Malazan Empire: D'rek - Viewing Profile - Malazan Empire

QuickTidal, on 26 June 2026 - 11:19 AM, said:

Yes and no. Some fans will blather on about how it doesn't even matter if the anime makes money or not, it only exists to advertise the manga/light novel source and the producers don't care if it doesn't even make a dime, and that most certainly is not true. Most anime *are* expected to be profitable (with often a good half of the anime's direct revenue coming from licensing it to global/western streaming services), though not necessarily by very much. But yes also the publishers and other otaku companies loooove their intermodal media cross-integration, so an anime that can also hype up manga sales, that they can do tie-in merch sales, that they can spin up a "collab" with some local tourism town for promotional events, that they can do product placement in, that they can use to promote some singer signed to the music label... well, all the companies that join the production committee to finance an anime are much more likely to want to pay for *that* anime rather than for some original anime project which has none of those benefits for them.

When it comes to doing a season 2 of an anime, a lot of those cross-integration benefits are gone. Sure, you'll see some small surge in sales of the source manga/novels, but none nearly as big of one as you got from season 1, and likewise across the board. Combine that with how there's no limit to the number of anime that can be aired at a time anymore now that we're in a streaming service model rather than a TV model, and the tendency has become that publishing/etc companies nowadays go for a 'scattershot' approach of greenlighting a lot of season 1s, get the small profit and cross-modal benefits from those, but only greenlight season 2s for the very few anime with huge season 1 successes which forecast that seasons 2, 3, 4, etc will be very profitable just from the anime alone. If there's any sense of risk that a sequel season won't be profitable... well, why take the risk when you have 10 million other manga/light novels waiting to be adapted instead.

That's also why it often takes a really long time for a season 2 to come out. If the director/lead writer/studio making the show knew right from the start they were greenlit for a second season there's a ton of pre-production work they would be doing for season 2 early on while season 1 is being made, and the staff that will work on season 2 could start working on it as soon as season 1 is done. Instead, they make season 1 with no idea if it's a one-off or will be continued, the production committee waits to see how the show does, finally the committee says they want a season 2 sometime around when, say, the 7th episode is airing. By that point the writers and storyboarders have been gone off to other projects for over a year, the director's already started doing pre-production on some other show, likewise the character designer and colour designer and art director are on other jobs, the production desk team will have to make all new contracts with the voice actors and find times in their busy schedules, the studio itself couldn't take the risk of just sitting around doing nothing so it's already booked 3 new shows to produce for the next 12 months... the whole production cycle has to be started over from scratch for season 2.

QuickTidal, on 25 June 2026 - 03:05 PM, said:

I enjoyed this one. It's cute. A bit tropey at times but not too much. Wish it had a season 2!

Maark Abbott, on 10 June 2026 - 07:41 AM, said:

Naaaah it's totally just straight-up fanservice

But hey, that's okay, that's what a lot of the audience wants! And for what it's worth, aside from that and a few other issues I still think MDUD is a very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, good show. The character animation and the direction/cinematography on it is crazy good. And even though the whole setup of the thing is very wish-fulfilly/manic pixie dream girl trope once it gets rolling the episode-by-episode writing is really good. Put those together and you get some incredible drama scenes, like Gojo stressing out about doing Marin's makeup halfway through S2. Or, heck, even though it's very fan-servicey, that hotel scene is probably the most visceral sexual tension I can think of from an anime scene. It's also really wholesome in S2 how the rest of the class actually turns out to be pretty supportive and breaks down Gojo's self-imposed preconceptions.

Other than S1 being over-indulgent in its "anime-isms" at times (the fanservice, introducing Jubei with the naked bathroom setup as if the story was headed into a tropey love triangle/harem), the only real issue I have is that I feel Gojo's side of the equation gets short-shrift. We spend tooooons of screentime and dialogue on learning all the little details and methodology of how Marin does cosplaying, modelling, acting, and later even a ton about photography techniques, all while barely ever showing or saying anything about how Gojo actually makes the clothes (or hina dolls) which must surely have just as much depth to it.

Also very slow romantic progress but the show was a huge hit so I'm sure they'll be making more seasons and it'll get there eventually.

QuickTidal, on 10 April 2026 - 02:28 PM, said:

Yeah, that debut episode was a lot of fun!

Yeah but that's not much different than JJK season 1 or season 2 I'd say. The whole "let's collect the fingers" thing lasted like 4 seconds. The whole school setting thing just ended up being a way to bring in the other 'class' of characters for a fight and then we never saw them at school again. The whole twist about was such a let down. Then the movie brought in that other guy who is supposed to steal the show even more away from the original trio?

Yeah, the Hidden Inventory bit actually stuck to its story and told it nicely, but that's only because it was structured as a self-contained flashback in a small number of episodes. And even then it was like S2 starting with "wow so we're finally admitting Yuta was never the main character and letting everything be about Gojo". Don't get me wrong, JJK has always had moments of brilliance mixed in there. Heck, I cried at that one train scene. But I gave up any expectations for the storytelling being even halfway competent around the middle of season 1.

(Though I still haven't checked out the new season yet, so who knows maybe despite having zero expectations already I'll somehow still end up being disappointed by it, too.)