English Dub Season Review: Mission – Yozakura Family Season 2 Part 1

Mission: Yozakura Family finally returns for its second season, with its first half getting dropped all at once! Or rather, the dub on Hulu decided to drop the first half of the season all at once, instead releasing it weekly like they did last season or how the Japanese broadcast of this season did. And I get the sense that if Undead Unluck had a full second season themselves instead of just a special, Hulu probably would have dumped that all at once on the platform out of pure apathy too. But to get back on topic, this season of Yozakura Family continues where the first left off, with newly wed protagonists Mutsumi, the tenth head of the family, and her childhood sweetheart Taiyo having helped her siblings overcome the Tanpopo organization, but left with still lingering questions about their estranged father Momo and their deceased mother Rei. After having some time to rest, a new threat emerges: the still living FIRST head of the Yozakura Family, Tsubomi, along with the six who ran the family after her! This uncovered and personal menace to the current Yozakuras forces Taiyo, Mutsumi, and their siblings to push past their limits to defend their peaceful lives and uncover the truth of their family roots.

Sounds good on paper, right? Well, sadly, that’s about the only place it ends up good. It’s certainly an interesting idea, hence why the score isn’t any lower, but considering the first season put so much emphasis on the importance of the Yozakura bloodline, specifically in the special qualities in their blood, one would think that having not one, but seven previous heads be recurring villains would lead to so much more exploration of how this spy family with ten generations to its name became what it was. But again, unfortunately, it seems the story is simply not interested in that, turning several people who supposedly led the family for some time (long enough to have at least a child) into stale looking silhouettes and not even names for most. The eighth head, Keiko, was a recurring character in the first season, and one of these resurrected heads is presumably the seventh, her parent. My writer brain weeps for the potential family showdown that could have been there. Oh, and also it turns out that Momo, the father of most of the main cast, who married into the family, is actually biologically a clone of the first head. Luckily genetics means there wasn’t any contamination of recessive genes but still that’s just not right.

But aside from THE MOTHER OF ALL WASTED STORY ARCS, there’s plenty of other problems with this half of the season, namely in its pacing and how poorly it sells its stakes. It takes a handful of light hearted filler episodes for the plot to get moving again, which does at least lead Taiyo to obtaining a rank up in his assassin level, but after that it becomes clear that the series no longer wants to engage with the fun assassination and spy stuff that was part of what made it entertaining. Then, to wrap up this half, we get a mini arc focusing on Kyoichiro, the eldest child, who I already didn’t care for because of him just being another example of the weird overprotective older brother who might actually be attracted to his sister that I cannot stand in anime but is sadly still prominent. And it sure didn’t help that this arc makes a big deal out of him basically one shotting all of these previous heads (power scaling? What’s that?) but then having to flee the family due to a poison he got from the fight. This is then uncovered by the very next episode after some pointless reflecting and then resolved by the one after that, even though they even changed the damn OP to make it seem like this would be a huge deal but it’s not. Then some insane ramblings from their crazy dad who’s holding onto their dead mom’s heart and that’s a wrap, see you in October! Or in the dub’s case, probably next year entirely. And honestly, I could use another break from this show after all of that, but I guess we’ll see how we feel about the second half, which should leave the anime at a pivotal point in the story.