly everyone largely forgot about it. At this point, I just hope that everyone can give the series a second chance to redeem itself after the back-and-forth fiasco that was Season 1 (which some people still remember to this day).

After all, if there's a wish you want to receive, seek Hanako-kun, and he will give it to you.

As a long time fan of Toilet Bound Hanako-kun, hearing we were getting a season 2 after 5 years made me ecstatic, and Lerche delivered with this season ten fold!! All the minor issues and problems that the first season had were fixed and were greatly improved on for this season. Also am a little biased for this season as it adapted my favorite part of the manga and they did it so well <3

Animation wise, this season was absolutely splendid and just looked so much better than season 1 in a lot of ways. The art-style for the anime for this season was ... also improved on a lot as it looks much closer to the manga now than it did before. Lerche somehow found a way to make this season amazing and it deserved it too.

For what this season was adapting, they followed the manga very closely this season. They also didn't reorder anything and just stuck the source and it shows as I feel they really put their all into this season. The picture perfect arc was a fan favorite in the manga and they managed to completely keep it as perfect as it was in the manga and i'm so glad it turned out great.

Super super excited we got a cour 2 announcement for this season as what's coming is my absolute favorite!! Even if we didn't get more after this I was super satisfied with how they handled this season and am so glad <3

This was one of my favorites of its cour. It was great to finally get a season 2 to one of my favorite anime. The characters were just as fun and compelling as I remembered. I enjoyed the shorter stories and also the multi-episode stories. The reveal in this season is also extremely intriguing to me and I can't wait to see how that bears on subsequent seasons. That said, there were some moments that weren't for me, but that's typical for the franchise as a whole, which is why it's 9 and not a 10 from me. I'm super looking forward to part 2 ... of season 2 in the next few months.

If you enjoyed season one then I'm sure you'll enjoy this too. If you were iffy on season one, then I would still encourage you to try this part since it does take things in a slightly different direction and fleshes out the situation more.