Kids suck. Kids are the beta version for young adults, full of annoying glitches and bad user experience, annoying to be around with, and without the adult features installed yet. Seriously, if you want to ruin something good, put a kid in the lead role. For every Usagi Drop there are a trillion shows where the kid ruins any hope of anything good. The entire point of Jigoku Shoujo Futakomori is the last few episodes, and they star a kid. He sucks. I don't care how much he gets beaten around (the perverse pleasure ran out with my patience for the twat), he isn't a proper person, and he ruined what was the best written part of the franchise up to this point.
Now, beyond that, what can be said about Jigoku Shoujo Futakomori that hasn't already been said about Jigoku Shoujo? Well, not much. If you thought that the first season was repetitive, well, here we go for an even more repetitive second season. Oh, the last few chapters are good, and they make people forget that the entire first half of the season is such a yawnfest that it made my brain bleed. Seriously, you can skip two thirds of the episodes of the season and not miss anything that hasn't been done in the first season.
Don't get me wrong, the repetitive nature of the "good person suffers, bad guy gets punished, no happy end for anyone" is what attracts people to shows like Jigoku Shoujo Futakomori. But the first season had at least some hints of an underlying story at certain points. What we do get is an episode for each of the main characters. It's nice to have their backstories, but even they are put within the formula that repeats itself over, and over, and bloody over.
While the annoyingly repetitive nature of the series will cause me to use the word repetitive a repeated amount of times, there are some improvements over the first season. The animation is improved, and there's an actual ending point that doesn't suck, but actually ties things together. The sound is still great. But the two best characters from the first season are gone for good. So, while the show is technically superior at what it does, it gets a whole lot more annoying for people who have long term memory.
Writing (Story and Characters):
Repetitive, redundant, repetitive, reduntant, redundant, but some nice things. Jigoku Shoujo Futakomori has its moments, but they don't manage to erase the tedius first twenty-something episodes (which are repetitive, and a large part of them redundant). Like the first season, the repetitive nature of the show is a strength and a weakness, but it really is more of a weakness for me (and indeed, those with long term memory and the capability to get bored). Shock value only lasts for so long, and it's been over fifty episodes by the time the second season is over. You may have noticed me repeating stuff a lot. Consider it a homage to the writing.
There is no story for most of Jigoku Shoujo Futakomori beyond "someone gets messed with, make bad guy go to hell, no one is happy. Rinse and repeat, including the episodes which are supposed to give us backstory. It becomes painful, quick. There is some aesthetic value to an episodic show that dares to not try any other flavor other than "like last episode", but really, this is the last show in the universe to binge watch. The last few episodes are rather good and only have a few plot holes that don't really matter as the show is about sending people to hell anyways.
Oh, the characters. There are a few ones I actually sympathized with this season. But really, Jigoku Shoujo Futakomori has a problem with such a large cast that we are focused on the four (and a half) main ones. They aren't all that interesting. They do get a backstory, so that's nice I suppose. Still, most characters are disposable by nature (and about half do get disposed of), and the endless villainy doesn't really matter in the end because it ends up being ordinary. Still, there are a few nice characters, I suppose.
Repetitive is the name of the game in Jigoku Shoujo Futakomori and it is repeatedly proud of that fact. I cannot get over how much of the season was just the first season only with slightly better animation. Still, I suppose that people who loved the first season will find the second even better as it is a purer, more polished version of what annoyed me.
Art (Animation and Sound):
Like last season in concept, exactly like last season in sound, better animation. The end.
Overall:
People tend to gush about Jigoku Shoujo or hate it. I say it is a mediocre experience, but alas, the completionist in me had to see it once I got started with the first season. It isn't quite bad enough to drop... just average. Jigoku Shoujo Futakomori will give you a more refined and slightly better executed version of the first season, but the refinement makes it truer to form, which makes most of the season have less impact.
Screenshots
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