Where the Hell is 86 Season 2?

Article at a glance;
It has been almost FOUR YEARS. March 19th, 2022. That was Episode 23. We are literally weeks away from the 4-year mark, and we don’t even have an “in production” tweet.
86 was NOT a flop. Blu-rays sold well, LN sales spiked, and the reception was overwhelmingly positive. Lack of content? Not the issue. Popularity? Not the issue.
So what the hell is going on? No cancellation. No announcement. Just silence. And today, we’re opening that can of worms.

This may be kind of hard to believe, but it has been almost 4 years since 86 Season 1 Part 2 concluded. Yeah, Season 2 Episode 23 aired on March 19th, 2022. So we are literally just a month away from the 4-year mark. But where the hell is 86 Season 2?? It has been almost 4 years, and we don’t even have a confirmed “in production” announcement for it yet! It is not as if the anime was a failure, people loved it, the Blu-rays sold well, and the LN sales spiked as expected, and it is not as if they don’t have enough content either.

So, where is our 86 Season 2 announcement? Well, let’s try to dig into this can of worms today. Obviously, this is just my speculation.

Hear Me Out…

Guys, think about what happened to the world after 86 Episode 23 aired. Almost right after that, the world was pushed into the age of AI. And what is 86 about? AI drones going out of control and taking over the world. So hear me out, what if A1 Pictures got taken over by the Legion and they halted the production of 86 Season 2 because 86 is anti-Legion propaganda or whatever. Guys, we might not be safe. But then, how are the LNs still ongoing? Well, the author probably went into hiding and is publishing the LNs from a cave.

But WE will not back down. On 19th March 2026, on the 4th anniversary of Episode 23, we will all play Avid or 3 Minutes 29 Seconds again in unison to show our protest, and THEN we will FINALLY get our Season 2 announcement! Trust me, guys, we will pull through!

Well, jokes aside, here is a more likely reason…

The Boring Explanation

Look, it is no secret that 86 Season 1 had a bunch of production issues. The last few episodes of Part 2 were delayed by like 3 months or so, airing in March. The reality is that A1 Pictures has just been insanely busy the past few years, and they likely want to create a proper schedule before starting work on 86 Season 2. I mean, think about it, they’ve had a lot of large-scale projects to deal with in the past 3-4 years, like Solo Leveling, Lycoris Recoil, Nier Automata, and more recently, Fate/Strange Fake.

They can handle a couple of big projects at once, but 3 or 4 at once is likely a bit too much even for a studio like A1 Pictures. So if you ask me, I personally think that they will start thinking about 86 Season 2 only after they have finished Strange Fake. Yeah, the reality is just that boring. Unfortunately, there’s no grand conspiracy behind the disappearance of 86 Season 2 lol.

That is all for now

But yeah, hopefully that answers “where is 86 Season?” Again, I know the answer is boring and not very specific, but this is likely the main reason why we haven’t heard a peep about 86 Season 2 even after all these years. But yeah, with that said, I will take my leave here. See ya!

And speaking of, check out my thoughts on Fate/Strange Fake Episode 7 here!