Episode 1 starts off with a coffee commercial by SolidS, a press conference, and then Dai and Rikka separating to attend to other work while Shiki and Tsubasa converse about their siblings coming to visit. Talk about busy, and that’s all in the first couple of minutes! Then we’re treated to seeing all of our favorite boys decorating for Tanabata and writing down their wishes, which will surely be elaborated on in future episodes. New characters with connections to older characters help show a fresh side to our beloved boys! And while there is such a strong sense of familiarity, we can also immediately see some slight changes in the characters we’ve come to love.

Our boys are back with some fresh looks! Of course, they have new outfits to celebrate their season 2 debut. But their hairstyles and lengths have changed too! Rikka looks rather similar with his standard ponytail being longer. But Tsubasa almost looks like a new man with his previously fly-away hair now being purposely styled for a more mature look. Shu sports a rather similar cut, while Ichiru and Issei, despite being twins, no longer have mirrored haircuts and instead have differing styles of bangs. Seeing the different idols’ new styles makes us curious about what else will be different this season!

While last season was mostly focused on the boys and their relationships with their fellow group mates and the other groups, this season we get both Tsubasa’s younger sister and Shiki’s younger brother from the get-go! And though they are SolidS’ siblings, they interact with and acknowledge having met members of other groups. If they were to appear for only one episode, it might make sense to include them in a future episode to space out plot-heavy arcs. With their initial introduction to this season, we might expect to not only see more of them, but also see more family members introduced for members of SOARA, Growth, and Quell!