What do you do at the end of the world? Are you busy? Will you save us? (SukaSuka)

Episode 3

Chtholly may have accepted her role in the upcoming suicide mission, but Willem isn't keen on the idea of letting her march off to certain death. He combs through the records of previous battles (with some help from Nephren) and decides there's a better way for the fairies to use their weapons. Chtholly isn't impressed by Willem's ideas, but his demonstration leads to a medical emergency and forces Nygglatho to reveal his identity to the girls. As Chtholly begins to change her mind about the mission, Willem agrees to a familiar promise on the condition that she makes it back alive.

SukaSuka has placed Willem in an interesting position, at least as far as the dug weapons are concerned. He has plenty of knowledge from his time as a soldier, but his body is so weak that a few minutes of sparring practice are enough to put him out of commission. This means he'll likely end up acting as a mentor to the fairy girls, which is a role that's normally filled by a supporting character. This has the potential to strike a neat, if somewhat unusual balance; Willem can affect the outcome of the battle, but not in the direct manner that a protagonist normally would. The weapons themselves are also rather intriguing, and the idea of assembling talismans into the shape of a sword feels a little more creative than the average weapon lore info-dump.

This episode also digs into Willem and Chtholly's backstories, though the results are mixed. On paper, SukaSuka makes a lot of reasonable decisions. We now have an explanation for how Willem woke up in this new era, and there's a plausible motivation behind Chtholly's rejection of his advice. Most of the pieces seem to fit together, but I feel like they should pack more of an emotional punch than they do. This might be due to a relative lack of new information. We already had a pretty good grasp of Willem's situation from the first two episodes, so the details of how he was revived don't really add any new personal dimensions to his story. It was also fairly obvious that Chtholly and company weren't the first fairies to be used in battle, so it's not a big surprise that she's already seen friends leave for a mission and never come back. This episode helps to clarify the characters' situations, but it comes up short in the drama department.

Tonal inconsistency is also an issue. SukaSuka continues to cling to some unnecessary light novel tropes in this episode, even though it might be better off discarding them entirely. Revisiting the awkward bedside exchange between Willem and Chtholly only serves us to remind us of how quickly the fanservice derailed that conversation, and having Chtholly freak out after the fact isn't enough of a comedic payoff to make it worthwhile. The show could also do without Ithea's recurring jokes about Willem's romantic inclinations, as these jabs end up distracting from any attempts to build up a family dynamic within the warehouse. SukaSuka is close to being a good series, but it will need to shed some of its genre baggage if it's going to tackle a more ambitious storyline.

This episode does enough to keep the ball rolling, but not much more. We get some useful (if minor) details, there's a clear path forward for the story, and no major narrative mistakes are made. On the other hand, the show's mysterious atmosphere is starting to fade as the backstory gets filled in, and it'll need some stronger emotional beats to make up the difference. The upcoming battle may prove to be a make-or-break point for SukaSuka, and the series will need to deliver some truly compelling scenes to prove that it's the real deal.

Rating: B-

What do you do at the end of the world? Are you busy? Will you save us? is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.