English Dub Review: Kuma Kuma Kuma Bear “Bear, Goes to Sea”

Overview (Spoilers Below):

Fina is delighted to discover that Kumayuru and Kumakyuu can change size. Yuna muses about how she leveled up during their time in Royal Capital.

She reminisces about the people she was able to help, and the excitement of opening a restaurant. It seems like she’s gotten everything she wants out of this game…except for some decent seafood.

Determined to track down some traditional Japanese cuisine, she sets course for Millela. Although the neighboring town is technically nearby, it requires crossing a dangerous snowy mountain range.

While on her way, she daydreams about setting up a transfer gate and chats with Fina on the bear phone. But their conversation comes to an abrupt end when Yuna and her bears discover a couple collapsed in the snow. She magics up a bear house and helps them recover.

They introduce themselves as Damon and Yuura, and explain they were headed to Crimonia in search of food. Yuna asks why they didn’t take a safer route, and they tell her about the kraken and band of thieves terrorizing the town.

The giant squid has decimated the fishing industry, and the thieves prevent hunting, causing food shortages in the area, and driving them to extreme actions like attempting to cross the mountains.

Yuna escorts them back to town, and decides to help. She heads to the adventurer’s guild and meets with the guildmaster, Atola.

Wowed by her credentials, Atola accepts Yuna’s donation of wolf meat, and even butchers the monsters herself.

When two bandits attempt to attack Yuna that night in her sleep, she apprehends them and forces them to tell her where the thieves’ hideout is.

The outlaws are just discussing moving on to greener pastures, when their marauding aspirations go up in a bear shaped puff of smoke.

Our take:

I’m consistently impressed by this show’s ability to find new adventures for Yuna.

I’m even more entertained by the fact that her self-imposed quests are usually the result of her craving some particular foodstuffs. In this case, seafood.

I’m not big on seafood myself (growing up in a double land-locked state makes me wary of fishy cuisine) but anime always makes it look SO good. Yuna’s rant about which traditional Japanese fare she misses the most (complete with illustrations of her heart, er, stomach’s desires) is a rapid-fire buffet of deliciously drawn dishes.

But the humor is where this episode really shines. Yuna’s deadpan “you fish, bro?” when Damon reveals his job as a fisherman, and her reaction to meeting Atola for the first time are two moments that are on par for this show’s approach, and yet well worth the watch of this episode alone.

I don’t know if the translation was cleaned up a bit for Yuna’s response to Atola, but hearing Marissa Lenti ask “uh, sorry is this an adult establishment?” while being hit on by the bikini clad guildmaster is comedy gold.

The character’s sea change between her “drunk and flirty” facade to “running on caffeine but happy to help” is also amazing, and serves to really highlight Amber Lee Connors’ (who also voices Vernal in RWBY) impressive range. Not every VA can switch seamlessly between breathy seductive tones and manic, flame-inducing energy, but she absolutely nails it. I’m looking forward to hearing more from her next episode!