Review of School Days

This is both the greatest and worst anime of all time, and it must be watched. Every medium of entertainment needs its lulcow to make fun of. For YouTube that would be DarkSydePhil, for movies that would be Samurai Cop, for video games that would be Ride to Hell: Retribution, and for anime School Days is a pretty good answer. This is such a time capsule of both everything wrong and great with 2000s visual novel adaptations that it ends up reminding me of a time we will never see again for better and worse. This anime would not get made in the 2020s. Itwould be way too contentious for any studio to produce, and there is probably a lot of either safer or objectively better source material to adapt. Especially since this would not appeal to a Western market that anime seems more and more willing to tailor for. I am not claiming this would appeal to Western sensibilities or even my own. There is a lot of creepy, weirdly sexual shots of minors that only Drake would enjoy. The main character does not believe in consent and takes zero responsibility. There are a lot of harem tropes and poorly done archetypal characters, as School Days is just really lousy with character writing. A good example is Otome. Her personality is a tomboy, and that is it; there is no elaboration on how she ended up that way or using habits to show it. We just take it at face value that she is a tomboy. She certainly does not have the memorability, nuance, or humanity of a character like Utena Tenjou. As someone who for writing likes character writing the most I should have dropped this immediately when I could sniff out that they were going to coarsely write these characters.

I hate harem writing because it is just a bland 5/10 dude collecting waifus like they are Yu-Gi-Oh cards and is just self-insert WattPad writing. I do not like it when I see the author just five-knuckle shuffle and project their fetishes in front of the audience. Especially when they are trying to cloak it as legitimate storytelling. I do not have any verisimilitude when a guy is using a LOVE MANUAL to get with women. This is the kind of writing that could only be peddled in an anime like this. I am speaking for myself here, but regardless, it is how I feel. I would prefer a monogamous relationship where the entire show is them growing closer and working through their shortcomings. It feels more down-to-earth instead of gaudily absurd.

Yet, I could not put this down. I finished this in two days, which I do not usually do for 12-episode shows unless they are really good, like with The Tatami Galaxy. What on earth made me compelled to watch this to the end? I even predicted the notorious ending and was half-correct. I actually find this quite overhated, and people will ignore any merit it has just because of how ugly the art is. Yeah, let me get the obvious out of the way first before I dissect this accurately like I am Tenma from Monster. The music is mediocre, the production is too generic for 2007 and dated in 2025, it has no animation at all, the directing is mostly flat bar a couple scenes, and the character designs are atrocious. If you think of the most uninteresting 2000s JRPG or visual novel designs possible, you are thinking of School Days.

I could probably name more issues, but there are also some unique boons. I love shows like It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, where the characters are just absolute FUCK-UPS and there is a lot of great comedy that can come from that. This show is really funny. The level of spice and shoe-size IQ characters (except for Kotonoha because she is just in hardcore denial mode) on display here made me laugh out loud numerous times. This would perfectly appeal to the slasher horror audience that enjoys movies like Friday the 13th, where they want to see characters get their comeuppance because of how loathsome they are. Makoto Itou is quite realistic in the sense that his obsession with sex and wanting it easy corrupts him into having a big ego, especially when he pulls a lot of women. The thematic writing is actually not half-bad, as the ending is really poetic for everyone involved if you know what happens. It is set up quite well.

There is a lot of novelty in an anime where everyone is so stupid and unlikable that you are rooting against them. They could have easily written this as a revenge thriller a la Kill Bill or A Bittersweet Life, and people would be cheering for Kotonoha to get her revenge. I think this is an issue where it's the right story but the wrong execution and genre. If School Days' premise was a mix of revenge thriller and psychological horror disguised as a generic rom-com, I think this show would be brilliant. There are plenty of subversive anime that are praised for how subversive they are. You have to be really talented to both be aware of audience expectations and mislead them, and this show seems to be pretty good at that from what I have read online.

We need shows like this, shows that uniquely FUCK UP. To quote Piandao, "You messed things up in a very special way." No one ever has the same thing to say about why they hate it, and it is one of the most fun shows to talk about. Rarely do you get a show that is problematic but also entertaining at the same time. A lot of horrible shows are horrible because they are super BORING and just infuriating (here's looking at you, DanMachi Season 2 and Sword Art Online). It just comes down to execution. In theory there is no such thing as a bad premise, just a bad execution.

This show definitely needed a lot more polish and writing chops. If School Days featured better sakuga and direction or much more interesting writing, this show would be revered unironically. If this show knew its audience better, it would be a cult classic. The show has underutilized potential. That is why I recommend it. To any future wannabe animators or writers like me who want to know, "What makes a cartoon good?" this is a superb example of what NOT to do. If someone just wants a trashy yet entertaining soap opera, this will give you a good fix and then some. It has that reality TV appeal.

To summate this review, this is the only anime I've ever watched where every score you could possibly give it makes sense. I could understand why people would give it anywhere between a 1 and 10. I would give it a 5 myself because it perfectly toes the line of being awful and genius at the same time. I never thought I would be fascinated, to this extent, with an anti-Clannad. School Days transcends any conventional definition of good and bad. School Days will make you feel things you have never felt before. That is why I recommend watching this anime.