Let's try this again, shall we? Thinking back to my first review, I immediately see that it wasn't even a review. It was a simple rant. My utter hatred of the anime stood out as the dominant force, over parts of the show that may have not been THAT bad. Thinking back, I can see that I left out some really important arguments. School Days : Review, Take 2.
STORY
I won't go into the story again as you can find that out yourself.(by the way, if you haven't seen the show, stop reading. This review contains HEAVY SPOILERS, and since there will be quite a lot of them, I won't bother marking each and every one of them.) When examining the story, you must forget about how good or bad the other parts of the show are, especially with this anime. So, from the outset, School Days begins like every cliché highschool romance. Boy meets girl, they fall in love and everything is rosy. Unlike every other romance anime out there, School Days explores the darkest parts of relationships. How many anime series deal with breakups, their effects, teenage sexual desires and cheating? Not that many. It can't be denied that School Days does have some sense of originality.
The pacing is fine. Not brilliant, not horrible. Things may feel rushed at times due to the nature of the show.
CHARACTERS
No matter how many perspectives I look at this show through, I'll never change my outlook on the characters. School Days has the worst cast of characters I've ever seen. Every character is unlikable. Makoto doesn't need an explanation, neither does Sekai, Kotonoha trusts others too much and pays the price later, the side characters only serve as sex objects to our main character, then there's that club that make a lovely revelation and Makoto's friend is completely useless. (seriously, there wouldn't have been a single difference if he was taken out of the anime) There is only one thing that I need to change my opinion on. The main character plays a vital role in any show or movie. As the audience, we grow attatched to the main character and share his emotions, but that's only if we find him or her likable. On the other hand, our negative opinions on Makoto are made worse due to his position. That is why only ONE single character deserves some relief from the constant shower of negativity, and that is Katsura Kotonoha. She is one of the two main female characters, and therefore gets a lot of our attention, especially in the second half of the anime. We obviously begin to feel sorry for her, as she suffers through bullying in school, Makoto cheating on her, and of course, her slow and painful descent into insanity.
The last comment I want to make about the characters is about how realistic they are. I'll only comment on Sekai, Kotonoha and Makoto, as the rest are irrelevant, or absolutely fucking identical to one another. In my opinion, Makoto is a believable character to some extent. He's a teenager, so that explains a lot... But it's important to note that there are a lot of people out there that, if placed in the same circumstances, would be the exact same kind of character like Makoto, immoral and greedy. Also I know a person just like him, so there's my argument!
Kotonoha is not very believable. There is no way someone can trust in their significant other while they are constantly being told they are being cheated on. Her descent into insanity may be exaggerated, however I cannot comment on how realistic that part is, as I don't know if something so extreme as her insanity is possible from such a breakup, and to be honest, I don't think I want to know either!!!
Sekai is unrealistic, in my eyes. She sees Kotonoha as her best friend, yet she cruelly and cold-heartedly betrays her, for her own needs. The only hint of realism she shows is when at first she is unwilling to cheat with Makoto, saying that it would make Kotonoha "upset". However after sleeping with Makoto, her worries fade away too simply, and too quickly. Also I feel as if her reaction of realising that Makoto was cheating on HER with "Girl no.3" (can't remember the name) is not extreme enough... It's as if she expected him to cheat... In that case, why was she with him? Oh fuck it...
NOTE: These comments on the characters' realism do not apply to them in the anime's final episode. Duh....
So, there are no redeeming qualities to the characters at this point. The slight hints of realism are not big enough to overcome the fact that every character is a royal asshole.
SOUND & ANIMATION
It's true that 41 tracks for a 12 episode anime is too many. To make it worse, most of them sound very bland. But, after listening through the whole soundtrack by itself, I found a few good exceptions. There's "Hamon" if you want to creep someone out, and a few other piano tracks that are played when shit (supposedly) hits the fan, or when the anime needs to create a seriously depressing atmosphere. And of course there's "Kanashimi no mukou e" which is one of my favourite anime songs because of how depressing it is, and is probably the best part of this anime. The opening is forgettable, as are most of the ending songs. No comment required about the japanese dub.
The animation is frankly, rubbish. It seems as if the company was desperately trying to save money, since even in the first episode, they had to black out every single background character. The animation style isn't bad, the pale, dull colors may add to the "theoretically depressing" moments later in the show, but in general it just makes the anime more dull, bland and boring. It isn't easy to pull this off, it worked in Zankyou no Terror, and even in Another, but not in School Days, or at least not remotely as well. There are huge flaws in the animation like the infamous School Days Building Window, or the 90° camera angles, which are so annoying, you have no idea. The only time the animation is any good is during that swimming pool episode, where Anime Breast Physics come into play. I mean, if you're gonna make a crap show, at least get the fanservice done well, right? Priorities...
To be honest, School Days doesn't have the worst animation I've ever seen. That ''honor" goes to Kanon 2002. (By the way, don't watch Kanon '02. If you're gonna watch the Key Trilogy, watch Kanon 2006 instead. Don't go near the older one.)
I quickly checked out another anime by the same company made in the same year called Shattered Angels, and the animation looks much better, and looks similar in art style to a newer TNK work, High School DxD. So I'm guessing, the company blew their money on that series before going on to make the School Days adaptation? I dunno...
FINAL RE-EVALUATION
Looking through the anime in greater detail cleared up a lot of problems I overlooked the first time, due to my immense hatred of the show. By writing a second review, I had hoped to make it what it was meant to be; a review. Not a rant. I wanted to bring in the arguments of those who say that School Days is a masterpiece. But here is where my biggest problem lies. While I do understand the viewpoint that it's a good show, I cannot bring myself to believe it. The anime has too many flaws, and they are giant flaws too, not something petty like slightly poor pacing, but that fact that the entire cast of characters is completely horrendous. For me, these massive mistakes took the show's (few) good, unique points, and threw them into a meat grinder.
So, how do I see School Days now?
I still hate the anime. But, for once I recommend it. If you can watch this anime and form your own opinion on it and explain it well, you'll be doing really well. And I don't mean blindly picking a side, and using its perspective.
For me, in the end, School Days is a failed attempt at a deconstruction of the Harem genre. There would have been so many different ways to approach it, but it didn't work, in my opinion.
I'm raising the score to 3/10.
The best way to watch School Days is by knowing as little as possible about it. So if you have a friend who likes writing anime reviews, definitely make them watch this.
~thobiazz~
