This era is very dear to me because of how I experienced it the first time. Season two was never translated to english and it probably never will be, so I had to pay for that machine translation service in order to read it. I was a little hesitant to spend my real-life money though, and I ended up waiting three days after reading season one to begin season two.
When I first read Sae-ism I had a very intense, uhh, honeymoon phase with it. All I could think about was Sae-ism, 24/7. I couldn't study or think about anything else. I dreamt about Sae-ism. I re-read it all day. I saw Sae-ism when I looked at my bathroom floor tiles (I'm not kidding). Those three days before reading season two made up the most beautiful agonizing wait. I knew there were other ten volumes of what was probably my favourite piece of media ever, and I still didn't know what they contained, I could speculate, theorize all that I wanted. What really added to my enthusiasm was the fact that season two had never been translated. Season one is already pretty obscure, there are probably only like three western Sae-ism fans in existence other than me - and there's a pretty big chance none of them has ever read part two. Season two was "uncharted territory" and I was probably the first person in the west to read it. And I remember when I actually sat down and opened the translated files for the first time; it was april 26 and I was sitting in front of my computer with two pendrives beside me because I wanted to make sure it would never ever be lost. This all doesn't sound like much, but it was all so exhilarating to me. I already said it in volumes 1-4 but I just wanted to say it again, because it was genuinely such a great time for me.
Sae died in the last volume so we got ourselves another one. (She tries to pretend she's the same person but she's bullshitting you.) This change definitely affects the pace and overall vibe of the series, because while season one was full of edge and violence and bloody drama, season two is less edgy, more refined so to speak, more lowkey (though not by much, or else it wouldn't be Sae-ism). This is because Sae the tenth's whole thing is covert manipulation and scheming behind the scenes, instead of just beating people up all the time like Sae the ninth. So the series loses a bit of that original grittiness and angst, but this change of pace is handled really well, so it's very welcome and I LOVED it.
After the end of season one, at first Misao was afraid, she was petrified. Kept thinking she could never live without Sae by her side. But then she spent so many nights thinking how she did her wrong... and she grew strong... AND SHE LEARNED HOW TO GET ALONG!!! But now Sae's BACK! From outer space!! This new Sae appears from SOMEWHERE and FOR SOME REASON is creepily obsessed with Misao as well, obviously, because we had to keep the plot going. But she doesn't show it outwardly, instead she tries to pull the strings around Misao's life in order to isolate her, while acting friendly and feigning innocence the entire time. Actually the first thing she does is... Fuck two of Misao's friends? It's part of her plan to get them to turn against each other because of jealousy and to make one of them kill the other, but it still bummed me out a bit :( Infidelity is NOT cool....... Then she does other things like framing Ran for buying drugs which gets you shafted in Japan I reckon, and then she takes Misao to her house and does some god-tier gaslighting, essentially telling her that "no you and your friends didn't actually see me getting struck by lightning and turning to dust because uuuuhhhhh julius caesar". And Misao actually fucking believes her. If this surprises you you don't know her at all, acting lobotomized is her main character trait. It's okay in my books though because it opens the MISAO BRAINWASHED ARC in which they are a COUPLE πππππππππππππππ come on and take a low ride with me girl on the tunnel of love yeah love... TURN IT UP FOR THEM BECAUSE IT'S THE LAST TIME THEY'LL EVER BE HAPPY I love this small arc because... you know how I'm built. Like I'm not even gonna pretend anymore that I don't want her and Sae to fuck nasty and this is maybe the closest they've ever gotten? Except maybe volume 14 but in entirely different circumstances. Leave me the fuck alone this arc is great
There's this moment where Kokai is eavesdropping on them at the mall and he hears Misao renouncing her friendship with him and the others, and it pans to him just blank staring down the aisle in a different store with two walls between them. I love this scene, it conveys the feeling of alienation very well.
And there's this other moment where Shibako is dragging Misao along with him while investigating on Sae and the possibility that she's behind every recent death and disappearance. She suddenly tells him to stop prying into Sae's business, and then fucks off. She does an anime girl run, with anime girl sparkles in her eyes, while anime girl blushing and thinking about how Sae is "such a kind soul". Then it cuts to Sae in her room jacking off to how STUPID Misao is. Iconic scene. Monumental.
But now I have to stop talking about Sae the tenth because I gotta get to the other main new thing but WAIT we gotta talk about this absolutely
In the last scene of volume 5, Sae goes to the... WHAT?????
"Nazo cemetery" are you shitting me... It's a company ππππ Imagine if there was like, a Google cemetery. A Walmart cemetery. A Bass Pro cemetery. Anyways she visits Sae the ninth's grave and essentially tells her that she was dumb and caused everyone in the Maki household to die/leave. Before this we weren't really sure if she was Sae the ninth or not; this scene confirms that she's a different person. This bummed me out when I first read it because I wanted THE ORIGINAL and not a fake wannabe. However after some time I got over it because Sae the tenth is a much more complex, interesting, and just delightful character, who also manages to do waaay more stuff. She tells her she can "rest easy" and then s
WHAT?????? How??? This is never brought up again by the way. Maybe it's like, an inside joke by Tohru with which he's referencing the ending of part one and how he knows that it sucked? We can only wonder... But I really hope that this is explained one day??? Because if somehow the Saes can conjure thunderbolts at will (???), it would imply that Sae the ninth was planning to commit murder-suicide with Misao, which is a very interesting theory to say the least. Anyways if I was Sae the ninth in the afterlife I would be pretty pissed at getting cucked and having my tombstone destroyed by a wannabe imitator of me. "Rest easy" my ass.
ANYWAYS ANOTHER IMPORTANT THING THAT HAPPENS IN THESE VOLUMES IS remember Madoka Kobayashi? Basically she was Sae the ninth's second target (after Ena and before Misao) and, when she expressed the desire to separate from her, she disappeared mysteriously along with her family. Turns out that she got brainwashed into becoming Sae the ninth's servant and being down bad for her. When Sae died she thought it was Misao's fault, so she became her coworker under a false identity with the intention of killing her. So Misao ends up being coworkers with her crazy ex's crazy ex (average lesbian drama). Who one day abducts her and tries to burn her alive and broadcast her death for the world to see. Which raises the obvious question... what the fuck happened to her? First she was a generic shy cute uwu anime girl and now she's like this? So you KNOW you're going to get a Madoka arc and that she's going to be expanded upon (IT WAS REALLY GREAT WHEN WE HAD THESE CERTAINTIES) thankfully, because she's one of my favourite characters. Anyways the attempted murder is interrupted by a giant furry with a hammer (average lesbian drama). But it's no ordinary giant furry with a hammer... It's my (ex) beloved Taicho!!!! I really miss him okay enjoy him while he's still a good character. He actually does things in these volumes aside from bashing people's heads in wordlessly, because he's never seen Sae the tenth before in his life, he doesn't recognize her as his master so he actually kinda works against her. This new thing of him acting like an actual person was... fine, until it wasn't. But for now it's enjoyable and it actually hyped me up when I first read it (I had no idea).
Back to Madoka, she's neuroticism incarnate, handle-with-care box of explosives, and her insanity combined with her fragility makes her very dear to me. And she's just plain phenomenal.
β Kokai's the guy getting beat up because they meet at some point. Madoka learns about Sae the tenth and thinks that she's Sae the ninth, but Kokai gets her to doubt that, so she decides to go check her out with her own two eyes. She finds her, goes up to her and asks "do you remember me π₯Ίπ₯Ίπ€π" and Sae goes "ummm yes I totally know you you're madoko kumbayashi π€π€" and Madoka immediately drops her electric baton thing and starts fucking bawling, and literally kneels in prayer in front of Sae.
It's such a raw, ICONIC scene... basically Madoka becomes Sae's surprise tool that will help her later, specifically when it's time to fucking murder Misao's parents. Sae frames her father for embezzlement and also fucks another girl while she's at it, and Madoka tries to kill them (it doesn't work #yayy) and makes it look like murder-suicide. She uses a singular scrawny charcoal burner that would NOT kill two people in a big ass living room... Tohru hasn't done his homework on sanctioned-suicide. But anyways. Madoka's whole arc has the subtext that she hates Misao for being a version of her that made it, so to speak. They were the same in the beginning (hence why Sae the ninth targeted them both - they had identical personalities) but Misao made it out alive and well, while Madoka is completely maladjusted; she envies Misao for this and carries out revenge not only for Sae, but really also for herself. Something that's highlighted is her envy for Misao's relationship with her parents: in this charcoal scene, she says something along the lines of "I failed when I was a daughter" idfk I used translators, frankly I don't know if it means that she wanted to kill her own parents but didn't get the chance to, or that she feels she was inadequate as a daughter ANYWAYS it's bad. Her less-than-ideal relationship with her parents is confirmed in volume 10, where her father basically admits to neglecting her - also this whole mess technically happened because her parents didn't act soon enough to help her with the whole Sae the ninth situation, so yeah. Anyways, Madoka takes these feelings of inadequacy and frustration out on Misao for no good reason at all, and she will atone for the pain she's caused only with her death in volume 10. Another plot point of great importance is her wearing a suit and tie at one point, which is the unequivocable sign that Tohru LOVES ME specifically. She also wears dog slippers one time. Immaculate fashion sense.
Another Madoka thing is, remember the gangster that got beaten up by Sae in season one? Getting his head bashed in multiple times has done a little number on him and now he's basically lobotomized. Now he is Madoka's weapon and nothing else, all he does is follow her commands and beat people up when she says so. I think it was a good idea to reintroduce him to the story like this, because his dynamic with her is fun (scrawny teenage girl uses giant dangerous gangster as a weapon), and Tohru doesn't try to make him an actual fleshed-out character, which isn't always needed and sometimes goes... very wrong...
Other important thing early on in volume 5 there's this scene in which Ran, Kokai and Shibako are waiting for Misao at karaoke and theOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
YESSS!!!!!!!!! I already said in the page for season one that I was super excited to see what the masked maid was going to do (back when I didn't even know she was called Tazuru). Before this, she only appeared once in the background. When I saw this I FLEW from my seat, Tazuru gets introduced as an actual character, I was waiting for this and of course she did NOT disappoint at all, but we'll talk about this in the page for volume 9. Aaaaaaah it was so good to read Sae-ism for the first time.
There's this really great scene in which Sae breaks a public bathroom sink over how horny she is for Misao.
These are the MAIN THINGS REALLY CONDENSED RUNDOWN of these volumes. The final thing that leads us into volume 9 is that Ran and Kokai manage to convince Misao that Sae is a big meanie, they get her out of her house with the help of Tazuru, who's willing to helo them escape provided that they won't show themselves ever again. But then Misao comes back because she wants to confront Sae openly because she's stupid.....Look...... If you think this specific plot device is bad now, it will get worse later. Let's... just try to accept it for now. Tazuru notices her, gets really really pissed and chases her through the forest with her badass anime wrist daggers.
It might sound like an exaggerated reaction, but breaking promises is the top #1 thing NOT to do in Tazuru's moral code. We'll see that a decades-old promise is at the very center of her whole life. Anyways after a long-winded and very good chase scene in the woods Sae catches up to them with a hunting rifle (the cover!!) and is obviously a little pissed at Tazuru, but not just because she's trying to kill Misao. She tells her "I won't let you take away my loved ones. I didn't intend to have two people killed... Did you think I could just overlook the first one?" That's SUSPICIOUS. That's WEIRD. This refers to Sae's backstory which will be explained in the unfortunately mixed bag that is volume 13, very basically Tazuru killed Sae's dad but look HE DESERVED IT AND WORSE!!!!!!!!! Then Sae shoots her.
Look, it was already sad to see her die even before knowing her backstory, because it's clear that she genuinely loves Sae, keeps Misao away in the first place because she wants to protect her, and tries to make arrangements with her with calm and benevolence- yes she was trying to kill Misao 2 seconds earlier but that's not important: she's so pissed at Misao because she broke a promise, an action which Tazuru finds unforgivable. Anyways, to this benevolence Sae reacts with pure malice and mockery, berating Tazuru and toying with her before finally killing her - that's also something Tazuru didn't do, she intended to kill Misao as quickly as she could, out of mercy.
Tazuru has an end-of-life flashback in front of the bullet, which brings us to volume 9, which... come see it for your fucking self. I'm gonna change to a new page because it deserves space.
This era of Sae-ism was just REALLY GOOD, from story to characters to that beautiful artstyle that captures the vibes in such an inexplicably perfect way. Honestly I can't decide if it's better than season one, but at the VERY least it's a way-more-than-worthy sequel to it. This is something irreplaceable, inimitable, and if I think about the fact that nothing will ever bring it back it bums me out, but overall I'm glad it happened, and I'm glad I got to experience it. This era of Sae-ism is orgasmic and, without overexagerating, the period of my life in which I read it was too, because I was riding the high from reading such a great series.
Fav parts: there are so many I can't even be bothered to list them all. Just read it
Awards: ATE!!!!!!!!
Verdict: 11/10
