Love Live! Superstar!! Season 2

Episode 8

Much as I appreciate getting some well-needed focus on Ren, I'll admit I was disappointed last episode wasn't primarily dedicated to a more ensemble focus kind of Love Live! Fuckin' Around. Now that we've finally got all nine girls under the same banner, I've been waiting to see them all intermingle and bounce their personalities off one another. With the broadcast delay we had to wait an extra week, but in “Chance Way” we finally get some of the good shit.

Sure, there's also an ongoing story about Kanon and the Krew figuring out where to stage their prelim performance, but what I'm here for is to see the new and old cast finally mix together, and they don't disappoint. Keke finally finds a sister zealot in her idolatry with Mei, and it's great to see them working each other up into a dander of questionable decisions. Sumire, meanwhile, has wound up having to babysit Liella!'s resident problem child and prevent Natsumi from setting up an OnlyFans for the group behind their backs. Then you have the absolutely vile concoction Natsumi comes up with by mixing Chi's takoyaki with smoothie mix, creating something so viscerally unappetizing that I'm sure she's about to start selling it on TikTok and shipping it un-refrigerated through the mail. There's also just a ton of funny touches throughout, like the sliding scale of exhaustion from the totally unflappable Chisato to the walking corpse Natsumi after chasing after Kanon. It's a whole lot of fun to have them all together now.

Those antics are key to keeping this episode afloat, because honestly it's pretty hard to get invested in Kanon's search for the right stage. For as lush as Superstar's environmental design has always been, there's never really been a focus on any particular spot or area in Liella's direct vicinity that's stood out to me. They could have put their stage in the middle of the school's courtyard for all the difference it would make, and while the moments where their friends help with research and student council duties are sweet, they're not substantive enough to carry the episode on their own. So when Kanon finally picked what the show decided was the perfect spot, it didn't really register for me. Like sure, you've picked a different street from last time, good job. If you really want to impress me then honor your predecessors and perform without re-directing traffic, cowards.

But for all that the subplot itself is underwhelming, the ensuing musical number is far and away my favorite Liella! performance in either season. Ever since Those Snow White Notes I've been a sucker for mixing shamisen into modern production, and “Chance Day, Chance Way!” pairs that with a killer bass line that makes the whole song a jam. Doesn't hurt that it also features some of the liveliest dancing animation of the season, and even has a few sequences where the transition between 2D and 3D is so seamless I had to frame step through certain shots to figure out when they made the switch. It's such a bop that it livens up the underwhelming dramatic plot and makes the whole thing worth it.

Now comes the question of just where we go from here, as we enter the final third of the season. Liella! have successfully passed the prelims again, but now it's time for the real test and the point where they failed last season. Sunny Passion are of course bound to be a problem, but Wien is also waiting in the wings, presumably biding her time so she can steal the spotlight again. And of course there's the lingering question of whether Superstar will follow suit with its older sister series and wrap up with just two seasons. There's plenty of reasons to think it might not – there's no impending graduation threatening to break up the band, and it would sure be a shame to only get half a season with the full line-up – but it's just as up in the air as the results of the competition itself.

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Love Live! Superstar!! is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.