The OVAs take what the main series does best, absurd comedy that lands harder because these characters are actually fighting for their lives, and remove any obligation to advance the plot, so the insanity can just breathe. Episode 3 hits different because it earns its catharsis; you've watched these people suffer through two seasons, so when the show lets them just exist together, it breaks you. This is Golden Kamuy stripped down to why you actually watch it: Sugimoto being an idiot, Asirpa's deadpan delivery, and the weird family they've built surviving another day.

Golden Kamuy 2nd Season OVA is a set of three episodes released in 2019, each packaged with a volume of the Golden Kamuy manga: the 17th, 19th and 23rd. The genres are action, adventure and comedy. The episode titles point to a prison break driven by love, a fight with a huge venomous snake in the Hokkaido wilderness, a story called Monster, and one named after Seton's animal stories.