The first season of Zero no Tsukaima started strong, but the story really began to drag after the Staff of Destruction arc. The second season, now at the halfway point, just continues the aimless wandering with war as a backdrop.Kirche and Tabitha continue to be conveniently timed assistance, reduced to bit roles following the RPG [spoilers!] arc. To some extent, the Valliere sisters are their replacements. Saito's lecher act has gotten old since he never gets away with it, nor does he try to stand up for himself like he did earlier in the first season.As far as actual events go, they are all related to the pending war, but they could be related to anything. Add to that the isolated feel of each episode, and you get a show that makes for disengaging viewing. I don't care for the war because it's so distant. I don't care for the events themselves, since they are generic situations where war and other related words are thrown in because the writers think that the viewer will automatically start caring.If they had a longer episode run, could they have done a better job adapting the source light novel series? Perhaps. But as it stands, ZnT II is just like any other predictable sitcom, with magical elements, and the word war thrown in as a value-add. At the end of each episode, the writers push the reset button, absolving themselves of the need to write effect since it took so much effort to write cause in the first place.I totally don't know who the Flame Snake is. Every time Colbert-sensei has a flashback involving a village, and fire, I stick my head in a conveniently placed hole in my floor.In the first series, we all knew that the secretary was the thief, that Wales was sketchy, etc. Only the first example was forgivable because it was an excuse to deploy a rocket launcher. I don't think anything Colbert does, now that he's gone from badass mofo to pacifist zen master, will quite live up to the satisfaction of seeing an RPG applied to a sand golem, but anything less will only solidify this series' mediocrity.
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