REVIEW: ‘Delico’s Nursery’ Episode 2 — “Creeping Intrigue and Child-Rearing”

The amount of world-building and exposition is ridiculous. Delico’s Nursery Episode 2 “Creeping Intrigue and Child-Rearing,” is finding some footing between the scenes of solving the Vamp Agency case and the noble vampire men figuring out the best way to raise their children. This episode pushes the child-rearing chaos and pandemonium to the forefront, sprinkling in some hints of mystery and intrigue amongst Dali Delico and his babysitting team of vampire men.

Delico’s Nursery Episode 2 kicks off with the children mucking and sulking about the Delico estate (the HQ for the mission). When one kid cries, so do the others. Classic toddlers. While Gerhard Fra, Henrique Lorca, and Dino Classico try to review the murder cases that are racking up as the days pass, Dali is having a fun time studying the kids’ behaviors.

Carrying over some of the hints these noble vampire men left from the last episode, Dali is the coolest among them. Gerhard is the parent who is extremely tough on his son Angelico, typically telling him to be quiet when he is crying or not acting “noble.” Despite his reluctance to do their jobs and raise their kids, he tries his best in this episode by trying to one-up Dali and show he’s a good caregiver.

As for the other two dads, Henrique is about as laissez-faire as a parent could get, which is funny later on when he’s eating dinner with his wife—who’s the stern one in their relationship. He has twins, Elena and Lucia. Dino is more calm yet enigmatic and calculating. His one son, Theodore, appears to be the oldest of everyone’s children, a quiet boy who likes to read independently. Theodore also has a walking and talking teddy bear, which is creepy because it comes out of nowhere.

So far, Dino’s been good at telling the audience and Henrique some of the side plots, such as speculating how Gerhard supposedly killed Dali’s wife, Frieda. He essentially explains how vampires in this world have the ability to compel other people, other vampires included. It’s sort of like how almost every vampire in The Vampire Diaries does it, except the vampires have to bite their target for the compulsion to work.

The episode nears its end by looking at the Vamp Agency’s main cast as they interact with their wives and kids before bedtime. The most interesting interaction to note is that Dino has no wife, explaining to his butler that he’s had so many wives that have left him. The butler suggests taking another wife, but Dino says something interesting—noting that a wife is not an accessory. Big kudos to Dino here, but then he has a weird laugh that makes him come off as a psycho.

By the end of the episode and the next day, the council of vampire fathers reconvene at Dali’s HQ mansion to hear some new developments to the case. The group looking and murdering people to find the TRUMP aka the True of Vamp (the original vampire) is called Pendulum. Dali is immediately amused upon learning that this splinter group of vampires have reappeared on his radar, as he mentions he’s had encounters with the organization before.

Delico’s Nursery Episode 2 does a good job of somewhat smoothly working in exposition throughout the episode and doing callbacks to important details. The latest development shows how the compulsion power works when one of the Police of the Blood (vampire police?) members warns the Vamp Agency with a threat from Pendulum before killing himself. Also, the true story behind Frieda’s death could be significant to the TRUMP murder plot, but the show is really just giving small bits to uncover that plot point finally.

Not sure if having pictures of bloodied bodies around kids is good child-rearing skills, but Delico’s Nursery Episode 2 kind of shows how fallible these men are at taking care of their offspring. All of the kids are pretty cute in their individual ways, only some coming close to Anya Forger from Spy x Family. But Delico’s Nursery is not as light-hearted as Buddy Daddies or School Babysitters, primarily because of the murder case.

The animation holds true to the first episode, not much action happened even when the Pendulum members are shown walking through the streets. Two of the only action scenes so far in the last episode and Delico’s Nursery Episode 2 hasn’t demonstrated any frames of the action occurring. It’s usually just cutting to people dying or cutting to after the fight. If this is the purposeful, stylistic choice going forward, it could get a little boring—more so for the viewers who care more about this series’s thriller/mystery aspects. Overall, Delico’s Nursery Episode 2 hangs on many loose threads that will probably reveal themselves in shocking ways in the rest of the season.

Delico’s Nursery every Wednesday on Crunchyroll.