I now see that it’s not exactly right to call Maria-Sama ga Miteru a shoujo ai series. If you want lesbians, there’s Aoi Hana, Sasameki Koto, Blue Drop or Candy Boy. Instead, it’s more like a relation-focused drama series that just hardly has any male characters in it. The second season continues pretty much where the first one left off, but it focuses more on drama than on the slice of life.
And it’s really the same typical drama of this series, that tends to make an elephant out of a mosquito. Because of how elegant the culture inside the school and especially the “student council” that this series focuses on is, the creators can really make the simplest things seem like huge problems, without overdoing it and delving into melodrama. Though granted, the second season seemed to be edging for that line a bit more than the first season did.
However, it also continues developing its terrific set of characters, who still remain the selling point of this series. What’s special about this season is that various characters come and leave, and so the main cast at the end of the series looks quite a bit different from what it looked like in the beginning. There’s a ton of background, extra depth and character-development in this season, which makes it worth watching if you enjoyed the first season.
I still think that my favourite episodes are in the first season (the Sei episode), however on average the second season is superior: it’s more consistent and overall more interesting development, although the final arc may have taken things a bit too much overboard. The graduation arc however rocked. It was subtle yet touching, and so many characters were developed in that arc alone.
| Storytelling: | 8/10 – Elegant atmosphere, subtle drama. |
| Characters: | 9/10 – Tons of extra development, background and depth for the cast of characters. |
| Production-Values: | 8/10 – Great character-designs, gentle music. |
| Setting: | 8/10 – An unique portrayal of a catholic school, unlike most stereotypical portrayals of the elite you see in your average anime. |
I’m so glad you actually saw this 2nd season, the oav and the 4th season have some awesomeness in them too ( almost every ep is beyond amazing!), though I admit that the 1st ep of the 4th season was the worst of the whole lot, among all the episodes so far, at least for me.So don’t let it influence your judgement, they are all worth watching! Now, it is a shoujo ai series in its own way, all shoujo ai series don’t have to be straight- forward and direct , this is the most ambiguous of the genre but the most magnificent too ( that’s precisely what sets it apart), I was so impressed by this that all the other shoujo ai series I watched seemed to be below the average somehow (exept “Simoun” and “Noir”, that didn’t equal this one but were splendid in their own way), just because they couldn’t rival this. You’re right when you say it’s centered on different relationships among the Yamayurikai students, their bonds are beyond anything one could imagine, despite this, you could choose your own interpretation, I think that the shoujo ai genre isn’t specifically meant to describe the sensual love of two girls but could also be an unbreakable attachment of the two , a bond that would follow them all their life ( that could also be an overflowing admiration towards someone, probably what most of the people have experienced themselves in their life), indifferently of the choices they will make later on, they may not end together after all, probably won’t , like Yumi said in one of the oav ( the 3rd probably) ” I keep on changing and even if I wish to freeze time and to stay in the Lillian academy forever, I know it’s impossible, because I will grow up …” and so on, we don’t know what their future will be but their bond will never disappear, that’ for sure , for as long as they live( just like the bond between Sachico’ s grandmother and her one-sama ).
You should check out the OVAs one of these days.
The thing with Marimite is that Sachiko and Yumi will never be together. I can see already, the author will die before it happens, then the fans will go berserk and kill the rest of the author’s family in revange.