Prison School is the true definition of exquisite torture. Exquisite, but also trashy torture, to be precise. This series really pushes the boundaries of what to expect in your sex comedies, but it’s also pretty darn good at just telling a thrilling story, even if that story happens to have a ridiculously stupid premise. It works.
I’m going to spare you the recap and just get to how good this episode was.
This show has an endless number of ways of making all their characters suffer and that’s what works for me beyond the initial shock at how extreme it is. It’s not really mean-spirited or hateful towards women as much as initial appearances may be, it’s equally….angry (lack of a better word) at both genders. It’s angry at how dumb and trivial the cast’s general perception and reaction towards just the idea of interacting with the opposite sex is. The show is just so good at sucking you in when you least expect it – it has no business being as well-paced and well-plotted as it is! It’s an example of using its premise right. It pushes extremes such that you can never really expect anything, which is saying a lot considering how pathetically cliché anime’s ecchi genre tends to be.
Given last week’s cliffhanger, and the opening to this week’s episode being so incredibly morbid in its polished direction, I’m not even sure if Gakuto losing his hair to get Kiyoshi a wig is considered some kind of an anti-climactic thing, because it totally works yet at the same time it’s so out of left field? The suspense stays on regardless though, and this week’s episode was so difficult for me to sit through because I just didn’t know how badly the boys were going to screw themselves over again (it’s not even a question of whether they’ll get back safely at this point). And yet I stayed. I stayed because I wanted to see some EXTREME SEXUAL HUMILIATION. I’m trash.
And indeed it was some real, top-class humiliation for Kiyoshi. Of all the goddamn uniforms he could’ve gotten, it was Chiyo’s. It’s incredible how well thought-out all the bloody things that happened in this episode were. Another twist that’s impossible to expect, and yet when it drops you can’t help but laugh so hard because now everyone is trash and everyone is suffering.
I told myself I was only going to read enough of the manga each week to catch up to the latest episode, but I gave in as of this episode. Personally, I stuck with this for Araragi and Chiyo’s potential bond, but I was utterly devastated when Chiyo found her uniform in Kiyoshi’s bag ;_; I HAD to read ahead!
P.S. Sorry, I bit my tongue!