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The Drifting Classroom #1
The Drifting Classroom, Vol. 1
In the aftermath of a strange earthquake, an entire elementary school vanishes, leaving nothing but a hole in the ground. While parents mourn and authorities investigate, the students and teachers find themselves somewhere far away...somewhere cold and dark... a lifeless, nightmarish wasteland in which their school stands like a lone fortress. As panic turns to terror, as the rules start to fall apart, a sixth-grade boy named Sho and his friends must fight to survive in an alien world...
190 pages, Paperback
First published August 8, 2006
51 people are currently reading
4628 people want to read
About the author
Kazuo Umezu
131 books305 followersKazuo Umezu or Kazuo Umezz was a Japanese manga artist, musician and actor. Starting his career in the 1950s, he is among the most famous artists of horror manga and has been vital for its development, considered the "god of horror manga". In 1960s shōjo manga like Reptilia, he broke the industry's conventions by combining the aesthetics of the commercial manga industry with gruesome visual imagery inspired by Japanese folktales, which created a boom of horror manga and influenced manga artists of following generations. He created successful manga series such as The Drifting Classroom, Makoto-chan and My Name Is Shingo, until he retired from drawing manga in the mid 1990s. He was a public figure in Japan, known for wearing red-and-white-striped shirts and doing his signature "Gwash" hand gesture.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 179 reviews
July 20, 2023
A horror story which has not become scary yet...
This is a story about an entire elementary school which has disappeared from its place leaving a big piece of land instead.
The story is so good we only care so far about the school itself, phones are out, tv is out, radio is out.
It also seems that they can't leave the school or they will drop dead.
The last scene where the girl gets her hand skewered will be explained next issue but i can't imagine who would do that.
This is a story about an entire elementary school which has disappeared from its place leaving a big piece of land instead.
The story is so good we only care so far about the school itself, phones are out, tv is out, radio is out.
It also seems that they can't leave the school or they will drop dead.
The last scene where the girl gets her hand skewered will be explained next issue but i can't imagine who would do that.
February 3, 2023
Trust me, The Drifting Classroom vol 1 and vol 2 gave me freaking nightmares and caused me to have difficulty eating for HALF A YEAR after I read the first two volumes. Yes, I was unable to bring myself to read further than vol. 2 even though I skipped to read the finale 10 years after I first read the first two volumes, but still OH MY POOR INNOCENT EYES AND MY OVERTURNING STOMACH!
Let me tell you how I came to read the first two volumes at the tender age of 12 or 13, I discovered the whole 11 volumes laying around in my grandmother's house, turned out it was one of my uncles who brought the whole series because my mom, my aunts and uncles used to read Kazuo Umezu's stuff when they were kids themselves (supposedly those stories were serialized in a kid's magazine called 'Children's Paradise' or something like that).
Mom, aunts, uncles, what the hell were you guys doing reading this stuff as kids!?
So the story is basically an intensified version of Lord of the Flies with Sci-Fi elements, monsters and tons of disgusting, nightmarish stuff. I read this as a kid and I was utterly horrified, the story of a whole school of 6 to 12 years old children (plus a handful of teachers and staff) being forced to struggle for survival in a deadly desert with monsters and other shits is truly horrifying, it also is unsettling to watch adults and children breaking down when faced by such bizarre situation. It really makes you wonder: what would you do if you were put to the same position!?
A GR friend asked me "what the hell might this be?" I can only say there are a lot of freaking crazy, disgusting, scary, ugly and heart-sickening things going on in these volumes!!! However, since this is a mother freaking horror story, so I guess this is a success?
A very good article in Chinese about this 'coming of age horror' and Sci-Fi masterpiece: https://everylittled.com/article/1574...
Let me tell you how I came to read the first two volumes at the tender age of 12 or 13, I discovered the whole 11 volumes laying around in my grandmother's house, turned out it was one of my uncles who brought the whole series because my mom, my aunts and uncles used to read Kazuo Umezu's stuff when they were kids themselves (supposedly those stories were serialized in a kid's magazine called 'Children's Paradise' or something like that).
Mom, aunts, uncles, what the hell were you guys doing reading this stuff as kids!?
So the story is basically an intensified version of Lord of the Flies with Sci-Fi elements, monsters and tons of disgusting, nightmarish stuff. I read this as a kid and I was utterly horrified, the story of a whole school of 6 to 12 years old children (plus a handful of teachers and staff) being forced to struggle for survival in a deadly desert with monsters and other shits is truly horrifying, it also is unsettling to watch adults and children breaking down when faced by such bizarre situation. It really makes you wonder: what would you do if you were put to the same position!?
A GR friend asked me "what the hell might this be?" I can only say there are a lot of freaking crazy, disgusting, scary, ugly and heart-sickening things going on in these volumes!!! However, since this is a mother freaking horror story, so I guess this is a success?
A very good article in Chinese about this 'coming of age horror' and Sci-Fi masterpiece: https://everylittled.com/article/1574...
October 29, 2021
This incredible horror book about a school of children who vanish into thin air is disturbing, gruesome, and entertaining from page one to the finish. Can’t wait to read Vol 2
May 25, 2016
Kazuo Umezu is seen as one of the great manga horror masters, and maybe THE manga horror master, and this is supposed to be one of his three most apocalyptic works, and probably his best known work in the west. I had read work by Junji Ito (Uzumaki) which I thought was great, and it's a horror comic about a school. . . so obviously I had to read it. This has as its beginning a fight between sixth grader Sho and his mom, where Sho leaves the house saying he isn't coming back, with his mother agreeing that this is a good idea, a conversation conducted at the top of their lungs. This is the set up for a tragedy: ""I hope you never DO come home again!" Ha!
Soon after, some terrible explosion happens when Sho is at school and the only thing that seems to be left in the world is this school or maybe even just this classroom, a kind of floating or drifting classroom. We have no idea what is left of the universe, but at a glance, doesn't look like much. And how are the kids and teachers handling it all, with the need for food and water and mommy and daddy? Chaos. Tears. And one teacher seems as bad an authority figure as the mother as things spiral out of control. Tragic, crazy, end of the world stuff, with strong fitting artwork. Impressive. Not THAT scary, but it's a fun crazy inventive story.
Soon after, some terrible explosion happens when Sho is at school and the only thing that seems to be left in the world is this school or maybe even just this classroom, a kind of floating or drifting classroom. We have no idea what is left of the universe, but at a glance, doesn't look like much. And how are the kids and teachers handling it all, with the need for food and water and mommy and daddy? Chaos. Tears. And one teacher seems as bad an authority figure as the mother as things spiral out of control. Tragic, crazy, end of the world stuff, with strong fitting artwork. Impressive. Not THAT scary, but it's a fun crazy inventive story.
October 18, 2020
I guess I’m in the mood to revisit some Japanese horror this fine holiday season.
The Drifting Classroom opens up the mystery of a school’s disturbing disappearance/teleportation into an unknown world. The school children and the adults begin to violently unwind. It’s hard to stay sane when reality is broken.
Nothing is made clear in this first volume. Many questions remain.
Reread.
The Drifting Classroom opens up the mystery of a school’s disturbing disappearance/teleportation into an unknown world. The school children and the adults begin to violently unwind. It’s hard to stay sane when reality is broken.
Nothing is made clear in this first volume. Many questions remain.
Reread.
October 16, 2021
This is a review of the entire series!
For Sho Takamatsu, it seemed to be an ordinary day of school like any other. In the aftermath of a sudden earthquake, his entire elementary school vanishes into thin air along with all the students and teachers that were trapped inside. The earthquake seemed to be so powerful that it caused a ripple in time, projecting the school into a dark and bleak wasteland where nothing but death, mutants and mind-breaking anomalies await. Sho takes on the role of the leader, trying to keep the other children safe from harm while searching for a way back home.
The Drifting Classroom takes things at a very slow pace. The horror elements don't even begin to seep in until several volumes into the series. While it starts off slow and does drag a bit in places, I think every volume is better than the previous. It took me a while to get into it but I really started to feel invested once I saw the bigger picture of what it was trying to portray.
While the dialogue and reactions of the characters seems a bit clunky and unrealistic at times, it's important to remember that many of the characters are extremely young elementary school students. Most of them haven't even learned how to talk properly let alone think themselves out of life or death situations. Watching children so young and vulnerable get thrown into one nightmare after the other led to some very intense chapters that didn't shy away from showing little kids being brutally murdered, eaten and smashed to pieces. It might not start out scary, but each volume escalates the horror, the violence and the stakes. As hundreds of children are driven mad with fear, hunger and isolation with no adults to care for them, it's only a matter of time until they begin to turn on each other as well. These kids can give the children in Lord of the Flies a run for their money once their minds start to break.
Some smaller things such as the art quality and the sometimes stagnant way the characters and their reactions are drawn feel off-putting and even a bit silly at times, but it's important to remember that this is one of the pioneers of horror manga, written all the way back in 1971. Devilman is another great manga that has some of the same issues. They're both great series, but you can tell they were written during the experimental phase of manga when they were just beginning to find their way into mainstream entertainment. Though certain aspects of The Drifting Classroom haven't aged that well, it was surprisingly ahead of its time in other ways. As the story progresses, it begins to tackle the themes of overindulgent consumerism, industrial pollution, and the greed of one generation causing major issues for the next generation. It goes into dark detail about how every little action we take that harms the planet hurts future generations of children far more than it hurts any of us.
***
If you're looking for some dark ambient music for reading horror, dark fantasy and other books like this one, then be sure to check out my YouTube Channel called Nightmarish Compositions: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPPs...
For Sho Takamatsu, it seemed to be an ordinary day of school like any other. In the aftermath of a sudden earthquake, his entire elementary school vanishes into thin air along with all the students and teachers that were trapped inside. The earthquake seemed to be so powerful that it caused a ripple in time, projecting the school into a dark and bleak wasteland where nothing but death, mutants and mind-breaking anomalies await. Sho takes on the role of the leader, trying to keep the other children safe from harm while searching for a way back home.
The Drifting Classroom takes things at a very slow pace. The horror elements don't even begin to seep in until several volumes into the series. While it starts off slow and does drag a bit in places, I think every volume is better than the previous. It took me a while to get into it but I really started to feel invested once I saw the bigger picture of what it was trying to portray.
While the dialogue and reactions of the characters seems a bit clunky and unrealistic at times, it's important to remember that many of the characters are extremely young elementary school students. Most of them haven't even learned how to talk properly let alone think themselves out of life or death situations. Watching children so young and vulnerable get thrown into one nightmare after the other led to some very intense chapters that didn't shy away from showing little kids being brutally murdered, eaten and smashed to pieces. It might not start out scary, but each volume escalates the horror, the violence and the stakes. As hundreds of children are driven mad with fear, hunger and isolation with no adults to care for them, it's only a matter of time until they begin to turn on each other as well. These kids can give the children in Lord of the Flies a run for their money once their minds start to break.
Some smaller things such as the art quality and the sometimes stagnant way the characters and their reactions are drawn feel off-putting and even a bit silly at times, but it's important to remember that this is one of the pioneers of horror manga, written all the way back in 1971. Devilman is another great manga that has some of the same issues. They're both great series, but you can tell they were written during the experimental phase of manga when they were just beginning to find their way into mainstream entertainment. Though certain aspects of The Drifting Classroom haven't aged that well, it was surprisingly ahead of its time in other ways. As the story progresses, it begins to tackle the themes of overindulgent consumerism, industrial pollution, and the greed of one generation causing major issues for the next generation. It goes into dark detail about how every little action we take that harms the planet hurts future generations of children far more than it hurts any of us.
***
If you're looking for some dark ambient music for reading horror, dark fantasy and other books like this one, then be sure to check out my YouTube Channel called Nightmarish Compositions: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPPs...
April 21, 2022
I'd been wanting to read this for a long time and am glad I finally did. It's honest and heartbreaking, especially when reality sets in. When adults are going nuts, how are youngsters supposed to stay sane? The art style is excellent.
October 27, 2019
What happens when an elementary school gets isekai-ed to a whole new and dangerous world?
I have heard so so much about this book. People saying how horrific it was, people telling it was great horror, and others. So for this Halloween, before it is over cries I wanted to give at least the first volume a shot. See if I would like it.
I wasn’t at first sure about the art, that is what made me struggle a bit, but after 2 chapters I started to love the style. It wasn’t perfect, it wasn’t always pretty, but for some reason I liked it.
In this one it is seemingly a normal day for Sho, an elementary school boy. Well, with the exception of a big argument with his mom, which will haunt him for a long time after. He is late to school and hurries to get there. I think if he had known what was about to happen that he would have gone for his lunch money, just like his best friend did. But instead he made it in time, and just a bit after school starts… there is an earthquake and at first the kids and teachers think it is all OK, but then things hit the fan, and we see that the school is somewhere in a new world. With nothing around them but desert sand (or whatever that stuff is).
And so chaos happens. I was a bit shocked with how the teachers handled the kids. Sure, I can imagine that they may have been trampled (like that one teacher), but hitting kids? Threatening them with broken glass? Um, no. That is just bad in my book. Very bad. Sure, it helped… but come on.
I felt so sorry for the kids. These are elementary kids so they are around 6/7-12 years I am guessing. You could see them being scared, afraid, wanting their moms and dads. I was actually tearing up for these little ones. Not knowing if they ever would come home, if they would stay alive, if they ever see their moms/dads again.
I did like how the chapters were written. Nothing was rushed. We see how chaos starts, how teachers try to fix things, how Sho was told to lie and how the teachers took that over (though he wasn’t even far from the truth in some parts), and then things went truly south (OMG at that last panel on the 4th chapter, NOPE cringes).
All in all, this was pretty OK to read. A bit gruesome at times but I think the true gruesomeness is still to come. shivers Also I still have so many questions. What happened to the school? Why was it teleported there? Will the kids survive? Will they come home? What will happen next? I hope we get some answers in the next volume.
Review first posted at https://twirlingbookprincess.com/
I have heard so so much about this book. People saying how horrific it was, people telling it was great horror, and others. So for this Halloween, before it is over cries I wanted to give at least the first volume a shot. See if I would like it.
I wasn’t at first sure about the art, that is what made me struggle a bit, but after 2 chapters I started to love the style. It wasn’t perfect, it wasn’t always pretty, but for some reason I liked it.
In this one it is seemingly a normal day for Sho, an elementary school boy. Well, with the exception of a big argument with his mom, which will haunt him for a long time after. He is late to school and hurries to get there. I think if he had known what was about to happen that he would have gone for his lunch money, just like his best friend did. But instead he made it in time, and just a bit after school starts… there is an earthquake and at first the kids and teachers think it is all OK, but then things hit the fan, and we see that the school is somewhere in a new world. With nothing around them but desert sand (or whatever that stuff is).
And so chaos happens. I was a bit shocked with how the teachers handled the kids. Sure, I can imagine that they may have been trampled (like that one teacher), but hitting kids? Threatening them with broken glass? Um, no. That is just bad in my book. Very bad. Sure, it helped… but come on.
I felt so sorry for the kids. These are elementary kids so they are around 6/7-12 years I am guessing. You could see them being scared, afraid, wanting their moms and dads. I was actually tearing up for these little ones. Not knowing if they ever would come home, if they would stay alive, if they ever see their moms/dads again.
I did like how the chapters were written. Nothing was rushed. We see how chaos starts, how teachers try to fix things, how Sho was told to lie and how the teachers took that over (though he wasn’t even far from the truth in some parts), and then things went truly south (OMG at that last panel on the 4th chapter, NOPE cringes).
All in all, this was pretty OK to read. A bit gruesome at times but I think the true gruesomeness is still to come. shivers Also I still have so many questions. What happened to the school? Why was it teleported there? Will the kids survive? Will they come home? What will happen next? I hope we get some answers in the next volume.
Review first posted at https://twirlingbookprincess.com/
June 26, 2020
Some horror manga seem to be either really good or too weird to understand. At this point this one is really good. The story didn't take long to get started as an elementary school has been teleported to a wasteland. However, at the same time there's a slow burn as we haven't seen any monsters yet and it's all been about the students and staff coming to terms with what's happened. I'm sure things are going to get much worse before they start to get better. Some of the characterization seems a little overdone, but a lot of manga is like that and I think it's more things being lost in translation rather than the writing itself.
Off to a strong start.
Off to a strong start.
August 31, 2016
So I'm reading these now, reminded of their existence by the fact that Nobohiko "Hausu" Obayashi made a supposed train wreck of a film adaptation. Premise: an entire grade school full of children is catapulted inexplicably into a mysterious wasteland during an earthquake. Not knowing where they are or if the world outside is gone for good, all semblance of order begins to breakdown into a Lord of the Flies scenario real quick.
The series is noted for its lovecraftian dread and unsentimental brutality towards its mostly child-cast, yet it was originally serialized in a comics newspaper for children in the early 70s, inspiring an entire generation of Japanese horror comic weirdos like Junji Ito etc.
This first volume is mostly spent setting up the premise, as the students see the barren moonscape they've been thrown into, the adults alternately fight to keep order or lose it entirely, and immediate survival concerns start to set in. The real insanity yet to come, so it doesn't fully have its teeth into me yet, but I'm definitely interested.
I'm gonna keep reviewing the subsequent volumes here, I think, so as not to flood this thing with Drifting Classroom updates:
vol.2 :: Things start to get bad. The lunch delivery guy barricades himself into the cafeteria, the teachers freak out worse then before, the children start to realize they're basically on their own. It's pretty great.
vol.3 :: past and present learn how to interact a little, the younger kids start to develop barbaric religious practices, general spiraling craziness. These are absurdly entertaining. There's a tendency for all the characters to seem like they're running around and yelling ALL THE TIME, which gets a little annoying/exhausting but also the plot is always moving relentlessly forward and revealing new dimensions and intrigues, so the breathlessness works. Also, I really really like just how many recognizable characters Umezu seems to be keeping track of throughout the school, it really adds to the compellingness to actually have a sense of who some of these people are beyond the immediate protagonists.
The series is noted for its lovecraftian dread and unsentimental brutality towards its mostly child-cast, yet it was originally serialized in a comics newspaper for children in the early 70s, inspiring an entire generation of Japanese horror comic weirdos like Junji Ito etc.
This first volume is mostly spent setting up the premise, as the students see the barren moonscape they've been thrown into, the adults alternately fight to keep order or lose it entirely, and immediate survival concerns start to set in. The real insanity yet to come, so it doesn't fully have its teeth into me yet, but I'm definitely interested.
I'm gonna keep reviewing the subsequent volumes here, I think, so as not to flood this thing with Drifting Classroom updates:
vol.2 :: Things start to get bad. The lunch delivery guy barricades himself into the cafeteria, the teachers freak out worse then before, the children start to realize they're basically on their own. It's pretty great.
vol.3 :: past and present learn how to interact a little, the younger kids start to develop barbaric religious practices, general spiraling craziness. These are absurdly entertaining. There's a tendency for all the characters to seem like they're running around and yelling ALL THE TIME, which gets a little annoying/exhausting but also the plot is always moving relentlessly forward and revealing new dimensions and intrigues, so the breathlessness works. Also, I really really like just how many recognizable characters Umezu seems to be keeping track of throughout the school, it really adds to the compellingness to actually have a sense of who some of these people are beyond the immediate protagonists.
April 4, 2023
A genuine page-turner, and some of the absolute best Lord of the Flies kid survival horror I’ve read. A lot of “who would win in a fight: one 38yo delivery man, or a dozen fourth-graders?”, not to mention a good chunk of silly season 3-era Lost science, but I was charmed.
May 1, 2013
Warning: This review includes all volumes of this manga and may contain spoilers.
When I started this manga, I wasn't sure if I should continue reading it. The art was very different than what I was used to, so that turned me off (however, I must say that after finishing the manga, I realized that I did like the art-- it fit the manga really well!). I also thought that the manga was too straightforward. I wasn't sure if I liked that, but after finishing the series, I think the straightforwardness of it all really fit the manga. I mean, the stories are already quite gruesome, so it was good to see characters think fast to solve the problem.
I think Umezu did a superb job on this manga. It was thrilling to read. The art really grew on me (so don't judge and give this one a try!). All the plot lines were interesting. One thing that I really liked was that this manga was unpredictable. I didn't know what to expect at all. When I was nearing the ending, I thought that it would be a happy one. I wasn't expecting a bittersweet one, which surprised me and made me like this manga even more. This was a really good read. It could be grouped under classic.
Review written on: April 27, 2012
First read on: April 21-27, 2012
Re-read on: May 1-2, 2013
When I started this manga, I wasn't sure if I should continue reading it. The art was very different than what I was used to, so that turned me off (however, I must say that after finishing the manga, I realized that I did like the art-- it fit the manga really well!). I also thought that the manga was too straightforward. I wasn't sure if I liked that, but after finishing the series, I think the straightforwardness of it all really fit the manga. I mean, the stories are already quite gruesome, so it was good to see characters think fast to solve the problem.
I think Umezu did a superb job on this manga. It was thrilling to read. The art really grew on me (so don't judge and give this one a try!). All the plot lines were interesting. One thing that I really liked was that this manga was unpredictable. I didn't know what to expect at all. When I was nearing the ending, I thought that it would be a happy one. I wasn't expecting a bittersweet one, which surprised me and made me like this manga even more. This was a really good read. It could be grouped under classic.
Review written on: April 27, 2012
First read on: April 21-27, 2012
Re-read on: May 1-2, 2013
March 31, 2022
I happened upon this graphic novel purely by accident as it was a return to the library I work at for another campus library.
Essentially, the story centers around a 3rd grader who has issues with his mother and ends up on a fateful day dealing with an earthquake at school followed by the building being surrounded by a volcanic magma like ocean blocking anyone from leaving.
This results in fear, madness, violence and a major mystery as to how and why this happened and what has happened to the rest of the children's parents and the world outside the school.
Just the first part in a series! Scary stuff!
Essentially, the story centers around a 3rd grader who has issues with his mother and ends up on a fateful day dealing with an earthquake at school followed by the building being surrounded by a volcanic magma like ocean blocking anyone from leaving.
This results in fear, madness, violence and a major mystery as to how and why this happened and what has happened to the rest of the children's parents and the world outside the school.
Just the first part in a series! Scary stuff!
July 17, 2011
Umezu is the best visual storyteller of the horror manga writers I've read, but I think I have found his stylistic weak point in The Drifting Classroom. The event the sends Yamato Elementary School into another dimension is part explosion, part earthquake, but truly otherworldly. In the real world, the campus has left an enormous cravasse in the town, but threre are no visible ruins of the school. The school itself seems to have survived undamaged a serious earthquake, until faculty and students realize that their campus is the only structure that exists in a landscape that could be called lunar except for the heavy cloud cover. All this Umezu narrates and depicts concisely with unsettling images. But for the range of emotions that his characters must be experiencing, he depicts them the most part as looking furious if not deranged.
The Japanese version of "tough love" might give Western proponents of the same reasons to rethink the technique. Sho is a sixth grader at the center of the tale. In the first chapter his mother purposely lets him sleep through his alarm as a lesson in responsibility. The ensuing fight escalates to the point that after he calls her a witch he leaves the house threatening never to return. His mother, surrounded by broken crockery, shouts after him, "Fine by me. You are no son of mine. I hope you never come back." Later, after the catastrophe, one male teacher's technique for calming the sobbing students is to grab a first grader and stab him in the arm with a shattered pair of glasses, shouting, "This is what will happen if you don't stop!" Since he has used his own son for the graphic demonstration, the situation blows over.
This is volume 1 of a trilogy, and most of the second half sets up characters and mysteries to be solved in subsequent installments. Older students are asked to keep younger students calm. First graders happily continue their group singing, but third graders prove to be a real threat. The teachers try lying to calm the students, but we know they are also capable of violence. The principal appears to have slept through the whole event until the last pages of the book. He shows up concerned that some one has stolen the month's paychecks. The cliffhanger ending introduces a power-mad cafeteria manager who realizes his chance to become most important player in the days to come.
The Japanese version of "tough love" might give Western proponents of the same reasons to rethink the technique. Sho is a sixth grader at the center of the tale. In the first chapter his mother purposely lets him sleep through his alarm as a lesson in responsibility. The ensuing fight escalates to the point that after he calls her a witch he leaves the house threatening never to return. His mother, surrounded by broken crockery, shouts after him, "Fine by me. You are no son of mine. I hope you never come back." Later, after the catastrophe, one male teacher's technique for calming the sobbing students is to grab a first grader and stab him in the arm with a shattered pair of glasses, shouting, "This is what will happen if you don't stop!" Since he has used his own son for the graphic demonstration, the situation blows over.
This is volume 1 of a trilogy, and most of the second half sets up characters and mysteries to be solved in subsequent installments. Older students are asked to keep younger students calm. First graders happily continue their group singing, but third graders prove to be a real threat. The teachers try lying to calm the students, but we know they are also capable of violence. The principal appears to have slept through the whole event until the last pages of the book. He shows up concerned that some one has stolen the month's paychecks. The cliffhanger ending introduces a power-mad cafeteria manager who realizes his chance to become most important player in the days to come.
July 19, 2011
As I said in my review of Cat Eyed Boy, Vol. 1, I picked up some stuff by Kazuo Umezu because I was temporarily out of new stuff by Junji Ito and I needed something to fill the void. While I read Cat Eyed Boy first, the Drifting Classroom series is apparently his most famous and well-known manga, and it turned out that my library has all of them, so I've started in and holy crap!
I mentioned before how weird it was to see the Astro Boy-ish artwork of Cat Eyed Boy juxtaposed with its occasional gruesomeness, but it's got nothing on The Drifting Classroom. The art style is still the same cartoony (but often amazingly detailed) work, but it's maybe even more consistent here. The story is sort of Lost by way of The Mist, but with elementary school children. And it is gruesome and harsh. Things don't get too crazy in this first volume, which serves to set up the story, but things quickly get worse from here, and even in this volume we've got children dying and getting stabbed by adults.
As I write this I've actually finished the first three volumes, and the series is fairly amazing, and definitely deserving of its reputation.
I mentioned before how weird it was to see the Astro Boy-ish artwork of Cat Eyed Boy juxtaposed with its occasional gruesomeness, but it's got nothing on The Drifting Classroom. The art style is still the same cartoony (but often amazingly detailed) work, but it's maybe even more consistent here. The story is sort of Lost by way of The Mist, but with elementary school children. And it is gruesome and harsh. Things don't get too crazy in this first volume, which serves to set up the story, but things quickly get worse from here, and even in this volume we've got children dying and getting stabbed by adults.
As I write this I've actually finished the first three volumes, and the series is fairly amazing, and definitely deserving of its reputation.
March 3, 2018
I'm reviewing the whole series here, 11 volumes. It would have been nice if it was collected in larger volumes because these slimmer volumes only make sense for a much longer series which is still running.
It doesn't help that there's just too many redundant panels showing inbetween stages that most artists would have left out. The duration is too long for it's own good.
As with a lot of Umezu's work, it was intended for children, but on translation into English it is marked as an adults only product due to the brutal violence. It has been said that his series Fourteen is unlikely to appear in English because the violence the children in the story experience is far worse than in Drifting Classroom.
Unconvincing events are a frequent problem (the way they restrain the giant insect for example, but there's so many things) and they happen so often that you either go along with it or reject it. I did go along with it to an extent and focused on enjoying the bizarre, atmospheric and emotional elements but some of the lapses in logic just never stopped annoying me.
If the entire thing were much more surreal, it all might have worked more seamlessly but it's just realistic enough that the most unconvincing things are bothersome. Perhaps I wasn't open minded enough about a wider variety of approaches to unreality to appreciate what Umezu was going for but I doubt he hit the right balance.
The art isn't Umezu's best, it can be quite awkward and crudely rendered but it's also quite tense and oppressive. Perhaps the awkwardness and crudeness is a virtue?
The main character has only a few different facial expressions: wide mouthed shock, quiet determination, shouting as a brave leader and some inbetween variations of these, usually quite intense. The other characters aren't so varied either. I guess it is a flaw but it does help keep the tone of the story that the characters usually look on edge.
As you can see, there's a lot of things I cant decide how well they work and I'm sure reader responses vary immensely.
At the end there's an okay short story about a doll with needle teeth, drawn in quite a different style from Drifting Classroom and a helpful overview of Umezu's other comics, most of which still haven't had an official English translation unfortunately, a few of them look very promising.
Despite all the flaws I've mentioned, I recommend this series, I thought the ending was quite good, there's enough uncommon imagination and intensity to make it worthwhile and I don't know of much else like it and there's not a lot of good choices for Umezu in English print.
It doesn't help that there's just too many redundant panels showing inbetween stages that most artists would have left out. The duration is too long for it's own good.
As with a lot of Umezu's work, it was intended for children, but on translation into English it is marked as an adults only product due to the brutal violence. It has been said that his series Fourteen is unlikely to appear in English because the violence the children in the story experience is far worse than in Drifting Classroom.
Unconvincing events are a frequent problem (the way they restrain the giant insect for example, but there's so many things) and they happen so often that you either go along with it or reject it. I did go along with it to an extent and focused on enjoying the bizarre, atmospheric and emotional elements but some of the lapses in logic just never stopped annoying me.
If the entire thing were much more surreal, it all might have worked more seamlessly but it's just realistic enough that the most unconvincing things are bothersome. Perhaps I wasn't open minded enough about a wider variety of approaches to unreality to appreciate what Umezu was going for but I doubt he hit the right balance.
The art isn't Umezu's best, it can be quite awkward and crudely rendered but it's also quite tense and oppressive. Perhaps the awkwardness and crudeness is a virtue?
The main character has only a few different facial expressions: wide mouthed shock, quiet determination, shouting as a brave leader and some inbetween variations of these, usually quite intense. The other characters aren't so varied either. I guess it is a flaw but it does help keep the tone of the story that the characters usually look on edge.
As you can see, there's a lot of things I cant decide how well they work and I'm sure reader responses vary immensely.
At the end there's an okay short story about a doll with needle teeth, drawn in quite a different style from Drifting Classroom and a helpful overview of Umezu's other comics, most of which still haven't had an official English translation unfortunately, a few of them look very promising.
Despite all the flaws I've mentioned, I recommend this series, I thought the ending was quite good, there's enough uncommon imagination and intensity to make it worthwhile and I don't know of much else like it and there's not a lot of good choices for Umezu in English print.
October 5, 2016
This is my review for the whole manga series.
One thought circling my mind while reading the manga: "What the fuck?"
That child abuse in volume 1 and throughout the manga is hardcore. Nobody should get away with that.
In volume 2, who would leave a gun lying around? Especially with kids roaming the halls. Seriously.
Volume 3, the kids jumped from the rooftop! Wtf.
Sekiya is a one mofo asshole.
I almost gave up on reading this, but I always bear in mind that Kazuo Umezu made this manga, and I loved watching The Curse of Kazuo Umezu. So for the sake of that I continued reading this.
Volume 9, "the operation" — as a student of medicine, I just read so many wrong stuff about the proper transfusion of blood and use of needles.
Volume 11, there's too many confession, saying "I love you" to each other. They're kids for pete's sake! Is this a horror or a shoujo manga?
After all the kids went through, I'm kind of okay with the ending. Sometimes the story is so absurd that I couldn't help laughing out loud. Unique plot and artwork overall.
One thought circling my mind while reading the manga: "What the fuck?"
That child abuse in volume 1 and throughout the manga is hardcore. Nobody should get away with that.
In volume 2, who would leave a gun lying around? Especially with kids roaming the halls. Seriously.
Volume 3, the kids jumped from the rooftop! Wtf.
Sekiya is a one mofo asshole.
I almost gave up on reading this, but I always bear in mind that Kazuo Umezu made this manga, and I loved watching The Curse of Kazuo Umezu. So for the sake of that I continued reading this.
Volume 9, "the operation" — as a student of medicine, I just read so many wrong stuff about the proper transfusion of blood and use of needles.
Volume 11, there's too many confession, saying "I love you" to each other. They're kids for pete's sake! Is this a horror or a shoujo manga?
After all the kids went through, I'm kind of okay with the ending. Sometimes the story is so absurd that I couldn't help laughing out loud. Unique plot and artwork overall.
July 12, 2020
Mother...when I recall that extraordinary moment, every little thing preceding it seems incredibly significant.
People have said to me that Kazuo Umezu is the master of manga horror and if this first volume is anything to go by, I have to agree.
The story revolves around Sho who, following a blazing argument with his mother, goes to school; just another normal day for the 6th former. However, when an earthquake hits, the school disappears and the children and teachers find themselves transported to a mysterious realm. Panic soon sets in and the teachers struggle to control the situation.
There is a lot of intrigue and mystery in this first volume. I look forward to seeing where it goes.
People have said to me that Kazuo Umezu is the master of manga horror and if this first volume is anything to go by, I have to agree.
The story revolves around Sho who, following a blazing argument with his mother, goes to school; just another normal day for the 6th former. However, when an earthquake hits, the school disappears and the children and teachers find themselves transported to a mysterious realm. Panic soon sets in and the teachers struggle to control the situation.
There is a lot of intrigue and mystery in this first volume. I look forward to seeing where it goes.
June 13, 2016
Classic horror. Weird and weirder.
July 25, 2022
I cannot say much right now but yes it definitely started with a bang...
January 25, 2023
a fever dream multiplied by 1,000
March 31, 2019
In Japan, Kazuo Umezu is to the horror genre what Stephen King is to it in America. He's a highly respected mangaka and his work has spooked readers for generations. Getting lost in The Drifting Classroom shows why he's so popular.
The Drifting Classroom doesn't start out with horror. It lets the horror tale descend, slowly, gradually. There's no boom where the reader goes, "Oh, that's scary," but instead the creepiness builds up--along with the anticipation.
The main character, Sho, is a sixth grader, but that doesn't mean this series is intended for children. On the contrary, it's aimed at adults. Sho and his mother exchange nasty words when he doesn't get his way, and he runs off to school, threatening never to return.
He doesn't realise he may get his wish.
There's a terrible earthquake of some sort. When it's over, parents and locals rush to the elementary school only to find it is missing.
Meanwhile, the teachers and elementary school students peer out and discover that their school is in the middle of a wasteland. Venturing out, they discover a plaque dedicated to them in honor of their deaths at the school.
But they're not ghosts. A teacher commits suicide, proving they can still die. Another teacher seems to snap, killing other authority figures at the school and going after the children. A deranged deliveryman, desperate to have the food for himself, wields a knife against anyone who challenges him.
Sho is the one who figures out what has happened (or what seems to be the case so far, anyway). Somehow the school has been transported into the future, so far into the future that when they do find plants and animals, these things are unrecognisable to them. Between when they got to school and now, evolution has had a lot of time to work.
Sometimes we flash back to the parents, especially Sho's mother, who is hysterical and believes she hears Sho talking to her. Others think she's crazy, but we, the reader, know that Sho really is saying the words that she hears.
Umezu does a good job at going for people's fears. What happens here of course isn't realistic, but he's delving into primitive, subconscious terrors. The Drifting Classroom is labelled with Parental Advisory tags for explicit content, but it's really not that explicit. It has a few gory images, though for the most part, the fear comes through implication.
The Drifting Classroom doesn't start out with horror. It lets the horror tale descend, slowly, gradually. There's no boom where the reader goes, "Oh, that's scary," but instead the creepiness builds up--along with the anticipation.
The main character, Sho, is a sixth grader, but that doesn't mean this series is intended for children. On the contrary, it's aimed at adults. Sho and his mother exchange nasty words when he doesn't get his way, and he runs off to school, threatening never to return.
He doesn't realise he may get his wish.
There's a terrible earthquake of some sort. When it's over, parents and locals rush to the elementary school only to find it is missing.
Meanwhile, the teachers and elementary school students peer out and discover that their school is in the middle of a wasteland. Venturing out, they discover a plaque dedicated to them in honor of their deaths at the school.
But they're not ghosts. A teacher commits suicide, proving they can still die. Another teacher seems to snap, killing other authority figures at the school and going after the children. A deranged deliveryman, desperate to have the food for himself, wields a knife against anyone who challenges him.
Sho is the one who figures out what has happened (or what seems to be the case so far, anyway). Somehow the school has been transported into the future, so far into the future that when they do find plants and animals, these things are unrecognisable to them. Between when they got to school and now, evolution has had a lot of time to work.
Sometimes we flash back to the parents, especially Sho's mother, who is hysterical and believes she hears Sho talking to her. Others think she's crazy, but we, the reader, know that Sho really is saying the words that she hears.
Umezu does a good job at going for people's fears. What happens here of course isn't realistic, but he's delving into primitive, subconscious terrors. The Drifting Classroom is labelled with Parental Advisory tags for explicit content, but it's really not that explicit. It has a few gory images, though for the most part, the fear comes through implication.
April 28, 2011
It just kills me that this is "rated M for Mature" (am I the only one who automatically hears that in the videogame commercial voice?) when it was originally written for kids. The set-up is straight out of children's nightmares: you tell Mommy you're never going to come home, and she tells you she doesn't want you to, and then you're transported to an apocalyptic wasteland where there's no Mommy.
On the other hand, kids these days seem kind of wussy. I still can't believe W-- compares his mother's stories of her childhood in Peru to child abuse. (Not even that his grandparents were abusing you, Rin, but that you're abusing him by telling him about living there!) Could kids who've never had to dial a phone or cross the room to change the channel deal with real adversity?
On the other hand, kids these days seem kind of wussy. I still can't believe W-- compares his mother's stories of her childhood in Peru to child abuse. (Not even that his grandparents were abusing you, Rin, but that you're abusing him by telling him about living there!) Could kids who've never had to dial a phone or cross the room to change the channel deal with real adversity?
May 4, 2014
These books are terrifying!! The first book merely sets up the story. A huge earthquake lasting three minutes rips through the town and when it's all over an entire school and everyone in it has disappeared, leaving a giant hole in the ground. When we next see the students and teachers the school is surrounded by sand with nothing else as far as they can see.
As reality sets in the adults seem to go nuts while the kids hold it together and try to save each other. By the time the second book comes around it's just simply madness! Complete edge of your seat, disbelief and horror. Quite fantastic!
As reality sets in the adults seem to go nuts while the kids hold it together and try to save each other. By the time the second book comes around it's just simply madness! Complete edge of your seat, disbelief and horror. Quite fantastic!
October 15, 2017
I'm pretty sure I read this. That is, I believe the version I read was volume 1 and that included the first 4 issues of the longer story. So far, it is very strange and scary and wholly unlike any western stories I can think of. An elementary school disappears from Tokyo--nothing is left but a hole in the ground. Meanwhile, inside the school, all of the students and faculty suddenly find themselves in the midst of a barren alien landscape with no explanation. The school administrators decide to convince the 6th grade students, in particular the protagonist Sho, to keep all the younger class students in the dark of the true situation.
August 29, 2014
This is a fantastic series, that's so weird, disturbing, and surreal.
August 19, 2016
Alright with one wtf moment
Read
November 20, 2021A weird but strangely interesting story begins...
June 29, 2024
average school experience
February 11, 2020
This is a review of the first two volumes.
I have been aware of this classic manga for a long time. It had inspired many of the later generations of authors in more or less concrete ways; an obvious example of it was one of my favorite authors’ (Shuzo Oshimi) series "Drifting Net Cafe", which happens to be his worst. It borrowed heavily from this series I’m now reviewing. “Drifting Net Cafe” is about an internet cafe from the early 2000s which gets suddenly transported, along with all its customers, to another dimension. All I knew of “The Drifting Classroom” coming in was that something similar happened. I supposed that a classroom full of kids was sent to another dimension, and as a result the children had to survive like in “Lord of the Flies”. I had heard it was quite hardcore, so many of them were going to perish. Now that this story popped up in my GoodReads feed, I figured I should finally get into it.
Turns out the title is inaccurate. We start by meeting a rebellious, yet clear-headed kid who, following the usual trope that apparently has been around for a long time, fights with his mother, who fights with him in turn in a way that both will regret for a long time after the story kicks off. His entire school with around 860 people, including teachers and assorted employees, get transported somewhere/somewhen else. The story quickly shifted to something in the vibe of “The Thing” (so far without the monsters), in which a bunch of people with different, often clashing personalities get stranded in a place with limited resources, and have to deal with each other’s violent, panicky natures. Almost immediately after the students discover that the school now stands in a wasteland of sand, . The plot doesn’t let up for a moment; the author kept throwing conflicts at the kids and the overwhelmed teachers, who can barely keep it together. Once they find out they have been cut off from civilization, that not even a portable radio can catch any station, their ordeal becomes a matter of survival. As the school relied on daily food deliveries, their supplies are going to run out soon. Worst yet, . The teachers turn out to be mostly useless and unreliable (then again, they willingly got into a profession that involves interacting with children on a daily basis, so there must have been something seriously wrong with them), more focused on arguing about what must have happened than in organizing the survivors. The kids, starting with our protagonist, have to grow up overnight to realistically deal with mortal dangers.
This series has been tremendously compelling so far. I can’t imagine how revolutionary it must have been back in the seventies. My main issues with it have to do with the few ways it has become antiquated. First off, as it tended to be the case in the early days of manga, the style owes heavily to grandaddy Osamu Tezuka, often called the father of manga (author of many revolutionary series, one of which, “Dororo”, was updated into a great anime last year), who in turn was inspired by Disney cartoons from the forties. It’s because of his popularized style that the world associated manga and later on anime with oversized, cartoonish eyes and generally childish face proportions. However, from the very beginning manga displayed one of the dichotomies I love so much about Japanese fiction: an often mundane, “cartoonish” façade that however comes along wildly original, uncompromising narratives that probe the depths of humanity, often caring little about the prevailing social conventions. Japanese fiction dares far more than Western stories have for a long time, particularly in these poisoned modern times of Marxist puritanism and civilizational dismantling [as an aside, a curious genre of Japanese fiction is the so called isekai, meaning “another world” (despite this story’s concept, it actually doesn’t belong in that genre). In those, a Japanese person or persons get transported to another civilization of which they need to learn the customs and how to best survive. The new world is almost invariably based on fantasy medieval/renaissance Europe, which evokes how in real life the Europeans from those eras contacted Japan somehow and influenced their society in many ways. It must have left an imprint in the local collective unconscious. In typical Japanese fashion, they absorb what they like from whatever comes in and they make it uniquely theirs, including the English language. Also, the almost mythical depictions of Europe common in their media produce a shock of disappointment when they end up visiting our ravaged modern Europe (“have we landed in Africa by mistake?”). I heard that reaction is so common that they had to give it a name, sort of like the Stendhal syndrome in reverse. At least they don’t have to live here]. “The Drifting Classroom” is a great example of that tradition, but otherwise the art style, while showing the obsessive attention to detail that one can expect from the Japanese, is burdened with incongruities inevitable back when the medium hadn’t become so sophisticated and its industry ruthless: the adults look like bodybuilders, people shout way too much, the characters’ expressions tend to be too samey due to the cartoonish nature of their design, people run in exaggerated ways that remind you of those early Disney cartoons, people collapse suddenly as if their consciousness had been switched off, the panel distributions are uninspired. Also, whenever the characters cry, which they do often, it looks as if semen is pouring out of their eyes. It makes me want to sing along to that old Neutral Milk Hotel song.
Despite the flaws I mentioned, I’m very impressed, and I want to get out of my office not only in general but to continue reading this series. Anyone who is into manga should give it a shot.
I have been aware of this classic manga for a long time. It had inspired many of the later generations of authors in more or less concrete ways; an obvious example of it was one of my favorite authors’ (Shuzo Oshimi) series "Drifting Net Cafe", which happens to be his worst. It borrowed heavily from this series I’m now reviewing. “Drifting Net Cafe” is about an internet cafe from the early 2000s which gets suddenly transported, along with all its customers, to another dimension. All I knew of “The Drifting Classroom” coming in was that something similar happened. I supposed that a classroom full of kids was sent to another dimension, and as a result the children had to survive like in “Lord of the Flies”. I had heard it was quite hardcore, so many of them were going to perish. Now that this story popped up in my GoodReads feed, I figured I should finally get into it.
Turns out the title is inaccurate. We start by meeting a rebellious, yet clear-headed kid who, following the usual trope that apparently has been around for a long time, fights with his mother, who fights with him in turn in a way that both will regret for a long time after the story kicks off. His entire school with around 860 people, including teachers and assorted employees, get transported somewhere/somewhen else. The story quickly shifted to something in the vibe of “The Thing” (so far without the monsters), in which a bunch of people with different, often clashing personalities get stranded in a place with limited resources, and have to deal with each other’s violent, panicky natures. Almost immediately after the students discover that the school now stands in a wasteland of sand, . The plot doesn’t let up for a moment; the author kept throwing conflicts at the kids and the overwhelmed teachers, who can barely keep it together. Once they find out they have been cut off from civilization, that not even a portable radio can catch any station, their ordeal becomes a matter of survival. As the school relied on daily food deliveries, their supplies are going to run out soon. Worst yet, . The teachers turn out to be mostly useless and unreliable (then again, they willingly got into a profession that involves interacting with children on a daily basis, so there must have been something seriously wrong with them), more focused on arguing about what must have happened than in organizing the survivors. The kids, starting with our protagonist, have to grow up overnight to realistically deal with mortal dangers.
This series has been tremendously compelling so far. I can’t imagine how revolutionary it must have been back in the seventies. My main issues with it have to do with the few ways it has become antiquated. First off, as it tended to be the case in the early days of manga, the style owes heavily to grandaddy Osamu Tezuka, often called the father of manga (author of many revolutionary series, one of which, “Dororo”, was updated into a great anime last year), who in turn was inspired by Disney cartoons from the forties. It’s because of his popularized style that the world associated manga and later on anime with oversized, cartoonish eyes and generally childish face proportions. However, from the very beginning manga displayed one of the dichotomies I love so much about Japanese fiction: an often mundane, “cartoonish” façade that however comes along wildly original, uncompromising narratives that probe the depths of humanity, often caring little about the prevailing social conventions. Japanese fiction dares far more than Western stories have for a long time, particularly in these poisoned modern times of Marxist puritanism and civilizational dismantling [as an aside, a curious genre of Japanese fiction is the so called isekai, meaning “another world” (despite this story’s concept, it actually doesn’t belong in that genre). In those, a Japanese person or persons get transported to another civilization of which they need to learn the customs and how to best survive. The new world is almost invariably based on fantasy medieval/renaissance Europe, which evokes how in real life the Europeans from those eras contacted Japan somehow and influenced their society in many ways. It must have left an imprint in the local collective unconscious. In typical Japanese fashion, they absorb what they like from whatever comes in and they make it uniquely theirs, including the English language. Also, the almost mythical depictions of Europe common in their media produce a shock of disappointment when they end up visiting our ravaged modern Europe (“have we landed in Africa by mistake?”). I heard that reaction is so common that they had to give it a name, sort of like the Stendhal syndrome in reverse. At least they don’t have to live here]. “The Drifting Classroom” is a great example of that tradition, but otherwise the art style, while showing the obsessive attention to detail that one can expect from the Japanese, is burdened with incongruities inevitable back when the medium hadn’t become so sophisticated and its industry ruthless: the adults look like bodybuilders, people shout way too much, the characters’ expressions tend to be too samey due to the cartoonish nature of their design, people run in exaggerated ways that remind you of those early Disney cartoons, people collapse suddenly as if their consciousness had been switched off, the panel distributions are uninspired. Also, whenever the characters cry, which they do often, it looks as if semen is pouring out of their eyes. It makes me want to sing along to that old Neutral Milk Hotel song.
Despite the flaws I mentioned, I’m very impressed, and I want to get out of my office not only in general but to continue reading this series. Anyone who is into manga should give it a shot.
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