Welcome all, to episode 3 of Zom 100! This week introduces a new cast member and devotes its entire run time to his relationship with our lead, Akira. All things considered it was pretty good! So without further ado, lets dive in.
Early on I was actually a little concerned about this episode. I was afraid that Zom 100 was starting to take itself a tad to seriously, that it was leaning to much into the serious zombie stuff. Like it would transition into a legitimate horror, or that it would let Akira’s friend die and use it as a “Shock” wakeup moment for him to take the whole thing more seriously. To my pleasant surprise though, neither of these things happened. Instead it turned out the “Serious” stuff was just a background plot of an actual zombie movie, used as a joke more then anything else. And as for the friend? He survived, reborn, and is now joining Akira! It’s funny how much a change of hair color does, because I actually didn’t recognize him from the OP/ED, so this was nice.
Instead what Zom 100 did was further condemn modern work practices/corporate culture through humor. I mean, we already had our lead, Akira, have this breakthrough back in episode 1. We knew how shit his life was. But here we get a look at the other side of the fence. Kencho, his best friend, basically had it made. He had a good job, good money, beautiful women, by all metrics he was successful. And yet… He hated it. It wasn’t what he wanted to do, he didn’t enjoy it, he wasn’t fulfilled. In his eyes he was cheating people, scamming them out of their money and lying about how much he enjoyed it because that’s just what you’re supposed to do. He kept up the status quo because, in his eyes at least, he had no justifiable reason to complain. Not when others had it worse.
What really made this work for me though was just how open and honest both of them, Akira and Kencho, were. They both apologized almost immediately upon seeing each other again, this whole zombie apocalypse thing driving them to think of what’s important. They valued their friendship above any sort of pride, agreed they were both wrong and were maintaining the status quo rather then pursuing what they truly desired. It was a quick, but highly effective, way of communicating their friendship to us. Despite the fact that they spent barely half the episode together, I really feel like they are good friends. Ribbing and looking out for each other, respecting and listening. I’m honestly surprised with how well Zom 100 introduced Kencho to the cast, because I already love him more then our female lead from last episode.
As for how the episode ended, I thought this was really nice. While some may not find the comedy of it great, I’ll admit it wasn’t my speed, I loved the symbolism of it. Akira taking the leap, self-realized and freed from his burdens. Kencho held back by his old-world mindset, being inspired by Akira. As he jumps he sheds his clothes, the dress shirt and business pants representing his old obligations and the hold corporate Japan had on him, being reborn into this new world naked and free. Almost failing but needing Akira’s help to drag him up, both of them sitting together naked and equal, stripped of all social pretense. It made for a really thematic, really touching end to the episode for me. Something on the same level as the bombastic finale of the pilot, which isn’t something I was expecting.
So yeah, all in all I found this to be a pretty good episode of Zom 100. It’s not quite as bombastic as I was expecting after the pilot, a bit more restrained then I’d thought it would be, but still good. It feels like Zom 100 isn’t resting on it’s laurels, wasting a bunch of time with Akira just fucking around doing nothing. Instead every episode has either brought on the zombie apocalypse or introduced a new character/eventual party member, with each character saying something about corporate culture. It makes for a nice experience if you ask me, even if it hasn’t “wowed” me since the pilot. Hopefully once all the cast are introduced Zom 100 can figure out where it wants to take its larger story. At the very least I hope it has something planned for that.
