DESCRIPTION

CAST

ANIME DramaYakusoku no Neverland
MANGA DramaYakusoku no Neverland
MUSIC Sci-FiBATEN KAITOS

REVIEWS

• 

  TheWho

  10/100
  Good job on ruining a good anime

  They have treated us anime only fans horrible

  I was personally a big fan of Promised Neverland Season 1 because of its unique concept and how it played out. I really enjoyed the reveal where we realise that the entire orphanage is a farm and its children are cattle. The caretakers of the children are Judas' Goats. This made me extremely hyped for the sequel, The Promised Neverland Season 2. Now that this anime has started airing, I am horribly disappointed.

  I do not read manga however some of my friends do. And all of the people who do read the manga know this, the anime skipped more than 4 complete arcs including the Goldy Pond Battle Arc which, according to manga readers is the best arc of The Promised Neverland. The hype it had created made me wait desperately for 1 whole year and when I saw that they had skipped the ENTIRE FRICKIN ARC, well, my disappointment and anger cannot be expressed by words. Whoever had the bright idea of making this call...the terms and conditions of Anilist forbid me from expressing my feelings.

  Even someone who has not read the manga can tell that they are trying to make it a rush job. There are just so many time jumps and blanks. Worst part is, they are not even trying to improve the story or even make it half decent which makes me as a viewer feel offended. I do not expect a sequel to this seeing how the ratings are going to plummet and honestly, we would prefer if they did not release a season 3 just to crush our hopes again.

  Overall, this anime is just leaving manga readers and anime only viewer fans all around the world incredibly disappointed. They are butchering the characters left and right and jumping through time as if we as viewers are brainless zombies that won't be able to realise it.

  This is just a speculation but, I believe the reason this is happening is because the manga finished releasing and the reason anime is made is to promote manga sales. As the manga is over, the creators had 2 choices - either abruptly end the anime and not make a season 2 or skip through the entire story as soon as possible with as less investment as possible. The result, hundreds and thousands of angry fans and critics. Well done!

  I am done with this anime now, seeing as how much of the anime story they have skipped, there is no hope left for this anime. I would suggest dropping the anime and reading the manga instead. I sincerely pray that some studio picks this project up and makes a remake that is not completely money minded. That said, I have no expectations from the current studio of doing a worth it remake. I wasted 180 minutes of my life watching 9 episodes of this anime. That is all

  Continue on AniList
• 

  AnimeDweeb

  40/100
  Empty Promises That Never Stuck the Landing.

  #"What happens now?"

  It's a question that's familiar to any viewer of The Promised Neverland (TPN). Season 1 left audiences' jaws agape on the floor with its many shocking cliffhangers and haunting atmosphere. But unlike the anime's many fans, I took this question a little differently. Sure, stellar direction and smart writing kept a great deal of tension going, but there were only so many ways to keep a season revolving around a single farm locale entertaining. So in addition to being left in suspense, my take on TPN's question would be one of anticipation. For me, the best part of TPN was the uncertainty of what lay beyond the walls of Grace Field. Kaiu Shirai proved themself capable of crafting a tight thriller under creative limitations, and our kids' escape brought with their freedom an endless set of possibilities. When I saw our crew finally stepping into the sunrise and staring ahead at an unknown future, I felt that anything could happen.
  Hopefully you can understand my disappointment at what they decided to go with.

  This review contains spoilers for S1, which is worth watching if you haven't already. Mild spoilers ahead for S2 as well, so skip ahead to my Tl;Dr if you'd wish to go in blind.

  ---

  Attempting to pinpoint just how TPN fell from grace may provide an infuriating challenge. Luckily for us, many of S2's major faults can be traced to its opening moments. Let's look at this mess from a few different lenses - the three strikes that marred this adaptation.

  #STRIKE ONE: PRODUCTION ISSUES

  The premiere's cold open is emblematic of this season's recurring problems. Our first glimpse at S2 involves dramatic shots of Emma and her friends, running in pitch-black darkness. It's hard to miss the ugly CGI arachnid that's revealed to be chasing them, but more subtle is how the animation from these first shots are tacked onto another sequence, near the end of Episode 4. The janky CGI and reused cuts hint at massive problems on the production side of things. Granted, the pandemic posed unprecedented challenges for the whole industry. I hold no ill will towards the animators and fully support their decision to push their release date by a season. With all that said, it'd be fair to expect better treatment for the sequel to Cloverworks' flagship title.

  One need not look hard into S1 to understand TPN's presentation at its best. Director Mamoru Kanbe and his staff brought Grace Field House to life, almost as a living, breathing being. Through the effective use of tight spaces, POV shots, lighting and haunting close-ups, the team found numerous opportunities to capture tense imagery. A strong OST and sound design elevated many of the show's sequences while accentuating the impossible choices our characters face.

  #Much of that craft is hard to come by in the sequel season.

  Cost-cutting occurs in sneaky fashion, as shots are reused far too frequently for a show of TPN's caliber. Also concerning is the repeated reliance on stills, montages and long shots, which demonstrates a desperate attempt at shaving seconds off the production timeline. The blurred forest backgrounds that mimicked anamorphic lens effects were a nice gimmick that got old real quick, making an appearance in nearly every episode. Adding to the drab environments are the copious lack of wildlife in the Demon woods, with all but the CGI spiders and a handful of lifeless animated overlays populating the space. It's quite the far cry from the many possibilities presented after the Grace Field escape, and a dull disservice to viewers' expectations.

  Some "Neverland" this is.

  Now, bringing up these points is not to chastise TPN's production team, which seems roughly unchanged from the last season. In fact, I'd say that S2 looks OK on the whole. The visuals are mostly appealing, the direction still shows signs of brilliance in certain sequences, and the OST still has its moments (albeit at the expense of shoehorning "Isabella's Sorrow" in at every given opportunity.) However, given that Cloverworks rolled out three seasonals this Winter, it's difficult not to observe this situation with a level of scrutiny. Two of them necessitated recap episodes, and lining up the visually-stunning Wonder Egg Priority against TPN doesn't yield fair comparisons. Quality aside, such recap episodes in single-cour anime (11-13 episodes) is a clear sign of production problems and, in the ill-equipped Cloverworks' case, possible mismanagement. I admit this is a speculatory claim, and couldn't find reputable sources to confirm such troubles. That being said, these observations are worth keeping in mind, in light of the evidence we're given and to set the stage for the other problems we've yet to cover.

  #STRIKE TWO: REPETITION

  The premiere's cold open is emblematic of this season's recurring problems. Our first glimpse at S2 involves dramatic shots of Emma and her friends, running in pitch-black darkness. Animation from these first shots are tacked onto another sequence in Episode 4. TPN gets away with this in large part because its series structure feels so repetitive. For a franchise known for its many twists and surprises, S2's biggest shock is in its lack of variety. Needless to say, I expected far more of the elements and craft which made Cloverworks' flagship show such a mainstay in the first place.

  What starts out as patient pacing turns out to be the same content regurgitated throughout the first half of the season. Emma, Ray and the 15 children that escaped Grace Field are left in the woods with little but their wits and a pen from the mysterious William Minerva. His device offers directions, bringing the kids one step closer to liberation from the demons.

  With minimal spoilers, here's how the next 6 episodes play out:

  • Ep 1: Children run around in a forest
  • Ep 2: Children recuperate in a secluded location
  • Ep 3: Children hike outside of a forest
  • Ep 4: Children recuperate in a secluded location AND run back into forest
  • Ep 5: Children recuperate in a secluded location AND run around in a town
  • Ep 6: A recap episode of the past 5 uneventful romps

  Ironically the one aspect of this season that felt distinct was the crew's time at the shelter in Ep 4, which even then felt like an off-brand ripoff of S1's setup in the House. Then it's back to the forest for more scavenging and… that about sums it up, actually. What's sad is that plenty could have been achieved with this setting. More dangers could present themselves in the environment, and the cast could learn more about survival within a realm in which they are not welcome. And it appears that the manga did just that, offering ample variety and developing its story into a bestseller.

  #News of TPN going anime-original caused a huge stir, and it's easy to see why.

  Shows that deviate from the source have a track record of going south, and audiences were rightfully concerned about how things would pan out when this was announced in Week 4 of the show's airing. Personally I liked that this reveal was hidden, throwing both anime-onlys and manga veterans alike in the dark. It's a shock that fits in with the nature of TPN's storytelling. Surely this was a creative decision, right? There's no reason for a show with a completed manga source to rush out an abridged conclusion, right? Supposedly the best arc got cut out, but author Shirai themself supervised the script and gave the green light, so that means we'd get something worth the change, right? Of course the show would live up to its name and deliver on its promises beyond the walls of Grace Field.

  Right?

  #STRIKE THREE: IN A HURRY

  The premiere's cold open is emble- OK, look. I'm just gonna jump straight to the point here: just like this season of TV, our characters are in a rush. If you feel that this half-hearted analogy throughout my review could benefit from more elaboration, you may find some serious issues with how Cloverworks butchered their flagship smash-hit.

  #S2 marks the death of smarts and tension.

  Resident brainiacs Emma and Ray seem to have left most of their intellect along with Phil and Isabella at the House. Ray proves particularly difficult to read; not through complexity, but through confusion. His motivations were somewhat suspect around the latter portion of S1, and his cunning made it difficult to determine his headspace in any given scene. Not helping matters are the baffling decisions he makes throughout S2's initial episodes, and the fact that these actions are left unaddressed^ makes his character infuriatingly suspicious to watch for little reason. Ray's writing does eventually improve, but seemingly at the expense of TPN's main heroine. Emma is a character defined by her resilience and blinding optimism, stopping at nothing to ensure her family's safety. Her arc actually starts off on a promising note, and Ep 2 teased an exciting new direction for her character - one where she sacrifices her righteous morals for a darker path. Expecting TPN to tap into its potential subplot turned out to be a mistake, as Emma almost immediately reverts back to her hopeful self shortly after. She carries herself with the unmistakable spunk from S1, minus any substantial results. It's hard to call Emma's expedition outside the House walls a success, given that nothing their crew achieves throughout a majority of the season actually gets the other Farm children any closer to being rescued. Ingenious problem-solving, the franchise's bread & butter, is all but absent here, with Emma's few favorable outcomes instead conveniently handed out to her on a silver platter, by no means of her own.

  #Along with our dumbed-down cast, many scenes feel rushed and largely inconsequential.

  S1 contained plenty of buildup to mysteries and tense sequences, directed capably for strong effect. S2 attempts to make up for its uneventfulness by chucking in poorly-handled chase sequences of our children playing Tag. The first season frequently ended on non-sequiturs, but those anticlimactic cliffhangers get more obnoxious in S2 because of the stale narrative that precedes them. Little attempt is made at slowing down to make each sparse setpiece interesting or distinct, with the writers instead counting on long stretches of exposition to bail them out. Key developments in the plot are revealed too quickly for any meaningful impact, because our cast needs to hike from one setpiece to the next. Brand new deuteragonists introduced in one episode can pull a Bond Villain and reveal their ulterior motives by the next. Of course, these nuances are conveniently never addressed again in subsequent cameos. One of our leads gets a flashback vital to the plot - one that could've easily taken up an entire episode. Yet it comes and goes within 5 minutes, and was made all the more comically pointless^^ since any relevant info was already mentioned in exposition from previous episodes. No time is allotted for any of these moments to sink in, turning threads rich in storytelling potential into merely serviceable sideplots.

  #Squandered opportunities by the script ruin the show's predictable endgame.

  The incessant rushing from one story beat to the next, with no regard for development, leads to lean conflict that lacks weight. As a lenient, anime-only weeb, even I could sense that plenty of plotlines were left on the cutting room floor. A handful of memorable characters from S1 return with barely any fanfare; what could have been hype reveals were devoid of excitement due to the small number of uneventful episodes spent without them. That's right, S2 can't even do cathartic fan service right. The central antagonist for the season's second act is a convincing counterpoint to our heroes' hopes for non-violent escape from the demons, not because of compelling evidence provided throughout the season, but the lack of such; Emma had accomplished so little during this time that we have no choice but to side with the villain's methods. Once that heavily-abridged storyline is neatly wrapped up with a bow, the show hilariously fast-forwards to its climactic showdown: a pathetic attempt at making a heist flick, with rushed twists and gaping plot holes that border on parody^^^. The fact that no screenwriter is officially credited for this penultimate episode is rather telling. It's a shame that the same team, who once gave us one of the strongest seasons of anime in recent memory, would even consider disassociating themselves from their own work a mere two years later.

  #How could this sequel to a surefire hit never land?

  A strong IP with legions of loyal fans, capable staff members, and a source material packed with new adventures to tell - Cloverworks had supposedly everything going for them. But given what we've seen this season, I'd argue otherwise. I believe the mangaka's involvement in the anime-original content isn't to blame, but rather a means of providing damage control for their own story and placating the fans through name recognition. Since S2 already suffered a postponed release date and a recap episode, I'm unwilling to accept the COVID outbreak as anything other than a contributing factor to this dismal effort. The only sensible answer I can come up with is as unfortunate as it is stupid: Cloverworks got cocky. Fans are aware that the manga has diminishing returns after the universally-praised Goldy Pond arc, which would have taken place in S2 if adapted faithfully. The studio may have projected a dramatic decline in interest for the series were that arc to conclude, and perceived the subpar reception of the manga's final chapters as a sign to jump ship. Lesser studios likely wouldn't take the baton from Cloverworks and finish adapting potential subsequent seasons, meaning that they were stuck with the series. But rather than adapt Goldy Pond faithfully and leave the franchise unfinished, along with the countless other unfinished anime in existence; the studio gambled on the hopes that an abridged, but conclusive, ending would yield more success than one that was faithful, but incomplete. Tough luck making that work though. "Trimming the fat" left no meat behind for audiences, and the meager result was bare-bones and butchered. S2 reeks of a studio getting things done for the sake of it. Rather than taking the opportunity to bring in exciting new additions in place of the cut material, Cloverworks mostly prayed that their many exclusions would magically make a good anime. Perhaps Emma's carefree optimism got to their heads, I only wish I could have some too.

  ---

  #**Tl;Dr**:

  Where most sequels would add to or reintroduce the status quo, S2 is defined by what it excludes. TPN returned with less craft, less variety, less intrigue, less surprises and less appeal. TPN bastardized decent ideas and even its own source material, unceremoniously shipping out an abridged final product. Its 4head solution to shaving the runtime of key events is that of wasting all our own, by compressing story threads into the least interesting iterations possible. So much is taken away with this anime-original route, but so little is added. Cloverworks took audiences to a destination, at the cost of a journey. As someone who wasn't very fond of the previous season but saw immense potential for its sequel, all I'm left with are empty promises.

  Seeing that Cloverworks had such a hand in ruining their adaptation, I think it's only fitting that a representative of the studio assigns the final verdict. Ai Ohto, care to do the honors?

  [ ](https://anilist.co/anime/124845/Wonder-Egg-Priority/)

  Well, there you have it. 4/10~

  ---

  #STRAY RAMBLINGS (**SPOILERS**)

  • Disclaimer: my stance on Cloverworks' involvement in TPN (especially in the latter portion of the review) is still speculatory. I'm no insider nor expert in the industry processes, so please take my interpretation of events with a grain of salt. I'd be happy to update this article should the situation develop.
  • ^After all this time, I still have no clue why the show bothered to show Ray carving coordinates onto a tree. The scene implies that either he's betraying the children once more by leaking their position to the Pursuers, or that he's truly reformed and leaving a rendezvous point for Emma. Both outcomes were likely, and I got overly fixated on figuring out Ray's motives for no damn reason. S1 and its many shocks trained us to pick out details and anticipate smart moves. Disappointed that the writers momentarily forget the kind of show they were making and unintentionally misled the audience like that.
  • ^^To say the flashback threw away potential is an understatement; the whole sequence was practically useless thanks to the little we actually got to see. It amounts to a superfluous montage, with no attempt at making the breakout anything other than an obligatory means of getting from Point A to B. It's funny how quickly we went from sneaking notes in Rubik's cubes to rigging explosives. Mr. Smee, Norman's self-sacrificing benefactor, doesn't even get a single line of dialogue, only showing up behind Peter Ratri before getting unceremoniously axed off two minutes later. It's appalling how the Lambda Facility lays all its horrors bare and still comes up with nothing to show for it.
  • ^^^My god, the plot holes.
    1) Were there two batches of hot-air balloons? Or just one, where the children were mixed along with the decoy bombs? Couldn't tell, the cuts were too fast. Speaking of which, how do you both remotely detonate bombs and control the decoy balloons' flight path while no such in-universe technology was introduced prior? Were you just praying on the timing of the fuses and the wind? Boy, that Lambda flashback would have probably made things clearer... oh wait, that got rushed too.
    2) How did the extra kids successfully sneak in next to Phil's group? Do the new Mothers just not know how to do headcounts? Beats me.
    3) Were the Mothers just in on Isabella's coup the entire time? Or was Grandma betting on the Suicide-Squad devices malfunctioning during the siege, after which she could instantly convince the others to join her rebellion over the radio? "What are we, some kind of plot magic?"
    4) What happened to Sonju's plan to harvest humans in the wild, remember that plot line? Neither did this wack-ass script, 'cause he's suddenly just OK with starting a demon rebellion and mobilizing a nation-wide attack on the compound.
    5) Heck, Isabella's actions make zero sense in Ratri's plans. Their plan to trap the children back in Grace Field would only be fully achieved on the assumption that Norman already located Emma's group. But even if Norman's absence isn't a big deal, you still run into some illogical problems. If Isabella already knew about the shelter radio over a year ago, and given that there's no way you could have known about Norman joining them, why wait for this one convenient happenstance before hatching your plan? Surely a convincing lie could have been used in the transmissions, misleading the group into believing that the kids were all getting shipped ahead of schedule. It's all convenient nonsense, much like the plan itself.
  • By this point you've likely heard of people comparing TPN S2's approach to that of Tokyo Ghoul: Root A. That's not exactly a fair comparison IMO. TG's mangaka conceived of Root A's script beforehand, and approached Studio Pierrot with his untested script while S1 was still in production. Even though the end product turned out bad, at no point did I feel like anyone on the Root A team was attempting to sabotage their story. Root A's anime-original route did at least spawn from a creative risk; TPN took theirs out of mismanagement.
  • Confession: I inexplicably feel the urge to fling Rossi's head like a football whenever he's on-screen.
  • BEST GIRL: Let's see, what pick would spare me from getting arrested… uh, Mujika's legal (I think?)

  

  ---

  Three strikes, and he's out! Now that Cloverworks has buried all that potential, perhaps I can find some new appreciation for what S1 did so well. Anyways, really glad you made it this far along with me. If you happen to like my verbose rants, feel free to check out my other reviews for seasons past and present. I also frequently post writeups under my list updates, so definitely take a peek if you'd like to see me mald over anime as they hit the airwaves. Peace~

  Continue on AniList
• 

  SamuraiBunny

  20/100
  We've been hoodwinked, bamboozled, lead astray, run amok and flat out deceived!

  Warning Contains Spoilers and Plenty of Profanity
  Seriously WTF is this garbage.
  Why the fuck did they remove one of the best arcs in the manga and skip towards the end.
  This Season is so bad that a non anime youtuber made a rant about it.

  I’ve seen Many Garbage Adaptations
  But I had to witness it with my own eyes as someone who had read the manga prior to watching the anime.
  It’s also bad that you're skipping from the first arc to the final one. It’s like if Bleach’s anime went from the Substitute Shinigami (Or Soul Reaper) arc to the Thousand Year Blood War arc, or Naruto’s anime went from the Land of Waves arc to the 4th Great Ninja War arc.
  WTF!
  I loved Season 1 i really did it, I love how they handled the first major arc in the series, and how they made an amazing OST in Isabella’s lullaby
  FFS they even removed one of the best characters in the entire manga

  

  ---

  Story? 1/10
  WTF is a fucking story craming 143 Chapters (while skipping a couple) into 11 fucking episodes is not a fucking story it’s just cramming a bunch of shit to get done with it. To be fair as someone who has read the manga the manga did had its problems and the final arc (Particularly the ending) was just underwhelming (And to be fair was better than the one we gotted), and when it was announced that the series was going anime original i wished that it would fix the major problems of the manga, but instead it made everything worse. It was so bad that it made me reread the manga and in retrospect as flawed as the manga was it was better than this clusterfuck of an adaptation.

  ---

  Characters? 1/10
  To cram everything to the end, they did it at the worst expense possible, they ruined every single character.
  To be fair the manga itself did wasted some characters but the anime but it much much worse
  Ray? Phil? Everyone else that’s not Emma? Fuck you, you’re gone.
  There’s 0 Character Development whatsoever everyone is the same as they are.
  Fuck you Character Development.

  ---

  Art 7/10
  Aside a couple of whatever you call these:

  

  The Art itself overall is fine i guess. Though it doesn’t help that Cloverworks were working on two other series in Wonder Egg Priority and Horimiya when they were working on this as well.

  ---

  Enjoyment? 1/10
  WTF is there to enjoy? Cramming 143 Chapters into 11 episodes? One of the best arcs in the manga being skipped? Every character that’s not Emma being pushed to shit. Fuck this shit. Fuck this Garbage. And Fuck everything it stand for. If I could find every copy of this shit I'd smash them with a hammer.
  The only good thing about this is both the it’s fire opening and the ending

  ---

  Overall
  I’m fucking frustrasted The Promised Neverland was one of the first manga I’ve read that I’ve seen got it’s anime announced, now it’ll be with the Soul Eater, the Pandora Hearts, and the Rosario + Vampires of the world fans wanting desperately for a remake aka the Brotherhood treatment. And unlike The Promised Neverland those series anime aired when their manga was still ongoing, The Promised Neverland Season 2 meanwhile was airing when it’s manga ended nearly a year ago. Not to mention the receptions towards Beastars and The Quintessential Quintuplets (Two series that aired in the same season as The Promised Neverland Season 2) manga endings weren’t that good either but you didn’t see their mangaka telling the people who were working on those anime to skip towards the end.
  At the end of the day like Many Garbage Adaptations The Promised Neverland like many anime would be more known for it’s anime instead of it’s manga, since after all most anime a just Cash-Grabs just to boost manga or light novel sales.
  Overall I give this garbage a 20/100
  Just fuck this anime and everything it stands for.

  Continue on AniList

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