Kaijin Kaihatsubu no Kuroitsu-san

Miss Kuroitsu from the Monster Development Department has a clever concept-following the behind-the-scenes struggles of an evil organization's R&D division as they create monsters to fight heroes. It plays with tokusatsu tropes in a way that could be really fun, and at times, it delivers some amusing moments. The corporate satire and bureaucracy of villainy make for some decent laughs.

However, the execution feels lacking. The humor is hit-or-miss, the animation quality is inconsistent, and the characters, while quirky, don't develop much beyond their initial gimmicks. The episodic nature makes it easy to watch, but it also means there's little payoff by the end. While it has its charms for tokusatsu fans, it doesn't do enough to stand out in the crowded anime landscape.

Overall, it's a decent time-waster, but not much more than that.

We have all seen shows where heroes battle evil villains but few where the protagonists work behind the scenes... in this case those who make the monsters the heroes are destined to defeat. Of course as they work they constantly hope that they will have finally come up with the monster that will win. Our protagonists work for Agastia, one of these evil corporations, to make something to defeat the hero 'Divine Swordsman Blader'. The heroes are the least of their problems; they come up with great ideas but penny pinching and corporate thinking spoil them. This means many of their creations are more likable than evil.

I thought this series was a lot of fun. Our protagonists may work for an 'evil' corporation but nobody involved appears to be genuinely evil... or even particularly unpleasant. There are plenty of battles but these don't take up too much time and are fun rather than intense. These fights scenes are definitely outnumbered by more humorous character led scenes. These characters are entertaining; most obviously the eponymous Miss Toka Kuroitsu. Other leads include Wolf Bete, a wolf man who due to a change of plans ends up in a cute wolf-girl body; and Cannon Thunderbird, a robotic bird-monster that is overdesigned and underperforming. The animation and characters designs are all pretty good. Overall I'd certainly recommend this series to anime fans wanting some light-hearted fun.

These comments are based on watching the series in Japanese with English subtitles.