After watching the first five episodes of this season, my biggest complaint was that Fermat set up a very interesting premise that it wasn't fully utilizing. The show sold itself under the idea of a protagonist who utilized mathematics in the world of cooking. There's a lot of merit to that, as real-life chefs can utilize science and mathematics to create meticulous dishes. Even the early episodes utilized simple but interesting techniques to bring out specific flavors. However, after the first couple of episodes, the show quickly deviated from using mathematics as a selling point, instead focusing on utilizing dishes to bring about specific emotional responses in customers.

While the emotional beats of the show were strong, it lost a little bit of its unique identity. The second half of the show feels like it was directly calling out my earlier complaints. Not only does this show address my issue with the lack of mathematics, but it even uses that as a plot point, tying into the larger narrative. I do think the second half of this season doesn't have as much variety as the first half, since there's one specific dish that needs to be focused on, compared to the four or five from the early episodes. However, the show makes up for that with a strong emotional hook. We finally get introduced to Ichitarō, the third childhood friend with whom the protagonist bonded over mathematics when they were younger. However, I like the way the show portrays Ichitarō as almost the antithesis of Gaku.

There's a strong emphasis on being pushed into a corner in order to bring out a specific result. Gaku's character arc seems to be about fine-tuning the new culinary skills that he acquired early on and combining them with his mathematical genius, which he was under threat of losing. The show doesn't display that many mathematical techniques, as a lot of it is more about building up to the crescendo of this character arc, but the payoff is satisfying from both a narrative and emotional standpoint. Finally, the show was able to entwine its best elements right at the very end…and then the show is over.

It's a good thing that the show left me wanting more, but I would argue it leaves me wanting too much more. Not only does it finally deliver on what it was promising at the beginning of the show in the final episode, but the way it delivers these messages is also very strange. There's a lot of foreshadowing and buildup going on in the background that runs parallel to Gaku's culinary journey. We got a few more hints into Kai's backstory and why he's as eccentric as he is. In fact, the rest of the supporting cast does seem to get a lot more involved in Gaku's journey, either directly helping him or sharing their own insight into what exactly Gaku represents in the future culinary world. It feels like everybody has a lot more to do, and I want to see them bounce off each other more.

I also admittedly like how Ichitarō is introduced and how his very presence seems to correlate to Gaku's inferiority complex. Ichitarō was mentioned a couple of times at the beginning of the season, but now he acts as this looming force that has the potential to suck all the joy out of people's lives. I like that he represents someone who threw himself into mathematics so much to the point where he can only see the world mathematically. In a lot of ways, it dehumanizes him as a genius, and it makes sense why his very presence causes people to feel so uneasy. I wish we saw more of him directly interacting with people. There are one or two scenes that brilliantly showcase how his brain works. He's not necessarily a bad guy; he is just unable to connect with anything outside of mathematics, which means that Gaku can act as a perfect bridge for people like Ichitarō. I just wish we got to see a little bit more of him instead of just being promised that we will see more of them in the future by the end.

That actually is a good summation of how I feel about the show's ending. There are all these promises about where characters will go and what will become of them to the point where these promises swallow the satisfaction of the ending itself. Teasing future events is one thing, but when you leave the very future of your main character's mental health as a cliffhanger, it makes me confused as to what final feelings I'm supposed to walk away with. This half of the season is a little tricky. Still, we got a stronger focus on mathematics, the character buildup was a lot nicer, and we had some stronger emotional stakes involved, along with a more involved backstory from the rest of the cast.

I also feel like the presentation for the second half of the season was much stronger. While the show still uses overly detailed and almost realistic backgrounds in a way that can feel jarring, the dishes felt more creative, and the characters were more expressive. There was a lot more humor with how everybody reacted to each other, and the show's use of musical stings felt a lot stronger. At the time of this writing, there is no season two announcement, which is a shame because that does leave the ending of the season feeling very unsatisfying. Still, if you enjoy cooking and want to watch a show that tackles the art from a different angle, I could recommend this season as a whole.