One Punch Man

Episode 1 seems to be out.

Looks ok. Not as good as season 1 but watchable enough.

Wait. Did it start today?

Apparently.

Either that or it got leaked.

Like others have said, the animation quality is noticeably worse than season one but that was expected as soon as the announcement of the studio switch was made. It's still good, though, and it's still a great adaptation so it's perfectly watchable.

That being said, the OP kinda sucks which is really sad. Season 1's OP was godly.

Honestly, that was a lot better than I thought it would be. They really did take a lot of the most awkward shots and instances of limited animation for that trailer, huh? The artstyle is still noticeably different, and the animation is slightly worse than the god-tier animation of the first season, but the animation itself is actually still really good, better than most of its contemporaries. Hopefully, this first episode is only a taste of what's yet to come, not a showcase of the season's best, like the first season's first episode was.

Just based on how much stuff they showed in the OP (and how much content they covered), I'm guessing this season will actually have super fast pacing and end with the big Garou fight. Maybe. I could maybe see the invasion/tournament arc taking place over the course of 3-4 episodes, if they really squeeze everything in there.

Eh. Hoping it picks up, the animation (when it's present) isn't bad but the direction is messy as hell.

Oh. I'm not going to be kind to this season. I suppose the studio change was inevitable, but still.

EDIT: Damn. They took that opening down seconds after I finished typing this. Which was only a minute after I finished watching it.

EDIT 2: Actually watching the first episode, huh, it's not all that bad.

We're getting Genos vs Garou, and Suiryu, so uh... Season 2 ends before they invade the Monster Association and then Season 3 will be all about the Monster Association, I guess.

I feel like they should've waited on Garou and just cut off with the Super Tournament.

Also, wow, the web comic's still going? I thought somebody in here adamantly stated that the webcomic was being supplanted by the manga and anime, and that ONE was working with Murata to basically make that version the new "canon."

Edited by Soble on Apr 9th 2019 at 6:58:25 AM

I guess ONE decided that he wanted to go back to working on the present story instead of retreading all of his old material.

Got around to reading the new webcomic chapter, and yeah, ONE is definitely pushing the story forward. I liked the little self-deprecating joke at the start of the chapter.

It's interesting that the art isn't much better than the last chapter. I guess One Punch Man really is just a webcomic and a side project to ONE. I was wondering if he would put more effort into One Punch Man since Mob Psycho ended, but I guess not.

His art in Mob Psycho 100 is much cleaner and more professional, and that makes sense since Mob Psycho is actually an official published manga.

Edited by PushoverMediaCritic on Apr 9th 2019 at 7:36:22 AM

Just watched the first season 2 episode.

...If not for being told about it earlier, I don't know if I'd have noticed the drop in animation quality, but I do admit it felt like it was lacking something compared to Season 1.

That new opening is definitely lacking something though. It felt kinda meh.

Anyway, hopefully the highs outweighs the lows. We've waited a long time for this, so it'd suck if the series didn't live up to expectations.

Read the chapter.

Hot damn, now that's how you train a dog!

Just watched the first episode of the new season myself.

Overall, I mean, it's not bad. It's competently put together for the most part, which is exactly what I expected from JC Staff. But it's not going to be the balls-to-the-wall that Madhouse in its prime was pulling.

That being said, it's been so long that I forgot that this portion of the series contains some of my favourite stories. Hell, the introduction of King alone has already made me happy to see the second season beginning.

Am I ever gonna stop wishing that it was the exact same people from season one working on it? Probably not. Is that going to keep me from enjoying it? Probably not.

Edited by Grahf on Apr 10th 2019 at 12:17:49 PM

I'm guessing next episode will cover Fubuki and Sonic go to Saitama's house, and Garou starts his Hero Hunting.

The real testament to the new animation will be how they animate the Serious Consecutive Sidehops. We already have a fair idea of how Madhouse would have handled it from other things they've done so now we'll see what JC Staff does.

I know they won't make it to Serious TABLE FLIP but I'm real curious how it's going to look now.

To comment on where the season will end, it has been suggested on reddit that it will end on the Elder Centipede fight
as it's the best and/or most climatic ending around that point of the story.
It end on a big fight, we get to see some nice character development from Genos and possibly King as well,
we get a sequel hook for Garou and then just after that there's the whole Monster Association thing for the next season.

Edited by Mewseeker on Apr 11th 2019 at 7:37:44 AM

Man, second episode is out.

The animation drop really got painfully obvious. What would have probably been guaranteed to be a high point got reduced to pretty much a two second thing with barely any animation at all.

Like, I don't know how to describe it with the correct terminology, but almost all of the connecting frames and smooth continuous movement that characters had in the first season is just gone.

That's amazing.

A trio of heroes get clued in on the truth about King. Fortunately, they’re a bunch Blood Knights as opposed to Glory Hounds and decide to set themselves up as King’s disciples that go with him everywhere. Taking advantage of his Monster Magnet status, they tell monsters and criminals that gun for King that they must proof themselves worthy by beating his disciples first.

Many of S-Class heroes, such as Pig God and Dark Shine, are people that underwent monsterfication and retained their sanity and humanity. Possibly quite a few other heroes as well. Retaining one’s sanity may even amplify the power of the resultant transformation.

One heroine has clued in on this, realizing her amazing strength came from monsterfication. She has a pair of allies, two guys who ate monster cells but also retained their sanity.

Damnit. Damnit. Damnit. Damnit! DAMNIT!

Oh, I was really hoping episode 1 was going to be a small taste of what was yet to come, and not a showcase of the best the season had to offer. My disappointment that it turned out to be the latter is immeasurable.

Story's still good, it's just a straight adaptation of the source material, but the animation being like this just kills the quality of the anime.

My only solace is that Mob Psycho was spared of this fate and stayed with Bones, and the Murata re-draw of One Punch Man is still going strong, so it seems like this season won't ruin ONE's brand.

Haven't watched the second episode yet but, from what I'm hearing, I should probably just drop this anime like a sack of hot garbage a go back to reading the manga since it has better animation.

What a waste.

I'm exaggerating a bit. Just a bit, but still... Genos vs Sonic looked pretty good, though the rest of the episode not so much. Garou looked nice, but him vs the A Rank Heroes was nothing special, Fubuki vs Saitama was actually kind of bad (and they tried to cover it up with an excessive amount of panning shots), and they completely ruined Serious Consecutive Side-Hops.

Edited by PushoverMediaCritic on Apr 16th 2019 at 6:46:19 AM

I'm glad I only ever stuck to reading the manga and was too lazy to check out the anime, so I feel no disappointment.

Truth be told the only 3 things I think you're missing out on were:

• the opening theme song
• the scene where Saitama catches Sonic's sword
• the "ok" during the Boros fight

It's cool seeing certain things in motion, and I do enjoy Saitama's dub voice sounding completely disinterested in what he's doing, but not only is Murata apparently superhuman when it comes to pushing this stuff out faster than the anime's second season there are parts that actually look better in the manga - the scene where Sonic zips around Saitama in the forest, and the Boros fight, are examples.

Burn the heretic.