To LOVE Ru Darkness 2
To LOVEる -とらぶる- ダークネス2nd (To LOVE-Ru Darkness 2nd)
- Comedy
- Ecchi
- Romance
- Sci-Fi
- Harem
- School
- Episodes
- 12
- Duration
- 23 min per ep
- Aired
- Jul 7, 2015 to Sep 29, 2015
- Status
- Finished Airing
Synopsis
Golden Darkness is drawn back into the spotlight as she digs further into the questions surrounding her altered life. From the shadows, the ominous Nemesis continues to pull strings—especially through Darkness’s younger sister, Mea—while the arrival of their newly revealed mother, Tearju, turns a once-distant family into a sudden focus of attention.
Meanwhile, Princess Momo’s ambitious “Harem Plan” starts to wobble as Rito remains unable to admit his feelings to his longtime crush, Haruna, even as her own emotions deepen. Beneath the everyday chaos of school life and romantic misunderstandings, a darker presence begins to stir, threatening the fragile balance of love, friendship, and happiness.
Otaku Consensus
To LOVE Ru Darkness 2 succeeds when Atsushi Ootsuki and Xebec treat the franchise’s ecchi machinery as precision slapstick: the pacing is fast, the character designs remain instantly readable, and the Yami-Mea-Tearju material gives the second Darkness season more spine than a simple gag parade. The verdict from fans and genre-focused reviewers is strongly positive for comedy, erotic escalation, and harem comfort viewing, while the recurring criticism is that Rito’s blandness and the fairly basic soundscape can make the non-ecchi dramatic beats feel less forceful than the manga’s stronger stretches.
Why You Should Watch
Watch To LOVE Ru Darkness 2 if you want an ecchi harem that knows exactly what its audience came for: elaborate accidental intimacy, alien-school absurdity, transformation gags, and a female cast with more comic agency than the male lead. It scratches a similar itch to High School DxD’s shameless fanservice and Monster Musume’s cohabitation chaos, but with a softer romantic temperature and a more mischievous, prank-box structure. This season is especially for viewers who like their fanservice tied to recurring character dynamics rather than one-off spectacle: Momo’s scheming, Yami’s guarded intensity, Mea’s instability, and Rito’s catastrophic physical timing all create different kinds of comedy. If you want ecchi without irony, apology, or grimdark posturing, this is one of the genre’s most committed 2010s entries.
Key Characters
- MMomo Belia Deviluke(VA: Aki Toyosaki)
Momo is the season’s most active romantic tactician, turning the harem premise into a deliberate social experiment rather than a passive collection of crushes.
- GGolden Darkness(VA: Misato Fukuen)
Golden Darkness gives the franchise its sharpest contrast: a quiet, controlled presence whose emotional baggage pushes Darkness 2nd beyond pure bedroom-farce comedy.
- MMea Kurosaki(VA: Yuka Iguchi)
Mea is compelling because she mixes school-life playfulness with a more volatile psychological edge, making her scenes feel less predictable than the usual harem banter.
- RRito Yuuki(VA: Akeno Watanabe)
Rito remains controversial by design: fans read him less as a charismatic lead than as the franchise’s human disaster engine, while critics often cite his blandness as the show’s weakest link.
What Makes It Stand Out
- 1
Xebec handles the animation production, with Yuuichi Oka adapting Kentarou Yabuki’s original character designs for TV. The result preserves the franchise’s recognizable silhouettes and soft, glossy character appeal, which reviewers frequently single out as part of its identity.
- 2
Atsushi Ootsuki’s direction keeps the 12-episode season moving in a compact late-night TV rhythm, alternating school comedy, sci-fi intrusions, and more intense Yami/Mea-focused material instead of stretching one mode for too long.
- 3
The season’s fanservice profile is unusually broad even by ecchi standards: AniList tags it at 97% nudity and 94% female harem, with bondage, body swapping, crossdressing, henshin, cohabitation, and psychosexual elements all marked at 79%.
- 4
The audio team pairs sound director Jin Aketagawa with composer Takeshi Watanabe, while the theme songs bring in Reika Kisumi for the opening and Mami Kawada for the ending. Reviews tend to praise the show’s visual and comedic identity more than its sound, making the music a functional support rather than the main attraction.
- 5
Its reception profile shows durable genre loyalty: MAL lists it at 7.42 from 145,525 votes, while AniList places it at 71/100 with 926 favourites. Those numbers are modest by prestige-anime standards but strong for a heavily ecchi sequel season.
Fun Facts & Trivia
- Fun fact 1
- The anime is officially known as To LOVE-Ru Darkness 2nd and aired as a 12-episode TV season from July 7, 2015 to September 29, 2015.
- Fun fact 2
- The core creative lineage stays tied to the source material: Saki Hasemi is credited for the original story, while Kentarou Yabuki is credited for the original character designs.
- Fun fact 3
- Online reception is sharply genre-filtered: one recorded fan review gives it 9/10 after approaching it as a long-delayed ecchi milestone, while broader review snippets cluster closer to 7/10 and criticize the basic sound and uneven adaptation choices.
- Fun fact 4
- Fan discussions commonly recommend continuing with the manga after the anime, noting that the To LOVE Ru story is already finished in print.
- Fun fact 5
- On MAL, To LOVE Ru Darkness 2 sits at popularity rank #1027, a sign that its audience extends well beyond niche completionists despite the season’s very explicit ecchi branding.
Studios
- Xebec
