To make matters worse, our unwilling castaways seem to be stranded inside the school. When one of the students makes a dash across the foreboding landscape, he collapses just out of sight and doesn't appear to get up. There's only a limited amount of food since lunches are delivered daily, and Sho – who raced to school after an unresolved fight with his mother, remember – didn't even have breakfast.
Desperate to reach his mom, Sho attempts to reach her by phone (a thought that doesn't appear to have occurred to any of the adults yet). He run, run, runs to the teacher's lounge, but to no avail since the phones are out of order. To keep the rest of the school from panicking, Sho's teacher convinces him to act as if he was able to get through to his mother. The rest of his classmates don't buy it, in part because reluctant liar Sho does such a poor job.
In this you can see the seeds of a conflict between students and teachers already brewing. The adults are willing to say and do anything to maintain some semblance of order, even if it doesn't really help the situation, even if it's at the expense of one or more of their charges.
While the American publication is rated for a "Mature" audience, Umezu's art is beautifully keyed into capturing a pre-teen point-of-view. Though relatively realistic in his figures, cartoonish expressions and physical movements are largely the order of the day. Even during the violent moments (and there are several of 'em), I found myself thinking of the sardonic horror art of Jack Davis & Johnny Craig. (There's a two-page panel of the school principal holding his bleeding head that looks like it could've been a cover to The Vault of Horror.) Just the sort of comics that a sixth-grader like Sho would've dug, I bet.
A promising horror series, methinks: between this and Monster, Viz' older readers Signature series looks to be one to watch.
Article comments
1 - Mark Hodgson
I'm on a real Kazuo Umezu kick at the moment! I'll certainly be keeping up with this series - so far, it's more rewarding than the Scary Book series from Dark Horse.
But please do NOT be tempted by The Drifting Classroom live-action movie adaption from 1987...
2 - Bizmark
Good GOD! This series sounds good but your review is terrible! How could any editor let this one slide!? Take hold of the English language for a second and drop the collo1quialisms! 'tween?! Jesus, do you have such a quick paced life that you needed to type "'" instead of "be"?! I'm sure you actually went to the trouble of thinking "wait, I'm going to say 'tween instead of between." Do us a favor and don't use vernacular in a review. Or just hang yourself.