Review of Umamusume: Pretty Derby Season 3

It’s been a while since I’ve watched Umamusume. That probably colors my opinion of Season 3 for the better since, even by my memory, Season 3 is more of the same kind of character developments, tensions, and emotional moments from the seasons before it — which I think is good! It might not be the best back-to-back-to-back is my main point here, but if you’ve made it this far then I think Season 3 will give you more of what you like. Kitasan Black is the main protagonist, and right out of the gate both her animations and voice are very expressive. At first I thoughtshe had too many motivations that suddenly got left behind one after the other (…that were then sparingly brought up as if they stuck around which was weird). But trust the process: it actually works out for her arc well enough. I also think the bumpiness that went into her climb — as well as what happened near the end of the anime — made for a unique and engaging watch.

Satono Diamond is a weird case that I think showcases how the main focus is Kitasan. Despite being set up as Kitasan’s childhood friend and rival, they have two different stories going on where they only occasionally clash. But when they clash, their dynamic works very well! And I don’t think the two of them doing their own thing diluted the plot like I feared, simply because I was invested in Dia’s story as well. Well, moreso in the last half since the superstition stuff isn’t my cup of tea (except for the part where she took it head-on; that was fun). Though admittedly her story did start to feel like a B-Plot. Still, I think they pulled it back into Kitasan’s plot often enough as well as gave it enough time, so it didn’t feel pointless.

Unfortunately, most of the side characters felt too shafted. And I really do mean “unfortunately” because by the end I wanted to see more of all of them! Season 3 just doesn’t give the side characters enough development, but constantly acts like it is/did.
Gold Ship is an exception where I think she had the perfect amount of time and spacing to influence Kitasan, and in a way that was surprisingly sincere.
Duramente very quickly takes a back seat despite me loving how straightforward she is—I mean, despite how much she’s built up at the start. She still shows up and it’s nice when she does, but she definitely doesn’t nail the final boss vibe she was presented as.
I was very happy with Nice Nature’s great role as a surprise sensei (and her fun opinion of it too). Then…it took a surprisingly sour turn before dropping out of the plot entirely without resolving said sourness. I get that it’s supposed to be a joke (that they even kept bringing back after), but it just didn’t work as one.
Cheval Grand was definitely supposed to be a bigger deal than she was. Her perspective on the events of the season were basically completely absent until the very end. She definitely would’ve been a stronger character if her thoughts in that one scene were sprinkled throughout! I know because that one scene had me actually care about her immediately!
Also, I’m surprised Teio didn’t do much at all despite Kitasan having such immediate access to her. I wonder if that was so she didn’t steal the spotlight after having her own entire season (which could be applied to all of Spica this season too).
Otherwise, I think this season had a lot of fun with making scenarios where a bunch of other horse girls could show up and do their thing, even if only for a few seconds. It was always nice to be reminded of everyone else’s little goings-on.

I think the most notable thing about this season is that the pacing with the race frequency is very fast. Multiple races can happen in one episode! You’d think this would mean the build-up to each race is underwhelming, but I didn’t feel that way at all. I think Season 3 had a really fresh momentum without any real downsides. Though there’s definitely still something to be said about the format that treats each race as a climax to a pocket of plot.
As an aside, the muddy race was a very good one. I don’t find the races as repetitive and samey as some people probably do, but more variety and strategies akin to that would be very welcome!

Season 3 got me tearing up just like all of the other series before it, which I expected going in. I wasn’t expecting it to happen as early as Episode 2 though. As the show went on, I surprisingly didn’t get too emotional too frequently (or, at least as frequently as I remember from the previous seasons). Still, when happy or serious moments happened (and they happened often), I was still mesmerized. Heck, they even pull out the black credits screen almost half the time because of the intense tone in a lot of episodes.

Unfortunately, I think this season is definitely the worst when it comes to being repetitive. There are so many flashbacks as well as characters repeating the same things ad nauseam that cutting it all down to a fine level probably could’ve made this 12 episodes instead of 13. And, while it’s nice to see everyone’s in-person motivations, I think they try to remind the viewer of them way too often.

Still, Season 3 is definitely more of what I love about Umamusume. A cute, fun main character overcoming emotional moments still hasn’t gotten old to me. I can’t properly compare it to previous stories (especially because of my uncommon bias for Season 1), but I don’t think it needs to be compared at the end of the day.

(Also, something has to be said about the music. It can get very weird at times. I don’t know if I like it or not, but it definitely stood out compared to the usual music.)