Over and over again, this episode features people staring wistfully at the world around them. A dwarf stands proudly before his bridge. Later, Frieren and company drink in the beautiful icy landscape. Elsewhere, Denken steels his determination as he glimpses his lost homeland. What’s certain is that these individuals are ready and willing to risk their lives in these lands. But before we start discussing such serious matters, however, we must set the stage. Right from the get-go, the party faces a 3000 meter deep canyon that they can’t simply fly across. Luckily, they find a bridge after traveling a short bit upstream. In fact, Himmel bought this bridge, knowing that he would never live to see it. He bought it all for his elf crush, too. Sheesh. Well, there’s your “aww, Himmel was the goat!” moment of the episode. In fact, he specifically told the Gehen the dwarf to ensure that the structure would last a thousand years. I’m no architect, but I feel like that’s a tall task for a wooden bridge or any bridge for that matter with such strong winds and nasty fauna in the area. But again, I’m no expert. Plus, the point isn’t to quibble over the practicality of a wooden bridge.
Rather, it’s the fact that we need to accept our mortality, and thus think towards the future. This is one of the major themes that helps tie this short-lived season together. By comparison, Himmel’s all-too-short lifespan looks like nothing more than a mere footnote when you stack it side-by-side with a lifespan belonging to someone like Frieren. But that “footnote” has gone on to leave an indelible mark on her life. So if you want to get all sappy, the takeaway here is that you should never underestimate how your actions might influence the people and world around you. Himmel may have bought a bridge for his mage, but countless generations will now be able to use it… as soon as Frieren and company takes out a nest of nasty birds, of course. But seriously, where would we be instead if more people could put aside their immediate wants and selfish desires for the sake of the future — for the sake of people whom they would never meet? Alas, the global temperature is rising, and the oceans are slowly dying.
After a brief stay at the Gehen’s newly rebuilt village — new for any long-lived species, I suppose — the party find themselves in sore need of a job yet again. The party soon reach an adventurers’ camp. It’s a place is full of prospectors seeking veins of lucrative holy snow crystals in fields of perpetual winter. Right after our heroes just got done murdering a bunch of birds, they’ve signed themselves up for a job to slay a majestic-looking beast all for a bag of coins. Well, they call it a monster, so I guess it’s okay to kill it for defending its territory. Mankind’s greed progress must not be impeded!
In the morning, after Frieren and company just got done wiping out the local fauna, the party takes in the view, a fleeting beauty which the elf admits will soon be spoilt by human hands — for some dinky potions, apparently. We’ll soon learn, however, that the adventurer who hired them for this job intends to protect the mining vein in order to preserve the vista. Ah, this is yet another “awww, we’re protecting people’s homes” moment that has been a recurring plot device for the season. But Frieren’s barrier is going to keep everyone out, so for whom are we protecting the vista? For nature itself? Which we just murdered? Suppose they allow the barrier to go down at some point. I dunno how your average adventurer will manage this, but let’s just play pretend. If, instead, they’re going to manually keep miners away for perpetuity, that still sounds like a Sisyphean task. Never underestimate what people are willing to do to earn a buck.
Over and over again, our heroes have risked life and limb for folks who continue to cling to the Northern Plateau despite the very real and ever present threat of demons. Even the fauna can tear villages apart. The extreme weather alone makes life up here harsh and brutish. Nevertheless, Frieren deliberately chose to travel by foot in lieu of a relatively quick jaunt across the sea. She chose this route all so she can retrace Himmel’s footsteps and help those who cannot help themselves. That’s the second major theme that ties these scant ten episodes together: our homes are worth dying for. Well, I can’t say I personally agree. Not to this extent, anyway. Dying for our homes is a sentiment that humanity has carried with it for a long, long time. You could, however, also argue that it’s a sentiment that has bred countless cycles of violence, because people simply won’t let go of the past. How many have died over a supposedly sacred piece of land? And how many more must die in the future out of sheer reciprocity? But I’m not a very sentimental person, so I just don’t understand. But don’t get me wrong. Even though I don’t agree with a lot of the views espoused by this series and this series’ author, I do very much enjoy Frieren as a whole. It’s a thought-provoking show.
And thus, their journey continues.
Stray thoughts & observations:
— The sheer cliffs overlooking the sea kinda remind me a bit of Ireland, actually. Obviously not an advertisement, by the way. Just the first link I saw on Google.
— Last week, we dealt with a nest of wyverns. This week, a nest of stubborn ass birds that keep attacking travelers attempting to cross the bridge. Though not the bridge itself, which is curious…
— Ah yes, more spells that you could just do yourself with a little practice. By the way, I prefer pancakes to waffles any day of the week.
— Yeah, ain’t no spell worth this.
— Oh hey, a callback.
— All this world-building for the Northern Plateau is not quite what I expected for a season finale, but I also didn’t expect a mere ten episodes for the second season. I wonder how long the third season will be. I hear that the manga is sadly on hiatus due to illness. This seems to be a recurring problem for mangakas.
— So many montages.
— Stark never seems to catch anything when the girlies are watching. The man can’t perform under pressure.
— We are treated to yet another fast and furious action scene. It’s well-animated, so I can’t complain much. Fern reuses a trick she had employed against Revolte’s underlings: flying out of reach so that her foes can’t detect her mana. Well, no reason to change tactics if it keeps working. It then looked like we were going to get yet another fight before the cavalry literally arrives.
— According to Himmel way back in the past, the view of the holy snow crystals alone is worth defeating the demon king for. Eh, to each his own.
— We’re told that the crystals are needed for magical potions. You can’t help but wonder if magic becomes a crutch for these fantasy societies. Perhaps they fail to employ human ingenuity to overcome their everyday problems, because there’s always a spell that you can cast. Why bother with the struggle when you can utter a mere incantation?
— At this point, these one-on-one moments might as well be dates.
— Unsurprisingly, Fern looks exactly like her mom. If she gets with Stark, however, I wonder what color hair their kids will end up with.
— Good ol’ Frieren up to her nasty spendthrift ways. How did she use to manage before Fern? Who kept her in check? Or was she often just penniless on her travels? Hell, Frieren’s solo journey would probably be a decent enough spinoff series. Think Kino’s Journey but with an autistic elf instead.
— I remember back in the first season, people loved to draw parallels between Frieren’s parties. Stark is the new Eisen, Fern is the new Frieren, so we need a new Heiter. Well, this episode doubles down on Frieren being the new Himmel, because Fern drops a “Because that’s what Ms. Frieren would do.” Well, Himmel liked wasting money on not-his-girlfriend, so our elf mage has to follow suit. Frieren soon wastes a good chunk of the coins they had just risked their lives for. Half, apparently. Why does she even get access to any of their traveling funds? C’mon, Fern, just hide all of the money!
— Well, I saw the announcement for a third season, and judging by the teaser at the end of this finale, Denken’s going to get a major arc in it. So the fabled Golden Land is real, and it used to be his homeland. Or it includes his homeland? I’m not entirely sure on that. Some demon — the most powerful of the Seven Sages of Destruction, apparently — has the Midas touch, and had turned an entire city to gold. According to Lernen, the former imperial mage intends to die in order to reclaim said city. Unfortunately (or fortunately for the poor animators), we won’t get his story until late 2027. Damn, who can say if I’ll even be around by then. Well, we’ll see.
I mentioned elsewhere how much I’ve enjoyed the second season of Frieren for embodying the series’ strengths more consistently while not having any of its major lows like the first season. Though it can be argued that the first season had higher highs and therefore makes the question of which season is better, an interchangeable on. Honestly, the second season is just a seemless continuation of the first; it’s essentially just ‘more Frieren,’ so who cares which stretch of episodes were better, right? Anyway, I really like the idea of 10-episode slices; all the more reason why I’m so glad to hear we already have a set year and month for the third season (that kind of announcement specificity usually doesn’t happen, so good shit)
Also, I’ve been thinking about the way this series handles demons and the conversations around it quite a lot, and I’ve come to the conclusion that the way demons are characterized so far could be properly justified and made to create effective drama in the future, if everything established about them so far is meant to be eventually turned on its head with a narrative twist. Hear me out: the people in the world of Frieren hold true to their beliefs about demons being predators and nothing more despite their sentience, because up until this point, not a single demon has yet to show a desire for moral thinking or to even consider it. It’s less that they’re incapable and moreso that they have yet to develop to a point in their evolution where they care for it.
Frieren then, as a series, could eventually introduce some interesting drama by someday giving us the first demon to display a genuine capacity for morality. If the series writer were to do this, it would recontextualize the way demons have been presented in a fascinating (and less morally contentious) way, and make Frieren (the character) and the rest of the world have to reconsider every thing they thought they knew. Hell, this could make some intense conflict/drama surrounding whether or not the demon is just faking its interest in morality despite genuinely valuing universal principles of thriving, causing within the group a moral dilemma of whether it’s safe to trust the demon, especially given the last time Frieren and Himmel tried to and it led to the death of innocent villagefolk
This might all be purposeful writing from the author, though it remains to be seen. Only the future will tell
For me, the first four or five episodes of Frieren — of ALL of Frieren — was the peak for me. I really don’t need any action in my anime. And while the second season has been strong overall, you do kinda feel like the characters are getting a little too comfortable in their niche. Stark is self-deprecating about his strength and can’t fish. Fern gets annoyed by small things. Frieren spends her money on dumb things. And a lot of the Himmel flashbacks felt like retreads. Show me something new. Show me a different aspect of his character other than anime Jesus. I would like the character development to be a bit more intentional.
As an aside, I was lowkey kinda offended when so many people thought the Revolte episode was hands down the best episode out of the entire series. I’ve seen these same people brought to tears by earlier episodes, but the one with all the fighting is the best one? We’re a bunch of meatheads, man.
The demon thing… it’s just hard to wrap my head around, because it’s a bit confounding. Smart enough to manipulate humans, but not smart enough to understand basic things like raising their own young. It’s so bizarre. Maybe you’re right about the author setting something up, but it’s all speculative. Until it happens, the whole thing will continue to annoy me on a meta level. Even the wildest beasts in nature aren’t relentless killing machines.
The last time Frieren and Himmel tried to trust a demon was one of the annoying plot points for me, because showing compassion doesn’t mean be stupid about it. Would I show mercy to a starving tiger cub? Yes. Would I also bring it into my home where my defenseless ass lives with my equally defenseless child? Hell no. So it felt like fait accompli. I’m going to do this insanely risky thing that will blow up in my face, and oops, it blew up in my face. I guess that proves that all demons are irredeemable! No, that’s not how it works! The demon child actually tried to give that grieving mother another child. That’s restorative justice in a way. It arguably had some semblance of morality! It just went about it the wrong way.
Yea, I definitely agree that Frieren has settled into a sort of repetitive groove, which comes with some engagement cons despite its overall pros. Still, it’s a comfy one: the sentimentality brought about from watching a near all-powerful elf who somewhat struggles with emotional vulnerability slice-of-life-ing it around with her two adoptive kids while experiencing, post-hoc, the effects her old party’s efforts have had across time, is just too wholesome for me to COMPLETELY lose interest, even when the characters’ development have seemingly hit a sort of groundhog’s day loop.
I think Frieren is at its strongest when not only is it touching on the themes of life’s impermanence, legacy, and the importance of paying forward good deeds, but when it’s also making commentary on Frieren’s (the character’s) role as an adoptive mother and the difficulties that arises from trying to raise two kids without the best understanding of how to do so: it’s one of the most human experiences this show tends to touch on every now and then, and one I hope to continue to see be explored more insightfully.
On another note, it seems like the series is moving into a “Frieren’s gang interact with a major side-character and explores them” kind of narrative structure, and through that, I’m hoping Frieren (the series) uses this baseline as a means to bring a variety of interesting conflicts and character dynamics to shake up the safe, albeit repetitive storytelling niche the series has gotten comfortable in
On the topic of people considering the revolte ep the best one, I too find that to be a bit revealing. Like, I genuinely don’t think there’s anything wrong in finding that episode to be Frieren’s best per se, but it does put a spotlight on the kind of viewers who think Frieren is at its best only when it “turns up and starts being about the action;” those types are all over the place in this show’s community, for better or worst. That being said, I do the episode has respectable narrative beats act as a culmination of what’s come before: Stark’s confidence, competence, and nobleness being on display throughout the fight is one such beat.
The episode also touches upon some interesting character moments, like how Serie’s tsundere nature of not wanting to see people she cares about die translates to her callous statements; to which Genau, who also doesn’t want to disappoint Serie or be attached to people, ends up interpreting her statements directly and adopting the wrong lessons from his emotional loss. The episode definitely has moments of substance, so I CAN, without any cynicism, fathom someone thinking it’s the best Frieren ep; but still, Frieren has had episodes of character substance in more abundance, not a lick of action, and has packed more gravitas than the Revolte ep, so I just can’t agree, given the mode I find most compelling about Frieren, that it’s the episode best representative of the show at its peak. It’s a good culmination episode, but not peak Frieren for me.
The show is still entertaining. My criticisms are arguably nitpicks, because Frieren’s comfortable lack of development is still superior to 95% of the anime out there. I just get this nagging, cynical feeling that whoa we struck gold with this story, so let’s grind the pacing to a near halt so we can milk these characters as much as possible. The primary conceit from the get-go is that, “No, just because you perceive the passage of time differently than others — because you can live for thousands and thousands of years — that doesn’t mean you can’t still significantly change and grow as a person.” Even when your loved ones have already passed on, it’s not too late. But ironically, the one standout thing about Frieren’s growth this season is that she’s been smiling more. It’s what people seem to mainly harp about. Granted, that’s nice to have, but that should be more of a cherry on top kinda thing.
The first episode kinda teased more change incoming when Frieren picked up on the tension between Fern and Stark. I thought the rest of the season would dovetail into her continuous development. Maybe she resolves a fight. Maybe could’ve done a better job helping Fern prep for the date. Maybe she wouldn’t just throw Fern to the dogs when they had to fight the demons, because that was kind of a shitty thing to do. But no, we never really got any significant step forward. Instead, it was just a lot of the same recycled (as another commenter put it) gags about, for example, her complete and utter financial incompetence. And this is kinda true for Fern as well. I can’t really say if she’s grown at all throughout this truncated season.
One of the things season 2 of Frieren touched upon that I wished got more time spent on it (and maybe will in future excursions) was this moment in episode 3, when Stark notes to Frieren the depths to which the latter understands Fern due to the level she remembers her favorite things. But instead of Frieren taking pride in such a wholesome compliment, she claims she doesn’t actually “understand” Fern; but rather, she simply remembers things she cares about.
I found Frieren making that distinction to be so interesting, because as much as she’s grown as a person, it seems she still falls into the trap of justifying/framing her actions logically. I don’t even think Frieren was in denial of her feelings when she claimed to not “understand Fern:” her nature as an elf, to this day, still makes it hard for her to distinguish behaviors being motivated by unconditional love versus ones being a byproduct of her intelligence/attention to detail, and seeing that emotional/logical dichotomy confound her is precisely why I find her and the show when this is the focus, to be mentally engaging.
While intermittent in its dose this season, I appreciate that the writing is still willing to shine a light on Frieren’s emotional flaws while smartly juxtaposing that to both the spoken and unspoken acts of love she demonstrates to her two kids, Fern and Stark. Eps 1, 3 and 9 were probably my favs from season 2
This season felt like the show was parodying itself. A bit too many saccharine moments and repetitive gags, I do wish the author didn’t present everything in the most optimistic way possible, just too monotonous for me.
In any case, thank you for your posts- while I haven’t been enjoying the show as much this season, reading your perspectives again has been fun. I’m sure this is old news already, but it’s nice to see you’re back. I last followed in 2020/21? and just saw a few weeks ago this site was active after a random check.
I actually somewhat agree with you. I think the characters are a bit too set in their ways. They haven’t really continued developing. It’s just more “let’s hang out with Frieren and friends!” It’s not dynamic enough.