Saga of Tanya the Evil Season Two, Episode Two, A Strange Friendship Review: Communists vs Nationalists.

The first episode of Saga of Tanya the Evil‘s Second Season set a solid foundation for the rest, with its action, sound design, and funny misunderstandings.
The second episode “A Strange Friendship” follows this up well with more setup for the future, and some especially humorous moments by the end.
Before discussing the events of the episode, I want to talk about the new opening and outro.
The OP is titled Why? RED Induction and is performed by Myth & Royd, the group who did the OP for Season One.
This may just be recency bias, but I think their new OP easily tops the old, starting loud, before going quiet and sinister, and then going full bombastic with the chorus.
The visuals of the OP also give us plenty to look forward to, especially with the teased two vs one of Tanya facing off against Mary Sue again, along with the mage Mikel.
As for the ED Weiter! Weiter! it is performed once again by Aoi Yuki, who continues to show off her vocal talents.
I also prefer this ED because it actually has visuals, rather than a showcase of light novel covers and illustrations.
Back to the episode, it starts off by once again showing us issues the Empire is having with the war effort.
We see this through talks between Tanya and Visha, and Zettour and Rudersdorf.
The combat units are only receiving weapons rather than basic necessities, and the Empire has to halt its progress due to winter.
Worse still are the partisans in occupied territory, along with the fact that, unknown to the Empire, the Russy Federation is now allowing mages back into its ranks.
We see this with the arrival of Political Commissar Liliya and mage Colonel Mikel at Mary Sue’s unit.
Liliya immediately sets about making friends with Mary, which is absolutely a ploy to manipulate her.
We know Liliya was chosen for being, “loyal to the party and idealistic.”
I expect we will see her push Mary to more extreme ends this season.
As for Mikel, he has been described as “charismatic,” and he will certainly lead by example, as seen by his fight with Tanya in the OP and trailer.
However, I do have to wonder how loyal he really is to the Federation, considering the mages were all put in internment camps.
Perhaps he has a similar mindset to the common soldiers, who believe fighting for the Federation will make them listen and improve the country.
Tanya is horrified to hear this viewpoint from a captive, realizing that she is not fighting communists but nationalists.
This makes the enemy a bigger threat, considering they view themselves as fighting for their country rather than an ideology, which she later explains to Zettour.
Zettour, being described as a “conman” by Tanya, is able to find a work around for this problem with Tanya’s advice.
In a speech to various nationalists from occupied territories, he drives a wedge between them and the communists by turning the territories over to civilian rule.
Given the haunting images of Zettour on a skeletal horse, I doubt this is entirely truthful, but his speech gets the job done, halting most partisan attacks and allowing Tanya’s combat unit to get the supplies they need.
In a humorous final scene before the credits, Visha delights in her new socks, and Tanya lights up in cartoonish exaggeration at the offer of coffee.
Tany’s joy ends when she notices a Being X nutcracker in the house, demanding Visha get rid of it.
The final, funny moment after the ED shows Visha offering Tanya a highchair so she can interrogate prisoners without being looked down on, much to her disdain.
After such a logistical episode, it was good to get a few chuckles at the end.
We will have to see how long the laughter lasts though, as the war continues to evolve over the season.
“A Strange Friendship” is a good follow-up episode to Season Two’s pilot, and I am excited to see what is next in store for Tanya the Evil.

Saga of Tanya the Evil Season Two, Episode One, Salamander Combat Team Review: Welcome Back to the Front Lines.

After nearly a decade long absence, Saga of Tanya the Evil has finally returned with its Second Season.
I quite enjoyed the first season, with its solid action, fantastic sound design, and titular character’s constant hilarious misunderstandings.
Going into the first episode of this Second Season, “Salamander Combat Team”, I had my fingers crossed it would live up to the first.
If this premiere is any indication, Season Two should be just as enjoyable as the original and movie.
The episode begins by setting up our cast of characters.
Front and center, of course, is Tanya, whose personality and goals are spelled out by her intro.
We see her praying to Being X due to brainwashing, before she violently lashes out, shooting the statue representing her enemy.
As Tayna stands before the massive combat unit she was gifted at the end of the movie (much to her horror), we see various characters’ perspectives of her.
Loria views her as his “little fairy”, wanting her captured for depraved reasons.
I am all for seeing great animation, but witnessing Loria suck on his finger in such detail was not something any of us wanted.
I hope Loria gets the same pathetic end the real person he is based off received.
After Loria, we see Mary Sue, who seems not to have learned anything from her fight with Tanya in the movie.
Sure, she admits to acting recklessly, but she immediately justifies it by saying God is on her side.
Finally, we see Lergen, Rudersdorf and Zettour, the former of whom is, as per usual, concerned about Tanya, calling her “a monster in the form of a little girl,” just as he did all the way in Season One.
Zettour wants a monster for the war however, and he finishes Lergen’s sentence as Tanya’s theme kicks in and she addresses her new combat team, welcoming them and us to the front lines.
Unfortunately for Tanya, her Salamander Team prove to be wildly incompetent.
This forces Tanya to step in and hopefully the level of animation and sound design we see here will remain consistent throughout the season because what we got was a fantastic continuation of Season One’s.
To the tune of her theme, Tanya flies through storms and swerves to avoid fire, eventually even destroying one of the planes with her knife.
Over the top?
Definitely.
Cool?
Also, definitely.
There is time for humor as well in this battle, because Tanya’s allies almost kill her with friendly fire, causing her to throw out her fists like child because, well, she is one.
This does not save the last pilot, however, and neither do his prayers to God.
It must have been pretty confusing for him to hear Tanya denouncing God one moment and then praising him the next, due to brainwashing.
The pilot does not have time to ponder this contradiction, though, for he is quickly obliterated by a magic blast from Tanya.
Her job done, Tanya naturally follows this up by chewing her new troops out, before we get a look at what the other nations are up to.
We see Mary lost her friend from the movie sometime offscreen, so I wonder if we will get a flashback to how that happened?
More importantly, Loria seemingly convinces alternate universe Stalin to allow mages back into the army to up their chances of defeating the Empire.
We know this will be a big deal, considering we saw one of these Federation Mages wreck Tanya’s men in one of the trailers.
Not long after Tanya gives her men a dressing down, Visha arrives with news that two Federation infantry brigades are on the attack.
What follows is a tense scene, which constantly makes it feel like Tanya’s forces are about to fall into a trap.
I was half expecting the Federation mage from the trailers to ambush them.
Instead, we got a classic Youjo Senki rug pull, where it is revealed that the enemy forces have been just as poorly trained as Tanya’s and they are easily defeated.
Tanya’s surprised “Eh!?” upon learning this gave me my biggest laugh of the episode, closely followed by everyone’s terrified reactions when she falsely praises them with a childish voice and expression.
She does this in the hopes of building a good reputation with her new troops, just in case the Empire loses and she has to rely on their testimony to stay alive.
In typical Tanya fashion, however, this has pretty much the opposite effect, because everyone is left absolutely terrified of her.
Tanya saying she will have a missing captain executed if he deserted certainly does not help her case.
The final scene of the episode then shows the new captains looking at a propaganda poster of Tanya, freaked out by how much it diverges from their reality.
Overall, “Salamander Combat Team” is a great return for Saga of Tanya the Evil after so many years.
It brought back the classic Tanya misunderstandings, as well as a greatly animated action scene with terrific sound design.
I look forward to reviewing the rest of the season as it releases.
It is good to be back on the front lines… which is something I am sure no soldier would ever say.
Certainly not Tanya.

Saga of Tanya the Evil Season Two: The Most Adorable War Criminal Finally Returns in July.

I have reviewed a lot of anime on my blog.
If I have learned anything in the process, it is that time plays a big part in my opinion.
I will often look back at a positive review I did of an anime and wonder, why did I rate that one so highly?
Not to say that my opinion of these anime have turned negative, but I would say that some of them are not as fantastic as I once thought.
However, there is one anime that I enjoyed and continue to enjoy whenever I revisit it, which is often.
That anime is Saga of Tanya the Evil, and it follows the story of a Japanese salaryman, cursed by a supposed god to be reborn into another world.
Now a little German girl named Tanya, the salaryman must survive an alternate universe World War One, where mages fly over the battlefield.
The anime has a lot of great qualities, the best of which being the titular Tanya herself.
She is a compelling character with her strict mindset, constant hilarious misunderstandings, and rivalry with the god she calls “Being X.”

Tanya’s constant mental battles with Being X were a highlight for me in the first season.

After finishing the anime, I was eagerly anticipating Season Two.
So, I waited… and waited… and waited…until it felt like we were never going to get Season Two.
Well now, in 2026, we finally have our first trailer (that is not just old footage), along with a release date.
The trailer begins by showing that Season Two will pick up from the movie.
Tanya has been gifted a full combat battalion by the military branch; despite the aneurysm it gives one of her superiors.
We get a brief look at all of the characters, including those in Tanya’s squad, two new communist characters and, of course, Tanya’s human rival Mary Sue (yes that is her actual name).
From there, the trailer goes through a series of fast animations, teasing what is coming.
We see Tanya engaging in an air battle, what looks to be some sort of demon and, most disgusting of all, Loria licking his finger.
Loria is based off Lavrentiy Beria, one of Stalin’s chief enforcers, who was definitely a sexual predator and probably also a serial killer.
Given that he obviously has nothing good planned for Tanya, I think we can all agree to pray to Being X that Loria receives a painful end.

I hope Tanya eventually strikes the same fear into Loria that she does to this pilot in the trailer.

But the highlight of the trailer is Tanya’s crazed expressions.
We see these insane smiles while she fights and tells her troops to prepare for war.
It will never not be funny to see hardened soldiers terrified by a little girl who they constantly misunderstand.
Case and point, the final shots of the trailer are everyone looking horrified as Tanya puts on her little girl voice and smiles sweetly.
To be fair, the last time Tanya used this voice was to trick her enemies into thinking an attack was not coming in a way that would avoid war crime charges.

Knowing that, Tanya’s soldiers being afraid of this face is completley understandable.

It will be both interesting and terrifying to see how Tanya schemes her way out of such charges in the new season, now revealed to be airing in July.
I will be watching day one, and plan to review each episode weekly.
Hopefully Season Two can live up to the first and, if we do get a third season, we will not have to wait as long.

The Saga of Tanya the Evil – The Movie Review: Tanya vs the Literal Mary Sue.

I loved the first season of The Saga of Tanya the Evil so immediately after finishing it, I naturally moved on to watching the movie, which was released two years after the show.
Directed once again by Yutaku Uemura, and based off the light novels by Carol Zen, The movie sees Tanya (Aoi Yuki) and her battalion of mages sent to infiltrate and spy on the Russy Federation, this world’s version of the Soviet Union.
However, once inside, the plan instantly goes awry, causing a chain of events that creates a film which is a worthy sequel to the anime.

“They’re Commies. Blow the s#$t out of them.” With these words, Tanya and her batallion begin their mission.

I was not let down by this movie, even though I felt like some things could have been improved upon.
The first of these things is Tanya’s relationship with Being X.
Her rivalry with the self proclaimed deity was a highlight for me when watching the show, so I was disappointed to see Being X not drop in personally to gloat to Tanya in the movie.
Another disappointing thing was that there is a flash forward, which clearly spoils the outcome of the entire war.
This should have been cut entirely.
I have heard it is like this in the light novels but, come on, knowing what’s going to happen to the Empire does remove the tension, somewhat.
The last criticism I have is of Tanya’s actual rival in this film.
You see, certain circumstances inside the Russy Federation lead to Tanya being confronted by the daughter of a solider who she killed in combat.
This girl’s name is Mary Sue (Haruka Tomatsu).
No, I am not kidding, there is literally a character called Mary Sue and, as her name suggests, she is ridiculously overpowered, most likely because of Being X’s involvement.
Now, I know Mary Sue being overpowered is clearly the point.
She is a character that is supposed to play off the stereotypical tropes of the Mary Sue archetype, possibly serving as a parody.
However, Mary does not feel like a parody but rather just a general usage of the Mary Sue trope, without anything new or interesting done, which makes her pretty annoying.

Mary is more like an actual Mary Sue rather than a commentary on the trope.

I know I have been criticising this movie a bunch when I said I enjoyed it and I did.
I just wanted to get a few of my grievances out of the way first before I got into the praise.
First of all, Tanya is once again a fun character to follow.
Not only is it still exciting and somewhat funny to see a salaryman in the body of a child plan and then carry out military operations, but the animators also clearly go all out animating her expressions, especially when she indulges in her sometimes crazy outbursts.
Just like in the show, the action is also great, with the sound design once again being stellar.
Then there’s the comedy, which had me burst out laughing a few times.

This reaction is pretty funny. Watch the movie and you’ll know why.

I will also say that this film contains a scene which is probably my favourite of the entire anime so far.
Watching this movie after the anime left me wanting more, so I was overjoyed to hear that a season two is currently being made.
Hopefully it will live up to the standard set by its predecessors.
Until then, there’s also a comedic OVA “Operation Desert Pasta,” which is pretty good as well.
The Saga of Tanya the Evil: The Movie is a worthy follow up to the anime and I cannot wait to see more from the monster in the form of a little girl.

The Saga of Tanya The Evil Review: The Monster in the Form of a Little Girl.

Before I begin the review, I will say that this contains spoilers for a reveal that happens early on, which will work a lot better if you do not know what it is going in. So, if you have not yet watched The Saga of Tanya the Evil, then it’s probably best to avoid this review until you have.

When it comes to picking an anime to watch, there are two features which, if present, will usually make me avoid the show I hear they are in.
These two things are the genre of isekais and character trope of lolis.
I don’t have anything against isekais, it’s just that I have found that they usually do not appeal to me.
Then there are lolis, which I don’t think I even need to explain why I find them to be an automatic avoid requirement for an anime.
However, despite The Saga of Tanya the Evil both being an isekai and having a loli as the main character, I heard great things about it, so I decided to give it a chance and was surprised to find that I loved it.
The isekai aspects of the show only make its premise way more interesting and the loli Tanya (Aoi Yuki) is not sexualised in any way (thank god).

Tanya being a child is wisely used as an often comedic or unnerving juxtaposition with her status as a military leader.

Directed by Yutaku Uemura, and based off the light novels by Carlo Zen, The Saga of Tanya the Evil tells the story of a salaryman in Japan, whose job it is to fire unproductive people at the company he works.
However, he is particularly ruthless and uncaring in his treatment of others, and this leads to a man he fired murderering him by pushing him in front of a train.
Just as he is about to die, the salaryman is confronted by a being who claims to be God, who is dissatisfied with the lack of faith in him.
It is at this time that the salaryman makes the unfortunate decision to declare that he is an atheist and does not believe he is talking to God, dubbing him Being X (Hideaki Tezuka) instead.
This leads to the first of many funny cases of miscommunication where the salaryman’s mocking comments cause Being X to believe that if the salaryman is reincarnated in a harsh situation then he will find faith in God.

And so the salaryman’s isekai journey begins.

Thus, the salaryman is reincarnated as the girl Tanya Degurechaff in an alternate version of Germany, known as the Empire, during a World War One where magic exists.
Wanting to secure a good life for herself, Tanya enters the military at nine-years-old with the hope of using her experiences from her past life to earn a comfy position safe away from the battlefield.
Only problem is that her constant miscommunication with people, and Being X’s interference keeps pushing her to the front lines.
And it is here the good usage of the isekai genre and loli elements come in, with the isekai storyline creating Tanya’s rivalry with Being X during the conflict, and the loli stature of Tanya creating the amusing display of a little girl as a military leader.
Or, as Erich Rerugen (Shinichiro Miki) would call her, “a monster in the form of a little girl!”

Tanya’s creepy faces get a lot of animation. Looking at this it’s not hard to understand why Rerugen is so unnerved by her.

It is this “monster” who is by far the most interesting character in the show.
The other characters are good but it’s Tanya who carries the whole thing, with her military genius, often crazy personality, and struggle for her own human autonomy against what is essentially God.
Speaking of that crazy personality though, it does lead to a few technically-not-a-war-crime-because-of-loophole scenarios and, oh, boy, are those dark.
A lot of the military strategy surrounding these events are also quite interesting to sit through, and when it comes to the actual combat of the series, it does not disappoint.
However, the thing I want to praise most about the action is not the animation but the sound design.
Seriously, the sound of the explosions and gunfire is top notch and makes the world of this horrible war feel tangible.

I found myself often replaying the action scenes just to listen to the glorious sound design.

It is not all action though because the comedy is also well done.
I have already mentioned that Tanya gets into a lot of difficult situations due to miscommunication with her superiors, and it gets funnier every time.
So, with an intriguing story which is lead by an interesting, morally grey character, featuring great action with terrific sound design, some comedic moments and engaging instances of military strategy, it is easy to recommend The Saga of Tanya the Evil.
It has certainly made me more likely to check out other Isekais in the future… not other animes with lolis though because I’m pretty sure most of those are going to be just as creepy as they appear on the surface.