Written by Rei Caldombra 5/16/2024 Video version: https://youtu.be/xpV1-owlynA

Previous Train to the End Post: https://www.blogunderalog.com/blog-collection/train-to-the-end-eps-4-and-5-review-bad-company

Back on this wild train ride with episodes 6 and 7. Episode 7 focuses on the girls forcing the truth of the fight out of Shizuru and setting up the main plot of this two-parter by having this grilling lead to Shizuru running away into a hoard of zombies. Episode 8 resolves the zombie conflict with the zombie queen and sets them back on their way to Ikebukuro.

The girls are talking on the train for a good portion of 7. We get more references to space, with the suggestion to name the train Apogee. Now we have at least one point where space is important, with our full understanding of the fight between Shizuru and Youka. Everyone was talking about how they did not really understand Youka and questioning why she left for Ikebukuro. Shizuru does not say anything while listening. They have to drag it out of her later. They call out Shizuru for being insensitive again when talking about their situation, making it clear this behavior is common with her. We saw her being insensitive multiple times in the previous episodes. And we are finally shown the full scene of their fight on the bridge and seeing the full scope of Shizuru’s insensitivity.

Yeah, insensitive is a generous way of describing Shizuru here. It turns out that Youka’s dream is to be involved in astronomy, specifically on the technological side of things. And this is why she wanted to leave for Ikebukuro. And after Youka tells her best friend about her dream, this is what she gets back.

In the last review I talked about how they previously encouraged each other to do what they want and promised under a star to support each other. Here she is basically the most unsupportive she could have possibly been. She pretty much told her that she might as well not try because she won’t be good enough. An average country bumpkin like her wouldn’t be able to do it. Shizuru brings up how they’re “the same” and shouldn’t dream out of their means. And then when Youka understandably gets frustrated over her response, she says that Youka is the one pushing them apart.

This is clearly Shizuru projecting her own insecurity of being a country bumpkin onto Youka. Shizuru’s dream is to be the best at Agano Jiu-Jitsu, which we get to see used again in this episode. Her using it against the zombies and calling it out is a smart way to remind us about it in this episode talking about dreams.

Shizuru wanting to be the strongest in their specialized martial art is a fine dream in itself, no offense to any inspiring athletes out there. But when you put it in the context of this conflict, her dream is as small as you can get. Her dream is specifically one that would be confined to what she has always known, which is Agano. This is the opposite of Youka, who dreams for something new and foreign to their small town. Shizuru’s dream is low to the ground while Youka’s is high in the sky, both literally and figuratively. I don’t think Shizuru can imagine them being capable of growing to be more than just some average person from little Agano. She is insecure about her ability to be anything more than normal. So she projects that onto Youka, saying she should stick to normal Agano stuff like her. She does not think what he said is wrong or insensitive because she truly think they will just disappoint themselves by .

It may also be intentional that we have these figurative references to size right after the last stop had literal tiny and proportionally gigantic people. This series also focuses a lot on scale, with so many of the shots outside train being massive landscapes. And this fits with the themes and imagery of space because it is infinite. Youka reaches for the infinite potential of space while Shizuru locks herself and her potential inside little old Agano.

Wouldn’t be surprised if we do end up actually in outer space by the end of the series.

To Youka, the person who encouraged her to follow their dreams and supported her the most did a complete 180 and shut her down. “So that’s what you’re like, Shizuru” refers to how she is a fake supporter, friend etc. Imagine passionately explaining your dream to the one person you thought would understand and support you, and get this. Yeah, that would ruin a friendship. I don’t blame Youka at all for being angry and leaving.

Based on how we’ve seen her in the present time Shizuru has not properly learned from this. I think she recognizes deep down that what she did was wrong, if it didn’t she wouldn’t be acting out as we have seen her do many times. She wouldn’t have called herself stupid for being defensive and blowing up on her friends when they try to get through to her. She does not want to admit how much she and Youka were hurt from the fight, and that her way of thinking about themselves is incorrect. Her strong desire to go to Ikebukuro and find Youka makes it very clear how much it matters to her. But she does not want to admit that to others or herself. She got traumatized by Youka leaving, so she puts up walls. She does not want to get close to anyone again. She continued to be friendly with the other girls but did not confide in them or talk about personal topics on the level of things like dreams, as she kept all the Youka stuff from them until now despite them also being friends with her and Youka at that point. After being genuinely surprised by Youka’s reaction in the fight, she feels very unsure of everything. She did not want to participate in the conversation before when they were talking about understanding Youka because it reminds her that she misunderstood the type of person Youka is. She thought they were the same kind of person. But she realizes that she was wrong and is angry over that, which is why she tried to blame Youka for the breakup. I really like the ideas being brought up here and am super excited to see how things develop with these two.

After being grilled by the girls and being rightfully told that she is entirely at fault, Shizuru runs away. This leads to her running into a horde of zombies, and meeting our baddie of the stop, the zombie queen Mita.

I don’t have a whole lot to say about the progression of the zombie plot, everything here is very funny. Shizuru gets captured, talks to the zombie queen, the girls pretend to be zombies to get her out, then they have a big showdown through the power of lewdness. I think my favorite moment of the goofy and dark mix of this show for this part was Reimi embarassingly trying to explain why she is shouting erotic things at the same time as Shizuru is snapping a zombie’s neck.

This episode has a lot of great visual elements that stood out to me. One character design detail I really like is how the lips are accentuated more.

This looks really nice and helps her character design feel more distinct. It may be minor to some but to me it was very noticeable and a nice bit of variety.

I also love the stylization of the zombies during the climax. These shots are so sick. They remind you of the classic horror style of zombies. I really like how they look when next to the normal style of the show as well. I think the blending and compositing was done very well. They look different but not out of place. Striking in the best way.

When it comes to interpreting the meaning of the zombies and their weakness to lewdness, there can be some substance to the focus on sexuality and eroticism. I wish I had more ideas about what it means, but I’ll do my best. This show is commonly referencing various parts of the human condition. Such as the point of living and suicide with the mushroom people, and societal systems with the military town. If you want to comprehensively talk about human nature, then you really have to hit on sexuality. Perhaps the reason why the zombies “died” because of laughing over lewdness is because sexuality is inherently related to reproduction. Reproduction can represent the creation of new life, bringing up the cycle of life and death. Zombies do not die, so they are absent from that cycle. Maybe that’s a reach but that’s what I could think of right now outside of it simply being a goofy way to resolve the conflict.

One interesting detail to keep in mind with interpreting the zombies is that they started to follow Mito before she put on the makeup. My initial assumption was that after seeing the zombies, she made herself look like them in a desperate attempt to blend in. But they bowed to her before that. Perhaps this is getting into the themes we often see with zombie media like society turning people into dumb followers that don’t think for themselves. They had no sense of purpose on their own, but following a leader gave them purpose. We did not get as much from Mito’s motivation as I would have liked, but it seems that becoming their leader gave her a sense of fulfillment she didn’t have before. The idea of them choosing to follow her means they are actively making the choice to live their lives under her orders. This is the opposite of what we saw in the last stop, with people being forced to follow orders under a strict ruling. This also tracks with the mushroom part, where the people were choosing to live their lives shortened. In the chaos of the 7G world, maybe these people wanted to be mindless zombies that don’t have to worry about anything. I think the show is doing a good job of having recurring themes of humanity between all the stops while giving each of them their own wacky situation to tackle specific ideas. Everyone is coping with the crazy world of 7G in different ways.

We did also get a bit more focus on Nadeshiko, which I wanted. Turns out she is really good at video games and seems to get angry very easily over people doing things wrong.

I do have some minor gripes with episode 8. I do think it’s strange how the show has gone out of its way to not show panties before, such as never showing us the mushroom growing around Akira’s butt, but chose to have that one straight-up panty butt shot. Maybe they wanted the viewers to feel the same stimulation the zombies did? It doesn’t bother me all that much, but it does feel unneeded and a bit weird. But perhaps that feeling is on purpose to keep the viewers uncomfortable. Perhaps they don’t want us to get too settled into a status quo and be on edge like the characters do. Which does fit with the general tone of the show, which is goofy but dangerous and full of surprises.

I’m sorry if I am being that guy, I promise that I do not think this is malicious or had bad intent in any way and will not talk about this for long. But they really should have chosen any color that wasn't black or brown for Reimi to put on the middle area of her face during the pretend-to-be-a-zombie part. I do not expect all countries that are very separated from Black related issues (on a large scale) to have a proper understanding of the Black History, not am I claiming to be an expert. But when this show has had many American references, I feel a tiny bit less lenient. I think this is simply an oversight, but I do want to say that I think most people creating media should not be putting black paint on people’s faces. There’s such a wide spectrum of colors to choose from, anything other than black or brown would’ve been fine so it’s a silly mistake to make at least coming from my American perspective. But I’ll stop here, just putting it out there as a thing I noticed.

With the zombie boss defeated, our team progresses forward. As usual I am looking for to more of this wacky adventure. Thanks for reading!