Daijoubu

School Days has become almost legendary among anime series released this past year. With the eager anticipation of violence on the part of many, the NICE BOAT incident, and then the ink-stained final episode, School Days excited much interest and passion among anime fans. But School Days was also a most fascinating character study. Kotonoha, Sekai and Makoto began as a typical love triangle, but soon followed a bloody path, gradually revealing their deeply flawed personalities. While I got as much pleasure from the sensationalized final episode as the next fan, the build-up to that denouement had many interesting moments revealing the main characters’ emotions. In Makoto’s case, the presentation of his gradual debasement could almost be described as subtle, with many notable signposts along the way. The sequence I present below is one of these.

In ep.9, Makoto is approached by the pony-tail girl. She wants to spend time at the school festival with him. Before he agrees, he eyes her up and down, as though evaluating her as a sex object and deciding, “Yeah, I think I’ll try a little of that.” The girl is happy, and true to the spirit of our debased age, she will later sleep with him right at school, and get filmed while doing it! The scene begins with Makoto sucking on something. Having a clearly sexual intent, it could be designed to momentarily trick the viewer into thinking the pony-tail girl has advanced further with Makoto then she actually has, lol. In any case, the screen shots I present below clearly show Makoto giving the girl a good looking-over. His food has already been firmly established as a phallic symbol, and the way he waves it around as he studies her reveals not only his aroused mindset, but also emphasizes his cavalier attitude as he plays the male role of an objectifying observer of women. His male gaze is further reinforced by the fact that we see her from behind, as he inspects her, turning his view from her face to observe her exposed leg, then moving up to her breasts, before lastly returning to her face. Liking what he sees, he agrees to spend time with her. It is a brief sequence, but it clearly shows his approach to women by this point in the series:

Makoto is quite different from typical male anime leads in the openness with which he displays his male lust. The usual weak anime hero would get smacked by the girl for doing this. This marks School Days as a unique and groundbreaking series. But, as I believe I’ve argued before, the fact that Makoto defies the genre by actually exploiting his harem, ensures that he will meet a bad end.

Read these blogs for other great anime moments: