The World Ends With You Season 2 anime could continue the story of the Reapers Game by adapting the direct video game sequel into a NEO: The World Ends With You anime. But when will Subarashiki Kono Sekai Season 2 come out?
The first anime TV series was produced as a collaboration between Square Enix, DOMERICA, and Studio Shin-Ei Animation. The animation studio is best known for Doraemon, Crayon Shin-chan, the isekai anime The 8th Son? Are You Kidding Me?, and the Teasing Master Takagi-san anime.
In 2021, Studio Shin-Ei Animation also released the Those Snow White Notes anime and A Couple of Cuckoos anime.
The main staff and studio for The World Ends With You Season 2 have not yet been announced.
The first season of the anime TV series was helmed by director Kazuya Ichikawa, who is best known for directing Bakuga: Battle Planet, Flying Witch Petit, and Monster Strike. In 2021, the director also worked on Seven Knights Revolution, which DOMERICA co-animated with LIDEN FILMS.
The World Ends With You game’s producer Tomohiko Hirano and director Tatsuya Kando are supervising the anime project. Writer Midori Gotou (Guilty Crown, Attack On Titan: Junior High) handled the series composition.
Tetsuya Nomura (multiple Final Fantasy 7 and Kingdom Hearts animations), Gen Kobayashi (Schoolgirl Strikers), and Arisa Matsuura (Monster Strike, Punch Line, Seven Knights Revolution) were the character designers, with the latter also serving as chief animation director. Composer Takeharu Ishimoto (Final Fantasy 7: Last Order) created the music.
The World Ends With You Season 2 OP (opening) and ED (ending) theme song music hasn’t been announced yet.
For the first season, The World Ends With You OP was “Calling” by Leah for Episode 1 and then it switched to “Twister” by MJR. The ED was “Carpe Diem” by ASCA.
The OP was originally planned to be “Teenage City Riot” by ALI, but when the band’s drummer was arrested the song was changed.
The first season’s finale, The World Ends With You Episode 12, released on June 26, 2021.
- Updated September 17, 2021: Added The World Ends With You English dub info.
This article provides everything that is known about The World Ends With You Season 2 (NEO: The World Ends With You/Subarashiki Kono Sekai 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.
FUNimation’s The World Ends With You English dub release
The first season of The World Ends With You was streaming exclusively on FUNimation Now with English subtitles. FUNimation’s Simuldub schedule initially listed the anime as only being a Simulcast.
Here is The World Ends With You dub cast:
- Ben Balmaceda as Neku
- Morgan Lauré as Shiki
- Van Barr Jr. as Beat
- Dani Chambers as Rhyme
- Drew Breedlove as Futoshi
- Brandon Potter as Hanekoma
- Anthony DiMascio as Higashizawa
- Andrew Kishino as Kariya
- Christopher Wehkamp as Kitaniji
- Marisa Duran as Konishi
- Brent Mukai as Minamimoto
- Jessica Peterson as Yashiro
FUNimation’s The World Ends With You English dub release date was on September 17, 2021.
The Worlds Ends With You reviews favor the game over the anime
The World Ends With You anime TV series (or Subarashiki Kono Sekai ) is based on the cult classic 2007 Nintendo DS JRPG game of the same name. Similar to how light novels with long titles are often shortened, the video game is known by a variety of names by fans, including Subarashiki and TWEWY.
If anything, since the first game is so old at this point, the first season of the anime TV series served as a recap for gamers eager to dive into the TWEWY sequel.
The original game was an emotionally charged story about breaking out of your insecurities and expanding your horizons with the help of others. The game’s story put a lot of emphasis on the thoughts behind Neku’s actions and how the people around him felt about him.
Unfortunately, The World Ends With You reviews have not been kind, scoring the anime’s first season lower than average. To be fair, the negative reviews do have a point since main character Neku Sakuraba was transformed from an edgy amnesia boy who rarely talked into an edgelord cliche who regularly blurts out monologues.
All of the characters behave similarly during the first several opening episodes. Rather than invoking the “show not tell” rule of good storytelling, these scenes seemingly intended to spell out the plot and characterization in a manner that treats audiences like kids.
Part of the problem is that the anime is attempting to wedge a 20-hour game into the episodic format of an anime season. With such time constraints, Neku’s witty dialogue blurbs are MIA in addition to many elements that contributed to the game’s thematic identity. The shopkeepers are briefly mentioned, not shown, and the humorous NPC dialogue is gone thanks to the anime’s rapid-fire story pacing.
Notably, the negative reviewers quickly dropped the anime so their perspective is based solely on the first four episodes, which were mostly focused on setting up the premise. Once the anime introduced Joshua and reached the major plot twists the anime’s story and characterization settled into a solid groove that was missing from the opening episodes.
The only question for fans is whether The World Ends With You Episode 12 stuck the landing. The original game had a solid happy ending for Neku, whereas the 2018 The World Ends With You: Final Remix introduced a New Day epilogue story that took place after the main game.
Without getting into too many spoilers, the Final Remix scenario had Neku and Beat awakening in an alternate Shibuya that was distorted. Accompanied by a Reaper, the two boys unraveled the mystery. Neku also experienced visions of the future that include a strange girl.
Oddly enough, the anime did not include this extended ending in order to connect to the 2021 game sequel. I say odd since the New Day scenario featured the bratty Reaper Coco Atarashi in a central role and she will be in the new 2021 game in addition to other characters from Final Remix.
Subarashiki Kono Sekai Season 2 release date predictions
As of the last update, Square Enix, DOMERICA, Studio Shin-Ei Animation, or any company related to the production of the anime has not officially confirmed The World Ends With You Season 2 release date. Nor has the production of a NEO: The World Ends With You anime 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 Subarashiki Kono Sekai Season 2 premiere date will occur in the future.
It just so happens that the direct video game sequel, NEO: The World Ends With You, is coming out for Nintendo Switch and PS4 on July 27, 2021. It’ll be available in both Japanese and English on the launch day.
Tetsuya Nomura also confirmed that the new NEO: TWEWY game is technically a sequel to both the anime and the OG game itself.
“The game, which will be a sequel to the anime set to air next April, will be out next summer,” Nomura tweeted in November 2020. “When I designed the main character of the sequel, I didn’t think that the mask would be in the normal world. The symbol on the mysterious phone was meant to be NEO.”
In an interview with Famitsu, he clarified his comment by saying that the team considers the story for the anime and the game to be equal.
“In our comments about the anime, we referred to this work as a ‘sequel to the anime’, which may have confused some people who asked, ‘Isn’t this a sequel to the game?'” he said. “But for us, it’s the anime version of the previous game, so we used that term because we consider it to be equal. We have no other intentions other than that, so don’t worry.”
Since the NEO game’s story is tied to the anime version of the story it would make sense to complete the animated version. But The World Ends With You Season 2 will likely only be renewed if the anime has been popular enough on its own.
In any case, it will likely be at least several years before an anime sequel based on the NEO game will be released. Anime projects are scheduled years in advance and the anime industry has been booked up solid due to the overabundance of projects in recent years.
NEO: The World Ends With You anime spoilers (plot summary/synopsis)
Note: This story summary was initially published before the 2021 NEO: TWEWY game released and will be updated over time with additional details.
Three years after the events of the last game, new main character Rindo is invited by high school classmate Fret to meet at the 104 Building in the Realground where they discover reaper pins. They quickly find themselves in the Underground and sucked into the Reapers Game.
In the OG game, Neku’s headphones represented his emotional distance from other people. In the NEO game, Rindo’s mask symbolizes the same character trait.
(It should be noted that Nomura came up with this character design before the COVID-19 pandemic started. He “never thought that wearing a mask would become commonplace in the future.”)
Unlike the original Reapers Game, Players are now divided up into teams of four. Rindo and Fret end up partnering with a purple-haired college student to form Wicked Twisters, which is named after a song from Fret’s favorite band. When the trio is rescued by Sho Minamimoto, he forcibly joins the group.
The game scenario is mixed up to focus on team battles. The Reapers Game still takes place over the 7 days of a week, but in this the team with the least number of points is erased from existence in addition to the team with the most points having their wish granted.
The top team in the new Reapers Game is the Ruinbringers. Featured characters include blonde, strong man Susukichi and Tsugumi Matsunae, a female character that was in the New Day epilogue scenario.
There are a variety of other characters representing the competing teams. Others include Deep Rivers Society, Variabeauties, and Purehearts.
Other returning characters include the quasi-friendly Reaper Koki Kariya and the not-so-friendly Reaper Coco Atarashi, who is now a teenager.
The new Game Master is the blonde-haired Shiba. When Shinjuku was inverted, he came to Shibuya and quickly climbed to the number one spot among the Reapers. Shiba is the one responsible for changing the rules of the Reapers Game.
The NEO: The World Ends With You trailer concluded with Tsugumi fighting against a hooded figure. Although we never see his face, Rindo recognizes this person and calls him Neku.
Unfortunately, anime fans will have to wait until The World Ends With You Season 2 release date to watch what happens next. Stay tuned!