The Spring 2026 Anime Preview Guide

The Most Heretical Last Boss Queen: From Villainess to Savior Season 2

In the otome game Our Ray of Light, Princess Pride Royal Ivy is a ruthless villainess and last boss, who seeks to doom everyone around her. But now, an 18-year-old from our world has reincarnated as her, and seeks to avoid this terrible fate. As Pride turns 16 and meets her fiancé, time is gradually running out.

The Most Heretical Last Boss Queen: From Villainess to Savior Season 2 is based on the light novel series by author Tenichi and illustrator Suzunosuke. The anime series is streaming on HIDIVE on Tuesdays.

I tend to like villainess shows. Sure, as a subgenre, it tends to have its shortcomings—in particular, I wish more of these so-called villainesses actually leaned into their roles and went full Regina George with it—but broadly speaking, I've still enjoyed them more often than not. So, it's rare for a show like Heretical Last Boss Queen to bore me as much as it has so far. The core issue plaguing the first season, in my opinion, is its complete and utter disinterest in doing literally anything original. From top to bottom, everything about this show screams “The My Next Life as a Villainess we have at home.” Even one of the love interests is literally named “stale.” And alas, the first episode of this second season is no different.

I think a trap that a lot of reincarnation anime fall into is showing us so much of the post-reincarnation childhood of the protagonist. More specifically, while it's rarely taken to the extreme, it is in shows like Hell Mode (and to be clear, this is much to Hell Mode's detriment), you can usually expect to see the protagonist really begin their post-reincarnation life around age 8 or 10-ish. But the thing is, those early childhood years tend to be really boring, and with only a very small number of exceptions (EX: My Next Life as a Villainess), does it actually feel like these episodes are entertaining enough, or at least plot-relevant enough, to actually feel like they need to exist. More often than not, these shows feel like they could've (and should've) just dumped the protagonist no earlier than their mid-teen years. Heretical Last Boss Queen, naturally, is exactly the kind of show I'm talking about.

This show very obviously wants to be a reverse harem, and now that Pride is 16-years-old (in-universe, at least—mentally, she'd be 34) and has a fiancé, I'd be willing to bet we're going to get more of that in this season. And that has some potential, but oh, the trudge we've gone through to get here. See what I mean? The pacing of this show is way slower than it needs to be, both in the previous season and even in this first episode. Being so glacial, it kills basically all the momentum it even might've had before it even begins. Combine that with utterly unmemorable characters and a basically non-existent story, and there's just nothing about this show that makes it feel worth watching—there are so many other villainess anime that do what this one obviously wants to, but so much better.

It'd be great if this season proved that the juice is worth the squeeze, but given how utterly bland and unoriginal it's been up until now, I'm more worried that it's just going to end up more exhausting than anything else. After all, it's exhausting just for the audience to get to this point. Season 1 feels like it could've just been compressed down to three episodes. Better yet, Pride could've been older when she realizes she's reincarnated. If this anime isn't going to do anything fresh or different, the least it could do is play the villainess anime greatest hits album well—and so far, it hasn't even been doing that.

Talk about a huge improvement here! The first season started out with an episode that was too expository for its own good. Now that we've long gotten that out of the way, this second season's opener reintroduces the world through a clever blend of the familiar and some new twists and spins. Seriously, no minute of it goes to waste. Everything just works.

Our cast is back and more elegant than ever. They've aged a few years since last time; Pride is now sixteen and just a short two years away from possibly seeing herself become the villainous last boss queen. The clock is ticking here, though not loudly enough to let doom and gloom cut through the din. No, the episode starts off the way season one did on Pride's birthday, and instead of being seized with dread, she goes on another elegant ball with Tiara and Stale. And I'm liking Pride's design here, by the way.

Stale and Arthur then have another one of their bromantic training sessions that provide some of the first season's best moments. Arthur is still overprotective of Pride, especially now that she is arranged to marry Prince Leon of the Anemone Kingdom, a playboy of a blue blood who was destined to become Pride's tortured plaything in the previous timeline. The twist comes when the conversation goes from Arthur being too weak to protect Pride, to now being too jealous to keep himself away from Pride. It's a small twist that leaves a big enough impression to keep one invested in the drama as it unfolds.

Being that he's one of Pride's most loyal knights, I can see Leon becoming the Lancelot to Arthur's...er...Arthur, who feels he's seeing beloved Guinevere (obviously Pride here) being snatched away from him. It's a story told a bajillion times over, sure, but as long as it's told well, it's fine. The first season of Most Heretical Last Boss Queen dived into the usual bout of isekai and fantasy tropes just the same, and even with all of its flaws, I can't say any of them were poorly told. I'm looking at this possible love triangle among Leon, Arthur, and Pride, and while I don't expect it to be free of cliches, I am looking forward to seeing how it plays out. (Also, a stray note, but I liked how Val was reintroduced by way of using his earth-shifting powers to climb up the castle walls. It's a subtle way to reintroduce his personality and abilities. And good on the show for not showing off his thing for feet, too.)

Fear. That is what is at the foundation of this story throughout both this season and the last. Pride, or rather the soul reincarnated within her, is ruled by the fear that, one day, she will lose control of her body—that the “Original Pride” will return. Then, using all the trust she has built, the Original Pride will destroy everything and everyone she has come to care about.

And then, on top of that fear, everything our current Pride does is tainted by the guilt of a timeline that never came to be. While we, the viewer, know that Pride has scores of men throwing themselves at her feet, in her mind, she can't even consider romance because she knows what the Original Pride did to them in the game timeline. The good she does for them isn't out of pure kindness or to win their hearts. It's to offset the karma she's inherited.

This brings us to our new addition to the main cast, Leon. At this point in time, he is a happy-go-lucky playboy. He doesn't care about Pride—though he, like her, is responsible enough to go through all the motions needed for royal courtship. The issue she faces is Leon is headed towards his own doom of sorts—one that the Original Pride preyed on to the extent of destroying the man mentally. Thus, our heroine feels it is her duty to protect him from both his fall and herself.

Of course, while those around Pride who care about her can see what is going on, they can't understand why. They know she is sacrificing herself and her happiness in some way—and that's the last thing they want from her. But Pride refuses to run away or have them help share her burden—and that's the true tragedy of this show. Pride's fear and misplaced guilt have left her isolated when she's surrounded by those who only want to help her achieve happiness. Perhaps, through the events of this season, she'll learn once and for all that she doesn't need to shoulder everything on her own—and that her greatest enemy isn't the Original Pride, but herself.

All in all, this episode is a great reminder of what this show is truly about and a solid setup for things to come.