Review of High School of the Dead

We can get started with the elephant-sized breasts in the room. Obviously, this is an ecchi, but I feel it's better executed than most ecchi shows and I can really only put Kill la Kill above it, and that's only slightly. EDIT: I also rate Kill la Kill higher because I have an inherent bias to the show since it was one of the first anime I completed. Story 7/10 While it could use some work, I think the story did a good job of keeping the show together. This is an action comedy, with high doses of ecchi in it. As such, the story doesn'tneed to be above a 4 for this anime to get a rating of 7 overall, and for me it exceeds that by three points. Besides the obvious "plot" that we'll get to in the art portion, it is a very straightfoward story. Leave one shelter, find a better one, leave that shelter, find another. Pretty easy to shove all the action into the travel and leave segments, while putting the high school comedy aspects into the stay in one location and avoid detection segments. The show also does a good job of explaining why the characters who can fight, can fight. Save for Komuro, who is just there for the viewer to project themselves onto. Komuro is just brave and impulsive, that's it. Seeing that the target audience for this is males between 12-17, I can give it a pass on that. It has its flaws, like the fact that there is no source of this infection, but the story is serviceable enough for an action comedy.

Art 10/10

The art in this show is some of the best I've seen ever. Of course, Madhouse is responsible for this, so I really don't need to say much more. Even in the aformentioned "plot" scenes I can appreciate the beautiful artwork and time that the animators put into making Saeko's boobs jiggle. What? You thought I was giving it a 10 based solely on the beautifully done work by Madhouse? Give me a break, 80% of this show's selling point is the girls.

Sound 10/10

With the pleasant absence of any autotuned openings and endings, this show really nailed it with sound. Everything from characters hitting zombies with buses and humvees to firing guns was well done. Every time Hirano fired that sniper rifle I was anticipating the beautiful sound of a zombies head getting blown off. I don't really know where else to put this comment, so I'm putting it here. The voice acting was pretty stellar. I'll be up front and say I watched the sub, so I have no clue about what the dub sounds like. None of the characters had a hard time convincing me of who they were, even Komuro, who is supposed to be a blank slate for teenagers to project themselves onto. Komuro really seems to care what happens to everyone in the group, even the ones that don't have gigantic anime titties attached to them.

Character 8/10

As mentioned before, the characters that can fight have good reason to know how to fight. The ones that do not know how to fight stick back and help with other things. The nurse mostly drives vehicles, Takegi mostly yells at Hirano while also providing useful information because she's an unbearable know-it-all, and Alice (pats only you damn pervs) is cute and gives Hirano sniper rifle magazines occasionally. The only real complaint I have is they are really just a bunch of stereotypes. Well fleshed out, not boring sterotypes, but stereotypes nonetheless. Komuro is the template for teenagers to latch onto. Saeko is the femme fatale. Takegi is the obligatory harem tsundere. Rei is the chick that the three teenage girls watching can latch onto, and the chick that basic motherfuckers will pick as best girl. Alice is the loli. Hirano is the pathetic nerd character. They are much more fleshed out than this, but they aren't original. But again, this is an action comedy with a heaping pile of ecchi, this is completely forgivable.

Enjoyment 10/10

This is the real hook of the show. Sure, you can spend all day looking at the nurse's assets, but you can also watch Hirano blow zombies heads off, stare in awe as Saeko defeats half a horde with a wooden practice sword, and watch Komuro charge into battle like an idiot only to come out completely unscathed due to luck or help from friends (usually Saeko or Hirano). For what it is, Highschool of the Dead is a very enjoyable show. Even if you aren't into ecchi, you've got zombies dying left and right, a bit of teenage drama here and there, and even a psuedo-villan that does nothing for three-quarters of the show. I spent most of my time watching in awe, laughing, or calling Komuro a reckless idiot. It's a fun show.

Overall 9/10

I'm not giving it a 10 because of a certain reason I can't mention that brought the story down to a 7. If you're okay with ecchi, watch this show.