Shin no Nakama ja Nai to Yuusha no Party wo Oidasareta node, Henkyou de Slow Life suru Koto ni Shimashita 2nd

Since there are enough reviews, I will address why the score is low for this very good anime. But before that, season 1 is a must watch. The main reason is that the anime is inconsistent with its theme. I assume most viewers are teenagers, which contributes to the issue since this anime doesn’t really aling with their perspective. I don’t mean it’s unsuitable, but I can’t see them enjoying it as they might lack the life experience necessary to connect with it. Heck, the main "villain" essentially represents them, so, naturally, there’s little joy in watching an anime that feels like a lecture.

Regarding the ... inconsistency:

Nude Scenes:
In almost every episode, there are nude scenes. While explicit bits are not shown, it pushes the boundaries as far as possible.

Issue 1: Anyone who cannot stand censorship will feel irritated.
Issue 2: Anyone who doesn’t want to see nude scenes will feel irritated.
Issue 3: Those who fail to distinguish fiction from reality and equate nude flat-chested characters with encouraging exploitation will feel massively irritated.

Theme Mismatch:
The anime claims to focus on a slow life but regularly includes gruesome elements like humans being killed, decapitated heads, innocent monster slaughter just to level up, blood, and heartless murder and similar acts. It’s hard to reconcile such brutality with a show supposedly about "enjoying a quiet life with your lover".


The love aspect explores life after becoming lovers, a point where most stories end because audiences lose interest.
The action, on the other hand, is brief and followed by moralizing lectures, which alienates viewers passionate about combat-driven narratives.

Religious & duty VS own emotion & Free will... a theme that is essentially a repeat from season 1, but won' say more due to risk of spoiler

In summary, the extremes clash and undermine each other, leaving no aspect fully realized. Anyways, as a reminder, everything I’ve written here is to explain why the score is low, while trying to keep spoiler low. The anime is much more than this, but I wanted to clarify why a very good anime received such a low overall score. And hopefully, this prevents others from watching it if it’s not for them

Overall the second season was executed better and more concise in comparison to the first season, however at the cost of having a flatter and less interesting story. The primary antogonist remains a stubbornly static character for a majority of the runtime for the series and weakened the show's ability to remain interesting as a result. It wasn't until around the end where he started showing considerable growth as a character. Before he started showing signs of actually developing as a character, every time he was on screen felt like a drag since he was written like a brick wall. The story became predictable to ... the point where you could basically tell how the plot was going to play out from mid way into the season. The challenge of making a sequel is trying to work with already developed and established characters from the previous seasons, and this season definitely made an effort to expand some characters but just didn't feel like enough. Theodora was an improvement over the first season along with much more screen time and could be partly because she was the only character that wasn't an enabler most of the time when the antagonist was involved.
The comedic moments hit a lot more effectively over the first one even as they only appear sparingly. It's also noticeable that they were continuously using shower scenes to show off the women for fanservice purposes, but at least it wasn't egregious and served as a situator for characters to share their vulnerable thoughts with each other.
This season is an enjoyable watch but can be predictable and boring at times and reduced moments that made the first season good.

While season 1's story had a lot of issues but underneath had a beautiful romance developing. Season 2 has nothing developing with a new story with the same issues.

Characters: 7/10

Everyone is still as nice and sweet as before. But the problem is that since Red and Rit are now a couple and engaged, and Ruti has retired from being a hero; this season gives nothing for these characters to do. There are 3 different romance plots that go nowhere since they're only used for jokes, specially Ruti's love for her brother (which would have been interesting to see Red dissuade her if they didn't sweep ... it under the rug). So from ep 1 to the last, these characters remain unchanged.

Story: 6/10

But there is a plot, somehow. There's a new hero and he's a nutjob. You know because 10% of an episode shows how sociopathic he is, until later episodes focus on him. But again like last season, the story refuses to go deeper than it is. The stakes are buried underground as the protagonist tells you again that "you're more than your blessing". And somehow he believes it and apologizes, but because the stakes reside in a cemetery, there's little to apologize for.

Animation: 6/10

It's not an A-lister so of course it's not going to be top notch. It's not bad but not good. But I noticed they lean into the comedic aspect by making more chibi faces. So that's something.

Overall: 5/10
I prefered season 1's gutless story with a side of beautiful romance than season 2's lackluster story with a side of nothing. The story is so lacking that if you watch only the last 2 episodes you won't miss anything important.