The third season of Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? is 12 episodes long plus an OVA. The season kicks off with a new arc where Bell finds a talking monster. This is significant because up until now, the adventurers had been exploring the dungeon and killing all monsters. To have one that seemed to be intelligent, and be able to converse and speak, upends all of what they know so far. Of course, it is only Bell that gives the monster an opportunity for them to speak, anyone else would have immediately slayed them. As a result, the monster is emotionally attached to Bell (adding to his legion of admirers) and is given the name Wiene.
Wiene takes on the appearance of a young girl but with monster traits. She is innocent and doesn’t know the ways of the people, which is understandable given her origin. Unfortunately, the story arc takes on a predictable setup, which is that Wiene has a dark secret and that she’s probably part of some grander plan that’s happening in the background. The fact that she is “good” but everyone else immediately assumes she is bad, and treats her as such, is also something that’s been done before in another anime, so it isn’t anything new here.
The predictable nature of the plot continues for the whole season. At least compared to the last season, it isn’t as rushed. The arc takes some much-needed time to flesh out and develop its characters and plot. The arc pits two groups against each other, being the typical bad guys, and the typical good guys. There is a wide divide and difference in ideology but at the core of it, it is pretty much just how they are dealing with racism in this world. It made it very black and white though, especially given the bad guys perform some cruel acts.
Despite the time spent, the season’s attempt to inject quality into the story just isn’t there. After trying to show how evil and deranged the villains were, they all get anticlimactic ends. Are they defeated by an epic showdown against Bell, or maybe they get their just desserts from the very monsters that they were looking down upon? Not really. They just die in a quick unceremonious death that doesn’t give even a shred of satisfaction. The same goes for Bell and his typical heroic actions that are cringeworthy and at times, painful to watch.
At the end of it all, the anime could have tried to give the viewers a surprise or a twist but unfortunately, the outcome is well within your expectations and predictions. It is a happy outcome where things will just work out. Despite trying to show how much Bell had to suffer and the effort he put into things, it doesn’t translate well and still feels too easy and superficial. The season finale closing off the arc is solid, relative to the rest of the series. There’s quite a bit of action and the events aren’t as cheesy as they had been in the past. Although the way it resolves the core issue… isn’t really resolving it at all. It moves things mostly back to the status quo but does promise to revisit it in the future.
There is an OVA which is mostly a fan service episode. This time, it is to do with hot springs and while it is not quite as silly as the previous one, the tone is still overly lighthearted. The first half of the OVA surprisingly restrains itself with the fan service elements but then dives a bit more into it in the second half. It isn’t as crazy as some other anime, but it provides much more fan service than normal episodes. There are some humorous parts but unfortunately, it’s yet another pointless filler episode where the eye candy isn’t even that great.
Overall, the third season of Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? is okay. It is a definite improvement over the second season thanks to not rushing its arc. Spending the whole season on one arc was the right choice, even if the plot wasn’t the most original or the most interesting. Bell remains a boring protagonist and quite generic at times. The series plays into tropes too much so that it can be stale. It needs a great story arc to really change things up.
