FUTARI WA PRECURE: MAX HEART

DESCRIPTION

CAST

ANIME ActionFutari wa Precure
MOVIE ActionFutari wa Precure: Max Heart (Movie)
MOVIE ActionFutari wa Precure: Max Heart 2 - Yukizora no Tomodachi
MOVIE Mahou ShoujoPrecure All-Stars DX the DANCE LIVE❤: Miracle Dance Stage e Youkoso
SPECIAL ActionPrecure All Stars GoGo Dream Live!
ONA Mahou ShoujoPrecure kara Minna e no Ouen Movie
MANGA ActionFutari wa Precure: Max Heart - Precure Collection
MOVIE ActionPrecure All Stars F
ANIME ActionKibou no Chikara: Otona Precure '23

REVIEWS

• 

  MetaThPr4h

  55/100
  It definitely could be worse, but this sequel doesn't do enough to feel necessary, failing to keep things fresh.

  “It was meh”, that's some words I hoped to not have to say after the amazing experience I had so far going through the franchise, even despite the issues I had with the first season of this entry that were saved more than enough by the positives, but Max Heart in my opinion is a sequel that doesn't provide enough freshness to feel necessary to be there.

  The biggest change compared to its prequel is the introduction of Hikari, another girl with powers (but not considered a Precure) that fully focuses on supporting abilities for the girls, not being able to properly fight like Honoka and Nagisa do. Her calm and quite adorable personality is likeable, but she isn't particularly memorable IMO, and the show is once again carried by the main duo… that start to suffer from just the length of the series being too much for the depth of their characters, with 50 episodes it was more than enough for the fantastic development of their friendship, and in Max Heart it kinda becomes an overkill with some episodes feeling too similar to things already done previously because there isn't that much more to do for them.

  The biggest negative in any case is definitely the villain side, Precure is a franchise that has some really lovable and/or memorable villain characters that bring a lot to the series, but that's not the case for Max Heart, they are just so forgettable and outside of the pretty funny Uraganos there is nothing I can even think of to describe the other evil characters, something I can't even say to the already underwhelming baddies from the second half of the original

  With the significant negatives said, here come the good parts. The art got a solid improvement that was quite noticeable through the whole run, the action looks as nice as usual, and well, despite the staleness the series suffers from, Nagisa and Honoka are still great nonetheless. More importantly I have to admit that I was very satisfied with the conclusion of the story, something that saved quite a lot my opinion on this sequel.

  

  I honestly wouldn't recommend much this sequel despite the still relatively positive score I gave to it unless you absolutely loved the first season or its been a good time since you watched it, the repetitiveness is very noticeable and I'm sad that I can't just go full fanboy as anyone reading my reviews on the franchise most likely sees me as, I can see people finding Max Heart outright terrible if they don't think that Nagisa and Honoka are as good as I do because they are what keeps this sequel entertaining enough to keep going in my opinion.

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• 

  PetalidiStelle

  50/100
  A sequel that falls shy of its potential, hardly expanding from its predecessor.

  I thoroughly enjoyed the first season of Futari wa Precure. It had two charismatic main characters, funny and cute sidekicks, some likeable villains, and I even like Porun who everyone finds super annoying. I mean, I get you, but I am considering getting a plushie of him whenever it is that I can go to Japan again. However, I was left with no choice to side with most opinions I read: Futari wa Precure Max Heart is an inferior sequel. The season presents us with the new character Hikari, who is the life of the queen of the Garden of Light. The queen lost her identity in the finale of the previous season and split into several fragments which must be collected to get her back. In the meantime, we are introduced to an array of new villains as well as an enigmatic young boy who all end up in the mansion used by the previous cast of bad guys as well as the current tenants, the two comic relief Zakenna. Hikari meets Porun and they become soulmates just like Nagisa, Honoka and their companions. This takes a few episodes, but she eventually becomes Shiny Luminous. You can see that she is not considered a Cure and honestly, I would rank her more in the mascot category. She acts as support to the other two characters and whenever she gets to act by herself, it is only to stop the bad guys temporarily for Cure Black and White to finish them. This pretty much sums up her dynamic in and out of action for the entire series, but I honestly found Hikari a character with a huge potential. In the first few episodes, we see her confused as to what is the place she just popped up in and why is she there. However, she ends up as the supposed cousin to takoyaki place owner and friend of the cast Akane, enrolling in school and in about 10 episodes she is a regular girl, just like that. I would have liked for that sense of confusion to be explored for a little longer, but I guess the series explains it as the queen teaching her about the things around her. I also found it a shame that as the series progressed, the Heartiels (the queen’s wills) got less and less screentime, mostly reduced to a few minutes of introduction, appearing randomly in the middle of one episode, and returning to the piece of merchandise they call a home. You may have noticed by now, but I like cute characters even – and especially – when they get annoyingly funny. Lulun is the exception here as she did not have that much depth as a character and was given about the same screentime as Porun in the previous season, therefore I enjoyed her presence. This leaves us with about 70% of the time being occupied with our main characters Nagisa and Honoka and their predicaments… which is basically the same as the previous season. We get the science competition again, Fujipi-senpai’s birthday again, a trip to the countryside again, and at some point, I felt like I watched enough episodes of lacrosse tournaments to make up a sports anime off its own. One thing I have to say is that when the series hit the spot, it did it well. There are some very sweet moments, and I particularly liked the episodes that focused more on a sort of slice-of-life story such as Hikari’s meeting with a boy who ran away from home and writing a piece about a dango store that is about to close due to the old age of the owner. Unfortunately, the fights with the villains were always quite bland and predictable, despite the amusing action scenes the series has accustomed us to, and this continued all the way to the underwhelming ending. Overall, I did enjoy the series enough not to drop it, but I admit it was a bit challenging to get myself to keep watching at some points. It did not taint my desire to continue exploring the Precure franchise as I have already watched enough to know each series has their own strong points and is different enough from each other. I would recommend Futari wa Precure Max Heart to those who loved the first season enough to see more of Nagisa and Honoka doing pretty much the same thing.
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• 

  ExtremelyTired

  65/100
  A 47-episode victory lap that proves the beauty of the everyday is worth the long goodbye.

  __LEGACY__

  I went into this season with very low expectations. Having just finished the original Futari Wa Precure, I had already felt hollow inside. I thought that watching this series, the direct sequel, would detract from my experience with the first and have me leave with negative feelings. And while in some ways, I think this would have been true if I had dropped Max Heart somewhere in the middle, having freshly finished it, I am very glad that I did, and the ending tugged on my heart strings in more ways than I possibly could have imagined.

  __THE BEAUTY OF THE EVERYDAY__

  I think episodic series such as Precure really have something special going for them in that regard. Due to the nature of episodic series, you're spending a myriad of time growing closer to and being accustomed to these characters. They find a special place in your heart, and so, when this status quo of the formulaic storytelling that this series breaks off, and the series ends, you're left with a big gaping hole in your chest. It hurts to see these characters that you are used to seeing in the same locations, undergoing the same transformations, and having very similar battles every episode graduate and head off into the next phases of their life. That bittersweet feeling is something wholly unique to episodic series, and I think that coupled with how well they delivered the ending makes watching this a worthwhile endeavor for anybody who enjoyed Nagisa and Honoka's dynamic enough in the first series. You will absolutely END the series on a positive note.

  Now, as for the overarching story, unfortunately Max Heart does not do enough to differentiate itself from Futari Wa. I think most of that can be attributed to the reuse of the Dark Zone as the primary antagonists. Simply changing the antagonistic force to an entirely new faction would have made this series feel a lot fresher, if I'm being completely honest. Adding Hikari to the roster helped a little bit, but I'm ultimately not a fan of how her character was handled.

  This next section will detail spoilers about Hikari's character.

  __A FRAGMENTED DYNAMIC__

  At the start of the series, I think she was at her best. She was just a mysterious girl, eerily reminiscent of the Queen, entirely unbeknownst to Nagisa and Honoka. Even as her identity slowly began to unravel, she wasn't just shoved into the group right off the bat. It was a slow burn, and she gradually felt more ingrained in the group dynamic over time. For a good chunk of the series, she would do things on her own, eventually meeting up with Nagisa and Honoka later in the episode for the Dark Zone fight of the week. By the latter half, she was spending time with them far sooner. To that end, I have to applaud the writers. She didn't feel like a character who was shoved into the narrative just to shake up the status quo, despite her being exactly that. Her presence was earned, gradual, and natural, which is just the way it should be.

  And yet, that same pro is simultaneously a con in my eyes. She felt so detached at some points that she hardly felt like a main character. Because she acts as a "support" to Nagisa and Honoka while they fight at close quarters and take the most damage, the original duo receives the vast majority of the spotlight. Meanwhile, Hikari ends up feeling sort of... forgotten about.

  This goes back to the pro I mentioned. Because she wasn't with the two right off the bat, she'd frequently be watching them from the sidelines, including during the slice of life school half of the episodes. Because Nagisa and Honoka already had established school lives such as lacrosse as well as their social circles, she had no reason to be with them, which just felt off at times, when there would be some convenient excuse for her to then join back up with the two for the fight of the week.

  Or, more importantly, the more story focused moments, particularly towards the end of the season. Hikari's overarching plot revolves around her needing to fuse back with the Queen. Because of this, she became separated from Nagisa and Honoka for the final battle as her last bit of story played out. And I am not sure how to feel about that, as it hurts their close group dynamic quite a bit. There were numerous other situations like this, where Nagisa and Honoka were grouped together, while Hikari was not. She just felt like an outsider at times where she shouldn't have been, and that's my biggest issue with how they handled her character. Despite my criticisms however, I think she made for a very entertaining addition to said group dynamic, and I enjoyed seeing her throughout the series.

  __ANIMATION__

  The animation was definitely standout this season, especially for a weekly series from 2005. I believe that this series had more sakuga fight sequences than Futari Wa in quantity. Every several episodes there'd be at least one cut that was a step above average, ranging from that to excellent. I'm very glad for this, as Nagisa and Honoka's rough and tumble fighting styles are a joy to watch as usual, including how in sync they move together. It makes me excited to see if they keep up the pace in future seasons, as well as how the series will evolve in its presentation.

  __MUSIC__

  Something I'm very thankful for is Max Heart's decision to reuse much of Futari Wa's soundtrack instead of attempting to do something entirely new with it. While that decision may have been carried out in an effort to save time to allow the composer, Satō Naoki, to work on Splash Star's soundtrack, it is a decision that I am thankful for, nonetheless. While I am not the biggest fan of all the tracks, there is something really special about the transformation themes as well as the more bittersweet songs. There were quite a few songs from the original that I've grown nostalgic for in such a short time, and even the ones that I didn't like as much prior, I've grown more accustomed to with time. So, while Futari Wa/Max Heart don't boast my favorite soundtracks in the world, I came out satisfied at the end of the day. In fact, my favorite song in the entire soundtrack I will attach below. Words cannot express how much I treasure this song, especially from 40 seconds to the end! Be sure to unmute! By the way, the song is called, Utsukushii Aozora, if you wanted to look into it yourself.

  __THE FINAL AFTERGLOW (CONCLUSION)__

  Max Heart is, in every way, shape and form, an unnecessary sequel. And yet, in spite of that, I can't help but be charmed by it in the end. It isn't a reinvention of the formula by any means but is instead a 47-episode long victory lap. Despite its flaws, such as a recycled antagonist and a third lead who often feels like a guest in her own show, this coming-of-age story excels where it matters most: depicting the trials, tribulations, and emotional payoff in the process of growing up. Precure Max Heart truly does have the heart, and I can't help but come out of it introspective and excited for what's next to come, both in the Precure franchise, as well as my own life.

  6.5/10

  
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