English Dub Season Review: Ultraman Season Two

Overview:

The second season of Ultraman.

Our Take:

The main thing I’ll say about Ultraman is that if you’re a friend of the franchise then you will love this show. It is packed with references and nods to past shows, and movies, and is based on the current manga. I am a little familiar with the series from an animated show from like the 80s or something but that’s about it. I still enjoyed the first season and this season though, I do think the first season was better, maybe because it was longer and therefore the pacing was a bit better.

Let’s get some of the technical things out of the way. It’s a CGI show and for some people that will be a dealbreaker from the gate. I don’t think it’s the worst I’ve seen and definitely forgot I was watching CGI pretty early on. Plus, the action scenes were always a joy to watch and I enjoyed them tremendously. There were a couple of new voice actors added to this season and I would like to hit on the ones who made the biggest impression on me. Christopher Swindle plays the new villain Pedant. While the villain himself leaves much to be desired from a story perspective, Christopher does not. He brought a lot to the table with this character and made him sound menacing but also wise.

Welcome back to anime Roger Craig Smith! He hasn’t really had too many mainstream anime roles in a while to the best of my knowledge. He plays Kotaro and honestly between his voice and the character themselves I think he might be my favorite. I really liked what he brought to the group of Ultramen.

The story wasn’t fantastic, it felt like it was just there to get us to the next action scene. Which is kind of how most action shows go but it just felt like a missed opportunity after the first season. The main issue is the pacing. It goes so fast that I had to rewatch and read summaries to try and piece together what was going on. Plus a lot of things just flat out aren’t explained. What is behind Kotaro’s flame powers? Why is Pedant attacking Earth? We get questions but few answers.

As I’ve mentioned the fight scenes are fantastic. Even down to the different fighting styles, it was really cool to see Jack using wrestling-style moves in his fighting style. Kotaro mixed in his fire powers with martial arts as well. Just seeing how all the Ultramen are different and even feeling different was important.

There is for sure more stuff for a third season and I would love to see it but they have to do better. I can see a lot of people forgetting about this one. Maybe it’s because they shortened the season for some reason but I think this could be something a lot better. After waiting three years I just expected a little more I guess.