Solo Leveling Ep. 5 “A Pretty Good Deal” is the episode where Sung Jin-woo realizes a very important lesson in life. It’s not that he shouldn’t take unnecessary risks, since he seems to be pretty good at calculated ones. It’s not even that he needs to remember that he has human friends who are just as traumatized as him, although he definitely needs to take a break to do just that. No, the important life lesson he learns is that no matter what, there is no such thing as a free lunch.

Solo Leveling Ep. 5 “A Pretty Good Deal”: Details

Solo Leveling textless key visual.
At least tall Jin-woo finally makes an appearance in this episode.

Solo Leveling Ep. 5 “A Pretty Good Deal” is the fifth episode (you can read reviews for Ep. 1, Ep. 2, Ep. 3, and Ep. 4 here) of the first season of this kinda sorta urban fantasy action anime. Said anime is the anime adaptation of the South Korean web novel and webtoon series of the same name by Chugong. A-1 Pictures (Black Butler, Blue Exorcist, Sword Art Online) is the animation studio behind this anime.

Makiko Hayase is the director and storyboarder behind with Solo Leveling Ep. 5 “A Pretty Good Deal”, with Norimitsu Kaihō as the writer. Shunsuke Nakashige is the director of Solo Leveling overall, with Noboru Kimura also being the writer for the same. Hiroyuki Sawano is the composer of the music you hear in the anime.

Speaking of music: the opening theme music for Solo Leveling as a whole is “Level” by Sawano and Tomorrow X Together. Meanwhile, “Request” by Krage is the ending theme music.

Voice Cast

Solo Leveling Ep. 5 “A Pretty Good Deal” features the voices of Taito Ban (Aleks Le in English dub) as Sung Jin-woo and Genta Nakamura (Justin Briner in English dub) as Yoo Jin-ho. The other notable voice role in this episode is Haruna Mikawa (Rebecca Wang in English dub) as Sung Jin-ah.

When and Where to Watch

Solo Leveling Ep. 5 “A Pretty Good Deal” made its airing and streaming debut on February 3, 2024. You can watch this episode only on Crunchyroll. In fact, you can watch this entire anime only on Crunchyroll for the moment.

Solo Leveling Ep. 5 “A Pretty Good Deal”: Synopsis

At last, this guy starts to make his appearance. He just hasn’t shown off his dedication to his video game obsession yet.

Alas, Solo Leveling as a whole is a very new anime. In fact, Solo Leveling Ep. 5 “A Pretty Good Deal” only just premiered 3 days ago as of this writing. Thus, you will all be getting the official synopsis from Crunchyroll instead to give you all an idea of what to expect from this episode. You can read that below:

Jinwoo joins a party led by Hwang Dongsuk to meet the headcount necessary for a C-Rank dungeon. Joined by another temporary hire, Yoo Jinho, the party defeats beasts without much trouble, but Jinwoo has suspicions about the group’s lack of a healer.

Solo Leveling Ep. 5 “A Pretty Good Deal”: The Good

Solo Leveling Ep. 5 "A Pretty Good Deal" screenshot showing Yoo Jin-ho being a young, naive, joyful fool.
Good thing about this episode: new main character! Hopefully.

As always, it’s the action sequence of Solo Leveling Ep. 5 “A Pretty Good Deal” that takes the first and foremost place in it. Seriously, if you’ve been watching the past 4 episodes, then you can see for yourself that this is the anime equivalent of an action film. Unlike live-action action films though, anime has to animate each action scene in art form. Which fortunately, Solo Leveling as a whole accomplishes, including this particular episode. The action in this episode is just as fluid as the previous episode. Despite how chaotic it gets, you never lose the flow of the battle. You can perfectly follow it along with Sung Jin-woo, who, amazingly, is mostly a spectator in this battle. He does get a chance to shine a bit, but it’s in such an offhanded way. As though he barely notices it and then moves on.

However, amazingly enough, this particular episode of Solo Leveling isn’t all about the action this time. It actually has a plotline. Admittedly, it’s not a particularly complex plotline. You can see the “plot twist” from miles away due to how much the episode telegraphs it. Still, it’s a step up from the usual fare of zero plotline. It’s not much of a step, but I’m glad it’s there. Now if Chugong builds up on that with a more complex storyline, then this story could be complete. Maybe. Hopefully.

Solo Leveling Ep. 5 “A Pretty Good Deal”: The Bad

Solo Leveling Ep. 5 "A Pretty Good Deal" screenshot showing Sung Jin-woo with a doubtful look on his face.
Even Jin-woo senses that there’s something off here.

I do have a complaint about Solo Leveling Ep. 5 “A Pretty Good Deal”. I feel like Sung Jin-woo seems to be almost completely abandoning his life in the real world for this game of his. He gets to talk to his sister once in this episode, and that’s it. Heck, Lee Joo-hee doesn’t show up in this episode at all despite that very first Ep. 1 implying that they were dating or at least were very good friends. And yet, Sung Jin-woo doesn’t even so much as mention her. I guess I was just wrong about that bit, and I guess he didn’t know her that well after all? Seems like a bit of a plot hole to me, but alrighty.