Welcome to Demon School, Iruma-kun Season 4

Episode 11

It makes sense that the demons wouldn't necessarily know what a friend is. Their whole society is, supposedly, based on being evil, and bad guys are kind of notorious for not having real friends or, in some cases, becoming evil because of the loss of them. (See: Poro) So even though it's quite obvious that demons have friends, they're probably not used to thinking of them in those terms, or any terms, really. Azz has at least a basic concept of the idea, but as you can see, his Azzpedia doesn't have the most…current definitions. So even though it's plain that the entire Misfit Class is made up of friends, the fact that they don't think of themselves as such is the clearest divide between human and demon that we've seen in a while…and the alacrity with which they adopt Iruma's more accurate definition and scramble to say they're all friends demonstrates the influence Iruma has on them.

I love that give-and-take dynamic this series has. As it goes on, there's less of a distinction between “human” and “demon” in a lot of ways, and all of the misfits are becoming a near-perfect blend of the two. Just look at the way Iruma has started painting his nails this season; it's a small change, but one that shows his growing comfort and confidence in the netherworld. Garp and Agares' friendship is another good example; they've gone from not interacting all that much to being thick as thieves, demonstrating a new, closer bond that they don't have a name for. Forget the love that dare not speak its name – for the demons, just being friends is weird enough that they don't have a definition for it, meaning that before this episode, they didn't have a way to quantify their relationships. And yes, not everything needs labels. But the advent of this label shows how everyone is changing through getting to know each other, and that's both lovely to see and thematically important, because with Kiriwo back, Iruma's secret is in danger. The sooner the Misfit Class accepts Iruma as a friend and a person, the smoother things should go when the cat gets out of the bag.

Juxtaposing the two halves of this episode helps to highlight the dual worlds the misfits are living in. The entire friendship debacle is barely over when Lead's crush on Elizabetta starts to make him suspicious and jealous of the other boys in class. He's recently spent time being thrilled with the concept of “friends,” but when it comes to Elizabetta, all bets are off for him. The extended trial scene where he convicts his pals of spending more time with the object of his affections during the musical is very Lead, blaming other people for purported crimes as a way to mask his personal discomfort. He's basically turning the whole thing into a game and getting all of the boys to join in, which makes his decision to charge Purson with crimes particularly serious. It shows that Lead considers Purson to be a member of the group just like anyone else in class, and Purson plays along beautifully. He's got a bit of a sly sense of humor, that one, as we see both when he's defending (or maybe “defending”) himself and when Lead realizes that he's lurking and he tries to deny it.

This is also the most we've seen of Dosanko in a while. She's not a character who works with too much screentime because she's kind of one-note, but it's always fun to have her put in an appearance with her amazing self-confidence and stories of lost loves. Ameri's also been MIA for much of this season, although that makes sense, given that she's not a first-year. But it looks like next week is going to be her moment, so just be patient a little longer: the real queen's return is foretold in the episode preview.

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Welcome to Demon School, Iruma-kun is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.