The Misfit Class Takes to the Stage: An Interview with Makoto Moriwaki and Setsuo Ito
With Welcome to Demon School, Iruma-kun now in the middle of its fourth season, a room full of enthusiastic fans gathered together at Anime NYC to celebrate the series. After playing a brief trailer for the current season, the host welcomed the anime's chief director, Makoto Moriwaki, and voice actor, Setsuo Itō, the voice of the new character Purson Soi, for a Q&A session to discuss some of their work on the current season, as well as some of their thoughts on Purson's character. Although Purson has existed in the background since the very beginning, it's only in this most recent season that he becomes a prominent character, and that made Ito very nervous about joining in with the rest of the main cast after so long, especially since it's full of so many veteran actors. However, Moriwaki was very impressed by just how fast Ito could deliver his lines as Purson to the point where she could barely tell he was nervous and all, highlighting that one of the biggest strengths in his performance is that even with how fast the character talks, Ito's enunciation allows every line to be heard clearly. Speaking more on Purson's character, Ito said his biggest impression of him is that he's a bit too earnest, especially in how quickly he talks, but he finds that endearing and can relate to him a bit, since he also talks a lot. As for Moriwaki, she hopes that Purson will have the chance to become an even bigger character in future seasons, and have more opportunities to play the trumpet.
Speaking of music, one big talking point during the Q&A session was on the episode “Lilith's Carpet,” which was done entirely as a musical. Between all of the dancing animation required and planning out the choreography, it ended up being a very difficult episode to produce, and required double the amount of staff to complete it, but she takes a lot of pride in managing to successfully pull it off, even showcasing some side-by-side comparisons of the dance choreography used for the motion capture. Aside from that episode, a couple of other highlights of the season for Moriwaki included the dance scene between Iruma and Ameri during the Deviculum, and the episode with Iruma's birthday party, since seeing him surrounded by so many loved ones after starting the series devoid of love from his parents was a moment that really touched her heart. Regarding future episodes, Moriwaki hopes everyone looks forward to the rest of the Demidoll arc and is especially excited for the character Gyari, hoping everyone is excited for her as well. In that regard, Moriwaki stated that love is a strong theme for the season, both with regard to Ameri's love for Iruma and Gyari's love for Kuromu.
Following the panel, we also spoke with Moriwaki-san and Ito-san about their work on the anime.
Was there any particular aspect of the manga that you were drawn to before working on the anime, and what do you enjoy most about the series?
Ito: The thing that drew me in really is the fact that Iruma goes into the Demon World, and even though this world is full of demons, it seems like a very human drama at times. As a reader, I admired Iruma's growth, especially during the Harvest Festival. He was really cool, and I really like the gap between the silly parts of the series and the very serious parts of the series.
Moriwaki: So the thing that drew me in personally is when I first started reading Iruma-kun, it was like, “Wow, this is super interesting and super catchy.” I mean, if you think about it, Iruma is one of the weakest human beings on the planet. And then, without magic or any special powers, he's going to become the Demon King, and that's already a given. The fact that someone like him could become the Demon King was such a draw for me.
What has been your favorite episode or scene to work on from the anime so far?
Ito: For me personally, one of my favorite scenes is when Iruma and Purson talk on the roof. There's also Lilith's Carpet. Even though my character really didn't speak during the performance and was sort of playing the trumpet the whole time, I love it so much.
Moriwaki: I have a lot of favorite episodes, but for today, I'd say my favorite is Episode 16 of Season 2. I call them the four idiots, but basically, Jazz, Goemon, Kamui, and Lied all work together to take down one of the monsters at Walter Park. None of them have a very significant magic ability, but they still somehow work together to bring the monster down.
There are a lot of colorful musical numbers in the show, such as in the episode Lilith's Carpet, that are featured throughout the anime. Could you discuss directing these sequences and the planning that went into creating them?
Moriwaki: I said this at the panel earlier too, but really no one on the animation team thought we could pull this off. When it was decided that we had to do this, most of the staff felt like it really wasn't going to be possible. It usually takes about half a year to create one episode of an anime, and this took four times that, so it took two years. Because it took four times longer to create, I want everyone to watch it at least four times. Since we thought it was so impossible, we're very proud of the fact that we managed to pull it off, and it's very cool that everyone is enjoying it.
How did you end up auditioning for the role of Purson, and what do you like about the character?
Ito: As for how I got the audition in general, the audition offer just came to me through my management or agency. As for why I got the part, I have heard it might be because I look like Purson. I've also heard it might be because Nishi-sensei saw me in another role in another anime, Mob Psycho 100, and they really enjoyed that performance. One of the things I like about him is that there's such a gap between certain parts of his character and his appearance that is such a contrast. No one notices him at all for three seasons in the background, but then when he starts talking, it's super fast and overwhelming. There's also the thing with his face where it's not very emotive, but he's still very emotional. He doesn't show it in his face, but he acts it out when he's rolling around or having a tantrum. It's very fun to play, and that's one of my favorite parts about him.
(For Ito) Purson has a very unique way of speaking in that he sounds very monotone, but is also a big chatterbox. How did you find the right voice for the character and what were some of the difficulties you faced with your performance?
Ito: I don't think I really did anything special, or I was trying to find a certain voice per se, but it's more like Purson's personality just came out. For example, he doesn't talk to very many people; while he's not exactly antisocial, he doesn't know how to interact with others very well, so he's had to learn that. There's also the fact that, again, while he doesn't seem very emotive, he's actually very emotional, and he doesn't really know how to deal with that. So I know. As for hardship, something that was very hard about this role was Purson's very fast lines that go on forever. Whenever I received the script and footage, I would have to finish my set of lines like that too, and I'm like, “Oh, like this is literally impossible for any human to possibly say all that in within that time”. I got into this role in the fourth season, and I didn't really know what to expect until I started, so I practiced a lot at home and really gave it my all to try to do it as fast as possible and as clear as possible. That was basically the hardest part.
Throughout the series, we see how Iruma's actions start to have an effect on all the other students at Babyls and on the entire Demon World. What is it about the character you think makes others so drawn to him?
Moriwaki: Obviously, the Demon World only had demons, but suddenly Iruma shows up, and they don't know he's human. He's the only human, but he has no hostility. He's just a very kind soul, and they were all very shocked at how different he was. There's a very specific scene in Episode 5 of Season 1, where Sabnock challenges Iruma to defeat a giant bird, but then Iruma decides to get in the middle of it to tell him to apologize to the bird, and somehow the bird forgives him. Iruma can make everyone around him feel comfortable because he's such a kind soul, and that spreads out more and more, as the seasons go along. I also believe Nishi-sensei wanted to create a very kind world. I think by the end, he's going to make a very kind Demon World.
While Iruma-kun has mostly been a school comedy, it's also started to take on more fantasy elements as we learn more about the Demon World. How has that affected your approach to the anime, and how do you balance those two sides of the story?
Moriwaki: There are a lot of aspects to the story. There's comedy, there's battles, and fantasy, but I haven't really thought about balancing any of them. It just happens. These incidents happen in the story, and the characters have to overcome them naturally, so everything just happens, and there's a very natural flow in this series, essentially.
Thank you to Moriwaki-san and Ito-san for answering all our questions. Welcome to Demon School, Iruma-kun is currently available for streaming on Crunchyroll.
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