The B: The Beginning Season 2 release date has been officially confirmed by Netflix to be scheduled for March 18, 2021. The official title for the second season is B: The Beginning Succession.
The B: The Beginning Season 2 anime will be produced by animation studio Production I.G., which is best known for creating the Haikyuu!!! anime and the Psycho-Pass anime series. In fall 2020, the studio also released the Moriarty the Patriot anime and the Crunchyroll Original Noblesse anime.
The first season was helmed by director Kazuto Nakazawa, who was also the Chief Animation Director, character designer, and original creator for the story. In the past, he’s worked on Netflix’s Perfect Bones, The Animatrix, Samurai Champloo, Terror in Resonance, and the anime sequence in Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill Volume 1.
The director said he originally started the Killer B anime with the intention of creating “dark hero stuff,” but over time the plot shifted to a crime suspense story.
“I intended to make something of a dark hero story. First of all, I was ‘painting.’ I do not have a theory for fundamentally creating a theory of direction and story. I am not interested in that in the first place. I draw original drawings as drawings,” Nakazawa told Gigazine in 2018. “I thought that drawing the screen itself is also about making any work, so I combine memory, experience, and technology inside of me. When the images float [into my head], I’m going to make something that accompanies it. It was like a feeling. Finally, it seems like it’s painful to draw actions for a crime suspense.”
Netflix’s oversight on the project involved the leadership giving “strict regulations” related to being an international TV series, but the director answered “yes” to all of Netflix’s demand since he was given artistic freedom otherwise.
“The atmosphere itself is also aimed at those conscious of overseas dramas,” he said. “If you are told, ‘Please do something like this,’ I will study what I learn and use any good parts that which I think can be incorporated into the animation.”
Nakazawa is returning for B: The Beginning Season 2, but only in a supervisory role. Yoshiki Yamakawa (High Score Girl, Little Busters!) helped direct the first season, but for the second season, he’s being replaced by second director Itsurou Kawasaki (Arc the Lad). Katsuya Ishida is returning for writing the scripts and series composition.
Akane Yano (CHOYOYU!: High School Prodigies Have It Easy Even in Another World!) and Hideoki Kusama (Date A Live animation director) are the character designers for the second season.
The remainder of the main staff is returning. For the first season, Kazuchika Kise (Made In Abyss, Psycho-Pass) created the storyboards, while Yukio Nagasaki was the sound director and Yoshihiro the music composer.
For the first season, the B: The Beginning OP (opening)/ED (ending) theme song music was “The Perfect World” by Marty Friedman.
The B: The Beginning Season 2 OP and ED have not yet been announced.
The anime is streaming exclusively on Netflix. The first season had 12 episodes and it released on March 2, 2018.
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Updated February 19, 2021: Added B: The Beginning Season 2 trailer and exact release date.
This article provides everything that is known about B: The Beginning Season 2 (B: The Beginning Succession) and all related news. As such, this article will be updated over time with news, rumors, and analysis. Meanwhile, let’s delve down into what is known for certain.
Netflix’s B: The Beginning Succession release date in 2021
On February 19, 2021, Netflix and Production I.G. announced the exact B: The Beginning Season 2 release date. The B: The Beginning Succession release date has been confirmed March 18, 2021.
Netflix’s announcement stated, “They might have solved their last case, but Keith and Koku aren’t finished yet. Here’s your first glimpse at B: The Beginning Succession’s story of detectives and killers in a high-tech world, arriving next year.”
Considering the timing of the announcement was in late October 2020, it wasn’t surprising that the B: The Beginning Season 2 release date was in the first half of 2021. Netflix does not stick to the cour system like Japanese TV broadcasters, so that’s why they’re targeting March 2021 similar to how the first season was released in March 2018.
B: The Beginning Season 2 was teased by the first season’s ending
Netflix’s B: The Beginning anime series is an original story by Katsuya Ishida and Production IG that is not based on a manga or light novel series. Director Nakazawa intended the first season to tell a “complete story”, but the post-credits scene in Episode 12 definitely left an opening for B: The Beginning Season 2.
Even though Koku cut off Kirisame’s arm earlier in the season, it was revealed that he was alive and Kirisame spoke to an unknown person. Kirisame said he’ll his promise to see Koku again.
“Didn’t I tell you. This is what you get when you leave things to a Reggie,” Kirisame said. “I’ll go this time. I need to get my left arm back from him, anyway.”
Back in 2018, director Nakazawa was asked if the ending entailed B: The Beginning Season 2, but his answer was fairly vague.
“I think many interpretations can be made, but I think that any story is only part of a big story,” the director replied when asked if he’d like to make a continuation of this work. “I think that ‘The Story Continues’ represents my own feelings, but I do not know if it will… or not.”
Based on the director’s response, it’s possible that Netflix had not yet greenlit B: The Beginning Season 2 for production at the time.
Production IG CEO Mitsuhisa Ishikawa also noted that Episode 12’s ending was created for anime fans who say, “I’d like to see Season 2 if this is the case.”
“It will be a pity for both the viewers and Netflix to end in Season 1,” said Ishikawa back in 2018. “So if you can ask for a continuation, it will be our pleasure as the creator.”
Thankfully, Netflix and Production IG decided to produce B: The Beginning Season 2. The new story should explore the lore behind Killer B aka Lohengrin and the two fossils found on Jetblack. Considering that Kirisame is alive, the second season should also reveal the unknown person lurking in the shadows.
Unfortunately, anime fans will have to wait until the B: The Beginning Season 2 release to watch what happens. Stay tuned!