Don’t Toy with Me, Miss Nagatoro 2nd Attack

Attack Attack!

Don’t Toy with Me, Miss Nagatoro 2nd Attack is the 2nd season of the Nagatoro anime series. And, I have to say I’m not a huge fan of this season’s title. It feels like there’s something missing. It needs an exclamation point.

Don’t you think “Don’t Toy with Me, Miss Nagatoro 2nd Attack!” looks better? Or, maybe “Don’t Toy with Me, Miss Nagatoro! 2nd Attack” is best because the exclamation point separates the title and subtitle. In either case, the title just doesn’t feel complete without the exclamation mark.

But, what if we take the Japanese title into consideration? Ijiranaide, Nagatoro-san 2nd Attack (イジらないで、長瀞さん 2nd Attack) also feels like it’s missing something. But, here, I’d put the exclamation point at the very end. The difference in language already separates the title and subtitle here.

Now that I’ve stalled for a bit, I guess I should actually write about the anime. The thing is, there’s not all that much to say about this season of Nagatoro. If you’ve seen the first season, you already know what the series is about. And this season isn’t very different from that one.

Of course, there are some differences. For example, Nagatoro’s toying is much more like flirting and less like bullying. But, that’s not really even unique to this season. We saw that shift happen throughout Season 1. Nagatoro’s toying was only true bullying in the first episode of that season.

By the time we were halfway through the season, I wouldn’t say she was a bully. And that’s still where things stand in Season 2. Partway through the episode, Naoto also starts wearing contacts. So, that’s a difference. Other than that, the only things new here are the new characters.

New Characters

There are 3 new characters in this season. The first is Misaki Nagatoro, Hayase Nagatoro’s older sister. Just by looking at Misaki, you can tell she’s related to Hayase. She does have a lighter complexion than her younger sister. But, we know Hayase’s tan is from her being on the swim team.

Misaki’s personality is also similar to Nagatoro’s. She teases Naoto when she first meets him. But, the person she likes teasing the most is her sister. She enjoys embarrassing Hayase, such as by showing baby photos of Hayase to Naoto. She’s also the one who tells Naoto Hayase’s first name.

The second new character is Hana Sunomiya. She’s the younger cousin of Sana Sunomiya, the previous president of the art club. Hana went to the same middle school as Naoto. And so, when she starts high school, she joins the art club as his kouhai.

Hana is a pretty different character from Sana. We know Sana likes to strip and paint nude portraits of herself. Hana isn’t like that — though she did attempt to strip once. Instead, Hana is very interested in Naoto and Hayase’s relationship. She wants them to become a couple.

The final new character is Orihara. We don’t know what her first name is, but it also doesn’t really matter. Orihara isn’t an important character, by any means. However, if we end up getting a third season — which seems likely — she’ll probably show up more.

Orihara is Hayase’s old judo rival. When they were kids, Hayase was the superior judo-ist (I don’t know what you call people who do judo). But, as they got older, Orihara surpassed Hayase, which led Hayase to quit the sport. I guess Hayase’s competitive nature evaporates once someone’s better than she is.

We’ve Seen It All Before

I know this is probably going to come as a big shock, but Don’t Toy with me, Miss Nagatoro 2nd Attack isn’t very good. It’s not a bad anime. But, it’s also not a good anime and I rated it lower than the first season.

It looks like most viewers rated it higher than the first season. However, they only rated it slightly higher — 7.53 compared to 7.32. Still, compared to my ratings, those scores are way too high. Nagatoro is a fine anime. That’s all it’s ever going to be.

So, what’s the biggest issue with this season? It doesn’t do anything new. What it needed was for the new characters to actually shake things up. They didn’t do that. Hana is a good addition to the series. But, I still felt that it was stale any time she wasn’t around.

Another issue this season has is that it continues to use stale gags. The example of this I noticed the most is when the characters say something like “that aside.” They do this when they’re changing the conversation. And, every time, they do a specific motion with their hands, as well.

In the first episode that they did this in, it didn’t bother me. Though, even in that one episode, they did it a lot. But, it quickly became apparent that this wasn’t a one-episode gag. Oh no. They continued to use this same gag over and over again throughout the season.

I also want to be very clear that I’m using a very loose definition of the word “gag.” At no point, even the first time it was done, was this funny. Very few things in this series are funny anyway. But, it’s obvious that the author must have loved this.

Conclusion

Don’t Toy with Me, Miss Nagatoro 2nd Attack is a 5/10. I don’t care if this is your favorite anime. You’ll have to come to terms with the fact that you like mediocre series. And that’s fine. I like bad anime.

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