Dhruv Sharma
‘Psycho Pass‘ Season 3, so far, has been exceptionally great and though it’s still a little debatable if it’s as brilliant as Season 1 or not, we can safely say that it does have the potential to get there. But when you start expecting so much from a particular season, even the most minor pitfalls hit hard and make you question its future.
Episode 5, though it does introduce us to a lot of intriguing plot points, it turns out to be relatively sub-par in many aspects. The pacing seems off, the animation quality has substantially dropped, and most of all, there’s far too much banter around explaining every single thing. Episode 5 is certainly not one of the best episodes of this season, and assuming that it’s just a hiccup in the spectacular run, we’ll just have to move on ahead.
Psycho Pass Season 3 Episode 5 Recap:
After passing out because of his mental trace, Arata wakes up in an infirmary. Kei then informs him that he met an ex-enforcer named Kira whose partner, Fuse, had died in a mysterious car accident. During this meeting, Kira had also warned him that the accident had occurred specifically when they were investigating the “wolves”—special people who can easily commit crimes without exposing their hues. In the next scene, Mao receives a card from the “wolves” and it seems like she could be related to them in some way. While BiFrost plans its next grand scene, Karina organizes a Special Religious Zone meet where she inaugurates the initiation of a new policy that allows immigrants to freely practice the religion of their choice.
But the opening conference gets attacked by a suicide bomber who turns out to be a follower of the Heaven’s Leap Cult. Later on, even Sasagawa ends up getting killed in a car accident and this forces Mika to allow Arata and Kei to investigate the foxes. Since the bomber was from a religious group, three religions leaders, Theresa Shinogi, Joseph Auma, and Torri Aschenbach, become the prime suspects along with Kurisu Kyoji O’Brien, who is an Immigration Bureau Observer. Arata, Yayoi and Kei interview all of these religious leaders but find no leads and the fact that all of their hues are extremely low, makes things even worse.
The team of enforcers ends up finding the drone which had performed the bomb implant inside the suicide bomber, and according to the information on its database, it turns out that there are four more similar bombers out there. Before Kei arrives at the hospital to question Kurisu, the second bomb takes his life. But soon, they discover that he had met Theresa the night before and she had also previously purchased the drone. From what they gather, they come to the conclusion that Theresa, Joseph and Torri are all involved in a massive smuggling ring and Karina’s new policy was coming in the way of their illegal business. With these leads, they arrest Torri’s uncle, Viktor, and Kei impersonates him in an undercover operation. Meanwhile, Kei’s wife prepares for her eyesight restoration surgery.
Psycho Pass Season 3 Episode 5 Review:
Compared to the previous episode, which was brimming with incredible action scenes, there is an evident drop in the animation quality of this episode and there are also moments in it where character expressions seem very distorted. Probably because of the high production value of the previous one, the creators had to cut down on the budget of this episode. Speaking of which, Season 3 seems to be following a consistent pattern where one episode involves a lot of foreshadowing and explanations of events while the one that follows it, is all about revelations and action scenes where the Agents come closer to the mysteries of their cases.
Makishima from the first season was indeed a great antagonist, but there’s something about the villains of this season that I like a lot more. There is this unusual looming sense uncertainty that makes them far more impactful. In fact, so far, it seems like Season 3 has more than one antagonist. It all started off with the BiFrost/RoundRobin, and now, even the Wolves and the Heaven’s Leap cult are being portrayed as evil entities whose ulterior motives remain unknown. It’s also interesting to see how the Cult is being positively acknowledged by the Sybil System and all of the religious leaders have this egoistic demeanor where they boldly challenge the Agents to check their hues.
As I always say, there sure is a lot going on in this season, but Episode 5, especially for someone with a short attention span, is a bit too overwhelming with the vast array of ideas that tries it presents in its 45-minute run. The animation quality is something I wouldn’t concern myself with unless it keeps dwindling in the coming episodes as well. Overall, almost as much as I did earlier, I’m certainly enjoying Season 3 and I’m specifically curious about the links between all of its omnipresent antagonists. Not to mention, all the conspicuous red flags around Kei’s wife really have my attention now, and as sadistic as this might sound, I’ll really be disappointed now if nothing happens to her in the next few episodes.
Read More: Psycho Pass Season 3 Episode 4 Review
