Hell Teacher: Jigoku Sensei Nube

Episode 11

No two episodes of Hell Teacher: Jigoku Sensei Nube are ever quite the same tonally, and this eclecticism is no more marked when comparing this week's action and gross body horror-packed episode against last week's sweet supernatural fable. This time there are two difficult antagonists for demon-handed teacher Nube to contend with, starting with the series' first returning foe. Way back in the series premiere, human-presenting fox spirit Tamamo Yoko masqueraded as a doctor, while attempting to steal young student Hiroshi's skull. Nube defeated Tamamo, but not for good, it appears. A cute fox girl finds Tamamo's fleshless head and resurrects/revives him in all of his blonde, bishonen glory. Obsessed with learning more about the man who bested him, Tamamo shows up once more as the school doctor so that he can lay his furry paws over all of the young boys.

I'm not sure why Hiroshi doesn't just tell the head teacher that “Dr. Tamamo tried to touch me inappropriately before.” I mean, I'm sure that trying to steal a schoolkid's skull counts as inappropriate touching, and even the allegation should have got Tamamo thrown out of the building and the police called. Nube would even be able to back up Hiroshi's story! But no, this isn't a show where normal societal rules apply, so Hiroshi must submit to Dr. Tamamo pressing a stethoscope to his bare chest, before fleeing swiftly in obvious emotional distress.

Nube does attempt to express displeasure at Tamamo's presence, but only in the most ineffectual sense, especially as all of the girls (including a blushing Ms. Ritsuko), charmed by his good looks, defend the feral interloper from their eccentric teacher. Tamamo's fascinated not only by Nube's powerful demon hand, but his self-sacrificing actions to protect his students; he'd assumed all humans were terminally self-interested. So when Tamamo transforms into his true animalistic form and unleashes fire magic upon Nube's students, he goads Nube into fighting him again.

This fight is cut short by the arrival of an even more upsetting foe than a handsy, child skull-harvesting medic: a creepy flying fish/wormy thing that reproduces like something out of Alien: Earth, spraying organic lifeforms with egg-filled liquid, its embryos leeching life energy to hatch, leaving dried out corpses behind. It's really gross, and possibly the most disturbing thing in the show so far. I'm not sure why the wormy monster thing first manifests from above a field of electrified solar panels. Perhaps the director is anti-renewable energy?

Even Tamamo seems concerned by the appearance of this extra-dimensional abomination, and Nube's full-powered attacks against it are totally ineffectual. With many of his students bodies slowly dissolving as slimy eggs gestate on their bodies, we're left with the first cliffhanger in a while. Will Nube and Tamamo be forced to team up to save the children? Or will Nube be forced to explain to his pupils' parents that their beloved kiddies were dissolved by alien eggs on his watch?

The later higher stakes do liven up what up until then is an otherwise a fairly humdrum episode with a lame bad guy I don't particularly care about. Tamamo's not that interesting of an antagonist, and his seemingly effortless infiltration of the school seems like lazy plotting. I'd like to see more of the cute fox girl he so rudely blows off at the beginning, though!

Rating:

Hell Teacher: Jigoku Sensei Nube is currently streaming on YouTube.