Review of Shakugan no Shana: Season II

Shakugan no Shana was, at least in my opinion, a pretty good show – it had strong action and good characters. I reviewed it previously (here: https://myanimelist.net/reviews.php?id=287931) and most of what I had to say holds for Shakugan no Shana Second. The difference is... there's a good deal less of the good stuff, and more of the mediocre stuff. When we do get to the denizen-based action, it's really strong; the final arcs are possibly even better than the material in the original, but you have to sit through a lot of episodes of the teen drama with... not a ton ofstakes or a good handling of the characters involved. It isn't terrible; certainly, there are still shows that focused on similar elements entirely and did worse than Shakugan no Shana Second does with its side dish here, but...

Yeah, the show still manages to drag here. And in that, it's weaker than its predecessor was. Otherwise, they're fairly similar, new stories with the same characters and fairly similar stakes. Is it worth watching though? If you enjoyed Shakugan no Shana at all, absolutely! For itself, it's... competent. If you liked the first season, you'll find stuff to like here... but the more important part is that Final is coming. As an entire package, the Shakugan no Shana series comes to what I consider to be an amazing conclusion, and Second is necessary to get there.