The Spring 2024 Anime Preview Guide

The Duke of Death and His Maid Season 3

As a child, a young Duke was cursed by a witch, making it so he would kill anything he came into direct contact with. He was shunned by his family and forced to live in a separate estate with one butler named Rob and a young maid named Alice. Despite never being allowed to hold each other, Alice and the Duke develop a strong relationship, resolving himself to break the curse to live a life with her. Such a task will not be easy, but through the friends these two have made in the human, witch, and wizard world, the possibility of breaking this curse only grows stronger with each passing day. After leveling up their magic and realizing that Alice's mother had broken her curse, will our Duke finally get the happy life he deserves?

The Duke of Death and His Maid season three is based on Koharu Inoue's manga of the same name. The anime series is streaming on Crunchyroll on Sundays.

I'm so happy to return to one of my favorite tragic anime couples for a third time. The Duke of Death and His Maid is a hidden gem that I don't think enough people talk about, striking the perfect balance between adorable wholesomeness and bitter tragedy. Season one was all about establishing the relationship between our two main characters. In contrast, season two seemed more about developing the supporting cast and expanding on the show's world-building. Season three looks like it's not wasting any time getting into the setup for the final confrontation of the show. The story already established that curses inflicted by the former head witch could be broken, as we saw with Alice's mother; now they have to ensure everything is in place to undo the curse inflicted on the Duke and others so everyone can get their happily ever after.

The first half of this episode picks up right after the finale of season two left off, with our extended cast being taught the ways of magic to level themselves up. There's a lot of cute and goofy charm here that almost felt out of place, even by the show's standards. The school national anthem being played twice in the first fifteen minutes made me laugh, but I was a bit worried we were deviating too much away from the main appeal of the series. Thankfully, the final third of the episode brought it home by bringing the focus back to the Duke and Alice. I like the underlying idea that Alice and the Duke have been through so much that something as extraordinary as seeing Alice's mom again doesn't warrant a huge reaction. I'm sure this isn't the last time we will see her, as it would be nice to see more interactions between Alice and her mother or even more direct conversations between the Duke and Alice's mother about the two getting married in the future. I hope that is coming later because it felt like all the conversations here happened very quickly.

The chemistry between all the characters carries the episode, though. When the Duke says that he's going to protect Alice and make sure that she is happy so as not to repeat the mistakes of her father, that's when I feel like the show is coming back to its roots. Overall, it was a solid end to an OK episode. We have our mission, we have our foundation, and now the question is, how exactly will the main overarching problem be solved? Give me that with plenty of funny and cute moments in between, and I will be a satisfied customer!

I'm so happy to see my favorite shy, death-bringing, high-society noble and his spectacularly horny maid return for their concluding season. With this first episode, we start exactly where the last season left off, with our core cast of characters attending a whimsical wizard school, honing their skills, and researching ways to neutralize the main antagonist, the capricious and terrifying witch Sade.

Red-headed witch Cuff has been training so hard on her offensive fire magic that she falls asleep standing up (I love that she's drawn fake irises on her eyelids to feign attention during classes), so obviously, one of the other female students licks her cheek, activating magic "to return her to her original state," much to the excitement/distress of the besotted Zain. Compared to the other wizard students, one announces she "can cut anything." In contrast, the third student speaks in some unintelligible dialect that requires rainbow-colored Japanese subtitles in addition to English. Her magic comprises making things go "CRACKLE BOOM." We've only just been introduced to this bizarre trio of oddballs, and I already want them to never leave.

Next, we're treated to one of Duke of Death's signature conceits – the impromptu musical number! And it's reprised later in the episode too! I can't think of many other non-children's anime that randomly burst into song every episode, but Duke of Death's whimsical energy is so buoyantly light-hearted that it seems to fit. This episode, in particular, seems so hyperactively insane from the outset that, of course, Zain gets to experience what CRACKLE BOOM means. Multiple times. Poor Zain never gets a break.

Almost every one of the delightful extended cast gets at least a moment or two to shine this episode, from blushing witch Daleth fantasizing about becoming human so she can be with Walter, the Duke's brother, to newly-awoken maid Sharon, who enjoys a heartfelt reunion with her now-grown-up daughter Alice. The circumstances of Sharon's sleeping curse removal remain unclear for now, as do the details of many of the show's long-running underlying mysteries. It's exciting to know that all of our questions will soon be answered! Even The Duke and Alice get a little time to be cute to one another, with him even causing Alice to blush for once, when he confidently declares to her mother how he will always stand by her daughter. Sharon's a blast as a character, too – free-spirited and chaotic, and it's obvious how her daughter takes after her.

Despite its still-wonky bargain-basement CG presentation, Duke of Death is a wonderful, wonderful show. I don't care that the production clearly had to cut corners so that it could even exist. This is a deeply odd, gently humorous, genuinely emotional, chaos-driven mishmash of a story that could probably only exist via the medium of manga and anime. It's well worth catching up on, especially as it's guaranteed to end this season, as it successfully adapts the entirety of its source. There aren't that many shows (especially romcoms) you can truly say that about, are there?