The Somali and the Forest Spirit Season 2 anime faces an uncertain future now that the manga series has ended. But when will Somali to Mori no Kamisama Season 2 come out?
For the first season, the anime adaptation was co-produced by animation studio Satelight and HORNETS. Satelight is best known for producing the Symphogear anime series, Netflix’s Cannon Busters, Log Horizon S1 (Log Horizon Season 3 confirmed!), and the Nanbaka series.
HORNETS has provided production assistance on a variety of popular anime, including Ace of Diamond S2, Banana Fish, Haikyuu, My Hero Academia, My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU, Saga of Tanya the Evil movie, and Zombie Land Saga.
The Somali and the Forest Spirit anime was co-produced by Crunchyroll as part of the anime production committee. Crunchyroll is also co-producing popular anime such as the upcoming The Rising Of The Shield Hero Season 2 anime and the Laid Back Camp Season 2 anime.
Director Kenji Yasuda helmed the project from studio Satelight. Character designer Ikuko Itoh adapted the characters for the anime. Writer Mariko Mochizuki is writing the series composition. Composer Ryo Yoshimata created the anime’s music.
The Somali and the Forest Spirit Season 2 opening (OP) music theme song and ending (ED) have not yet been announced.
The first season featured the OP “Arigato wa Kocchi no Kotoba” as performed by Naotaro Moriyama, and the ED “Kokoro Somali” as performed by Inori Minase (who stars in the show as the Japanese voice of Somali).
New episodes are streaming on Crunchyroll with English subtitles. Crunchyroll has not yet announced a Somali and the Forest Spirit English dub. The finale, Somali and the Forest Spirit Episode 12, aired on March 26, 2020.
This article provides everything that is known about Somali and the Forest Spirit Season 2 (Somali to Mori no Kamisama Season 2) and all related news. As such, this article will be updated over time with news, rumors, and analysis. Meanwhile, let’s delve down into what is known for certain.
Somali to Mori no Kamisama Season 2 release date depends on the manga creator
As of the last update, Satelight, Crunchyroll, or any company related to the production of the anime has not officially confirmed the Somali to Mori no Kamisama Season 2 release date. Nor has the production of a Somali and the Forest Spirit sequel been announced.
Once the news is officially confirmed, this article will be updated with the relevant information.
In the meantime, it’s possible to speculate about when, or if, the Somali and the Forest Spirit Season 2 premiere date will occur in the future.
Although streaming revenue is now the most significant factor influencing the decision to greenlight a second season, anime co-produced by Crunchyroll does not have the best record of seeing a sequel. The major exception is, of course, wildly popular anime such as Shield Hero.
The biggest obstacle for Somali and the Forest Spirit Season 2 is the manga creator’s health problems. Without more manga chapters a second season seems extremely unlikely to happen.
Somali and the Forest Spirit manga’s ending was unexpectedly caused by creator’s health
The story for the anime series is based on the Somali to Mori no Kamisama manga series by writer and artist Yako Gureishi. Published as a web manga on Web Comic Zenyon since April 2015, the manga is up to Volume 6 as of April 2019. Each volume contains six chapters, so Volume 6 is up to Chapter 36.
The release date for Somali to Mori no Kamisama Volume 7 has not yet been announced.
The manga was produced at a relatively slow rate. While progress was not as slow as the Made In Abyss manga, where chapters are published “when they’re ready,” the Somali manga took several years before there was enough content for an anime adaptation.
Unfortunately, the manga went on a long hiatus starting in 2019 due to health problems. With the creator’s condition worsening in 2020, it was eventually announced in December 2020 that the manga’s serialization was being canceled, effectively ending the manga before the final ending could be revealed.
North American publisher North Stars Pictures has licensed the official English translation for the Somali and the Forest Spirit manga series. Purchasable via Amazon, the official English release is already up to Volume 6 as of January 21, 2020.
Additionally, there are fan-made scanlation projects, but they stopped with Chapter 32 in April 2019 once the manga series was licensed.
Satelight has done a great job of capturing the magic of the world journeyed by Somalia and Golem. The father and daughter relationship feels real, and so do all the sweet moments they share.
While the story is mostly a slice of life, the animation and sound remind audiences of the underlying fear bubbling beneath the surface. After all, the monsters may be kind to other monsters, but human is definitely on the menu, and the manga makes the dark undertones explicit.
The pacing of the anime started as almost a panel-by-panel adaptation where Episode 1 started with Chapter 1 (minus some bonus side story panels at the end). Chapter 2 was similarly adapted in full, but then the anime started skipping material, starting with Chapters 3 and 4.
The manga explored the connection between the health of forests and their Guardians, such as the Golems, and how new life sprung up from the site of a dead Guardian.
The manga also revealed that an older human named Zeze (or Zaza) lived relatively close to Golem’s own forest, whereas the anime had Somali and Golem traveling to the desert before sighting any humans.
While this story arc provided more details about the world’s history and the human hunts it’s not surprising Zeze was cut from the anime since he’s not a reoccurring character in the manga.
Some of the important details that came up in dialogue (like the fact that Golem is dying) were shifted to the talks with the Oni in anime Episode 2 (which adapted part of Chapter 2 and all of Chapter 5). Arguably, this change was an improvement since it allowed the anime to introduce the two reoccurring Oni characters Shizuno and Yabashira earlier in the story.
With Episodes 3 and 4, the anime adapted Chapters 12 through 15, skipping an entire story arc in the process. The beginning of Episode 5 adapted just small parts of Chapter 16, which involved desert traveling, cooking, and sightseeing, but was mostly skipped by the anime.
Otherwise, Episode 5 adapted Chapters 17 and 18 of Volume 3 and the first several pages of Chapter 19. The anime version was better since it created tension by not explaining Haitora and Uzoi’s plan in full until the dramatic moment when the harpy girl turned on the human girl.
Episode 6 adapted Chapters 20 and 21. That means by the halfway point, the anime will have adapted 15 chapters. But what about the content that was skipped? Fortunately, the story arc was adapted out of order beginning with Episode 7.
Warning: The following contains huge spoilers pertain to Somali and the Forest Spirit Episode 7 and 8.
Episode 7 adapts Chapters 6 through 11, which have Somali and Golem visiting a witch village where they shop for items, including wicca wine. Golem’s main goal is to investigate the massive library to find any books on humans. A book on the life story of a creature named Hallein pertained to humans, but then they run into ghostly fish that eat books!
The book they were looking for ended up eaten, so Golem and Somali must speak to the curator, the last witch who read the book hundreds of years ago. This ancient witch is on our deathbed, so visiting with her proves difficult.
In Episode 8, a witch named Izolda Nevzora turned out to be the curator’s ancestor, so the dying witch knew the story well. But what was shocking is that as a young witch Izolda met humans for the first time… and living with them was a golem creature named Hallein!
The witch had never seen a golem before, but to the humans, Hallein was a god who had established their village hundreds of years before and taught them their way of life. The golem saves the witch from being discovered as non-human when unknowingly asks the humans what species they are.
Similar to Golem, Hallein does not protect the forest and instead protects humans, although he refuses to reveal his motivation for doing so. Still, Hallein has quite the scathing view of humanity despite living with them.
“Humans are weak. They’re timid,” Hallein explained to the young witch. “In an instant, they’ll turn on a living thing if it defies their common sense. They can only find peace via grabbing a blade. That is the human species.”
In the end, a tragedy causes the young witch to depart from the human village, but not before realizing in full just how much humanity hated and feared anything unlike them. At the same time, Izolda became friends with at least one human, so she knew humans could overcome their prejudice.
Izolda desired that humanity remain isolated and a secret so they could slowly learn to compromise with non-humans. So, the tale was passed on orally in secret, until the current curator wrote down the story.
This book was stolen and released into the world of monsters, indirectly causing the great war by causing numerous species to investigate the foreign land of the humans.
As such, the current curator blames herself for the destruction of humanity. Before dying, she requests that Golem seek the end of the map and find humanity for Somali.
Considering how monumental this story arc is concerning the overall plot of the manga, Satelight’s writers may have rearranged the anime’s story so that it was closer to the end of the first season.
Note: This comparison was updated after Somali to Mori no Kamisama Episode 12 aired in Japan.
Episode 9 adapted Chapters 22 and 23. In the manga, Golem and Somali met up with the two Onis Shizuno and Yabashira, but it was a different town in which Somali saw the mouse-like dentist.
Chapter 24 was skipped since it contained a minor story set during their travels between towns. It made sense to skip this story since Somali was already wearing the new minotaur outfit that was shown in Episode 12. It’d also make a good starting point for Somali and the Forest Spirit Season 2.
Episodes 10 and 11 reordered the events of Chapters 25 through 28 slightly in order to keep the story set in the same town and to introduce Rosa slightly earlier. The anime also made it more clear when Rosa realized Somali was a human and showed her betraying them to the human hunters. Rosa also suggested that they take the mine tunnels, whereas in the manga the onis had previously found the entrance to the abandoned mine on their own.
This part of the story was changed significantly since the manga had everyone escape on a mine car ride instead of fighting the human hunters. A bridge between the mountains abruptly collapses but Golem uses his powers to cause trees below to quickly grow and catch their fall.
Rosa did betray them in the same manner and Golem didn’t want to use his powers so soon since his body’s frame was close to breaking. Rosa also told her story about human prejudice against the so-called Grotesques and Golem’s transformation was in Chapter 30, the ending of Volume 5.
Somali to Mori no Kamisama Episode 12 ended by adapting Chapters 31 of Volume 6. However, the festival and the final emotional scene where Golem tries to leave Somali with the Oni only to realize that he does indeed possess emotions is an anime original ending.
The good news is that manga readers who wish to read ahead of the anime can buy Volume 6 in English and read what comes next.
The bad news is that there currently isn’t enough source material for creating Somali to Mori no Kamisama Season 2. Worse, since the manga was canceled there is no official ending to the story, which means a second season would require an anime original ending.
Anime fans should probably count their blessings and be happy that the first season ended as it did.
Somali and the Forest Spirit 2 anime spoilers (plot summary/synopsis)
Note: Spoilers for Somali and the Forest Spirit Season 2 assume that the story will pick up with a story set in Chapter 24 and then resume with Chapter 32 of Volume 6.
Traveling together with the Oni, Somali and Golem come upon a poor village that desired for Golem to stay. The elders lavish them with a feast and the fluffy children immediately befriend Somali.
But there’s a dark twist. The hamlet’s forest was burnt to the ground by a lightning strike and they intend on using force to compel Golem to stay and restore life to the forest.
While Golem is incapable of helping the forest directly since golems are born within the forests they are guardians over he does his best to help the village by listening to the forest’s voice.
The children also intercede and the elders are shamed by their actions. When Golem proves that the forest is still alive, the village realizes that all they need to do is commit to overseeing the forest’s resurrection… not threaten others with violence.
The confrontation with the human hunts caused Golem to ponder his own existence in manga Chapter 31. His frightening transformation was beyond anything known and Golem wondered to himself, “Just what exactly am I?” This question ties into their next quest, which just happens to intersect with a new mission involving the witches.
Lady Laigle has become the new chief librarian following the death of the previous leader Izolda, but Laigle has felt guilty ever since because she wasn’t able to ease the elder witch’s passing. Word comes from a foreign land that a stolen copy of The Chronicles of Haraiso has been spotted, so Laigle decides to make the months-long journey to recover the book which led to the collapse of humanity and help take back a small part of Izolda’s regret.
The book is located on an island floating in the middle of a dark green marsh. This island is home to a black market called the Cauldron that’s famous for its exotic items. And, it so happens that Somali, Golem, and their Oni traveling companions have arrived at this very market.
Unfortunately, anime fans will have to wait until the Somali and the Forest Spirit Season 2 release date to watch what happens next. Stay tuned!