Review of Vinland Saga Season 2

I Don’t have any enemies ~ a ferocious warmongering viking. Those who only “watched” season 1 of vinland saga or are unfamiliar with season 2 will definitely get baffled by this statement and what occurs in season 2 of this anime. Those who “Understood” rewatched and completely absorbed the ending of season1 of vinland saga will completely understand why and how the season2 flows and leads to probably the best point the series has reached till date. Now before I start a raging debate between those who miss the action and battles of season 1 let me remind you where things went wrong , and why the vinlandsaga is so masterfully crafted that many actually forgot the most important factor and plot point of the story.

It was the SACRIFICE of thors not the Murder of thors that has brought us to this point of the story, throughout the first arc of thorofin being a kid and thors guiding him towards being a true warrior , we were given hint after hint , that thors wanted his kid to learn what it meant to be a real warrior , to have strength to fight injustice not cause it , to protect oneself and to have mercy and remorse for every single human being because no one is TRULY your enemy. Those who rewatched or have completely taken their time to analyze and absorb dialogues of season 1 will know, the Thorofin Revenge arc was not him training up to kill askeladd but him losing his way due to rage, anger and hate. Through his murderfest he kills or causes death and destruction upon many he was unwilling to harm, which only eat away at him later.

The problem is many of us due to the beautiful nature of the writing , were also consumed by the same hate and rage , since we have been taught to relate most with the protagonist, so throfins fit of rage and violent path full of mistakes seem REASONABLE and JUSTIFIED, only when askeladd tells him in his final moments how pointless his past few years have been of him being stuck in a loop of hate rather than moving further do we see the infamous knife dropping scene , where throfin sees a flash of his violent past now knowing that in the end it was all for naught.

Plot (10/10)
The story is so well written that you can make arguments on both sides of a controversial topic without any side seeming like a pea brain , the morality of owning a slave , the option of being nice to everyone but losing control since that is how the medieval era works one cannot afford to look weak. In this season we explore the absolute limits of till when to simply endure and till when does a real warrior not resort to violence , the appearance of throfinn is not all that has changed in him hence I cannot blame anyone to failing to more or less recognize who he is as a character, the sole embodiment of hatred violence for thorfinn died right in front of him and hence he is basically lost , he considers his 10+ years of struggle a complete pointless grasp at a goal that was futile in the end since even when he was offered his revenge , he could not accept it. This is due to the unfair world that he had lived in , he had formed an unfortunate but rather common image of a true warrior, this image of a warrior kills scores of people with ease and efficiency , craves valor and tough fights , embraces wounds and longs for a duel to the death . so when the symbol of his hatred askeladd, who to an extent that even had his respect went on to choose a noble sacrifice is when the story for season2 was set , with thorfinn realizing his quest for revenge was pointless since askeladd too was more of a warrior than he was, the struggle at the farm and thorfinn learning of the fruit of the labor of man and real hardwork was a character development arc that took a pretty long time indeed , but it was probably the most important arc of the story where throfinn learns that he was mistaken and this time he would follow the last words of the two people he respected the most and become a true warrior. The pacing is slow but smooth now it would be weird if thorfinn straight up went to war and refused to kill so the plot intentionally drives up the SEVERITY OF THE INJUSTICES in the farm arc hence why it would FEEL SLOW but is just a way to help us get used to the new thorfinn. starting with mild bullying to all out war and this time the response of thorfinn slowly changes due to him and the people around him.

Characters (9/10)
There is a almost a complete cast refresh and also a new MC that is introduced in this season , this new character Einar is also brilliantly written and is a complete direct counterpart of the old MC , he had been on the receiving end of the spectrum and is beyond the point of just letting things slide and simply enduring . Einar is indeed a new rage thorfinn in the making however this season the development of throfinn as a person and as warrior helped him guide Einar and made sure that Einar does not fall into the same abyss and cycle as him . the other characters like Ketil snake and his crew and Arnheid were good additions . Arnheid is the epitome of all that is unjust in this world and the amount of suffering she has to go through is frankly a bit much. She is the one who is a consent less sex slave , also has to relive her painful past and suffer major consequences , all this misfortune falling only on one single character is a little bit of a forceful sympathy enhancement drug i feel but yes it serves as important triggers for very important events and do have lasting consequences on almost every single character. The development of the side characters is mostly fast paced when in comparison to thorfinn which could be because of them being adults by this point.

Sound and VA (10/10)
Mappa never disappoints in terms of soundtrack so many amazing songs for the op and ed were selected , I was pissed when the switch happened but gradually loved the new Op and ED as well. The OST fits the slice of life moments really well and is a good fit and most of the old themes make comebacks at very tangible and crucial moments and add extra meaning to them and made me love those old OST from s1 even more. The VA job for every character was phenomenally done , this is the one series I make sure I have headphones on for .

Art and animation (9/10)
The art in the farm arc rivaled that of prime mushoku tensie and the CGI and animation during fight scenes as well as the choreography of the fights is flawless , most of them seem to be real life motion capture of realistic medieval fights, the artstyle remains a bit mappa biased and if you have seen their other works you can certainly tell that it is a mappa work. THe art in the OP and EDs are always jawdropping good and mappa really spared no expense with this series.

A ONE HUNDERED PERCENT MUST WATCH, i would recommend trying to rewatch s1 and try to completely absorb the story to avoid feeling lost.