Five years of a gag that refused to move an inch, and then this season actually pays. Satou finally stops burning his cigarette down over Yachiyo and says the thing, and Todoroki has to put the katana down long enough to hear it. Inami's androphobia stops being a punchline and becomes a distance two people are actively trying to close. Meanwhile Souma is still smiling while he blackmails everyone, Kyouko is still eating parfaits on the clock, and Popura is still not short. The knock is fair: the joke formula is a metronome, and marathoning it flattens the comedy, so ration it like the Wagnaria staff rations actual work. But the last stretch lands because you sat through three seasons of nobody changing, which is exactly what makes it hit when they finally do.

The third season of Working!! goes back to Wagnaria, a family restaurant in Hokkaido, for one last round of workplace comedy. Souta Takanashi, who loves anything small and cute, is starting to fall for Mahiru, who is afraid of men, but he cannot admit it to himself, much to the amusement of Hiroomi and Kirio. Kirio at last runs into his missing sister Aoi, who has been living in the restaurant's attic and would rather keep Hiroomi as her big brother than go home. Manager Hyougo keeps hunting for his wife Haruna, who gets lost easily, and Jun, who has had a crush on Yachiyo for four years, learns her birthday is the next day and finally finds the courage to give her the presents he has been buying all that time.