40 Fun Facts About Highschool of the Dead

What do the survivors in Highschool of the Dead call the zombies, since they differ from the movie kind?

Them is the survivors' standing name for the undead, a euphemism coined by Hisashi Igo, who becomes one himself in the first episode.

Saya Takagi is among the first in Highschool of the Dead to realise the zombies react only to what?

Sound is all the undead can sense, which Takashi Komuro tests by slipping past a crowd of zombies quietly until another survivor's noise draws the horde.

Highschool of the Dead director Tetsurō Araki went on to direct the first season of which hit anime?

Attack on Titan arrived in 2013, three years after Araki's zombie series, and with Death Note it is the work he is best known for directing.

Why was the Highschool of the Dead manga, which published only one chapter after 2011, left unfinished?

Its writer died in March 2017: Daisuke Satō had been ill since 2008, and artist Shōji Satō agreed to leave the story where it had stopped.

What job does Shizuka Marikawa, the only adult in the main Highschool of the Dead group, hold on campus?

Nurse Shizuka Marikawa is 27 and admits she is only a temporary hire still in training, yet she is the one who drives the group's getaway vehicles.

Which country's Ministry of Culture put Highschool of the Dead on a 2015 list of 38 banned anime and manga?

China had singled the series out months earlier too, when officials announcing a crackdown on violent and sexual anime described it as borderline pornographic.

Before he finds any firearms, Takashi Komuro fights his way out of school in Highschool of the Dead with what?

A baseball bat sees Takashi through the escape; he later carries a revolver recovered from a dead policeman and then moves up to a shotgun.

As children, Takashi Komuro and Rei Miyamoto of Highschool of the Dead made which promise to each other?

To marry someday was the pinky promise, but Takashi's indecision led Rei to date his friend Hisashi Igo instead, a sore point when the outbreak begins.

Which studio, where director Tetsurō Araki began his career, animated Highschool of the Dead?

Madhouse made all twelve episodes and the 2011 OVA, and Araki had already directed Death Note for the same studio.

In the 2011 OVA episode of Highschool of the Dead, where do the survivors end up, supposedly safe from zombies?

A tropical island gives the cast a beach episode, though zombies still arrive: a closing scene reveals a tunnel linking it to the mainland.

Saeko Busujima, a third-year student in Highschool of the Dead, is president of which school club?

Kendo explains the wooden practice blade Saeko fights with at first; her father is abroad at a martial arts tournament when the outbreak hits.

Where do Takashi Komuro and Rei Miyamoto barricade themselves in the first episode of Highschool of the Dead?

The rooftop gives the pair a view of military helicopters flying past toward the city, oblivious to the carnage in the school below.

Which vehicle do the Highschool of the Dead survivors borrow from the apartment of police sniper Rika Minami?

A Humvee parked outside the flat belongs to Rika, a friend of Shizuka Marikawa, and the group also helps itself to her private stock of firearms.

Saya Takagi, the pink-haired second-year in Highschool of the Dead, proudly describes herself as what?

A genius is Saya's own label, and she backs it up, using her deductions about the undead to steer the group out of danger.

Kohta Hirano of Highschool of the Dead improvises his first weapon in a classroom from which tool?

A nail gun, pieced together like a rifle in a classroom, is Kohta's weapon until real firearms turn up; Saya Takagi makes do with a drill.

Where do the survivors arrive on foot in the final scene of the Highschool of the Dead anime series?

A shopping mall is where the anime leaves the group; the manga carries on from there to a police station and a school said to be a safe zone.

Separated from the bus by a tunnel crash, how do Takashi and Rei reach the city in Highschool of the Dead?

On a motorcycle taken from a zombie rider, the pair head into the city, even though Takashi has no licence to ride one.

Soichiro Takagi thanks Saeko Busujima for protecting his daughter in Highschool of the Dead with which gift?

A katana made from military-grade steel is Soichiro's thanks, and a nod to Saeko's father, who once trained him.

Where are Takashi Komuro and his classmates studying when the outbreak begins in Highschool of the Dead?

Fujimi High is home to all five student survivors, from second-years like Takashi to third-year Saeko Busujima.

Which Highschool of the Dead character joins the survivors when Takashi Komuro rescues her along with a puppy?

Alice Maresato is seven when Takashi brings her to safety along the top of a fence, after her father, a reporter, is killed while seeking shelter.

What is unusual about the Highschool of the Dead anime's closing themes, all sung by Maon Kurosaki?

Each episode has its own ending song, twelve in all, and the full set was released together on one CD in September 2010.

Kohta Hirano of Highschool of the Dead is modelled on the real creator of which vampire manga?

Hellsing author Kouta Hirano knows about his schoolboy namesake, and joked in an afterword that he had to go and kill zombies at his high school.

Uniforms worn by Rei and Saeko in Highschool of the Dead became downloadable costumes in which zombie game?

Lollipop Chainsaw let players dress its cheerleader heroine Juliet Starling in both girls' uniforms, among costumes drawn from four anime series in 2012.

The illustrator of Highschool of the Dead, Shōji Satō, also writes and draws which vigilante manga?

Triage X began in 2009, while the zombie series was stalled, and it became Satō's sole focus once that story was shelved for good.

Why does Rei Miyamoto of Highschool of the Dead despise the teacher Koichi Shido?

He held her back a year at the request of his politician father, whom Rei's policeman father was investigating for corruption.

Rei Miyamoto of Highschool of the Dead trades her sharpened broomstick for a rifle fitted with what?

A bayonet lets Rei wield the rifle like a spear, and she later points it at Koichi Shido when he turns up at the Takagi estate.

Cut off from the group, where do Takashi Komuro and Saeko Busujima camp overnight in Highschool of the Dead?

A shrine shelters the pair after a day spent drawing the horde away in an amphibious vehicle, and there Saeko confides the dark side she fears in herself.

In the Highschool of the Dead finale, what stalls Koichi Shido's bus so that it smashes open a barricade?

A nuclear EMP from a high-altitude missile blast kills nearby electronics, and the crash lets the horde pour into the Takagi estate.

Soichiro Takagi, Saya's father in Highschool of the Dead, leads what kind of organisation?

A nationalist group answers to Soichiro, and he shows its followers what they face by publicly executing a friend who has turned.

Which company released the English dub of Highschool of the Dead on DVD and Blu-ray in North America?

Sentai Filmworks licensed the series for a 2010 simulcast, then issued a dub directed by Steven Foster that gave Takashi Komuro a far fouler mouth.

Which manga magazine, also home to High School DxD, serialised Highschool of the Dead from 2006?

Monthly Dragon Age ran the series, and when fan scans spread abroad the creators printed an English note in chapter five asking readers to buy the real thing.

Which publisher brought the Highschool of the Dead manga to North America, starting in January 2011?

Yen Press also ran a full-colour edition in its online magazine Yen Plus, and the second book reached fourth place on the New York Times manga best-seller list.

Which actor, the Japanese voice of Death Note's Light Yagami, plays Hisashi Igo in Highschool of the Dead?

Mamoru Miyano had starred in Tetsurō Araki's Death Note as Light; in this series his character does not survive the first episode.

Kohta Hirano of Highschool of the Dead says he spent a month in America training with a veteran of which unit?

Delta Force training is how Kohta explains his aim, and the bullied schoolboy becomes the group's marksman, giving Takashi sniper cover during a rescue.

When zombies breach the Takagi estate in Highschool of the Dead, Saya's mother hands her which German pistol?

Luger P08 pistols entered German army service in 1908; Saya later trades hers to Kohta Hirano for an MP5.

In the Highschool of the Dead OVA, smoke from which plant's burning leaves makes the cast hallucinate?

Hydrangea leaves go on the campfire because Takashi Komuro gathers the foliage as kindling without knowing the plant, and the fumes give everyone lurid visions.

What job did Yuriko Takagi of Highschool of the Dead hold abroad, building contacts that enriched the family?

Wall Street stockbroker was Yuriko's career in New York, and when the estate falls she fights the horde beside her husband.

Chapters of the Highschool of the Dead manga, some titled after American pop culture, go by what name?

Acts is the label on every chapter, and one title riffs on the western The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.

Protesters at the police bridge blockade in Highschool of the Dead blame the outbreak on what?

A government bioweapon made by America and Japan is the claim of the conspiracy theorist leading the crowd, as police are cleared to shoot to keep order.

Rika Minami, whose apartment shelters the Highschool of the Dead survivors, is a sniper in which police unit?

Special Assault Team snipers including Rika are busy clearing zombies from an airport runway while her friends make use of her flat.