bbergstrom - 2015-05-30 06:18:31

EMP's Reviews #3: Battle Royal High School

Version Watched: Anime Sky Scraper English Dub

Battle Royal High School takes the route of throwing plot in the trash bin and focusing entirely on action. The result is a chaotic, insane action film that by all accounts is really bad, yet one of the most entertaining things you can watch. If you plan on watching it, I highly recommend the English dub, as it's one of those classically terrible 80's anime dubs that end up being intensely entertaining. One other thing that should be noted: if you're faint of heart, this is not the movie for you. The movie has no regard for subtlety and you will see blood, guts and tits... copious amounts of them all, sometimes at the same time!

Story
As stated previously, the story was completely disregarded in this movie. There IS a semblance of plot, but it's entirely nonsensical and only serves to provide the motive for the insanity to follow. The general gist of it is that there are some demon... fairy... things that manage to open a gate to Earth... and they kind of mind their own business, but some asshole kid and Robocop decide it's a good idea to kill them, because fuck demons. Good luck following anything past the first 10 minutes, I envy you if you manage it. Needless to say the plot is awfully put together, but the sheer insanity of it adds to the entertainment value. Oh I should also note all this somehow happened because swole meathead bro got knocked the fuck out by "I have a crush on senpai-chan" via the apparently so incredibly powerful slap that it tore a rift in the world and allowed these demon fairy things to enter Earth. Yeah... it's a fucked up plot.

Writing
The writing in this film is also awful (go figure), but it's the hilarious kind of awful. You will hear such deep and meaningful lines as "nice tits" (directed at a dead girl) all throughout, and you probably have no soul if you don't at least smile at the sheer ridiculousness and stupidity of the dialogue.

Characters
The characters in this film consist of literally Robocop, really swole meathead dude and I have a crush on senpai-chan (x2). There isn't much to them, Robocop is pretty much your average Tokusatsu character, swole meathead kun is your average hilariously nonchalant douchebag, and "I have a crush on senpai-chan's" are both talking tits. You know, the average characters of these types of mindless action movies.

Animation & Art
The animation is insanely gory in all the right ways. It's pretty difficult to explain just how gory it is, but if I were to link some gifs it would be spoiler territory. I'll just say it's not uncommon for people to explode into meat fountains. Also the movie will be the forefront of your shock gif collection, some of the deaths are legendary. As for overall quality, it isn't actually half bad. Has a decent amount of fluidity, pretty detailed, especially when it comes to gore, and the art is pretty decent as well. The fights aren't particularly interesting, it's what happens in them that makes them so good, not the animation. Overall though, there isn't much to fault with the animation aside from a lack of detail in the backgrounds.

Sound
There isn't much soundtrack to speak of. As for the English dub, it's 10x more enjoyable than the sub version. The voice acting is cheesy, 80's and everything you could hope for to compliment such a silly movie. 
I wholeheartedly recommend it over the sub version.

Conclusion & Recommendation
Battle Royal High School is an incredibly stupid and bad movie, but it is just so entertaining at the same time. I'd say, as long as you can stomach it, get around to watching this sometime. Your life isn't complete without at least experiencing some of the later scenes of this movie. Watch it with some friends too, if you don't die of laughter, you will have something to talk about for weeks.

Thanks for reading my review! If you enjoyed it, consider checking out my other reviews!