School-Live Archives | Page 2 of 2

Review:

I ended up watching this show after reading D’s review of episode 1, so didn’t really know where it went after that and I must say episode 2 was a delightful surprise. My current suspicion from this is that the teacher is also an illusion that Yuki is seeing but one that the other girls treat like an imaginary friend. I wonder if that’s true or if the stilted interactions and the teacher randomly appearing at times and not being around at others are just part of the added creepiness but my bet is she doesn’t exist.

Outside of the ongoing questions about how much of what we are seeing is real and how much is in Yuki’s head, episode 2 gives us far more insight into the other girls and particularly Kurumi as the episode begins and ends with her having some seriously nasty flashbacks and we also see her in action against the zombies.

These scenes are such a stark contrast with the happy go lucky and bright colours we normally see and the juxtaposition from slice of life school romp to full on zombie horror is really well handled. It isn’t jarring but rather feels like the brightness exists only to show how dark things can get and it means they don’t have to push too far to make these darker moments horrific. By the very nature of the music and colour change as well as the expressions on the faces of the characters, horror is created and almost more effectively than in a show that showers the audience with buckets of blood every other scene.

We also realise that the girls didn’t start in the school given there’s a reference to one of them surviving in a mall and we realise they don’t know how far the zombies have spread or if there is anyone left to come and rescue them.

I like that despite the fact that they can fight the occasional lone zombie this group aren’t arming up and trying to fight their way through the horde (at least not yet but I guess if their supply situation gets too bad it would be a different story). It is rare to see a zombie tale where the main characters really are just sitting and waiting, trying to survive without moving around or fighting every other moment.

Very much enjoying this so far but we’ll see how the rest of the story unfolds.

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Overview:

I picked this up after reading the first couple of D’s (D Talks Anime) write ups on this series last month. While I’m not overly keen on slice of life stories set around clubs of cute girls in high school, zombie stories tend to fascinate me and the mix of the two seemed pretty irresistible so I had to at least give this one a go. Fortunately it was available on Crunchyroll.

Review:

If I didn’t know what this show was about and hadn’t read what the twist was for the first episode, I don’t know how far I would have watched. But much like Life (movie reviewed here) knowing where this was going actually helped because it made me a more alert viewer. Small details that may have been overlooked were everywhere in the early parts of the series as we watched Yuki go about her ‘normal’ school day.

There’s so much deliberate irony in this episode and it works really well. I liked how background characters were frequently out of focus or pretty much just outlines, the way we lingered on shots of the window, the table barricade (wait, why is that there), the classrooms. I loved the way her friend reacted every time Yuki mentioned a class and the way she hesitated before calling into the room to chase the dog. Even smaller things like the book being read in the club room that is an obvious Stephen King knock off (I think the one decent look I got at the author had it written as Steppen King). It’s really well done so even though you are watching cute girls run around a school chasing an excessively cute and overly dexterous puppy, there’s plenty to engage you. And then there is this:

Yep, Yuki is delusional and the end of the episode pulls the veil off of the school and lets the audience see things as they are. Now I’m stuck with questions such as how did these girls manage to barricade themselves in the school when whatever caused the zombie outbreak occurred and how many of the other characters we’ve met are actually real? Very intriguing beginning.

Are you a fan of 100WordAnime.blog?

If you like this site and you like what I do, consider becoming a patron.

Thanks,

Karandi James.