Seasonal Discussions Fire Force S2 - When Fan-Service actually gets hot

[SoaringDylan]

After a relatively short hiatus having only aired in Fall 2019, Fire Force is back with S2 and Episode 1 has already aired!

--Light spoilers for Ep 1 follow--

Many critiqued the first season for its heavy usage of Fan-service in some of the most obnoxious and impossible ways we have seen in a shounen for quite some time. However, after hearing the cries of the community, many hoped that David Production would tone it down a bit.
Sadly enough, they did the opposite and seem to be embracing the Fan-service even more.

The first episode is focused on two sub-plots, the first of which is about Shinra, Tamaki, Iris & Maki going out shopping for Commander Hinawa for plan "Commander Hinawa's Makeover". Since his taste of fashion is... sub-par, some may say. During this part Shinra seems to have embraced his lewder tendencies, which were a lot more subdued in season 1 as far as I remember.
Towards the end of the episode the 'plot' moves on to the 'Fire Brigade Newd Calender' where all the 8 fire companies provide newd pictures of their man for the calendar. I suppose the only takeaway of this, is that Fire Force is now embracing both male & female fan-service.

But besides the fan-service, the episode of course also covers a great fight with an infernal, showing of the great animation David Productions is well known for.


Is this first episode a sign of for what is to come? or was this perhaps a jab at the community and will the fan-service lessen in upcoming episodes?
If you can overlook the fan-service, the fight scenes in this show are more than worth it, and I'll definitely be watching the rest of this season in hopes of finding out the truth behind the Infernals.

How about you guys? Did you drop this series because of the fan-service? Or are you able to look past or embrace it and enjoy the series for what it is?

 

[Tactician Karina]

Fire Force is one of the three shounen anime that has overtaken One Piece and Fairy Tail as my favorite in the genre (the other two being Demon Slayer and Black Clover), so I'm very excited that season 2 is finally here. The fanservice doesn't bother me at all (in general it doesn't tbh) and I'm mainly reading/watching it for the characters and action anyway, plus it's nice seeing more manga/anime with firefighters in it (standard version of Fire in His Fingertips was okay and the Firefighter! Daigo of Fire Company M manga is good too).

Anyway loved the opening, pretty flashy and cool. Nice seeing Ogun Montgomery looking cool as usual in the OP, also seeing Hajiki in the opening as well.. The ending is nice too, love the video game style they went with.

It's good that the first episode started on a light note (considering what'll happen later on) with the calendar photos, which I wasn't sure if it'd get animated but I'm glad it did. Arthur making his appearance in a grand fashion is great of course, love his and Shinra's dynamic. My favorite quote when referring to Shinmon in the calendar "It'd be July right? ...Did they take this without asking?" also "Call us the beef squad." lol. Did anyone else notice Excalibur from Soul Eater in the hat store (as well as the other small Soul Eater references), it was a nice touch. As usual the episode had great animation, hoping to see more of that in later episodes especially.