Queen’s Blade 2nd season 1

Picking up right where the first season left off, we visit Nanael in the heavens. While taking a relaxing bath, the angel sums up all the warriors she encountered on her journey that seem contenders for the throne in the “Queen’s Blade” tournament.

Nanael’s bliss is short lived however as Hachi comes to fetch her for she is to appear before the head of the angels, who comments the cheeky angel for her earlier achievements. But before Nanael can gloat, she is ordered back to earth to participate in the tournament, again with the added burden of carrying a vial of holy milk.

Walking through the capital Gainos, Reina runs into Tomoe and Shizuka and the three girls share a meal together while talking about their motivations to participate in the tournament.

Hearing Tomoe’s reason for fighting in “Queen’s Blade” is to save her country, Reina thinks her own reason which is to become stronger while fighting more powerful opponents may not be as profound.

Diligently praying in front of the church altar, Merfa is startled when something comes crashing through the roof with a thunderous roar. Checking the rubble, she is shocked to see the angel Nanael has been brought before her by what seems to be divine intervention.

Looking for a place to stay the night, Cattleya finds a suitable inn but Ymir’s tsundere tendencies soon take over as she berates the weapons smith for thinking they are comrades just because they happened to travel the same path.
Understanding Ymir is just putting up a front, Cattleya takes her son to stay at the inn while the feisty dwarf heads off.

Visiting a market, Nowa is awed at all the activity and different foods for sale at the many stalls. With the enthusiasm of a child that sees something wondrous for the first time, Nowa besieges Allean with questions like if they can just take the fruits on display, why the fish are all dead,… much to the warrior elf’s despair.

Observing it’s the first time Nowa has visited such a large city and human concepts like trade, money are unknown to her, Allean has her hands full with the energetic girl.
Noticing the stares of all the people around, Allean blushes and quickly pulls her hat down, marching after Nowa, wishing she’d taught the young half-elf more about human customs.

Spotting Irma on a walkway overlooking the city while lost in deep thought, Echidna surprises the assassin and quickly gets frisky with her, much to Irma’s dislike. Yelling at Echidna to get lost, Irma is obviously irked at the elf’s poignant remarks.

Observing the scene as she walks by, Nyx hurries her pace, frightened by the two women. Catching her breath as she rounds the corner, Nyx is swiftly assaulted by her own magical staff Funikura, which seems to have rather unique and perverted ways of punishing her.

Night falls and while gazing at the streets below from her hotel room window, Elina laments the darkness prevents her from finding her sister Reina.
Nursing the wound she received at the hands of Reina, Clodette reminisces on the battle against her sister where her own sword was shattered.

Watching Aldra’s castle from afar, Melona, Airi and Menace ponder about the swamp witch’s reason behind sending them to participate in the tournament instead of just having them assassinate the queen directly.
Taking matters into her own hands, Melona decides to go after the queen directly and parts ways with her companions.

When her spies report on the angel Nanael’s appearance to join in the tournament, Aldra smirks, telling them she does not care.

Retreating to her quarters, Aldra gazes at her own reflection in one of the many stone columns, each the remnant of an eternally petrified opponent. Reminiscing on her past as she walked through the arid dessert plains of hell with her companion Aldra is interrupted not only by a voice within herself that seems to possess her but by Melona who suddenly strikes at her from the shadows.

Allowing herself to be sliced by Aldra’s sword, Melona draws her opponent in close, ensnaring the queen to squirt lethal acid at her face. Much to the shapeshitfer’s shock, Aldra is unaffected by the acid and proves to be more than a match for Melona, who is quickly defeated and turned into stone by Aldra’s petrifying gaze.

Apparently the demon inside Aldra seems to have more schemes ready, as it sends out a letter to Listy, making the thieving warrior believe the orphanage is in dire need after count Vance has taken over and pushed them against the wall. Enraged, Listy seems ready to run out into the night.

Meanwhile, Reina escorted Tomoe and Shizuka to the address they had been looking for and before they part ways, Tomoe encourages Reina to not give up on her goal.

“Queen’s Blade” is back! Not much seems to have changed from the first season, the animation style and quality is pretty much the same, with copious amounts of fanservice shots and angles of the buxom characters’ bosoms and buttocks, including plenty of explicit breast exposure.
The scene where Nyx is assaulted by her own magical staff has a heavy underlying bondage and sm theme so this first episode of the second season opens much like the first episode of the original season did.

This episode also served as a bridge between both seasons, introducing each character to the viewer and highlighting the most significant past events for main characters like Tomoe, Reina,…
The main plot was also kicked off -or rather continued- by showing us hints of Aldra’s past and possible motivations.

Was rather surprised to see Melona appear as I was quite sure she had been killed off in the final episode of the first season, although she’s not around for long as she’s the first to fall at the hands of Aldra who turns the shapeshifter to stone. Exit Melona… again?

Personally I enjoyed the light-hearted, humor oriented scenes far more. Nanael as always was quite the hoot, but the funniest moment was no doubt the market scene with Nowa and Allean, from Nowa’s childlike innocence to Allean’s subsequent frustration and embarrassment I laughed quite a bit.
Glad to see Allean appear in this episode, hope she has a bigger role this season.

Not sure if I’ll keep blogging “Queen’s Blade”, since I did the first season do want to finish things but with all the other promising shows this upcoming season like “Kämpfer”, “Sasameki Koto”, “Shin Koihime Musou”, “Kiddy Girl-and”,… to be frank not sure want to spend that much time on a series of this level since the silliness of the copious amounts of explicit nudity is starting to weigh on me.

It also looks like “Queen’s Blade”, “Kämpfer” and “Kiddy Girl-and” will air on the same weekday,… guess we’ll see!