BOFURI: I Don’t Want to Get Hurt, so I’ll Max Out My Defense. Season 2 Review

Returning for its second season, BOFURI: I Don’t Want to Get Hurt, so I’ll Max Out My Defense. doesn’t need to do much to impress as we already know what we’re in for at this point – epic overpowered hijinks that slap you in the face so much you can’t stop laughing! There’s only so much you can do with this concept though, so I must ask – can another dose of Maple and co. really go the distance and give us something new? Let’s dig in and find out!

If you’re not familiar with the show, BOFURI follows the antics of Maple Tree, an off-the-wall guild in the fictional fantasy MMORPG “New World Online”. In Season 1, we saw leader Maple and her best friend Sally pull in other oddballs including samurai warrior Kasumi, the tanky Chrome, researcher Iz, and twin sisters May and Yui, all the while defeating each major game event and gaining ever more absurd powers along the way until they’re recognised as one of the most powerful guilds in the game.

Season 2 starts where the first season left off, as the gang step into the newly released fourth level of the game, a Japanese-themed area based on night-time blossom viewing. While there are specific story arcs in the series, BOFURI is often a more episodic type of show, where it uses each episode to tell a different story or focus on a specific character. While this gives it plenty to keep things fresh, the pacing often suffers as a result, and in jumping into the first few episodes of Season 2 here, you can really feel that as it moves along way too quickly.

There are some nice elements and little stories going on in its first episode, particularly with Kasumi gaining her new Purple Phantom Blade skill, but despite being an absolutely beautiful area, we hardly get to see any of this new level before we’re being ushered into the main boss fight and progressing onto level 5. This formula then repeats over the next few episodes: a cool little character story; big boss fight; move on.

I would have liked to see more exploration of each of the different levels here as they evidently have a lot of character. Presenting it as a boss rush sadly gives little time to flesh out each part of the world or give the gang specific quests to complete, and it just feels like nothing has the space to breathe.

That said, it does well to pack a lot of character development into so little space, and it knows exactly what it needs to do to keep things engaging as each character-focused story is amazingly good fun and filled with laugh-out-loud moments. In the aforementioned Kasumi episode, we see a whole new side to her as her power turns her into child. Meanwhile, Sally has to take on her worst nightmare: ghosts in a haunted mansion, and when monster taming is added to the game, May and Yui really come into their own as they strive to save a pair of cute teddy bear monsters that become their companions. While each character gets their chance to shine, Maple does annoyingly get in the way sometimes, as her tendency to get into trouble only to gain some new game-breaking power takes the spotlight away from the other characters’ achievements. This is a big pain point in Sally’s haunted mansion quest as, while that could have been a breakthrough moment for her, Maple ends up finishing the quest off for her instead.

The series’ pitfall is the fact that Maple is the star of the show, and as much as she is absolutely hilarious, there are moments where it is a little too much and you can sympathise with the game’s developers who have no end of trouble continually fighting against her evolution. This, I must add, is fascinating to watch as they have to throw ever more crazy things at the players to keep the game challenging. But hey, as they say in the show, it’s about making things fun at the end of the day, and if Maple is happy enough rolling around in her sheep wool form or as a giant Atrocity lizard, then all the power to her.

So, the series definitely has its weaknesses, but I’ve so far ignored the best bits and they are the longer story arcs offered by the big events in the game. In the first season, these were interspersed throughout but here they’re very much loaded into the second half with both the monster taming and the battle royale events. With the bigger events, the series has an opportunity to dig into the world building as we get a deeper dive into the different levels that the first part of the season lacked, and it’s a whole lot better for it! There are a bunch of different mysteries to solve, and it feels like each of the main characters are on their own little personal adventure. Plus, each of the monsters they tame fits perfectly into the team and are just as creative in their design as Syrup and Oboro (who also get nice power-ups in this arc too!).

The battle royale event is excellent though, and it delivers a bombastic finale that requires every inch of the top players’ prowess. This is largely where the side characters from the other guilds come into play, and it gives the show an opportunity to flesh them out a bit more too. We’ve seen them in dribs and drabs over the course of this series, but it’s here where they’re able to blow the monsters’ socks off. Separated from their main parties, all the cast form unlikely alliances and it’s nice to be able to see what characters like Dread or Marx can do. I’m also thankful that Maple doesn’t have it easy and she has to actually rely on her friends and guildmates to pull through. It’s tense and exciting stuff because, maybe for the first time, you’re not sure if she can actually win.

Produced by Silver Link, the show looks absolutely lovely and is awash with colour. It has a cute, bright art style which definitely hits the more casual, comedic vibe it’s going for, but it also isn’t afraid to get creepy or disgusting either. This is in particular reference to the monster designs, which get really wild towards the end of the series. I certainly wouldn’t want to meet them on a dark night! The environments and towns of each level are nicely detailed too, although they could do with some more NPC characters to make it feel a bit more lived in.

Composer Taro Masuda returns to provide the score, and it’s pretty great to listen to with jaunty adventuring tunes and some more amped-up music for the big boss fights. Junjou no Afilia return with some cute idol pop to provide the opening theme, “Kono Tate ni Kakuremasu”, while FRAM provides the ending theme, “Step for Joy”, which is always a nice song to cap off an episode with.

Voice acting is good across the board in both English and Japanese, and it’s fun to see both casts really have fun with it. Kaede Hondo and Megan Shipman really go to town as Maple, which is actually a challenging role with all her different form changes requiring slight changes of voice (props to the sound teams here too!) but all the cast members are good choices and fit their roles well.

BOFURI: I Don’t Want to Get Hurt, so I’ll Max Out My Defense. Season 2 comes to us via Crunchyroll, and they’ve given us a solid release here. On the discs you’ll find all 12 episodes of the series in both English and Japanese with English subtitles, while extras include promo videos and trailers, episode previews, episode summaries featuring the in-anime game developers, and clean opening and ending animations. I think the digest videos and previews could have done with their own separate menu as if you’re coming back in after a few days after watching an episode, they’re useful reminders for what is going on; otherwise though, there are no issues to note.

While it doesn’t quite hit the same highs as its first season, BOFURI: I Don’t Want to Get Hurt, so I’ll Max Out My Defense. Season 2 is still a blast to watch, filled with all the fun moments you’d expect from the series as Maple and the gang go wild in every quest the game throws at them. If it didn’t have such rough pacing and didn’t have Maple steal moments from its supporting cast I would have rated it higher, but as it is, this still comes highly recommended for anyone who enjoyed the first season.