Quick Review #117: Kingdom II Harukanaru daichi e (movie)

Title: Kingdom II Harukanaru daichi e / キングダム II　遥かなる大地へ　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　

Rating: 8 / 10

Recommended for: 

For those who have watched the first movie and want to know what happened next and/or are fans of the cast especially Yamazaki Kento, Seino Nana and Oosawa Takao

* Potential spoilers ahead!

* Disclaimer: I have not read the original manga.

* Currently available on Netflix (subject to geographical location)

Liked:

- Compared to the first movie, this sequel clearly had lots more going on despite the fact that the battle technically only lasted a couple of days. However, the scale of the battle scenes, majestic landscape shots in line with the sub title as well as the obvious growth in Shin's character and physical skills made this more interesting to watch. The thing is, you probably need to watch the first movie to see the key differences and improvements. While there was a summary in the beginning to refresh your memory of Part 1, I think that might not make much sense if you are jumping straight into Part 2.

- Considering the fact that Part 2 was shot in Japan and China over a long period of time and had to be scaled down due to the shooting period coinciding with the height of the COVID pandemic in 2020 and 2021, I would give a high score to this movie for the effort alone. While CG could probably account for the aerial shots of large armies, there would probably still be a need to gather many extras to play the soldiers on both sides along with horses and chariots. It could not have been easy to film in such locations too where the weather conditions should be pretty tough. The fighting sequences were definitely more refined than Part 1 especially Yamazaki Kento who seemed much more skillful as Shin in the span of 6 months (based on the movie's storyline) and Seino Nana (if she did all those scenes herself) was truly brilliant.

- Although Yamazaki didn't stand out too much in Part 1 compared to Yoshizawa Ryo, he definitely led Part 2 well with marked improvements in the action scenes and Shin evolving to be someone who started to think more rather than act rashly. The hidden star of Part 2 is actually Seino though. It would not be an understatement to say that her character Kyoukai stood out more than anyone else and I hope to see her again in the future installments of this series.

Disliked: 

- I have to admit, I started to watch "Kingdom" solely for the sake of Oosawa Takao. It was very disappointing to see that he finally appeared in Part 2 with only 30 mins left to the end. Much as I think he still left an impact on the story as well as in Shin who realised his inadequacies and needed to learn to become a great general, I simply didn't get enough Ouki in this movie. 

I also wondered - why is that the rest of the generals were all covered up in their armour suits but Ouki was showing off his chest and arm muscles like that? While I don't mind seeing a beefed up Oosawa, I just felt odd that Ouki stood out in such a manner. And his hairstyle somehow seemed to be a bit too long for a general and would get in the way during battle. Oh well, maybe that's how the manga designed him to be.

- Likewise, some of the characters who stood out in Part 1 such as Nagasawa Masami only appeared in the summary section. Yoshizawa as the King stayed in the palace all the time so there was hardly any action from him. Hashimoto Kanna also "stayed home" but I imagine that Ten will become a military strategy advisor in time to come (as proclaimed at the end of Part II) since she's not really built physically for the warfare. I'm not sure if these characters (except Eisei) will be featured more prominently in Parts III and IV but given the endless stream of new characters popping up, I'm concerned that they might not get a chance to shine again.

- Frankly speaking, since I do not know the manga's storyline, I do not know what to expect. If the story stays true to history, then this will be a journey where the Qin kingdom (pronounced as Shin in Japanese) had to conquer all the remaining states. Part II only covers Wei (Gi) so it will be a long way till the end before Eisei achieves his goal of unifying China. It remains to be seen if future installments are all about the conquests or would feature more in terms of battle of wits plus Shin's development to become a great figure one day.