WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid S Episode 2, "Hot Guy Kobayashi! (In Many Ways)," now streaming on Crunchyroll.
The Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid S season premiere introduced the radical chaos dragon Ilulu as a new enemy for Kobayashi and her dragon friends. But just one episode later, Kobayashi is already redeeming and even befriending Ilulu, who becomes shockingly sympathetic after her aggressive introduction. Resolving their conflict also resolves the issue of Kobayashi's magically-induced sex change -- though surprisingly and impressively, that was apparently never a big deal to begin with.
Kobayashi as a "hot guy" (as the title puts it) is the exact same character Kobayashi has always been in terms of both appearance and personality. The only real issue caused by this sudden change in anatomy is that Kobayashi's sex drive has increased and physical contact with girls has become a lot more awkward as a result. Tohru uses this as an opportunity to try to seduce her "master," which she comedically flubs by not realizing Kobayashi still finds her more attractive in a maid outfit than naked. She's female again by the end of the episode, but there's no need for a big "changing back" scene because the change was never a serious problem.
Ilulu, however, could be a problem, not only for the trouble she's causing but also the trouble she's attracting. The same night Kobayashi goes to confront Ilulu, a dragon from the Harmony Faction named Cremene is trying to hunt her down. Rescuing Ilulu from the hunter, Kobayashi has a heart-to-heart with the chaos dragon that reveals her traumatic past -- and an opportunity for genuine connection.
It turns out Ilulu had human friends as a child, but after her parents were killed in the war, the Chaos Faction indoctrinated her into hating humans -- even though she always just wanted to play with them. Kobayashi relates this indoctrination to her own patterns of following orders as an office worker, saying this sort of rote routine is easy when you don't have friends to hold onto. The other dragons have brought joy into Kobayashi's life, and Ilulu realizes they can do the same for her if she gives them a chance. Tohru arrives to defeat Cremene once and for all, and now Kobayashi and Tohru's household has a new member.
The final section of the episode, with Ilulu adjusting to life with Kobayashi and Tohru, is pure comedic delight. Ilulu's bizarre design is given a fittingly bizarre explanation: she's so bad at transformation magic that she needs her breasts to be absurdly huge in order to maintain a form at all. This also explains why she doesn't usually transform her claws and tail; when she tries to form humanoid hands, they're hilarious monstrosities best described as a cross between The Powerpuff Girls and Junji Ito. Ilulu's extreme forwardness in her completely unreciprocated feelings about Kobayashi is just icing on the cake. She might not be a villain anymore, but Ilulu is an increasingly amusing source of chaos.
New episodes of Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid S stream Wednesdays on Crunchyroll.
