Review of School Days

It has now been several years since the controversy surrounding School Days have come to pass. The meme has faded into relative obscurity, Yandere characters are now a dime a dozen, and that very nice boat has long sailed off into the sunset. With the controversy behind us we can now begin our analysis to determine whether this cult title is a work of incredible bravery and intellectual substance as some have suggested, or the ludicrous eroge turned soap opera as others have claimed. In order to settle the dispute I have striven to make this evaluation as objective as possible, by detachingmyself from the work as far as possible and instead exploring it in the form of a series of hypothetical questions.

School Days is an anime about a love polygon with so many faces that if you were to draw it, a grade schooler would be able identify it correctly. There is nothing wrong with this on a conceptual level, quite the opposite in fact: it's undoubtedly a recipe for intrigue, but one with a high likelihood of failure. Without taking the utmost care about the execution, the story could quickly disintegrate into pure exploitation, rather than the vivid exploration of the human condition desired by the creator.

Suppose that the protagonist of the series was a very charming, and powerful person, though lacking in integrity and moral fibre. Under those circumstances, it's not too much of a strain on the imagination to suppose they could be a cold yet seductive character, with no qualms about sleeping with multiple different partners. This would not be inconsistent with common prejudices about human interaction as if instead, a rather plain man was portrayed in the same circumstances. A man who say, didn't appear to have much in the way of a sense of humour, one who lacked any charisma, was not physically attractive or had any outstanding personality traits other than indecisiveness. Suppose in fact that he were so bland that he did not seem like a character at all, and was so generic that he came across more like a basic representation of an adult male, devoid of palpable personality traits to the degree that he feels more like a framework in which almost anyone could insert themselves if they so desired. Supposing that were the case, then it probably wouldn't make the story very convincing. In fact, it would probably feel more like a mechanism for living out some adolescent sexual fantasy, supposing that it were approached in that way. Theoretically speaking.

But there are two sides to any relationship, and perhaps it is the female characters who can elucidate what it is about this seemingly plain and rather bland figure who inexplicably never fails to leave every woman he meets stewing in their own sexual juices. It would not be sufficient to simply depict them falling in love with him again and again; there would need to be some exposition to explain what it is about this person... actually, let's give him a name. Something right off the top of my head, I don't know... Makoto Itou maybe. Yes, let's have the female characters verbally signify what it is about Makoto Itou that they find so captivating. Perhaps a whisper in the ear of "You're so handsome, Makoto-kun" in a moment of tenderness. Or a "You're so kind, Makoto-kun" after a gesture illustrating his humanity. Who knows, maybe even something like "You've got such a huge dick, Makoto-kun" would provide sufficient explanation as to why this Makoto Itou character suddenly finds him self inside every female he encounters. The specific details are not too important in the end, provided that some kind of reasoning is applied and not some redundant assertion like "You're very popular with the girls, Makoto-kun". While it's widely accepted that all women are prone to extreme jealousy and are by their very design, sexually insatiable, expecting them to make that deduction on their own is a bit unreasonable. Yes, I know that this is the only explanation that makes sense in the circumstances, but making it explicit will be necessary if we are going to create a work of intellectual substance.

It cannot be said enough that well developed characters are essential in creating a story, and that relying on plot twists alone is not sufficient. The purpose of any twist is to shock the audience with an unexpected turn of events, and in order to preserve the atmosphere where such a device is viable requires a great deal of diligence.

First of all, one must take care not to overuse plot twists throughout the story. And it goes without saying that you should not reuse the very same twist multiple times. Let's take a purely theoretical example of a main character initiating an affair with a female character. The first time this happens is likely to come as a shock to the audience and will undoubtedly lead them to invest more of themselves into the story. If that character were to then initiate another affair, while still shocking it most likely would not have the same impact on the audience as it did in the first instance. If the same character were then to begin a third affair, a sense of incredulity or even a feeling of being patronised to may eclipse the feeling of surprise. Yet another affair afterwards may even have the unintended consequence of becoming so over the top to be unintentionally humorous.

This feeling of incredulity may not be limited to the same plot device, but any new developments that may occur later on. If the patience of the audience has been stressed to the extent they are no longer able to take the work seriously, the impact of even a significant and unexpected twist may be wasted. It may even have the opposite effect of what was desired, causing the audience to laugh uncontrollably at the mess you have made.

That is, of course, assuming that creating a work of intellectual substance was your original intention. You could, of course, be perfectly content with making a harmless exploitation piece, with ambitions no further than titillating your audience before doing something a bit unusual at the end. But supposing for a moment that you really were trying to make something clever, a modern Greek tragedy say, or even a serious examination of the consequences of being sexually promiscuous or indecisive are... then you might inadvertently make yourself look rather foolish.