English Dub Review: Hanaori-san Still Wants to Fight in the Next Life “Midnight Run”

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

Ryusei and Hanaori use whatever of their old power they can muster to fight off monsters in the sewers, but Hanaori worries if she should embrace her new life or try to reclaim her old one.

OUR TAKE

While the Opening and Ending certainly hinted at it, this episode is where the show starts building on the romcom side of the story. Or rather, the one sided feelings that Hanaori is developing for Ryusei, apparently quite reluctantly. And I would be more willing to focus on it being an adorable enemies to lovers story that is pretty common in these scenarios…but unfortunately, Ryusei reincarnated as an adult teacher and Hanaori is a teenage student. So, despite the many cute moments that Ryusei manages to make her heart swoon from looking hot in the right light or saying some sweet and encouraging things, I must on principle hope that this relationship remains one sided forever, even if the two participants are probably mentally decades older than their bodies. This is also easy to be against because Hanaori is actually pretty dang annoying and each time she acts annoying, I gain more desire to see bad things happen to her. Not a great sign considering we’re only a quarter of the way through this series. Well, I say a quarter of the way through, but that’s just wishful thinking since the amount of episodes hasn’t been confirmed quite yet, so here’s hoping it’s not another situation where I gotta cover this for the next six months.

There is a bit of meaningful drama here, though. As Ryusei and Hanaori are both reincarnated beings from the same world, they’re able to relate to each other, even if back then they were two different species. Apparently eating options were quite limited there, as Ryusei, being an undead Demon Lord, only ate Miasma (evil gas), and Hanaori only had the budget to eat hard bread, so living in this new world is probably a big step up. Though that doesn’t stop Hanaori from wondering if settling down and enjoying a cushy high schooler life is something she really deserves, especially since she still needs to fight monsters in her new home. Ryusei, as we saw at the beginning, has long since made peace with his new life, probably because he has way less responsibilities than running a whole undead army. Still, there are definitely some blanks to be filled in regarding their respective former lives, and it looks like we’re going to get some of that filled in next time, as another reincarnated warrior, known as a Returner, has also arrived on the scene and apparently is much more willing to show her feelings for Ryusei. Oh good, more of that.