Ok I finished vinland saga now and it was damn good but I have the same feeling I had after psycho pass season 1 that leaves me really failing to see how the story could continue to be nearly as good afterwards.
Askeladd's death was fairly well executed and in some ways he had to die for the story. He was too effective to allow thorfinn to grow and you see this same type of character killed off all the time in shows. Ironically thors was killed off for the same reason. The problem is, askeladd kind of IS the show. Removing by far the most interesting character from the story leaves a huge gap to be filled. The battle for succession is also wrapped up and theres no reason to think canute will have much trouble wiping out the inevitable rebellion with thorkell by his side.
Even if they do throw in some new OP warriors to fight against it will kind of be from out of nowhere since we already say the dane and english armies plus thorkell has already had a whole season of build up so seeing him be matched or surpassed by someone just introduced would feel pretty lame.
From the brief things I've seen hinting about the future, it seems to kind of go the ruroni kenshin route with this season 1 of the anime being samurai X. A real shame. I suppose I'll just have to pretend the story ends here. Canute is on the throne with few obstacles to the revolution he wants to create, thorfinn is freed from his revenge obsession, leif found thorfinn, good enough for me I guess. Every episode of this anime was great and the finale was no exception, I just kind of wish they'd wrapped it all up here.