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Zombie Land Saga (TV) (all seasons).


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Panino Manino



Joined: 28 Jan 2018
Posts: 734
PostPosted: Tue May 04, 2021 2:54 pm Reply with quote
At this point is should be clear for everyone watching that Kotaro's behavior with the zombie is a facade, and the anime already recognized in the first season that he does more behind the scenes than the zombie where aware.

Claiming that he doesn't "giving them any leadership, direction or even useful advice" is just defamation and false.
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Agent355



Joined: 12 Dec 2008
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Location: Crackberry in hand, thumbs at the ready...
PostPosted: Wed May 05, 2021 3:59 am Reply with quote
^Granted, I haven’t seen the first season since it aired, so I may have forgotten some details. But besides for reviving them, how has Kotaro supported the zombie girls? He demands that they be idols whether they want to be or not (the fact that they all want to be, I feel, is partly *because* they’re characters in an idol anime, especially Saki). He yells at them. A lot. It’s usually funny but it can be grating and sometimes borders on abuse. Does he tell them *how* they should perform? He usually demands they figure it out themselves, despite the fact that he’s the one pressuring them.

His scenes can be very funny, but I don’t like his entitled attitude or how he treats the girls. Perhaps there are specific scenes or interactions I’m misremembering, and feel free to post details of them. But from what I remember, he’s demanding and mean about it without being helpful, like a bad teacher who just yells at his students but never actually teaches the curriculum.
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Panino Manino



Joined: 28 Jan 2018
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PostPosted: Wed May 05, 2021 10:05 am Reply with quote
He demands the zombie to figure for themselves how to solve their problems and he is right in doing so. He wait until the end to offers some help or hint.

My biggest grip with his loud behavior is just because I don't like loud behaviors, but personally I think the fact that he turned them into zombies makes all subsequent "abuse" irrelevant.
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Bargain Hunter



Joined: 07 Mar 2009
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PostPosted: Wed May 05, 2021 10:21 am Reply with quote
Kotaro is my least favourite part of the show. I grit my teeth through his scenes so I can watch what I actually like.
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Agent355



Joined: 12 Dec 2008
Posts: 5113
Location: Crackberry in hand, thumbs at the ready...
PostPosted: Wed May 05, 2021 3:12 pm Reply with quote
Panino Manino wrote:
He demands the zombie to figure for themselves how to solve their problems and he is right in doing so. He wait until the end to offers some help or hint.

My biggest grip with his loud behavior is just because I don't like loud behaviors, but personally I think the fact that he turned them into zombies makes all subsequent "abuse" irrelevant.


On point 2, that the fact that he made them into zombies makes all abuse irrelevant, NO! That’s like saying that parents have a right to abuse their kids because they brought them into this world. That’s not true; abuse is hurtful and damaging *especially* if the abuser is the victim’s parent, and just because you made a kid/gave them life doesn’t give a parent the right to hit them or yell at them (excessively. Most parents yell sometimes, but when they yell everyday about everything, it’s both counterproductive and hurtful.)

And kids, students, mentees need guidance. A teacher who yells at a class to figure out how to do math on their own without first telling them that 1+1=2 is neglecting their responsibility to make their demands and their lesson clear and doable. Humans need to be taught how to do things, not just yelled at to do them.
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Panino Manino



Joined: 28 Jan 2018
Posts: 734
PostPosted: Wed May 05, 2021 3:15 pm Reply with quote
Agent355 wrote:
Panino Manino wrote:
He demands the zombie to figure for themselves how to solve their problems and he is right in doing so. He wait until the end to offers some help or hint.

My biggest grip with his loud behavior is just because I don't like loud behaviors, but personally I think the fact that he turned them into zombies makes all subsequent "abuse" irrelevant.


On point 2, that the fact that he made them into zombies makes all abuse irrelevant, NO! That’s like saying that parents have a right to abuse their kids because they brought them into this world. That’s not true; abuse is hurtful and damaging *especially* if the abuser is the victim’s parent, and just because you made a kid/gave them life doesn’t give a parent the right to hit them or yell at them (excessively. Most parents yell sometimes, but when they yell everyday about everything, it’s both counterproductive and hurtful.)

And kids, students, mentees need guidance. A teacher who yells at a class to figure out how to do math on their own without first telling them that 1+1=2 is neglecting their responsibility to make their demands and their lesson clear and doable. Humans need to be taught how to do things, not just yelled at to do them.

Yes, you're right.
But still, I can't take his abuses seriously because of the context that they're zombie and the detail that this anime is also a bit of a satire. From this point of view Kotaro not treating them well is "good", normal and expected, different from most series from this genre that don't show this bad side of the industry.
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15433
Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Fri May 07, 2021 3:15 am Reply with quote
Season 2, Episode 5

Well, if yo wanted to see Kotaro put down a peg, this episode did it a bit. Specifically he looked to try to pull one of his strange entrance announcements, and Lily totally stole his thunder by doing her own and was practically reduced to whimpering. He also totally bombed on stage, which might even be too sad to put on TV.

But Lily is honestly one of my favourites of the group, and I greatly enjoyed her doing some brand of Japan Has Talent. Lily's initial performance was kind of a surprise with a rakugo (which is apparently a pun on her name as "Number Six"), it is an old art but still interesting, showing her performance ability. And when finding out that a song with importance was being sung by a child actor right before her, Lily transformed it into something on brand for her twinkling, looks like she even became a bit viral with younger audiences copying her dance. Her performance was pretty interesting to watch, especially how she did things

Also, Lily's pink ribbon with a strip of white in the middle looks like the trans flag when put with her blue hair. Was also partially motioned towards when Lily visited the kid in the boys room. Lily was never going to hold a grudge against that guy, although Lily probably does feel some sadness that she will never not be a kid, and she would want to cheer him on. Even if his name is Light and he pulls a "all according to plan" moment.

Looks like next episode will be a Tae episode, which is fantastic.
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Panino Manino



Joined: 28 Jan 2018
Posts: 734
PostPosted: Fri May 07, 2021 8:53 am Reply with quote
DuskyPredator wrote:

But Lily is honestly one of my favourites of the group


It's clear which zombie are the favorits of the production team.
NO 3D!
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Blood-
Bargain Hunter



Joined: 07 Mar 2009
Posts: 23668
PostPosted: Sat May 08, 2021 7:37 am Reply with quote
Yay, I'm getting my Tae-centric eppie next week! I love her and the production team really seems to put a lot of effort into her wackiness even when she's not the main focus on screen. Loved that she was just randomly wearing a nun's habit this time.
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15433
Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Thu May 13, 2021 9:58 pm Reply with quote
A legendary episode for the legendary Yamada Tae.

The episode gave us the chance to catch up on a few other characters, such as Saki's friend's daughter's group, who are now a dance troupe. They were enthusiastic, but evidently uncoordinated as novices, but nice to see them in a community activity. The chicken mascot guy was also in the dance competition being done, apparently being the reigning champion. His involvment spurred Tae to get up on stage, and she outshone him with her zombie prowess, also scaring that one lady that they traumatised from the hot spring episode. Tae won the prize, but was much more interested in the sack of onions over the prize money, that Maria wanted to make sure Tae look after it.

Enter the police officer, who is kind of his usual brand of ineffectual, and convinces a group of teens and their mentally handicapped friend to go to the boat races, convincing said friend (Tae) to bet all her money on races. The rival delinquent group was also there, seeming to have at least their leader they support putting her energy to more productive causes. Tae uses the method to pick her ticket that she used to choose their group name, sucking on a pen and then spitting out the ink, and then with the race win Tae earned enough to pay off their debt, she is as always legendary.

The other thing that was happening this episode was following the reporter as he was following Tae, seeing all the weird parts of Tae that are hard to explain. And it would seem that at the very end of the episode, he might have figured out that indeed the group are zombies, which will be rather curious where things will go from here. The episode also started off with him talking about how a few of Franchouchou resemble famous people, and posited that perhaps the other member resemble other people., which might have him looking into who each member is. And on that note, he might actually have the first piece to figure out who Tae is, because one thing he witnessed was Tae going to the cemetery, and saw what he might think of as rude in Tae eating offerings left at a family shrine. The thing was that the name on the stone was for the Yamada family, Tae's family name, which means that Tae must have some memories of her living life, enough to understand what she was doing, and someone was leaving an offering of apples, so she might have some living relatives.
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15433
Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Fri May 21, 2021 3:36 am Reply with quote
Season 2, Episode 7

Another fantastic episode, with the sort of things I wanted out of the second season. It did start off really weird, with us following some random girl being a happy ditz, breaking her glasses and then accidentally walking into the men's room of the bath house. This girl, Maimai, did have the sort of every girl feeling similar to Sakura, which why it did start to feel ominous when we see Kotaro drop soap before Maimai slips and starts falling in slow motion, much like Sakura did in episode 1 when hit by the truck.

The implication seemed easy, they might be getting a new member after Kotaro was accidentally involved in the death of a new girl. It was both hilarious and so grim when we then see Kotaro anxiously introducing to the others that they have a new member, that he went for a bath and comes back with the corpse of a teenage girl wrapped up in a sheet, with everyone giving the expected responses. It is dark even by this show's standards as the corpse rises as a new zombie, before thankfully showing that the girl did not actually die, and Kotaro is a big dork that just did something outside of the contexts that he maybe thought he could save a girl who just died to become a zombie, he kidnapped a teenage girl who accidentally got knocked out. Mai Mai takes learning that they are all zombies incredibly well, saying that maybe they probably should not even worry about being seen as zombies, but also holds the truth she knows to get herself be a new member.

Kotaro saying that they would need to kill her to keep their secret was kind of funny, in the sense that it was ridiculous. But it is an interesting thing, Kotaro is mostly background for the majority of this episode, but there are parts that seem very important about his character. Such as the easy one that he could possibly create new zombies, but them checking out a high school to get permission to play, it is quick, but even through sunglasses there is some odd melancholy from him there. As far as I am aware there is still that sort of theory of the linger question that connects Sakura and him, why he chose her, the theory being that he may have been a classmate of Sakura in high school. There has to be something there. Right along with a scene of seeing Kotaro doing his usual seduction move on a male faculty member.
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Panino Manino



Joined: 28 Jan 2018
Posts: 734
PostPosted: Fri May 21, 2021 9:07 am Reply with quote
This episode #7 had another suggestion that Kotaro went to the same school as Sakura, and just like the bathroom accident he also mighty be involve in her death.
In the end of the episode we see the results of that reporter's investigation. I didn't saved the translations from those newspapers archives, but I remember the one about Sakura's death mentioning that the truck driver hit her after some shiny light suddenly obscured his vision. Maybe the flash of a camera? Maybe Kotaro was there taking photos of Sakura in secret and accidentally caused the accident?

Anyway, fantastic episode indeed.
Even after so much praise and recommendations that I give I'm sometimes surprised by how good ZLS is!
I really liked Maimai, she left a strong impression and in the end they referenced Momoe Yamaguchi. Fair, her time with Franchouchou was legendary.
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15433
Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Fri Jun 11, 2021 12:14 am Reply with quote
Season 2, Episode 10

Coming off of learning about Yugiri, which I honestly don't have much to say, we finally got a few answers of Kotaro's goal, starting off with going their failure between the first and second season. Nice touch that apparently Tae was who gave the girls courage that they could leave the house without Kotaro doing the makeup himself, like she did her own.

Apparently there is really a curse that will literally destroy Saga or something, perhaps evidenced through this episode having Kotaro having close calls such as washing up on the beach with squids, and something almost hitting him. The girls were also all picked to be revived because they were apparently victims of the curse that could have potentially brought fame to Saga. Kotaro also met the master that is immortal and does the zombie reviving thing 12 years ago, which would make it 2008, which happens to be the year that Sakura died, which I don't think is unconnected.

The reporter also deadnamed Lily when saying all their names, and thinks that Kotaro is trying to profit off of the dead.
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Bargain Hunter



Joined: 07 Mar 2009
Posts: 23668
PostPosted: Fri Jun 11, 2021 11:54 am Reply with quote
When are we getting a Legendary Tae-san spin-off that the whole world wants and needs? The one WITHOUT Shades, thank you very much.
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15433
Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Fri Jun 18, 2021 4:56 am Reply with quote
Season 2, Episode 11

Well, disaster hit and Saga is pretty decimated, kind of looks like those things you see on the news. For one their house destroyed, after it apparently started floating away while they were sleeping. The girls had to rely on their crummy makeup job for a few days, doing work during the day to help at a shelter, while raising the spirits of kids in the shelter at night with little concerts. Until it eventually chipped off and they revealed their real faces to a crowd.

Kotaro looked to have a pretty rough time, submerged in water for days, and then on a bit of a journey to find them. And he plans to have them put on a concert in several days, to apparently hopefully save Saga. And we did get a confirmation that Kotaro knew Sakura, she said his name even when alive, he attended her funeral, and likely set on his journey after frustrated from what happened to her.

Biggest surprise, the garbage policeman was actually helpful and good at his job for once, helping to save Kotaro and the master.
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