English Dub Review: Miss Kuroitsu from the Monster Development Department “Saved by a Smile from the Deadly Price Typically Extracted through Deals with Monsters That Dwell in the Deep like a True Ring of Solomon”

Overview (Spoilers Below):

Kuroitsu’s team needs a stamp of approval from each of Agastia’s executives to get their latest request fulfilled. But terror (and frustration) awaits at each of their lairs!

Our Take:

The first half of the episode primarily focuses on Kuroitsu and her friends going around different lairs requesting their approvals. Following a few mishaps getting them, the gang quickly found out that two of them were ineligible, which pisses Bete off. This happens to be one of the more enjoyable segments of Miss Kuroitsu, even though it follows the same episodic structure as the previous episodes.  

One reason is that it expands the Agastia organization through various executives and their different secret lairs. The show spent the first few episodes focusing on one headquarters in Agastia, so seeing the other lairs and executives beyond that is a decent change of pace for me. Another reason was the humor involving Bete being inappropriately touched by some of the executives she encounters, including the Kraken. Knowing that Bete has gender dysphoria makes these sequences awkwardly humorous in a good way.

The second half of the episode introduces more members of Agastia’s rival organization Black Lore. One of them is Dr. Koharu Hoen, who runs Black Lore’s Monster Development Department and is also Sadamaki’s former classmate back in high school. Another character is Hoen’s monster Elbucky, a space cat who is immediately attracted to Bete despite the latter being a wolfman in a woman’s body.  

This segment dives a bit more into the rivalry between Agastia and Black Lore, mainly because it connects to the White Alligator incident in last week’s episode. But, more importantly, it showcases the difference between their work environments through paid vacation times for employees. Black Lore is seen as a “black company” that forces its workers to work unpaid overtime and doesn’t give out paid vacations. Meanwhile, Agastia, despite its villainous nature, is more comforting with its payment towards its employees. It’s a solid yet brief insight that represents the business rivalry uniquely.

Overall, the fifth episode of Miss Kuroitsu is another series of enjoyable scenarios that expand upon Agastia and introduce some more bizarre characters into the world. It may not offer anything too exciting to its sitcom-like narrative and the sound mixing for some of the voices is somehow inconsistent. However, it benefits from its characters and humor, mainly involving Bete. It definitely looks like the show’s writers are taking advantage of Bete’s embarrassing physique regarding the comedy with this episode. It might not be everyone’s taste because of its sexuality, but it does make for a good chuckle if you’re into that type of stuff.