Review of High School of the Dead

BOOBS, BLOOD, AND BODY PARTS! WOO! High School of the Dead is certainly not something you'd want to be caught watching, but, if you're interested, it is extremely mindless and serviceable. Most zombie movies or shows usually don't have much in the way of story besides 'survive' or 'find a cure'. And, High School of the Dead isn't any different. Granted, the idea of watching characters survive an extreme situation can be a great plot in itself, but the execution in this anime isn't as extreme as I had hoped it would be. It was still fine for what it's worth. The characters are also fine. Thegirls provide a lot of fanservice, and I've said this a lot: Fanservice is fine as long as it either fits the character, or the character is interesting and compelling enough. And unfortunately, that isn't completely the case here. Shizuka and Rei are kind of throwaway characters that don't add much besides big boobs. Saya, despite being a bit obnoxious at times, is at least better and a little interesting. Takashi as a main character is....eh. He isn't too interesting, but he could've been much worse. The two stand-out characters are Kouta and Saeko. Kouta is a pretty hilarious and entertaining character who was just fun to watch. Saeko is a crazy badass, and hey, that's pretty fun to watch too.

There are attempts at drama, character relations, and even background stories, and while some of them are actually good attempts, they're not all that great in the long run. They don't add much, in fact, they mostly take away from the best part of the anime, because they take up time that could be devoted to a very specific element. Which is....

The action. It's gritty, smooth, well animated, and really awesome. This is honestly what keeps this anime from being a high 4 or low 5. There are plenty of dynamic and fluid action scenes using both guns and swords sprinkled all around to justify a lot of the weaker elements. And yeah, the animation looks great, it's either impressive or a bit sad that a good amount of effort went into animating something like this. Nonetheless, the action is very fun to watch.

High School of the Dead is very mindless, so you ironically won't find any zombies chewing on it (I admit, that joke was dead on arrival. SOMEONE STOP ME). It's something where you can click off your mind for a few hours and watch some big breasted girls fight zombies. But, at least it's kinda fun.