“Raising Dion” Season 2 carries forward the same look-and-feel as Season 1. We get all the familiar faces from the first season back, and we are also introduced to new ones. Dion has defeated Pat and has now formed his own team, whose daily job is to make their neighborhood a better place. This includes settling the garbage bins, making sure that the morning newspapers are at the door-fronts and not anywhere else, and more. But it doesn’t take much time for things to go downhill. The Crooked Man has returned, and this time he is more powerful. Dion must protect his mom and friends at all costs.
The last episode of “Raising Dion” Season 1 showed the Crooked Man getting hold of Braydon. Naturally, it would be Braydon who would have to take the story forward in Season 2. On the other hand, we have Pat, who has miraculously returned after 2 years. He no longer has any part of the crooked man inside him and is a “good man.” However, the Crooked Man, who now has Braydon under his influence, has a new plan to kill Dion. He is creating an army of flora-powered zombies as a part of his plan. And he is using Braydon’s mind-controlling powers to put these zombies together to give shape to his plan.
However, the most confusing part of the whole series is the search for a cure for the parasitic spores. The parasitic pores, courtesy of the Crooked Man, are what affect people and turn them into the so-called zombies that we see. So, in order to find a cure for it, the plan is to access Dion’s DNA and extract its P-strand (the one that gives him the power) and create a gene therapy that will neutralize the infection caused by the spores. We get this (somewhat), but will the young children who are watching it get this? Also, the amount of scientific jargon that is used afterward and for a while will distract one’s attention time and again. Especially for the children watching the show who are too young to understand terms like “gene therapy,” “mutated cells,” and “pathogen.”
What is disappointing is the fact that, in the end, Pat and the crooked man are one again. The whole of season 1 dealt with them, and it only seems that season 3 will do it again, albeit in a different way. The creators could easily have rooted for a different person, perhaps one of Dion’s friends like Esparanza or Jonathan. This would have explored Dion in a new light. We cannot hope for a different villain altogether because there is none in the comic except for the Crooked Man. Also, the comic is a 24-page story. One can only do so much. So, Season 3 will probably be the last.
The post-credit scene shows a villainous Pat with his army facing a grown-up Dion in a true-to-form costume. We do not know whether this whole scene is a sneak-peak into the next season or just a dream of Dion, and we will have to wait for “Raising Dion” Season 3 to find out. But we can expect Pat to have a new avatar since he has willingly joined forces with the Crooked Man and has powers of his own too.
All the actors had established their characters big time in “Raising Dion” Season 1, and nothing goes wrong in Season 2 either. Ja’Siah Young and Alisha Wainwright smoothly carry forward their mother-child relationship as Dion and Nicole, respectively. Sammi Haney as Esparanza surprises equally with her eloquent mannerisms. Jason Ritter as Pat doesn’t have much to do in this season but does justice to his role, and so does Jazmyn Simon as Kat (Nicole’s sister). Griffin Faulkner as Braydon nails his role as a child possessed by a dark entity. As for Rome Flynn as Tevin and Aubriana Davis as Janelle, both the characters weren’t provided with any scope for exploration. That will probably be done in “Raising Dion” Season 3.
As for the presentation, the cinematography holds our attention. The VFX certainly makes a mark and is no less than a Marvel or DC project on Netflix. Instead, it is much better than they are. The songs used are pretty good too and showcase the moods they are set against.
To summarize “Raising Dion” Season 2, it’s the same villain, the only difference being that it has a shape and has taken over a child. Two new characters are introduced, namely, Tevin (Rome Flynn) and Janelle (Aubriana Davis), who act as secondary characters only to extend the plot. Pat is back to normal, but not for long. You might miss Michael B. Jordan as Mark, who is not shown even once in the eight episodes. But then again, this brings back the comic-book theory from which the series has been adapted and everything is strategically aligned to that. Hopefully, it will change in Season 3.
In conclusion, “Raising Dion” Season 2 is an entertainer that takes Dion’s journey as a superhero, and you won’t need gene therapy to understand that.
See More: ‘Raising Dion’ Season 2: Ending, Explained – Is Pat The Next Supervillain?
