Multicour anime are interesting. For the cynic they are attempts to milk as much cash a franchise possibly has to offer. For the fan they simply mean more anime to enjoy. Perhaps more objectively they are a way of covering larger amounts of content with intermissions to allow production teams to revaluate reassess and improve upon their approach. Id like to think that Arslan Senki: Fuujin Ranbu fits the latter description. And yet at a mere 8 episodes I find the sequel of the 25 episode long Arslan Senki to be incredibly underwhelming. I find it so lacking in fact that I question its existence and what purpose it served for the franchise as a whole. 420http://i.ur.com/96tKVg2.png Ever get that feeling of dj vu? Things pick up right where Fuujin Ranbus predecessor left off. Kind of. If you recall the first season finished off with Arslans forces successfully capturing the Keep of Saint Emmanuel and marching towards the Parsian capital. In other words shit was about to go down. Except it never does. The second cour begins with Arslans army doubling back to Peshawar to repel yet another foreign invasion. Meanwhile Silver Mask Guiscard and Andragoras are all doing their own thing. 420http://i.ur.com/tMnv6fC.png My honourhttps://www..com/watch?v=UIXNOQ8ej9c This opening sequence of events is indicative of the cours biggest problem: nothing happens. Virtually no progress is made throughout the entire season. Okay thats a little unfair. Things do happen pretty important plot developments at that too. Except all these developments occur outside the scope of Arslan and his party. That is to say they all concern less important characters. As such what were left with is Arslan and co. dawdling around aimlessly while the show tries to move all the pieces around him in preparation for the next hopefully more climatic phase. Its filler. And it certainly feels like filler. Welcome to Copacabana beach Arslan and his troupe are the central figures of the story. They certainly have the most screen time too. And yet this season they quite literally go on vacation while the rest of the cast plays catch up. They find themselves embroiled in a boring and predictable subplot that adds nothing to the show. Nothing is gained in terms of plot devices to influence their journey in any meaningful way. Nothing new is achieved. To make things worse we get more of the same drab flat humour. Hell we dont even learn anything new regarding Arslans true parentage. None of the core group is really changed by the experience either. They simply continue to fulfil their same old archetypal roles. Daryun continues to be a raid boss Narsus continues to be an insurmountable tactical genius Alfreed continues to be uncomfortably horny for Narsus and Farangis continues to be a stoic pair of tits. The point is the season doesnt build upon any of the central casts character tropes that were established the previous cour. Even Arslan remains the insufferably kind hearted but determined kid he was at the end of last season. Sure he has a slight shift in attitude during the finale but this was a long time coming and didnt exactly require eight episodes of lounging around to get to. 420http://i.ur.com/tgdCWVL.png The season in a nutshell The other major players sort of get some development. You cant really call it development in the case of Guiscard and Andragoras who simply reaffirm their caricatures as conniving douchebags. There is some long overdue exploration of Silvermasks past which reveals a couple of new dimensions to his character. Hes still overly simplistic and a pain to be around whenever he opens his mouth but at least its something. Which is sad given it was the only thing the cour had to offer. Once again very little that happens is of any consequence and so its really difficult to remain invested in the show. At least the boredom only lasts eight episodes. And by the seasons end were literally back to square one albeit with a couple additional elements. If Berserk 2016 and Mekaku City Actors Episode 9 had a lovechild So Fuujin Ranbu doesnt improve on the first season as far as narrative goes mainly because it doesnt have one. But does it improve technically? After all with only eight episodes youd think thered be more budget allocated to each individual episode. Nope. It suffers from all the technical difficulties that plagued the first cour. In fact its possibly even worse. Its the same shit. Masses of identical CGI soldiers said CGI soldiers clumsily swinging swords at each other poor quality art a drab and uninspiring colour palette that even a more tropical setting cant save not to mention the absurdly athletic horses. Thankfully we didnt have any horses jumping on war elephants. Theyve moved on to houses instead. 290http://i.ur.com/0wk14hJ.png 290http://i.ur.com/37p2ST0.png Reuniting long lost twin brothers since 2015 Musically its mostly the same tracks from the previous season. Id argue its worse given the baller Lapis Lazuli OP from last season is replaced by another Eir Aoi song that just lacks the same punch. Kalafina keeps doing Kalafina stuff as far as the ED is concerned. On a side note Im really not a fan of Hiromu Arakawas FMAesque character designs here. I find them unfitting for the setting and tone and they simply make it harder for me to take the show seriously as a war epic. The character designs from the 90s OVAs are a lot classier mature and more aesthetically pleasing in my opinion. 420http://i.ur.com/mTDtFRO.png What is my purpose?https://www..com/watch?v=X7HmltUWXgs Arslan Senki: Fuujin Ranbu makes very little progress. What little progress it does make happens to concern only the side cast leaving the primary characters neglected and twiddling their thumbs. It fails to improve on the first season. It fails to make any serious plot progression it fails to develop its characters in any meaningful way and it fails to entertain. You can chalk it up to the source material but ultimately as its own independent entity this season fails at mostly everything really. Fuujin Ranbu is filler. Filler to set things up for the next assumed instalment which I am unsure will ever arrive. And its filler that could definitely be done without. The few important plot developments surely didnt need eight episodes to cover. And for every plot point that mattered we had to endure a countless number that didnt. I had little faith in this rendition of the Arslan Senki story prior to Fuujin Ranbus release. Now I have even less if any.