Hello and welcome to Project Nitsuj. Most of you might remember my review of The World God Only Knows. It was one of my first reviews and an anime based off one of my favorite mangas of all time. The story of a shut-in gamer who’s forced to help capture dangerous souls from Hell by making the girl fall in love with him was a good premise and executed well. Because of this it received a good amount of praise, fans of the manga liked, fans of anime liked it, critics liked it, I liked it everybody liked so when they promised a second season by the end of the first everybody was excited and counting down the days to when the second season would begin to air. And in the Spring of 2011 our prayers were answered the second season began to air. And with July here and the third season scheduled to air I can think of no better to way to celebrate then by reviewing the second season and giving my thoughts about it. Let’s see who everyone’s favorite gamer has to capture next. This is The World God Only Knows season 2 or as I like to call it The World God Only Knows 2: Chain of Events.
Opening/Ending Theme
Our opening for this season is “A Whole New World God Only Knows” by Oratorio The World God Only Knows the same people who sang the opening for the first season. I do like this opening and the overall feel we get from it. It starts off slow and peacefully but than halfway through starts to pick up the pace and become more louder. Much like the first it sounds as if it’s being sung by an angelic choir while talking about Keima proclaiming his god-likeness and how he’s tired of doing this job. Compared to the first this one seems to show Keima becoming a lot more human instead of god-like which we’ll see why in the review. If I had to choose which one I like more I would have to go with the season one opening over this one, both are good but I like the season one’s a little more. The ending for this season is “Ai no Yokan” sung by the capturing targets this season and Elsie. Once again like the first season each of the targets sing the ending together for the first episode and then they each sing it separately for their arcs. It’s a very beautiful song that centers on the targets and they each have their own part so you can tell them apart from each other. I actually like this ending more than season one’s ending because of the melody, the lyrics, and the singers sound a little better.
Kusunoki Kasuga and Haqua du Lot Herminium Arc
After a brief recap of the first season told through the lens of Dragon Quest (ahh~ 8-bit graphics I don’t care how weird or awkward you are in today’s world to me you will always be awesome) we cut to Keima and Elsie talking about the spirits when Elsie accidently bumps into a school bully (it’s always a bully and never a teacher. I wonder why). Elsie is frighten by them but Keima with his badass self doesn’t seem all that impressed by them and calls them minor characters even going as far as calling them parsleys (oh that’s mean to the parsleys couldn’t you have called them something less respectful). They take offence to this and began beating up on Keima (and they say vegetables are good for you) until we see our capturing target a cool 3rd year named Kusunoki who hates weak and cute things voiced by the queen of badass girls Ami Koshimizu (Himari from Omamori Himari), somehow she keeps finding a way in my reviews I don’t why. Kusunoki tells the bullies to knock it off but their leader takes out a baton and charges at her but unbeknownst to him Kusunoki is the captain of the girls Karate Club and manages to beat him by just using the wind pressure from her punch (light as a feather that parsley is. Also in the manga, the parsley boy pulled out a knife instead of a baton. I guess the show didn’t want to get into trouble about promoting acts of violence. PG rating has even reached Japan). She calls Keima a weakling for not defending himself and Elsie comes in where her sensor goes off and reveals that Kusunoki is the next target for Keima.
The next day they go to where Kusunoki is training by herself since she’s the only member because the others quit on account of her extreme ways (oh come now, all she wanted you guys to do was do park tour training Assassin’s Creed style). Here, Keima takes the initiative to become her pupil and officially becomes the manager of the club. For the next few scenes we see Keima do chores like wash the floor, bring her snacks (rice cakes) and put the kitten out that keeps coming into the room (it’s pretty tedious). After a few days Keima can’t seem to figure out what Kusunoki’s problem is until he walks in on her playing with a kitten that snuck in (I thought I taw a puddy cat). Keima quickly pieces together that deep down Kusunoki likes cute things and is just pretending to dislike them because they don’t match her image of strength (what are you on woman!? Look at the women from One Piece, Naruto, Bleach and Fairy Tail! These women are so strong, cute, and deadly that I’m afraid they’re gonna kill me if I screw-up around them). She tries to get rid of the cat by tossing it from a building ((1) now we’ll see if cats do land on their feet. (2) I wonder how many lives he’ll lose before he hits the ground? (3) Hey it’s raining cats but where’s the dogs. Take your pick). As she’s throws the cat it gets saved by the ghostly image of her feminine herself who has materialized thanks to the power of the spirit.
Keima confronts Kusunoki on the event since he saw it all and says that he’ll help her by drawing out the feminine side but is unsure how (dress him up as a girl that usually gets the cute factor going). Elsie comes in and says the two should go on a date in which they both reject (an otaku boy and a karate girl going out together? Talk about your weird couples). But when the ghost appears to convey her excitement Kusunoki decides to go along with it. So they go on a date with Kusunoki wearing a cute dress and Keima takes her to an arcade (he’s an otaku what were you expecting) and they get into a friendly competition of whack-a-mole. The ghost doesn’t show up and they’re about to give up but when they share ice cream together the ghost finally materializes and is released from Kusunoki’s body. After a quick wardrobe change Kusunoki fights her other self (starting to sound like Persona 4 here) fighting game style (Get serious! Get ready~. Go back! Give~! Hey, come on, come on! You dead! Sor~ry!). As the two fight the ghost throws Kusunoki into Keima who offers the key to victory (a containment unit and blaster from Ghostbusters?). No, instead he just puts a flower on Kusunoki’s ear and tells her that having a cute yet strong martial arts is the best way, that it’s okay to like cute things, and that there are many things that are both cute and strong in this world. The two don’t believe such things can exist but when Keima asked if their date was a waste of time the ghost admits that she had fun, submits to the real Kusunoki (you’re me and I’m you), takes control of her body to kiss Keima, and the spirit is released from her body. We see later on that she begins to carry the kitten in school taking care of it and now believes that the strong should protect the weak.
When Elsie is trying to explain the powers of the spirit to Keima her sensor goes off again and she gets trapped by a capturing jar which was used by her friend, fellow demon, and the next target Haqua voiced by Saori Hayami (Musubi from Sekirei). We find out that unlike Elsie, Haqua is a smart person who graduated at the top of her class and rewarded a badass scythe called the Scythe of Testament which is her main tool for capturing spirits (all I got was a diploma, where’s my badass scythe). Haqua tells Elsie that she’s the district chief and that she’s in the area hunting a spirit that escaped from one of the hunters. Elsie offers to help but Haqua rejects the offer and Keima doesn’t care because he’s playing a game (priorities, priorities, priorities). Haqua gets lost in the school but Keima finds her and he offers to help her but she rejects because he’s Keima what do you expect. But she accepts after Keima tells her that he won’t spill the beans that she let the spirit get away (did he just threaten a devil? That was some badassary right there). He tells her all he wants is information about the situation he’s in because Elsie has told him nothing and that she is an unreliable partner (oh come on she can’t be as bad as Navi. *Navi appears* Hello! Hey listen! Hey listen! Hey listen! *Isis shoots Navi* (Isis): Enough of that annoyance. Find your own partner. (Nitsuj): This is why you’re the best babe. (Isis): Don’t call me babe. (Nitsuj): Yes, ma’am). As they search for the spirit together Haqua threatens to kill Keima but he plays it cool and says she won’t kill him (silly girl! You love me!) because if he dies Elsie dies with him and Keima can tell that even though Haqua denies her friendship with Elsie deep down she does value her as a friend. Once again, this scene shows just how cool Keima is. Able to read the situation quickly, turn it into his favor, and quickly take control of the situation and the people in it. Just a straight-up genius right there.
Haqua finally tells Keima that spirits are actually the souls of demons from Old Hell which was a ruthless time where demons were pure evil (sounds like politics to me). However, there were some demons who opposed that way of thinking, rebelled against them, won, and established New Hell where reason and order are maintained. But sometime ago the souls of the defeated demons of Old Hell escaped, made their way to the human world and were drawn to the negative emotions of females where they would feed off those emotions to gain power and thus the spirit squad was deployed to find them and capture them before the spirits regain their power (the more I hear about this the more I feel this would be a good Shin Megami Tenshi game). After figuring out the spirits feed on negative emotions (which should have been obvious given that they hide in girls I mean let’s face it, you’re not gonna find anymore negative emotions then in there. That or Shinji from Evangelion but he’s a guy or at least we’re told, not entirely sure myself) they go to the place where negative emotions are at their strongest (A showing of the Twilight saga. No, that would imply that people actually saw that shit) the old school theater which was built on top of a graveyard (they say that the ghost of critics who died here come back from the grave to review their plays). After dropping Haqua off at the theater Keima takes his leave saying that she can handle the rest from here since she’s already caught 10 spirits but she confesses that she hasn’t caught any spirits yet and that she made up the lie to keep face (next you’ll be telling me the cake is a lie) which leads us to the gap in her heart; she feels the pleasure of being the top student and now that she’s in the field she’s keeps failing, has a hard time living up to the expectations set for her, and doesn’t want everyone to think of her as a failure. She gets a call from Elsie who’s also in the theater and has discovered the location of the spirit which turns out to be the biggest zit I’ve ever seen in my life 0_0.
They meet up and try to capture the spirit but it takes control of the unconscious students in the building to stop them. The spirit escapes to the roof and Haqua tells Elsie to stay out of her way but Keima warns her to take Elsie along but her pride won’t listen and she decides to handle things her way (let the record show, that this dumb devil took the blows and did it her way). When she gets to the roof she starts to doubt herself and the spirit takes control of her (this is what happens when you don’t listen to Keima). She captures Keima which makes Elsie the only one who can save them (and they’re fucked). After taking advice from Keima that the only person Elsie needs to fight is Haqua she tells Haqua that it’s okay to fail and that in her eyes Haqua will always be a great demon (friendship~!!!!). This snaps Haqua out of it and they work together to capture the spirit and save the day.
Chihiro Kosaka and Jun Nagase Arc
The Chihiro arc starts off with Keima depressed because he finds out from Haqua that there are still 60,000 spirits to captured (Alright. IT’S OVER 9000!!!). Elsie tries to cheer him up but it fails and then her sensor goes off in the hallway to reveal that their next target is their classmate Chihiro voiced by Kana Asumi (Yukikaze from Dog Days) an average girl who doesn’t really stand out from the crowd and is just as plain as a white t-shirt. And I’m not gonna lie, out of all the girls in the series she’s probably the most realistic out of all of them. She’s the normal girl, she doesn’t stand out in the crowd like the other girls, she’s not rich, athletic, or smart like the other girls we’ve seen in the series and her problems are everyday problems a high school girl would face such as confessing to a boy she likes. If I had to relate her to a game character she would definitely be the npc you see in the background of rpgs. You know, that character you see but only talk to once because the game tells you to or you just ignore them completely because they serve no relevance or importance to the game? Well, that’s Chihiro, the character who you see at school or in life that you talk to once and then soon forget about her because she’s just too plain to remember and Keima comes to this conclusion as well. Keima says that he can’t establish a route with her because there’s nothing all that interesting about her explaining that the more troublesome a girl is the more it makes them stand out in the crowd (a very valid point. All the girls so far have been troublesome and their problems have been easy to see and fix. Here, we really don’t know what Chihiro’s problem is). As they continue talking they overhear Chihiro confessing to a boy but getting rejected (shot down in her prime). The next day she still seems depressed about the confession and Keima in an uncharacteristic act tries to go cheer her up (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxkliYp8yE0). But his attempts fall short because Chihiro pulls out a book, cheers up, and prepares to confess to the next guy (Bitch! I call bitch!). This causes Keima to go off on her saying that her love is not love at all (said the guy who hits on girls and then moves on to the next target) and how she really does nothing with her life. She counters this by saying that he’s worse than her and calls him a cockroach (ouch). After that Keima rejects reality entirely and does nothing but play videogames for days with Elsie worrying that he might be dead in his room because he hasn’t eaten in days (that, and there are crows gathering outside is room). He finally goes to school where collapses from exhaustion and hunger and is saved by Ayumi.
She gives Keima some food and tells him to make-up with Chihiro saying that they’re friends and that she felt bothered by Chihiro bad mouthing him (she loves him. It’s Friday, and she’s in love). She setups Keima and Chihiro to clean the classroom where she sees the object of her affection walk by the class room. She says the guy has a birthday coming up and is looking for a gift in a magazine (he’s an adolescent boy in high school there’s only one thing he wants. . . a Chibi Isis. That’s right folks, for a price of 20 dollars you too can have your very own cute and adorable AI girl to love, cherish, and keep you company. Just install the Chibi Isis onto your computer and you too can have an AI girl to help keep viruses away, do chores around the house, play games with you, manage activities, check your e-mail and much more. (Chibi Isis): I may not be very smart but I look forward to being friends with you Nii-chan and Nee-chan. Please take care of me. (Nitsuj): Just call 1-800-I-was-frozen-today and we’ll deliver it right to you. Call now while supplies last). Keima says her attempts will fail because she knows nothing about him such as what are his likes/dislikes, what’s his personality, or hair color (these are all good questions. If you like someone that’s good but make sure you at least know who they are before you try to ask them out). She says his way of thinking is ridiculous (lady, listen to the man, I don’t see you being successful in your confessions unlike him) but after he slips that he has kissed a girl she swallows her pride and asks him for help in her confession (yesterday’s enemies are today’s friends). So Keima decides to help in her hopeless romance by creating events where they meet and steadily start to develop a relationship (thou art I and I art thou, thou shalt have our blessing when thou choosest to create a persona of the Random Boy Arcana). Throughout the process Keima seems to be giving it his all and taking it serious but Chihiro remains carefree and unclear on everything so far (you sure you two aren’t in a relationship because this sounds like a lot of typical relationships) and even starts to flirt with Keima a little bit. On the day of the confession she decides to give up on it saying that she really didn’t like the guy at all (Again, I call bitch). This causes Keima to explode saying that even though the people he’s work with were different from each other they gave it their all in everything they were trying do (again, very true) and he wants to know why she won’t be serious about anything. She finally breaks and says that even if she was serious nothing will happen because she has no real talent and runs off. Keima sits there and agonizes over his failure to see Chihiro’s character because he was so focus on achieving the goal but quickly snaps out of it and chases after Chihiro.
He finds Chihiro at the harbor on a ship (why did she go there I have no idea. Pretty cool setting though). Once on the ship Keima asks why she chases after boys she doesn’t have feelings for (now, that’s a question I would love to ask teenage girls who like Justin Beiber and 1-D. Guarantee you, none of them will give me a straight answer worth believing). She says that she wants to shine just like them and that being beside them made her feel like she was shining (well this explains why Tails was always following Sonic around). She then says that she thought Keima would understand her since the two are so alike but Keima denies that statement saying that he even though he’s given up on the real world he hasn’t given up on himself saying that if he wishes for something nothing is impossible for him (wow, that’s actually very philosophical). She retorts that statement by saying that there are things in the real world that prohibit her from being something more than just average (laws, society, culture all these things are just used to stop you from doing it big). But Keima tells her that if she wants something she can have it but only if she truly tries. He then admits that he misjudged her and said that she’s the only person to ever beat him (props to you girl for beating Keima. Mad respect right there). She still denies Keima’s encouragement but after a kiss and a lame one liner of always being there to help Chihiro, her spirit leaves her body and Elsie captures it (where there is love, I’ll be there~). The next day she decides to start a band with her as the vocalist even though she’s not really that good she says she’s going to give it her all (remember this because I’ll be coming back to this later). At the end we see that Chihiro is no longer half-assing her life and we end with Keima realizing that everyone struggles in real life and wondering what will happen to him.
After a manga episode (I’ll come back to it at the end) we get to meet our final target of the season Jun voiced by Aki Toyosaki (Momo from To Love Ru) an upbeat and idealistic teacher in training who gets assigned to be a student teacher for Keima’s class. She’s also a fan of pro-wrestling (well there’s a hot character trait if I ever saw one) saying that teachers are like wrestlers because wrestling is all about the hopes and dreams of athletes pursuing ideal strength (I always thought it was about men beating the hell out of each other to win titles and earn money but your idea is good too) which will lead to the gap in her heart. She’s a person who believes strongly in her ideals and wants everyone to follow those ideals without question even if they don’t want to. In class she sees Keima playing videogames and is shocked that nobody including the teachers don’t say anything to him and just ignore him (the elephant in the room so to speak). She comes to the conclusion that Keima is a problem child and decides tp convert him (oh yeah, the guy who gets straight A’s, doesn’t bother anyone, and follows the rules to a certain degree is a problem child let focus our attention on him instead of the child who bought a baton/knife to school I’m sure he’ll be fine in society). When she approaches Keima she’s taken back by his eyes at how they show nothing (he has the eyes of a doll) and comes to the conclusion that Keima is lonely and vows to turn him into a real person (you have a better chance at figuring out why The Joker is The Joker).
The next day when Elsie tells Keima that Jun has a spirit inside her he decides to head home saying that teachers only make friends with students and that getting a teacher to fall for you is time consuming and requires a lot of events (it’s true, in Persona 3 Fes I wasted so many days maxing out the Hermit social link) and thus he must setup an event where they’re at the same position. As he’s leaving Nagase stops him and through a series of events manages to get Keima to talk a little bit and stay in school. Realizing he’s fallen into a trap and became her student he decides to create a series of small events where he tries to piss her off but they all backfire on him. She unleashes her final attack by buying a PFP (Sony: You win this round Fony) and getting Keima to teach her how to use it. After she says that Keima can’t run from reality by playing games he gets pissed off saying that she doesn’t understand him at all and that he’s not playing games to run from reality. And to be fair this outburst of anger is pretty legit, someone said this to me a long a time ago and it just pissed me off. People play videogames to relax and have fun. We like the graphics, the stories, the characters, the lessons and world videogames create. Stop using that escape reality argument. Elsie comes in and drags Keima off to cool down and decides to go the teacher route and plans to use his homeroom as a stepping stone to get close to Jun since the two went to school together. He goes to his homeroom teacher Yuri Nikaido (who is a straight up sadist and hates Keima) to get information about Jun and after a bit of talking and becoming her slave he finds out that Jun was on the basketball team at school but the other players quit because she kept trying to force her ideals on to the other players that they couldn’t take it anymore and decided to quit. Later on, Keima gets Elsie to create a fake wrestling ticket that is identical to Jun’s so that when they go to the event their force to share the same seat together (how he figured out what her seat number and section was is beyond me seeing as she never told him about the event nor did he see her ticket. Plothole away~). Once there Keima tells her he knows about the basketball team incident and questions if she was really pushing her ideals for the good of the team or for herself which makes her angry and she leaves saying he doesn’t know how she feels.
The next day in class she asks the class to sign-up for a marathon but they all say no and say she’s too serious as a teacher. This causes her to blow up, go off on the class and run out angry (man emotions have been running wild this season haven’t they). After Keima calls the class a bug-ridden bunch he goes after Jun. Once he finds Jun he tells her that she’s just forcing her ideals on others and tells her she doesn’t have to force her ideals on others, she just has to reinforce them and stand by them. She takes these words to heart and the students find her on the basketball court where they apologize for being hard on her. After that a few days go by, Keima doesn’t come to school, and Jun’s training period is over. As she’s leaving Keima goes to say goodbye and tells her to come back. She says she will return vowing to become a better teacher by then, getting Keima to stop playing games when she returns, and they end with her kissing him causing the spirit to leave her and ending the arc.
Manga episodes and OVAs
Much like the last season there are a few manga episodes that take place between arcs. Luckily, this season only has two manga episodes and they’re actually very good ones. The first one is episode 8 and is split into two parts. In the first part Keima learns that there’s a rare first edition game called Love Tears going on sale in the next town over so the following morning he drags Elsie with him to buy the game but while waiting for the store to open he finds out that there’s a big retro game fair going on and decides to check it out tasking Elsie with getting the Love Tears game for him. After explaining the history of dating sim games, teaching her the difference between many editions of the same game, he goes off to the fair and leaves Elsie with her task. She manages to find the game but using the knowledge from Keima she accidently buys the anime version of the game instead. Surprisingly Keima isn’t upset by this saying that he bought the game at the fair in case something like this might happen and that he blames himself for Elsie’s screw-up because he didn’t teach her the difference between animes and games. In the second half Haqua comes over to ask for Keima’s assistance in writing a report about her arc. Using a scale model of the school along with some autonomous dolls they complete the report. But when Haqua changes a few events she gets into a fight with him and mistakenly says that Keima sexually harassed her which gets display by their dolls. Elsie sees this and in a fit of anger attacks him and accidentally let loose the dolls. After they find the dolls Haqua thanks them for their help, leaves, and shows signs near the end that she might have fallen for Keima.
In the final episode Keima has fallen in love (https://youtu.be/lG2kFXDPot8). Not with a real girl but with a 2-D girl named Yotsuba Sugimoto nicknamed Yokkyun that Keima believes is the ideal game heroine. He becomes so obsessed with this character that he becomes even crazier than normal (and that’s saying a lot). Later on he receives a message from a game studio asking him for help to create a game under his direction. As he starts to think of ideas for the games his inner thoughts begin to argue about what’s important, ideal, and perfect for the game such as music, setting, story, etc. anything that goes into making a game his inner thoughts argue about how it should be done. It’s actually an interesting look at how a game is really made. I imagine this is what goes on in the minds of creators making a game, trying to figure out what’s important, where they want to focus their attention on and how it should be done. The war in his mind finally comes to an end when they all remember that the important aspect of a dating sim game is the heroine. After realizing this Keima sends a message back to the studio simply asking them to create a good game and nothing else. The season ends with us getting a preview of new targets for the next season and Keima saying that although he doesn’t accept reality, he can still be a part of it. These manga episodes are very good and funny. I did like how Keima tried to teach Elsie about videogames in episode 8 so that she could understand him a little more and I liked the internal conflict he had in the final episode and his message at the end. I actually do like these manga episodes more than the ones in the first season. They’re a lot funnier and more story-driven then the others and center more on Keima.
There are 3 OVAs out there. The first centers on Chihiro’s rock band called 2-B Pencil with Elsie, Ayumi, and another classmate named Miyako seeking a club room for their band but the English teacher Kodama denies their request and tells them to study for exams (that and they only have 4 members instead of 5). They work out a deal with him that if they each score 100% on the English exam they’ll get a club room. Seeing as how most of them suck at English Elsie enlists the help of Keima to get him to tutor them against his will but after Elsie pleads with him he agrees to help. Kanon also joins in on the tutoring after overseeing them in classroom. He shows them all the questions that Kodama will have on the test and tutors Ayumi, Chihiro, and Kanon separately for a while where they begin to act awkward and embarrassed around him showing that even though their minds have been erased the feelings they have for him are still there. The day of the test comes and they all get 100% except for Elsie but Kodama gives them a club room anyway because he’s overjoyed at the fact that Keima got a 99% on the test instead of 100% which Keima blames he missed the point because he was tutoring the girls. However, I like to think that Keima knew that Elsie would fail and knew that if he didn’t get 100% Kodama would be so overjoyed and happy that he would give them a club room, he’s way to smart and clever to get distracted by something as small as this and miss a point.
The next two OVAs came out about a year after the second season ended and focuses on the Tenri arc which would become the game changer for the series entirely. It’s the beginning of summer vacation and Keima has only one thing on his mind, playing videogames nonstop all summer (a good summer plan). When he gets home his mother introduces him to the new neighbors Mrs. Ayukawa and her daughter Tenri a shy girl who enjoys popping bubble wrap, doing magic tricks, went to school with Keima in elementary (even though he doesn’t remember her) and secretly has a crush on him. She’s voiced by Kaori Nazuka (Nunnally from Code Geass). The next day Elsie‘s sensor detects a spirit inside Tenri and urges Keima to do something but he doesn’t want to be bothered with her. While at the mall buying games they run into Tenri who is has a different personality and is more aggressive than before telling Keima that she won’t accept his help. She takes her leave and we see later on that the person warning Keima wasn’t Tenri but a girl named Diana a separate personality who resides in the same body as Tenri and urges Tenri to get closer to Keima even though she doesn’t like him. She’s then approached by a devil named Nora a big-breasted woman who used to bully Elsie back in Hell and has a habit of using violence to get spirits out of bodies. She’s voiced by Megumi Toyoguchi (Silvia from Princess Lover!). Nora says she’s here to fill the gap in Tenri’s heart and uses her robe to read Tenri’s mind where she sees Keima and gets the false impression that Tenri hates Keima and wants to see him suffer. She captures Keima and uses her robe to see what Keima loves the most which is a dream where he is a 2-D character and Yokkyun is there with him (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5iqYuFmzqg). Nora destroys the dream which causes Keima to go berserk and scare her away. After seeing Keima chase away the devil Diana decides to trust him and ask for his help while Nora makes plans to kill Keima even though she knows Elsie will die as well. They retreat back to the school where Keima comes up with a plan to use a captured spirit to fool Nora into believing that the spirit in Tenri has left her (excellent plan). The only problem is Elsie turned in all her captured spirits and is told to go find one from the other devils. While they wait Keima comes to the conclusion that Diana is not a spirit but something else (no shit, Commodous) they’re attacked by Nora and run to the theater building where Tenri shows Keima a secret tunnel and he begins to remember his past with Tenri.
In the second episode of the Tenri arc, we pick up where the first episode left off. As they journey through the tunnel Keima starts to remember a class field trip he went on as a child where he and Tenri got lost in a cave because of an earthquake and how inside the cave Tenri starts to fall for him (man, the couples in this series are weird but yet somehow cute). As they journey into the cave another earthquake occurs knocking Keima out and spirits begin to flood the cave and are about to attack Tenri and the unconscious Keima (they need an adult). But Diana appears before Tenri and saves them by Tenri agreeing to allow Diana to inhabit her body and gets them both back to the theater where they’re discovered by the teachers. After remembering the event and getting the gaps fill-in from Tenri’s side of the story Keima comes to the realization that there’s a connection between Diana and spirits (isn’t it obvious. For some reason this arc seems to downplay Keima’s intelligence) to which she reveals that she was one of the people who sealed the spirits in Hell. When they exit the cave Nora finds them and begins chasing them. They hide on a ship where Elsie returns saying she couldn’t find any captured spirits from her friends but Diana reveals that she has a weak one and they stage a confession where Tenri admits that she loves Keima, he kisses her, and uses Elsie’s robe to make it look like the spirit escaped Tenri’s body causing Nora to stop chasing them. After Nora leaves Keima wants to know more about the spirits but Diana says to wait and that she will give him answers at another time. The episode ends with Keima and Elsie surprised that their next door neighbors are the Ayukawas.
All in all the OVAs are good and a joy to watch especially the Tenri arc. As I said before the Tenri arc was the game changer for the series. Up until this point the process had been the same, girl has a spirit, Keima performs a conquest, gets a kiss and that’s the end. The Tenri arc established a new element to the series that would serve as the basis for something much bigger in the story to come and one that would change the perspective of the story all together. Watch the first OVA if you want, it’s a filler chapter in the manga it’s not really all that major so if you wanna skip it I say go ahead but I highly recommend watching the Tenri arc otherwise you’ll be lost when the third season gets started.
Final Thoughts
The second season of The World God Only Knows is a good follow up to the first season. The story is the same find the girl, make her fall in love with Keima and get a kiss but I will say that the problems they have this season are a lot more realistic and understanding than the girls from the first season. Like Kusonoki rejecting her feminine side because she does martials arts in pursuit of strength is understandable, some people do deny apart of themselves because they’re afraid of what others will think of them. Her problem reminds me of Kanji from Persona 4 on how everyone called him disgusting because he was a boy who was good at crafts and would rather nit and make stuff toys than play sports like other boys which caused him to close himself off from what he liked and become a person he really wasn’t. Haqua being a top student but then going into the field and failing constantly is something I can understand greatly because I’ve been there. When I was in high school I got straight As in each subject but when I went to college I struggled on a few subjects that I thought I was good in, this took me back. Chihiro’s problem of wanting to stand out from the crowd is also good and something everyone wants to do, stand out from the crowd and be seen as that unique individual. In fact, her arc was my favorite arc out of the whole season for how real Chihiro was and her problem. Jun’s problem of forcing her ideals on others is a problem that people still do to this day, many people do believe strongly in their ideals and often try to force their ideals on other people. We see it in politics, sometimes in videogames and magazines, and in our friends. Most ideals aren’t bad but when they try to force those ideals on others and not listen to them or consider their feelings or thoughts than it becomes a major problem.
The main cast is roughly the same. Elsie is still the lovable clumsy devil who’s always messing up and is there as a comedic foil for Keima. One major change I will say about this season from the first is that Keima is becoming more human. In the first season we saw Keima just capture his target and then move on without letting his emotions drive him. In this season we see Keima become more human, in the Chihiro arc we see him get into fights with Chihiro a number of times and make mistakes because he let his emotions get the better of him. In the Jun arc we see him get mad at Jun for misjudging him, something I think he wouldn’t take too personal if this was his past self. Finally, in the manga episode we see him take the initiative to teach Elsie about videogames. Yeah, I know he was doing it for selfish reasons and as a means to an end but for the first time in his life he tried to bring someone into his world and depend on them for something. For most of this series he’s only depended on himself and his knowledge of games but for the first time we see him actually truly depend on someone else to do something for him. He actually trusted Elsie and had some faith that she would come through for him.
The animation is the same as the first season so there’s nothing much to say on that but the music is great. This was something I forgot to mention in the first season, but the soundtrack for this anime is amazing. It’s all orchestra music and it sounds godly and beautiful. It totally matches the overall feel of the story and events that they take place in the anime. Another thing I forgot to mention is that the female cast of voice actors have their own character songs which for the most part are okay. My favorite character song being Shiori’s character song which is very cute in my opinion. They also sing their own version of the ending song for each season and the musical arrangement is different for each and is sung differently by the voice actors so it doesn’t feel like you’re hearing the same song being sung all over again. The one who sang the ending the best in the first season was Kanon’s voice actor and for the second season surprisingly I feel that Kusunoki sang the ending song best. I totally thought Chihiro was gonna be my favorite but no, Koshimizu came in and just owned this song.
Is it better than the first season?
Yes, but only by a small margin. As I said before the targets are a lot more realistic this time around as well as their problems, the story is still the same as the first season, and probably the biggest improvement this season showed was Keima becoming more human.
Final Score
The final score for the second season of The World God Only Knows is a 7.5/10. If you liked the first season you’ll definitely like the second season for its more realistic characters and problems. And I can’t wait to see what they do for the goddess arc in season 3 and for those of you who haven’t read the manga up until the goddess arc don’t worry cause the Nitsuj got you covered on that. Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time on Project Nitsuj.
*Gets up and walks down the hallway*
(Nitsuj): Oh hey Isis how’s it going?
(Isis): I’m doing well master; I was just having a little chat with your new invention the chibi Isis.
(Nitsuj): Ah yes, the chibi Isis are going to be a big hit in the world. I can feel it. Though I don’t remember telling you about.
(Isis): No, you didn’t tell me about it. Because I would have openly protested the use of my image on this invention.
(Nitsuj): Well I can understand that but still I think if you were to stop and consider the possibili-
(Isis): No.
(Nitsuj): Not even if I-
(Isis): No.
(Nitsuj): Alright, I know when I’m beat, take your best shot.
(Isis): Not even gonna try to run away? That’s no fun.
(Nitsuj): I know when I’m beat. I took a bet, lost, and now I have to face the consequences. Go ahead.
*Isis prepares AI pistols*
(Nitsuj): How’s my hair Isis?
(Isis): Curly.
*Isis fires guns*
(Nitsuj): AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH~!
*All videos and music are not owned by me and belong to their respect owners. All rights reserved*
Thanks for reading. As always please leave a comment or send feedback, request, or comments to iamprojectnitsuj@gmail.com