Review of Solo Leveling Season 2: Arise from the Shadow

I'm one of few who were a little underwhelmed by season one of Solo Leveling. I felt like it didn't do enough with its characters and felt like Jinwoo simple wasn't strong enough, though not in the physical sense, to carry the show on his own like they had him do. Add the staggered pacing and over-the-top dramatics, it simply didn't do enough for me. Skip forward to Solo Leveling Season 2: Arise from the Shadow and I actually am impressed with what they've done here. Story & Characters: Solo Leveling Season 2: Arise from the Shadow has a lot going for itin that Jinwoo's journey is a little more interesting this time around. The first arc takes Jinwoo and multiple other hunters into a new type of portal that is far more dangerous than any of them really signed up for. What we realize this, things start to go south very quick, and its this sense of danger that really starts this season out well. It's not that it's Jinwoo's life that we feel is in danger, but also with those that he feels he should be protecting. There's urgency and some real anger, from one of our new characters Chul. I like him fine enough, but I feel like he represents a lot of the problems that Solo Leveling previously had, in that these antagonists kind of all feel the same. They didn't use him in the same way as some of the previous characters like this, something I think they finally figured out, so it's not as annoying as it might've otherwise been. That being said, I really like how they showcased Jinwoo's new found powers with the Necromancer and Song-Yi, another new character, was incorporated quite well here.

The second arc takes us through some of Jinwoo's everyday life, which he starts to take far more seriously, now that he knows what kind of limits he can play around with. This arc focuses mostly on him. Esil is the daughter of a demon king, who lives in one of the realms that Jinwoo visits. I actually really liked her, I felt like she added a new companion to Jinwoo's brigade for this arc. The personality is definitely weird, but this arc would be far more boring without her in it. I do like that they kept parts of this arc short and sweet too, because, aside Esil, there really isn't a ton to this until you get to its conclusion, which was done exceptionally well.

The final arc is where things really ramped up, and this is kind of where we start to be reacquainted with some older faces - including Hae-In, Gun-Hee, Jong-In and Woon-Ho. They're all decent characters, but my minor issue is that it feels like Hae-In should have had far more inclusion in her role throughout the story. We learned a little more about her during the course of the season, but if she's going to be a central character like it's kind of implied, I didn't feel like they did a very good job of making this seem.

During the course of the season, they introduce a swarm of new characters who have minor roles, and aside the fact that I'm absolutely awful with Korean names, a lot of them don't feel terribly significant. They go through the trouble of showing us who they are and mentioning how strong they are, but by the end of the season, they are mostly forgettable. They also kind of do the opposite with some other characters that feel like they're going to big later and leave us wanting to come back to find out, which I minded significantly less.

The finale of Solo Leveling Season 2: Arise from the Shadow seems to imply there will be more, but with no official announcement, as of this writing, it's hard to say what their plans are. I'll definitely check it out because I like where they're going with the story, even if their use of characters still needs some minor work. (Story: 9/10, Characters: 7/10)

Art: This series still looks very good, but I'd be lying if I didn't mention some minor gripes with how they animated the final fight of the season. A lot of seasonal anime start to have quality issues as the series goes on, which doesn't tend to bug me a whole lot, but save the detailed animation for the end, not start. Animation is still strong, but not insane. (8/10)

Sound: I'd be lying if I said I was going to give this anything but perfect again. Hiroyuki Sawano continues to be a master in anime music, not to be held back by an insane OP, Reawaker by LiSA and Felix (of Stray Kids), and ED, Un-Apex, by TK from Ling Tosite Sigure. Voice cast was, again, brilliant, as kind of expected with anything voice directed by Caitlin Glass. She somehow gathered seasoned veterans from all corners of the anime VO world, including Johnny Yong Bosch, Patrick Seitz, Trina Nishimura, Christopher Wehkamp, Stephen Fu, Colleen Clinkenbeard, Zeno Robinson and Todd Haberkorn. Most of them don't even appear in seasonal anime unless it's a sequel to an older work. (10/10)

Overall: Solo Leveling Season 2: Arise from the Shadow is a good reminder that you can always do better after a slow start. While I'm not surprised, as season one was mostly setup, I'm very happy to see how much better this season is. This series is still likely a pass for anyone who doesn't like the "lead being OP" trope, but outside of that, I love what Solo Leveling does. I'm not sure where they go from here, but I think they'd be foolish not to at least consider having this series continue on. (9/10)