May 05, 2012

High School Of The Dead Ep07

Last episode, we experienced the quintessential HSotD experience.  If someone came up to me and said "what is HSotD all about," Ep06 is the one I'd show them.  If you remember correctly, and I think you do, The Fellowship had taken refuge in the house of Boing-chan's friend, up-armed themselves, oh and the wimmenfolk took a bath.  At the end of it, however, a barking dog had drawn a horde o' undead to their doorstep.

Meet another J Random Survivor.  We will call him Skippy for the duration of his stay with us.  Skippy is armed with an over-under shotgun, what many might call the perfect zombie-hunting weapon.  These unnamed "many" would be wrong, because over-under shotguns are usually single-shot weapons.  Well, dual-shot as there are two single-shot barrels, but Skippy here, quite wisely I'd think, is using both barrels on his undead targets.  Anyway, Skippy, possessing all the tactical genius of a fly that landed on a copy of Sun Tzu's "Art Of War" once, is running around blasting zombies and making whole metric farktons of noise in the process.  Drawing more undead to him.  Seeing that he has to reload after every shot, this may not be the brightest idea he's ever had.  Eventually, the inevitable occurs: he fumbles a shell.  At this point, near as I can tell, a shotgunner has four options: 1) let it go, man, 'cause it's gone, and shoot one barrel; 2) pull another shell out of your pocket; 3) feets don't fail me now;  4) come to a complete halt, bend down to pick the dropped shell up off the ground, and let the zombies gather around you.  What would you do? 

Since I've named him Skippy, you can guess which choice he made.  But he picked up the hell outta that shell, and a good job it was, too!  It was the best job of picking something up off the ground that you ever did see, going back to when some kid named Arthur pulled a sword outta a random rock somewhere.  Art got a kingdom out of it, though.  Skippy here, well, at least he makes an appearance in this episodic review.  That's gotta count for something!

The death of Skippy is also noted by Hirano, Saeko and Takashi, who are up on the balcony munching popcorn and generally enjoying the show, safely far above the gathering hordes.  Well, not really.  They note that "it's getting worse" out there.  Our Hero is all for going out there and trying to save everybody.  Saeko gently but firmly points out to him that he's a FRIGGIN' MORON.  Not only are they gonna have to deal with the undead hordes, but sooner or later, living people will notice that there's an awful nice safe spot up there and come a-callin'... and they don't have the resources to save them all.  Or even themselves, quite possibly.

Oh yeah.  Forgot about that little detail, didn't you?



No, I'm not sure what that's supposed to mean, either.  Engrish, most likely... maybe "good night and good luck," horribly mangled?  Edward R Murrow is whirling dervishly in his grave.  I'm not even sure it applies to this episode, but what the heck, it's HSotD, it's not like I expect logic or anything.  If I was looking for logic, I'd go back and watch Rio Rainbow Gate!... it's more realistic.  Yes, I know what I just said.

After expressing disbelief at her attitude, Saeko makes it clear that she hates what she's saying, but it's realistic nevertheless.  Handing him the binoculars with the instruction to look at what's going on, she walks away, nearly causing Hirano's death via nosebleed in the process.  After steeling himself, Our Hero takes a look... and notes that Hell has come to breakfast in the City of Townsville.  Then something catches his eye...

Oh no, no no no no no.  HSotD, now you've gone too dang far!  You are NOT gonna kill a kid and turn her into a zombie in front of us.  There's realistic and then there's realistic, and you are not realistic.  Dad and daughter run to a house with lights on and people moving around inside (see?  Saeko was right!), and he begs for them to let his daughter in.  The family inside yells that they don't need one and turns the porch light off.  What?  NO MORE HALLOWEEN CANDY???

RAAAAARRGGHHH DAD SMASH!  With a plumber's wrench?  Well, you use what you can get, I suppose.  (note: I really tried to make a "landshark" joke here, but it doesn't work as well from the outside...) After threatening to cause tiny little leaks in all their sinks, the family inside gives in... "hang on, we'll be right out."  Hooray, the little girl will live!  Dad is relieved!  Thank you, thank you HSotD!  I take back everything bad I said about you!

Oh GODDAMMITSOMUCH.  The housedwellers, armed with a knifeonastick, skewer dad, slam the door shut and turn the light back off.  You bastiches!  They do apologize, though, which is nice of 'em.  Probably taking bets on how long the little girl will last.  Dad staggers backwards, bumps the gates open, then slumps to the ground.

With his final breath, he tells her that he's fine, but she needs to go find someplace to hide.  Then, and only then, does he die.  The little girl sobs and wails.  Well, duh, of course, what would you expect?  Except the undead are attracted by sounds, and daddy opened the gates when he fell down.  Oops.  And then the zombies come.  Takashi, who has been watching this little drama, closes his eyes in frustration and turns away...

...just before Hirano clicks the safety off, chooses single-shot on the selector, yells "ROCK AND ROLLLLLLLLL" and opens fire.  Zombie after zombie goes down as the girl scrambles to hide somewhere, anywhere.  When Takashi, not unkindly, asks him about abandoning everyone and not shooting because it draws the undead's attention, Hirano replies with "Dude, it's a little girl.  You're gonna go rescue her, right?"

Of COURSE he's going to rescue her, what do you think this is, he says whistling tunelessly as he tries to disavow any knowledge of some of the preceding sentences suggesting that HSotD would let a little girl die for our "amusement."  It was pretty close, though.

You will believe a man can fly.  As Our Hero weaves his bike through the mass o' flesh betwixt him and the damsel in distress, and Hirano snipes those he can't avoid, those remaining at the safehouse congratulate themselves on still being human.

Well, mammalian at least.  Emphatically so.  Everything is going well with the rescue attempt, right up until Takashi makes it to the yard the little girl is in.

Human bodies apparently do not provide great traction.  Who knew?  The bike is wrecked, and while I'd love to say it goes flying through the front door of the house, I can't.  Sometimes justice is not served, mores the pity.  Though if the door DID go down, likely the man with a knifeonastick would come out again and try to skewer Our Hero.  Then Hirano would have to shoot him, and then where would we be?  I suspect we don't want to give Hirano a taste for blood...

I've never been so happy for a well-positioned leg in my entire life.  The girl is huddled in the corner of the yard, which is not what I'd consider "hiding," but then I didn't just see my father stabbed and hordes of undead trying to eat my brains, either.  Meanwhile, Yappydog just won't stop barking, attracting more and more shambling horrors towards them.  Perhaps he's trying to get her killed?  That's it, it's his revenge for being treated like a dog all his life by this little girl... that isn't his owner... oh.  Hm.  Well, maybe he just doesn't like people.  I mean, I don't like people as a whole very much, they're stupid and think I'm weird.  Individual persons, I'm okay with.  It's just that, as a group, people are dumb.  Did I just say that out loud?

Wielding that most famous of videogame weapons, Our Hero goes all Gordon Freeman on those undead threatening the little girl.  They're even safe for a bit, as he even managed to get the gate closed in the process.  Good work, hero!  Meanwhile, back at the safehouse...

Everybody loads up Humvee-kun to attempt a rescue mission for the rescue mission.  Problem is, there's roughly two gazillion zombies between them and Takashi and Alice-chan.  Humvee-kun is sturdy, to be sure, but that's too many for him to handle... Our Hero needs to come up with a plan to get closer to the safehouse.

And there it is.  Walk along the top of stone fences and hope that none of the zombies do anything like stick their arms up or something.  Which is exactly what happens, nearly causing the two of them to fall into the mass of Mardi Gras partiers undead in the street.  Things look grim, and maybe HSotD really will turn Alice into zombie chow after all, the dumb jerks.  Then, with a blare of trumpets and an insane scream of "CHAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRGE"...

My god, I do love this show so very much.  After plowing over the population of half the state of Rhode Island on the way to the rescue site, it turns out that Our Hero and Alice aren't quite there yet.  While Saeko defends Humvee-kun, Saya tells Hirano to buy the two escapees some time. 

Telling Hirano to "buy some time" is like telling me that RRG! is coming out on DVD here in the States.  He gives an insane laugh and suddenly zombies are being destroyed in wholesale amounts.  At this point, I'd just like to point out that Hirano is arguably the luckiest man on the face of the Earth.  Why do I say such a thing?

Best earmuffs ever.  If he had a beer and a pizza, he'd be set for life.  Probably end up anemic, though, from all the bloody noses.

A final jump puts Our Hero and Alice and Yappydog onto Humvee-kun and the rescue is complete!  Fade to black, roll credits.

Other than a bit right at the beginning, it was all action all the time for Ep07.  The beginning, though, sets the tone for the rest of the series: all is grim, all is dark, everybody is out of their minds, but at least we've got each other to see us through.  But they've gotten lucky so far, and they know it.  Ominous.

*FANSERVICE SHOT OF THE WEEK:


Next episode: more zombies!

Posted by: Wonderduck at 10:08 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
Post contains 1783 words, total size 14 kb.

1 You...ummm...you omitted an important plot element.

OK it's non-pivotal and an aside...but you omitted it.

Also...I don't think he's named Skippy either.

I just thought I'd point that out.




Posted by: brickmuppet at May 06, 2012 12:58 AM (EJaOX)

2 I prefer to believe that the scene in question doesn't exist.

Posted by: Wonderduck at May 06, 2012 01:04 AM (6CHh4)

3
...emphatically so.


I laughed.




Posted by: brickmuppet at May 06, 2012 01:05 AM (EJaOX)

4 Brickmuppet, you've piqued my curiosity - what plot element are you referring to?

Posted by: Siergen at May 06, 2012 02:11 PM (3/gGt)

Hide Comments | Add Comment

Comments are disabled.
36kb generated in CPU 0.0132, elapsed 0.0693 seconds.
47 queries taking 0.0601 seconds, 280 records returned.
Powered by Minx 1.1.6c-pink.