So I had watched the first two episodes a little while back, and ish was getting real. There was some invasion of the body snatchers stuff going on, there was a forbidden military project unveiled, and then Kobayashi initiated a coup and had the immortal council killed. I was thinking this was looking so good that I'd better set aside the rest of the series for a marathon.
So that's what I did today...and...yeah. What started off as a hard sci-fi / political thriller turned into a full-on harem. Not even a love triangle. Like a love hexagon. Maybe a love heptagon. You've got your main three (Nagate, Izana, Yuhata), plus the new hybrid-Tsumugi, Samari briefly decides she wants in on all this, one of the sisters seems to kinda dig Nagate, plus there's always placenta Hoshijiro because why not? I've probably forgotten one or two.
And that throws the pacing into a ditch, because the slice of life section takes up most of the middle of season two. And it's not even that it's bad. It was endearing to watch the mains shack up with each other in a nice house, the Izana choice/transformation* seemed to work plot-wise (although I freaking hate watching, because she's obviously going to be the unrequited-love character here), they smack you with
some nice fan service, and there's real chemistry developed between Nagate, Izana, Yuhata, and Tsumugi. It provides a pretty good payoff when they're all put in danger (even though Yuhata is an odd fit; she's just tossed in...it works, though).
[*Her
other physical transformation works really well, too. Quasi-cyborg looks good on her. I'm a fan of the Izana focus. But all of that focus just makes me think they're going to drop her from having a happy ending.]
But...y'know, they completely drop the coup. What, the shadow organization that was running Sidonia is murdered all at once, and...that's...it? Nothing? They've been slow burning the whole immortality angle, but it's summarily dropped after episode 2. The final 10 offer nothing there. The body snatcher angle - by, we presume, Ochiai - just sort of blends away and we get maybe like two glimpses of an evil plan in the final 10 episodes.
The hard sci-fi element goes bye-bye, too. Every battle was a struggle before with using the Kabizashi, but eff it, 'cause now we got these bazooka things. And eff all them physics (before moving the ship for an evasive maneuver was a fraught affair because of the effects of gravity inside, but now it's done for a sight gag).
There's some redeeming quality with the finale, because for all they set Nagate up to basically be a god-tier BAMF, he ends up needing to be saved. At the last moment, reality-tinged stuff like "I better have enough ammo" shows up. Being saved by the squad, plus Yuhata's smarts, was a really nice touch.
So...it was alright. Good, even. Especially if you're in the mood for a long middle section that balances character feels and that love hexagon while
flashing fan service. But "good" is a bit of a letdown after the first season, and the first pair of episodes of season 2. Shit was gonna escalate...but then you get slice of life. And they set you up to really like four characters, all for the purpose of - I assume - screwing over two of them. Not looking forward to that.