Zombie Land Saga – Ep. 2

Well, she dropped dead so might as well drop the mic.

You know what? Maybe obscuring information until the last minute worked in Zombie Land Saga‘s favor. This is clearly an anime that just needed to be seen to be believed.

Evidently, absurd is the name of the game with this anime. I mean, that was obvious from the start but this episode does find a way to take it up a notch with the hijinks and screaming going on. Whatever implicit commentary it has about…anything, it’s clearly buried six feet below all the zany stuff. That does admittedly make Zombie Land Saga a tricky candidate for Episode Reviews. Writing something short isn’t really the issue but rather, there’s only so many ways you can say “yep, this is weird and I really enjoyed it”. Still, did I enjoy it? Why, yes. Yes I did.

I thought maybe things would wear thin after the first episode but it’s yet to happen. Having everyone except Tae regain their consciousnesses helps a ton here. Ai (Risa Taneda) and Junko (Maki Kawase) get a fair amount of focus as you find out that they don’t really want to participate in Kotarou’s weird “save Saga with zombie idols” plan despite being actual idols when they were alive. Saki (Asami Tano) also gets some spotlight as she too doesn’t want to be an idol and thus has a bone to pick with Sakura choosing to follow Kotarou’s training to the letter. Everyone else seems to be in the background for now though the material they do present is amusing. I particularly kind of love how Yugiri (Rika Kinugawa) is just acting out her courtesan duties since, naturally, a 19th century girl such as her has no idea what an idol is.

The rap battle between Sakura and Saki is easily the best part of the episode. By default, it’s hilarious that two episodes in, these idols have yet to do traditional J-Pop. Even so, I really enjoy how into it these girls get in this scene and adding Yugiri’s koto into the sound mixing surprisingly works really well. Also, please tell me that was Mamoru Miyano beat boxing as Kotarou. I never thought I’d ever hear such a thing if that’s the case.

There is some well-articulated commentary to be found here. Saki vents her frustration that her friends (and tamagotchi) are all dead but Sakura points out that it’s still a blessing to even be “alive” again so all the girls in the idol group should really make it count while they can. Even better is that she extends the message to Ai and Junko, telling them not to give up and let their talents go to waste. Even odder is that she extends the message to all the old folks in the audience though her telling them not to let the condescending attitudes of youths get to them is still pretty on point. I guess Sakura figured she might as well include the people who are still alive while she’s at it.

One way or another, Zombie Land Saga is proving to be one of the more worthwhile anime this season. Time will tell if this will merit enough discussion for blogging but let me make it clear that I am really enjoying this experience this show is offering.

OP: “Adabana Necromancy” by the cast of Zombie Land Saga

Well, this is a little more accurate than the ED to what the show is actually like…I think.

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