School Days

School Days is a sadistic perversion of the High School Romance genre - out is the usual staple of charming characters, sensitive moments and budding romance replaced by lust, cheating and vengeance. To this end the show has to be given credit for it's new take on a well worn story dynamic - taking people in with it's cutesy exterior and presumed love triangle set-up before shattering their expectations with a slow but carefully executed increase in both drama and cruelty.

It's also unparalleled in it's ability to make you despise it's characters; chief among them is the main male protagonist Itou who shows such selfishness and inability to emphasize throughout you wonder if he has genuine mental impairment! Other characters are more multi-layered, showing good aspects (at least at first) but they too also succumb to the general depravity as the show meanders on from one deranged low to another. Towards the end, things start getting a bit too depraved - which almost takes you out of the narrative entirely but then the brutal conclusion rears it's ugly head with all the force of a steam train and you realise now why the depravity was necessary - it had all led us to this one point. The cathartic moment where the people in question get what they deserve.

School Days is a short, sharp jolt out of the nice cutesy preconceptions we have about High School Romance stories. It's unforgiving, sadistic and depraved - but all the while strangely compelling. It has to be applauded for its creativity and how it manages to conjure up strong feelings of hatred towards it's characters. While it couldn't be universally recommended, it's worth watching to those who can stomach it as something that's very unique and different.