Welcome to Hyakkou Academy, the school molds the minds of
those destined for greatness. Here it
isn’t about how good you are in the classroom, it’s about how good you are at
the art of the gambling game. If you’re
good, you’re part of the elite echelon of students. If you’re bad, you’re a pet until you can
clear your debt. It’s the worst kind of
class system and someone is about to challenge it like never before. Her name
is Yumeko Jamabi. She may look serene
and beautiful. But beneath her heavenly
appearance lies the ultimate demon, a woman who gambles not for position or
fortune but for the sheer thrill of betting it all. Hyakkou Academy has no idea the storm that is
about to befall it when Yumeko joins the game.
Wow…am I glad I never went to this Academy for high
school. At long last, after a half year
wait, ive finally been able to watch the first few episodes of one of last
summers big hits, Kakegurui. I’ll admit,
my interest came from the odd premise and, let’s face it, an extremely
attractive lead character. And while both
are here and work in their own way, I’m still trying to recover from all the
crazy overload that was also promised in the previews, I dare say they didn’t
do the final result justice. Hyakkou
Academy is a mad, mad world and Yumeko Jamabi has come to play to her crazy
hearts content.
Yumeko Jamabi. She
certainly is something. At first she
seems like the ultimate, unattainable girl next door, a transfer student whose
beauty easily dwarfs anyone in the school.
But once you really get to see her in action as she show goes on…it’s
almost a good thing she’s not interested in being anyones love interest. Yumeko’s true love is the thrill of betting
it all and seeing where the pieces fall.
The higher the risk, the hotter she gets, literally, the girl is in a
near sexual frenzy a couple of times. It
made me think of Alucard from Hellsing when he fought Luke Valentine and got
excited at the prospect of battling a monster as wacky as he was. Actually, Yumeko’s showdown with first year
Itsuki ends in a similar fashion, with Yumeko seeing she’s all talk and feeling
a bit letdown. Past the obvious crazy,
it’s hard to get a clear read on Yumeko or her intentions. Is she really just a gambling addict who gets
turned on by playing the game? Is she
here at Hyakkou to challenge the hierarchy, a la Ryuko Matoi in Kill la
Kill? One thing that I will say
surprises me is Yumeko’s Sherlock Holmes level intellect, being able to sniff
out deceit and how one pulls off a cheating maneauver in almost no time
flat. She may be addicted but Yumeko got
the smarts to back up her skill.
Hyakkou Academy’s school life is bizzare and plenty times
downright cruel. Students used as prop
stools or chairs for superior gamblers, others being forced to clean up messes
and most “house pets” often spoken to as less than human beings, everyone in
this school deserves to get punched. As
uncomfortable as Yumeko’s special brand of psycho makes me, im kind of glad
she’s here to shake up the social order and challenge it. The games she and the other students play are
all very unique in their own way. The
library of gambling options goes beyond your standard Las Vegas casino and
mostly features customized versions of classic games like Rock Paper Scissors
or Memory Games. Each episode takes a
small chunk of time to explain the rules.
Still, when everyone is basically breaking the rules in some form or
another…I kind of have to wonder what the heck the point is. In the end, the rules don’t matter. What does are the inevitable freakouts of the
losers that put any witness in a Phoenix Wright game to shame. Every girl looks pretty but when they think
they’ve got the drop on Yumeko or Yumeko sees through their scheme, their faces
turn absolutely, and probably intentionally hideous. Most of them are downright terrifying and yet
not as terrifying as a super turned on Yumeko being both sexy and insane at the
same time.
Prior to checking out the series, I took a look at the
first volume of the manga (I have Volume 2 and still need to read it). It took me a while to get through the first
volume because it took me a couple of reads to wrap my head around the
rules. In the series, however,
everything feels a lot more brisk, heck some episodes feel over just as swiftly
as they began. It’s rapid fire storytelling
for sure. Still, the first three
episodes felt pretty similar for the most part with the same story structure:
Ryota narrarates “welcome to my God awful school”, Yumeko discovers a new game,
she begins to lose then realizes the trick, Yumeko gets turned on and the
opponent collapses, rinse repeat. I
guess it was a surprise then when Yumeko doesn’t win the game at the end of
Episode 3. Normally this would break any
main character a little. Yumeko,
however, does what we might expect…and behaves like a sexy kitten, taking it
all in stride…this is going to be an odd one to grade at the end.
Kakegurui so far is pretty something. It’s exciting, it’s crazy, it’s hard to look
away from and…wow Yumeko, how can I be afraid of you and yet intrigued at the
same time? And just how many more ways
can the animators find to create the ultimate overreactions to tearing ones
world down at the single turn of a game?
Kakegurui has begun…let’s see where the crazy train takes us.
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