Love Live! Nijigasaki High School Idol Club (ラブライブ！虹ヶ咲学園スクールアイドル同好会, Rabu Raibu! Nijigasaki Gakuen Sukūru Aidoru Dōkō-kai) Season 2 is a 2022 television anime series that’s part of a multimedia project created by Hajime Yatate and Sakurako Kimino. The television series is directed by Tomoyuki Kawamura and produced by studio Sunrise (now known as Bandai Namco Filmworks). Staff credits also include writer Jin Tanaka, character designer Takumi Yokota and music composed by Naoki Endō. The second season of the series first aired in Japan on April 2022.
Background:
“After the festival, the Idol Club has never been more popular! Everyone is closer to their dreams, including manager Yu Takasaki. But with their newfound popularity comes a new rival vying for the spotlight. The stage is set – let’s start the show!”
Plot Synopsis via Anime Limited, January 2024.
The Love Live! franchise continues to thrive with multiple idol groups over the past decade. After the success of Love Live! School Idol Project with μ’s, followed up by Love Live! Sunshine!! with Aqours, Love Live! Nijigasaki High School Idol Club was the next one to receive the spotlight, though from what I have seen it’s not as popular as the other four groups (even Love Live! Superstar is more preferred to this).
While Love Live! primarily focuses on one singular large group, Love Live! Nijigasaki High School Idol Club went a different direction focusing on individual solo idols or small groups, but they do provide the traditional one big group here and there. Pretty much if you were a fan of the idols this season is for you. I’ve not watched it yet due to my blog but given that I’ve watched the previous two idol series, this one would be next in the chronological order!
Funimation acquired the streaming and home video rights for Love Live! Nijigasaki High School Idol Club before the merger, and Crunchyroll did the same for the second season but both seasons were only for the United States & Canada. Anime Limited took over the Love Live! franchise from MVM with Love Live! The School Idol Movie onwards so this also includes both seasons of this series.
However, the second season pretty much didn’t get any exposure during simulcast and folks had to resort to piracy in order to watch the new episodes. This also applied to the newer seasons and series, and while one of them got Vimeo treatment, it’s generally not a good look for the future of the franchise. At least the home video release has finally appeared, but it isn’t good enough.
Collector’s Edition Contents:
While Crunchyroll have released the series as a regular Blu-ray set, Anime Limited have continued the consistent treatment for the second season of Love Live! Nijigasaki High School Idol Club. In fact it’s so consistent that both seasons match on the shelf even on its Blu-ray case.
This release is presented with a rigid box containing a Scanavo case to house the Blu-ray discs, and alongside the case is a 36-page booklet as well as 9 Art Cards. The booklet covers character bios, interviews with the Japanese cast and artwork.
The artwork is free of any information or BBFC content and the info sheet covers the information and specification like previous Anime Limited releases. The limited edition Blu-ray has 1000 units printed for an SRP of £69.99, and is expected to receive a standard edition Blu-ray release later down the line.
I pre-ordered the series during the early bird line-up back in November 2023, when the series was initially planned to be scheduled for December of that same year, via their AllTheAnime online store for an additional discounted offer from their Anime (Un)Limited membership (therefore the price was £35.99 instead of the £39.99 early bird offer).
Physical Contents:
- Rigid Box with Scanavo packaging and clean artwork
- Info sheet for specification and BBFC description
- 36-page Booklet
- 9 Art Cards
On-Disc Contents:
Distributor: Anime Limited
Released: 1st January 2024 (AllTheAnime), 8th January 2024 (General retailers)
The collector’s edition release for Love Live! Nijigasaki High School Idol Club Season 2 contains all 13 episodes across two Blu-ray discs, with the encode & authoring done by Crunchyroll. The audio options include Japanese with English subtitles and the Funimation English dub.
The white subtitles are unlockable during playback, and the regions are locked to Blu-ray players set to B.
Blu-ray Specs:
| Languages | English, Japanese |
| Audio | English Dolby TrueHD 2.0 Japanese Dolby TrueHD 2.0 |
| Video | 1080p High Definition Native format 16:9 aspect ratio |
| Region | B |
| Subtitles | English |
| Locked Subtitles | No |
| Discs | 2 BD-50s |
Blu-ray On-Disc Extra Features:
Disc 2:
- Promo Videos
- Commercials
- Textless Opening Song “Colorful Dreams! Colorful Smiles!”
- Textless Closing Song “Yume ga Bokura no Taiyō sa”
Unboxing Photos:
Final Notes:
Love Live! Nijigasaki High School Idol Club Season 2 is available to purchase on Blu-ray by Anime Limited in the UK & Ireland. The collector’s edition Blu-ray release can be bought through different retailers including Amazon UK, AllTheAnime Store, and Anime-on-Line.
(Disclaimer: Amazon links are also included when available. They are affiliated so if you decide to order them, I’ll earn a small percentage if they ship which will help me with any hauls or small bills.)
The Normanic Vault 
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