English Dub Review: Is It Wrong To Try To Pick Up Girls In A Dungeon III “(Wiene) A Dragon Girl”

Overview (Spoilers Below):

One day while journeying through the forest on floor nineteen, adventurer Bell Cranel runs into a strange sight. He finds an injured monster cowering in need of assistance. Unlike other monsters, this one happens to look just like a cute little girl. (Because why not?) Bell decides to help her, and takes her back to the surface.

The other members of his party aren’t all convinced by his decision, especially Liliruca, who’s determined not to be taken in by the monster girl’s charms. They split up and try to find out more info about talking monsters, but don’t learn much besides almost being tailed by some mysterious spies looking for the talking monster girl. In the end, the dragon girl remains with them, but the future is fragile.

Our Take:

The third season of Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? starts off with a pretty wimpy premiere. There aren’t any big battles or major revelations; instead the episode feels a mid-season breather in terms of pacing. Of course, there is a bit of a twist thanks to Wiene’s introduction, but that’s barely enough to propel the episode forward for this start to the season.

This kind of storyline is always hard to pull off, and this show is not the kind of series that handles stuff like this gracefully. Wiene starts off as a helpless monster who takes Bell in with her adorable face, and by the five minute mark she’s already speaking their language fluently. But of course, she doesn’t understand the need for clothes or gender-separated bathing. It’s all very dumb for the most part. While some parts of her bonding with the group are somewhat sweet, like when she gets her nails done by Welf, on the whole her character has no real personality or agency and only serves to add to the show’s kawaii factor.

What’s more interesting is the lore that Wiene’s introduction brings to the show. Apparently, no one has ever heard of talking monsters before. Or rather, they have, but only spoken of in whispers in dark tavern corners. The team’s search for info doesn’t turn up much except for the fact that there have been rumors of voicing and even singing coming from empty floors.

It seems obvious that this season is going to be about monsters and humans reconciling, which has some potential to be cool. but more potential to just be poorly done. Not all monsters are adorable moe girls who love eating rice and fruit. It’s going to be kind of interesting to see how Wiene reacts to the inevitable conflict that’s going to happen later on down the road. While she seems to be enjoying the love and attention she’s getting on the surface, the dreams she describes to Bel are disturbing to say the least, involving her murdering humans who look like him.

The premiere of Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? doesn’t have much steam, which isn’t unexpected for a series that already has so many episodes under its belt. What is disappointing is that the generic conflict seems to be monster against humans, and it’s not executed with any cleverness so far, just lots of exposition about how monsters are scary and can’t be trusted. I just hope the show can be trusted to deliver a second episode that’s more entertaining.