Zombie Land Saga S1E3: “Dead or Live Saga”

Beach volleyball episode? Beach volleyball episode. Let's play us some beach volleyball!


Open on Dickface addressing his slaves in his usual, drill-sergeant-like manner. His sternness breaks for a moment, when he congratulates them on their successful performance the other day - especially with how Sakura managed to salvage the bouncing head situation - but it doesn't last long.

He can't just show pride or gratitude without it also being double edged and trying to undermine the girls' confidence and self esteem. I think my favorite part is when he berates them for being at risk of "losing sight of the goal" when he's given them no incentive whatsoever to share that goal.

He also informs them that tomorrow they're going to be doing a guerilla performance (he tries to write "guerilla" in English for them, but gives up two letters in and switches to Japanese). This means an unannounced performance in a public place. One of the girls cheerfully compares this to the samurai practice of testing their new swords on random peasants during Japan's more lawless eras, which creeps most of the others out. Ai asks Dickface if the police won't trouble them about causing this kind of public disturbance, and Dickface brushes her off, even when she reminds him of how poorly their interactions with the police have gone thus far and points out the difficulty of keeping their disguises intact in an uncontrolled environment in broad daylight. He brushes that off too, and irritably tells them that he also isn't going to accept any of this rap or metal crap this time, he wants a genuine idol performance.

...

You know, if they just told him "fuck you, we're doing the performance we want," would he have any recourse? It seems to me that they actually have a fair amount of power over him already.

I really hope they realize this at some point, and hopefully sooner rather than later.

...

Another issue they raise is that it'll take them a while to figure out an appropriate routine for this guerilla performance, and him demanding they have it ready by tomorrow morning is not reasonable or even realistic.

He just tells them that it's a good thing they don't need to sleep, and leaves them to figure something out.

Roll intro. I might be misremembering, but I don't think the intro was quite as long in the previous episode? It might be doing a growing intro thing, or it could just be my imagination. Anyway, once that's over the girls are dejectedly trying to figure out what to do for their boss' insane guerilla order, some perky blue-haired girl whose name I didn't catch proposes that Green Face should have a leader. Idol groups always do (apparently).

It seems to me that Sakura is already sort of occupying that role, since she's the one who introduced them in their last performance and generally took the onstage lead, but I guess it needs to be official. Unsurprisingly, Saki tries to appoint herself in charge (pointing to her completely unsubstantiated history as a biker gang leader as qualification).

Nobody else feels like arguing her, so I guess she's the leader.

She wants their first priority to be taking over Kyushu and consolidating power there before conquering the other islands and planning their mainland invasion. Before the strategizing can begin though, Perky says that they should also come up with a better name for themselves. "Death Musume" worked for their metal debut, but "Green Face" is really just not appropriate for an idol band even if it has the dorky zombie reference in it. She proposes "Lily With Cutie Lily Magic." Her name is Lily. The other girls are irritated by this. Saki counters with "Joan d'Arc and the Wicked Rage Void Slackers," but no one likes that either. The aristocratic girl who made the samurai murder rampage comment earlier suggests a compromise name, "The Mibu Wolves." That somewhat pleases some of the girls, but Sakura thinks it doesn't quite hit the right genre notes.

The discussion is ended prematurely by Tae the still-zombiemode girl trying to eat the whiteboard marker, and then going on a rampage when they try to take it from her.

There's a pretty good joke in here, with Tae grabbing the marker and staring at it with what seems to be keen attention for a few seconds before putting it in her mouth. Makes it seem like the marker was jogging her memory and finally awakening her or something, but no.

...granted, I'm still not discounting the possibility that she's been awake the whole time and just pretending to still be zombiemode.

They end up calling themselves "Franchouchou," after some weird noises Tae makes after ingesting enough ink to cough/sneeze it up. Okay, sure. Now that they have their name, they need to go ahead and conquer Kyushu. And the first step to doing that, of course, is figuring out their song and dance routine for tomorrow.

Cut ahead to late that night, with several of the girls - including Sakura - having given up and gone outside to dejectedly play on Dickface's merry-go-round (which he just has in his yard, I guess). Throwing an idol act together in just one night with a group of highly variable experience livings and no existing working relationship is just too daunting. I wonder what they'd been planning to do last time, before the rap thing happened? Not sure, maybe they were just planning to wing it in a way that they can't do in such a precarious situation as this guerilla performance. Tae gets carried away spinning the wheel after they get her started on it, and eventually Sakura goes flying off. As she sails through the air, though, she is reminded of those moments of elation she felt getting applause and adulation onstage the last two times, and is filled with determination. Even though she faceplants hard enough to bury her head in the soil a half second later.

Sakura pulls herself out of the dirt and declares that she's found renewed hope and optimism, and that she's sure they can do it again just like they did the last two times, they just need to go back inside and keep practicing. Just then, whatsername the scary aristocratic girl (who still has flesh, despite having supposedly died in the eighteenth century or whatever) comes out of the house right then to slap her across the face for being such a defeatist and demand that she and the others get back inside and keep practicing this instant. I guess they'd have been motivated one way or the other, lol.

Back inside, Ai and Junko - the two with the most relevant experience - are trying to keep their own hopes for this up. Though I still want to know what their motivations are, assuming they aren't actually sold on Saki's world domination ambitions.

Yugiri. That's the scary princess girl. I thiiink I've got all their names down now.

Anywaym Ai thinks that even if their performance isn't technically very good, the crowd will probably like it if there's feeling and sincerity behind it. Of course, how "sincere" any of them are about this is very much in doubt, seeing as they're slaves working under some degree of duress. Really, Sakura and possibly Lily are the only ones passionate about their music for its own sake. Suddenly, the others come back in, full of renewed energy and/or fear, and they get back into their game, practicing relentlessly.

Jump ahead a couple more hours. Junko and Ai have now retreated, frustrated at how enthusiasm hasn't translated into technical proficiency overnight. Dickface comes up to them and gives them an incredibly self-serving and gaslighty pep talk about how the other girls are trying to live while these two are letting themselves rot (note that he's talking to the only two who tried to escape and seek their own unlives rather than submitting to him). Being young teenagers, they're cowed by it.

God, I fucking hate this guy. I know I'm probably supposed to, but...he's awful in a way that feels too real for this otherwise very silly and lighthearted show.

So, next morning! Dickface releases a van full of reluctant undead near a train station, all painted and disguised up as their living selves, and tells them to go conduct a guerilla operation that would make the mujahadin proud.

Ai and Junko refuse to leave the van. Dickface just leaves them be instead of fighting them. Sakura is disheartened by this, but resolves to do as best as they can even without their two most talented members. If Saki, their "captain," feels anxious about this as well though, she doesn't show it.

The girls line up on the sidewalk by the station entrance. Tae sneezes. Saki raises the megaphone to her mouth and angrily demands that all nearby civilians take heed and bear witness to Franchouchou's surprise performance. Despite her being the "captain" and announcer though, Saki seems to have let Sakura continue being the lead singer. It's the first actual idol-ish number of the show, and while the dance moves are a bit simplistic as you'd expect the band really isn't half bad.

From the van, Ai and Junko watch silently. Whispering along with the words, but not seeming terribly invested. That is, until Lily - the youngest of the lot - mixes up the choreography and bumps into someone else, falling over in the process. They cut out the music and hurriedly pick themselves up. The crowd, which had been gathering around their performance and starting to kind of get into it, slowly goes back to its morning business.

Back at the van, Ai and Junko suddenly get much more emotional, shouting for the others to get back on track and get things moving again. Not that anyone can hear them from inside the vehicle, but still. It seems to be more out of affection for the other girls who they've kinda-sorta befriended at this point than out of any sense of professionalism, as you'd expect given how everyone's been characterized thus far.

The others get themselves back in shape and resume the number from a few beats back, but it seems like they might have missed the window. They're not getting as much attention now. I'm guessing Ai and Junko are going to dive in with some insane improvised entrance that renews the shock and awe factor? Maybe.

Well, I was almost right. Perhaps unnerved by that initial mishap, Sakura forgets the lyrics a few lines later, and it looks like they're going to come crashing to a halt again. The two reluctant watchers do a less zany, but more realistic, rescue than I'd anticipated, diving in from across the parking area to pick up where she left off and make it look like a dramatic pause/transition.

I don't know if this show went as far as Symphogear did, in having more experienced singers voice act the more experienced characters (that was one of the few details I really liked about Symphogear), but in any case Ai and Junko's VA's definitely sell them as more confident singers, and they deliver the same tune with greater vocal range than Sakura. It's a nice touch.

They work in another dramatic pause just to make the first one seem more intentional before bridging to the final verse, which Sakura, Ai, and Junko deliver in three part harmony before being joined by all the others halfway through. Even Tae kinda mumbles similar-sounding gibberish in unconscious imitation as she stumbles around the periphery.

It still isn't enough to bring back the crowd. By the end, their audience appears to consist of just one child. But said child is totally enchanted by them, which seems to warm Saki's heart in particular.

She has a soft spot for children and tamaguchis.

Overall, it hasn't ended up being a very successful performance. Which is completely Dickface's fault, of course; if they'd had just a couple more days to prepare, it seems like this would have been great.

Just as Dickface is about to pick them up after their show and probably bitch them out for failing to do the impossible task he set for them, a cop comes over and tells them they can't just perform on public property unannounced like this. It's...well, he's apparently the only cop in the city, he's got a whacky neurotic personality, and he's extremely trigger happy. You all know what I'm going to have to call him.

Ai and Junko have to hurriedly grab Saki and pull her away from Ortega before she provokes him into trying to arrest them and causes things to get REALLY unpleasant. Sakura desperately tries to apologetically talk him down, but calling attention to herself wasn't the best move either. Her face seems familiar to him.

Fortunately, Dickface recognizes Ortega as well, and herds the girls into his van and dashes away with them before any more questions can be asked. Their escape breaks a number of traffic laws, but the officer doesn't seem to care. Because he's too distracted by the stunned, openmouthed expression Sakura gave him when he leaned in, which he interprets as...

Okay. It's official. I'm not even joking anymore. This guy had a kid who moved to Mexico and started a family there, and three hundred years later the madness continues.

Epilogue is just Sakura thanking Ai and Junko for somewhat salvaging their performance back there, and the two of them musing about how maybe this isn't going to be too terrible after all. Junko is also getting over some more minor reservations she'd had about not being a solo act, which she always was in life. I wish the conflict with Dickface was acknowledged more here, but honestly...it seems like the show just isn't going to push that angle, at least not anytime soon. Oh well. End episode.


It was cute. More evenly distributed gags than the previous episode, making for a more consistently enjoyable experience. That said, it doesn't reach the same heights as the previous ep either. Nothing nearly as funny as the rapper harrassment scene, or as artistically creative as the freestyle performance. The music was fine here, and the animation for the dancing was pretty, but nothing about it really stands out from other anime musicals.

I wonder if it's a coincidence that this episode's performance was also the first proper "idol" number. Playing with musical styles and subcultures gave the last couple of eps a lot of their substance. That was lacking this time around.

Generally enjoyable, aside from my ongoing irritation with Dickface and the girls' schizophrenic attitudes toward him, but I'm learning to just sigh and roll my eyes when that's relevant. As I said last time, I'm liking this show, but it isn't really giving me much to talk about. With rare exceptions, all it's trying to do is be silly. It most often succeeds at being silly. Silliness is fun, but it's hard to dissect in text.