The Summer 2023 Anime Preview Guide

Bungo Stray Dogs Season 5

Dostoyevsky might be in jail, but that doesn't mean that he's entirely out of the picture. After overcoming the Rats in the House of the Dead, the Armed Detective Agency and the Port Mafia have no time to rest, as a new Dostoyevsky-affiliated group quickly rears its ugly head. The Decay of Angels is even more ruthless than their predecessors and even worse, one of their members has a page from The Book – and anything written on it becomes reality. Decay of Angels uses this to frame the Armed Detective Agency as terrorists, and only Atsushi and Kyoka are able to truly escape the setup.

Their pursuit of the real villains leads them to a mysterious casino in the sky, where it turns out that even what they thought they knew may, in fact, be wrong. While Dazai gets himself thrown into the same prison as Dostoyevsky to attack from that angle, the rest of the Agency is racing against the clock to stop Decay of Angels – although it already may be too late.

Bungo Stray Dogs Season 5 is based on Kafka Asagiri and Sango Harukawa's Bungo Stray Dogs manga. It streams on Crunchyroll on Wednesdays.

You'd think it wouldn't need saying by this point in literary history, but apparently it does: never underestimate a master detective. Maybe it's because most of the authors who appear in Bungo Stray Dogs aren't mystery writers, or maybe it just comes down to the characters' personalities, but this episode's finale makes it very clear that people ignore Ranpo at their own peril – and Poe too, for that matter. While the entire episode is good, Ranpo's brilliant performance in the end absolutely steals the show, and since Nikolai is also a player here, that takes some doing.

Unlike most seasons of this series, we jump back into the action without mucking around in the past first. On one level, that's too bad because the next past arc in line is about Chuuya and Dazai at age sixteen, and it's terrific. On the other, given where the previous set of episodes left us, the impulse to dive back into the main action is smart. After all, when we last saw our book buddies, Dazai and Dostoyevsky were in prison, the world believed that the Armed Detective Agency were terrorists, Sigma had fallen off an airship, and Atsushi, Lucy, Ango, and Kyoka were all hiding in Lucy's power. At the same time, the rest of the Agency were captives. To not pick back up where we left off would have been cruel.

The first half of the episode does an excellent job of reminding us of everything at stake while also revealing a few cards the plot had been hiding, namely that Sigma and Nikolai are alive. While Nikolai's explanation of how he used his space manipulation power to save his own life feels a little forced (how he saved Sigma's makes much more immediate sense), the importance of realizing that he's still kicking is significant. Sigma's more of a wild card, but his attempt to convey to Atsushi everything he knew in his “final” moments suggests he could be a valuable ally. Indeed, he's not thrilled that Dostoyevsky appears to have tried to kill him, and having both Nikolai and Sigma as potential turncoats could help change things in the Agency's favor.

It does feel a little jumpy as if they're trying to cram just a bit too much into a short amount of time, but Ranpo's press conference at the end (and the way he stops Poe from claiming too much credit) make up for a lot in the second half. Other highlights include Ango's dry commentary on Lucy and Kyoka's feelings for Atsushi and Kunikida's angst as he tries to figure out how he will move forward from here, especially without his hands.

Tides may be turning, plots are heating up as Atsushi zeroes in on where the Page is, and the Agency begins dusting itself off. This is a solid start to the new season, and as manga readers know, it just takes off from here.