Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? II

Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? II

Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? II anime series cover art
Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? II

Overview

Is It Wrong to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? II (Dungeon ni Deai wo Motomeru no wa Machigatteiru Darou ka II / ダンジョンに出会いを求めるのは間違っているだろうか 2期), or simply Danmachi II, is the second season of the main line of the Danmachi series.

If you’re planning to watch this season, you should first watch the original season of Danmachi. Danmachi: Sword Oratoria is a side story which takes place alongside Danmachi season 1, but is not necessary for watching Danmachi II.

There are two main arcs which take place during this season, the Apollo Familia and Ishtar Familia arcs. Unfortunately, neither of these arcs were good. And I’ll have to go into spoilers to explain why, so this review will have a lot of spoilers — you’ve been warned.

Let’s start off with the Apollo Familia arc since that one will take less explaining. The Ishtar Familia arc will come after I introduce some of the new characters of the series.

So the big issue with the Apollo Familia arc is that it’s almost entirely setup. There are three and a half episodes of setup, and then half an episode of the arc actually playing out. It really felt like this was a filler arc, but I don’t think it was supposed to — which isn’t good.

Basically Apollo decides he’s going to steal Bell from Hestia’s Familia by challenging them to a war game. This means it’s the tiny Hestia Familia against the massive Apollo Familia. The war game takes the form of a castle siege, and Apollo’s Familia is defeated in about 10 minutes.

New Characters

Aside from Apollo himself, I don’t think any new characters who really mattered were introduced at this point in time. There were some female background characters who showed up a few times, but they really don’t seem like they’ll ever be important.

The characters who do matter come from the Ishtar Familia arc which was twice the length of the Apollo Familia arc.

Starting off with Ishtar herself, she’s the goddess of love from ancient Babylonia. If you’ve played Fate/Grand Order or are watching the new Fate/Grand Order anime series, you’ll be somewhat familiar with her — though these are very different interpretations.

In Danmachi, Ishtar is considered one of the most beautiful women to ever exist, and this allows her to use her looks to control anyone she pleases. And, of course, she sets her sights on Bell. But not because of Hestia; instead, she learns that her rival, Freya, also has her eyes on Bell.

Haruhime Sanjouno from the anime series Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? II
Haruhime Sanjouno

Then we have the main girl of the season, Haruhime Sanjouno. She’s a Renard, which is a fancy way of saying she’s a fox girl. Though I’m not exactly sure why Renard was chosen over Kitsune for the fox species in this series — she is from the far East after all.

Anyway, Haruhime is being kept by the Ishtar Familia as a slave and human weapon. I won’t spoil exactly what her ability is that makes her useful to them, but if you’ve read my recent My Hero Academia episode review you’ll know this isn’t exactly a trope I enjoy.

The final character I want to briefly mention is Aisha Belka. She’s one of the most powerful members of the Ishtar Familia and has also taken it upon herself to watch over Haruhime.

Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in the Red Light District?

So what’s wrong with the Ishtar Familia arc? Aside from the fact that it uses the trope of a “weak” person being used by the enemy faction as a human weapon.

The two biggest issues I have with this arc are also present in the Apollo Familia arc, but to a much greater extent here. The first is that for the second time in a row the arc revolves around a god(dess) who wants to take Bell for themselves. I get it, everyone wants Bell, but we never really get good explanations for why.

We know that Bell has a good special ability, but the other gods and goddesses don’t know about that. Instead, Apollo wanted him just because, Freya wants him for an unknown reason, and Ishtar wants him because Freya wants him. Those aren’t exactly good plot motivators.

Goddess Ishtar from the anime series Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? II
Goddess Ishtar

The other issue, which I’ve heard from just about everyone who watched this season, is that it has nothing to do with the part of the series people like: the dungeon crawling aspect. I think there were one or two short scenes in the entire 13 episode season which took place in the dungeon.

For this arc in particular, the vast majority of screen time was spent within the red light district run by the Ishtar Familia. And I understand that the fact the season didn’t take place in the dungeon shouldn’t be an issue, but this series really doesn’t have much else going for it.

And the sad thing is, the next season — which has been confirmed by the way — doesn’t look like it’s going to take place within the dungeon either. At least it does look like it’s going to take place outside Orario, so maybe that will be more interesting.

Conclusion

Every season of Danmachi I’ve watched has been worse than the one which came before. The first season was a 7, Sword Oratoria was a 6, and I’m going to have to give Danmachi II a 5/10. Everything about it just screams mediocrity, so I can’t rate it any higher. And let’s not forget, this is a J.C.Staff series so a 5 is somewhat expected.

As for the OP/ED, the OP was alright at best and the ED just wasn’t good. The best animation of the entire series was in the OP, which is actually pretty common, but it still wasn’t great and the song wasn’t anything special. The ED had almost no animation and a bad song, so there’s not much else to say about that.

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My review of the next season is available here.

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