School Days — An Anime That is Far Better Than Its Reputation
Spoilers ahead. This is an opinion piece.
School Days is an infamous anime series based on a visual novel. The anime stars Makoto Itou, the average every man of any harem anime. After developing a crush on Kotonoha Katsura, his friend and classmate Sekai Saionji helps them get into a relationship. After this, the series begins its journey of ups and downs, relationships, and so much infidelity.
The infamy of this show stems from the characters. Makoto is a horrible person. He cheats on Kotonoha with several different girls including Sekai and seems to only be interested in sex. Sekai lies about being pregnant with his baby and eventually kills Makoto. Kotonoha severs Makoto’s head and kills Sekai in return before escaping on a nice boat, cradling Makoto’s head. Makoto in particular gets the brunt of the blame due to igniting this garbage heap of a fire. He’s genuinely unlikable as a protagonist and often upsets viewers. However, I find this aspect of him to be the primary reason to why he’s a great character and why School Days is an excellent anime.
Harem is a genre of anime in which a man happens to be surrounded by several gorgeous women who are all in love with him. It’s usually played for comedy rather than drama and polyamory is rarely seen as a valid option. There are some traditional rules of this genre that occur throughout almost ever harem from Monster Musume to Magikano.
One of the primary rules is how the protagonist is designed. The protagonist will almost always be an average Joe Schmo. They rarely have any particular talents or skills and are instead average at everything. Their only defining personality traits is that they’re nice and they have trouble making choices. This gives a reason for the protagonist to be surrounded by beautiful women despite being indistinguishable from a background character. This is also done sot he player can easily reflect themselves onto the character. A character with too much personality would be far more difficult to identify with. So, we now have an indistinguishable character that is nice, identifiable, and has women throwing themselves at him.
Makoto fits this description like a glove at the beginning of the anime. He seems nice and fairly devoted. But, when the girls begin throwing themselves at him, rather than making a choice to stay with one of them, he decides to keep all of them. Makoto enters a sexual relationship with almost every girl in the anime. Makoto lacks a defining trait common in harem protagonists — he is not virtuous and is willing to take advantage of his situation. Makoto abuses the trust instilled in all the girls around him. In most harem anime, the protagonist will refuse to sleep with the women around him because “it’s not right” and he doesn’t want to hurt the feelings of the other girls. But, Makoto’s perverted nature gets the better of him. One could argue that they would never hurt these girls like this, but this isn’t true for all men. In America, men who do this are often known as “fuckboys.” This is why School Days shines. It has realistic actions and character reactions, for the most part.
The main heroines, Kotonoha and Sekai, are not exempt from this realistic portrayal. They both fit into a common harem niche — the first girl and the childhood friend. The community of harem friends have a saying that goes, “First girl always wins.” The first girl put on screen and seen interacting with the hero will always be the one he falls in love with, on the off chance that he does make a choice. If the first girl doesn’t win, then he will normally fall for the childhood friend. The other girls don’t matter as they normally exist to round out the cast, or in the case of visual novels, offer more choices to the player. All the other girls in the series block Makoto’s number after they find out what he’s doing. The only girls left are Kotonoha and Sekai. But, what kind of girls would even want to stick around someone like Makoto?
The answer is girls who are not quite healthy. Kotonoha doesn’t have a social life as many girls bully her for her looks. Because many guys talk about her, she has a reputation for promiscuity which leads to even more alienation. This causes her to get attached to Makoto in a way that is not healthy. She’s willing to stay with him despite his emotional abuse and constant cheating. Other than her family, she has no one else to rely on but Makoto. This plays on the stereotypical first girl in harem series. Kotonoha is the “perfect” girl. She’s shy, demure, beautiful, and patient. She’s the perfect girl because she will allow Makoto to do as he pleases without complaining.
Sekai on the other hand falls into the childhood friend trap. She’s a tomboy who offers to help Makoto with his love life only to find that she’s in love with him herself. Sekai, unlike Kotonoha, doesn’t have any major character flaws in the beginning, but gains them. Due to being in love with Makoto, and Makoto being indifferent to her, Sekai’s mental state deteriorates as the show goes on. Makoto is shown to be callous to her feelings while still expecting sex. This causes her to act irrationally. She lies about being pregnant to get his attention, only for him to try and convince her to abort it. He also shows that he does not care for her in the slightest when he kisses Kotonoha in front of her for the sole purpose of upsetting her.
School Days is a deconstruction of harem anime. It answers the question of what would occur should a teenage boy finds himself in a harem. The answer is manipulation. He would manipulate all of them for his own gain. School Days answers the question of what kind of women would want to be around a protagonist who constantly surrounded by women who show an active interest in him. The answer is girls who are suffering from mental deterioration. All the “normal” girls cut Makoto from their lives the moment they find out what he’s been doing. Kotonoha has other issues that she is covering up by dating Makoto while Sekai slowly loses her mind due to the emotional abuse he puts her through. While, in reality, this entire ordeal probably wouldn’t end in murder, the emotional responses of the girls and the actions of Makoto are some of the best I’ve ever seen in a harem anime.
I think the reason School Days is so loathed is due to how unlikable the protagonist is. Also, harem anime tend to be one of the more escapist genres where the viewer just wants to imagine themselves in an ideal situation. There is an ending in the visual novel the anime is based on in which all three main characters enter a polygamous relationship. I think more harems should go this route. Sleep tight.
