Anime review: Kakegurui

So, there’s this gambling den where people risk their future. Money is power in capitalism and the more you have the more powerful you become. Ok, it makes sense so far.

And then it stops making sense because the gambling den is a freaking high school, where the only thing that is not going on in there is learning. Everybody is acting like a horny lunatic and wants us to accept the educational system is fine with letting its young people become unstable gambling addicts.

The status quo is broken by a transfer student, of course, since that is the only reason to have high schools in modern anime. Instead of having to be creative, you just let the plot write itself by following the exact same formula every single time.

So, they gamble and the first game they play is a rehash from Kaiji, only with no strategy since there is no way to know how many cards of each type there are. Which means it’s all random bullshit. They try to make it sound like there are tactics because everyone is cheating, but it comes down to dumb luck and the horny protagonist finding a wau yo solve everything. Just because!

As much as the theme tries to be an allegory to the materialism of modern life, it fails to prove it by saying it all comes down to a lucky draw. Furthermore, for a gambling series, there is no actual tension, since the only thing that is at stake is money. Fortunes come and go in every episode, and although that seems to be ruining the lives of those who become broke, we never see the effects of it, besides becoming an errand boy for horny bitches in a high school. Woah, what a dreadful life it is to not have money, yet still going to a prestige school and doing a few chores for horny bitches who are probably having sex with you eventually.

If that wasn’t enough, the main girl in the show is so ridiculously rich to the point she doesn’t care how much money she wins or loses, therefore she is not really risking anything. Her objective has nothing to do with making money or making sure you are not going to lose them. The premise is betrayed almost immediately, since everybody gambles because they are addicted to gambling, and not because they risk everything for a better life, like in Kaiji.

The series is eventually fairly one-note. There is not variety in personalities, since everybody is the same closet psychopath. The games differ but play out with the exact same structure without connecting with one another, thus there is not much of a plot. There is not even much of a worthwhile objective. Every character is self-destructive, and has no long-term plans other than cumming in his underwear while gambling. It gets tiresome and cringy very fast.

Many try to defend the show as a psychological thriller and a character study, by making it sound like it’s all about the effects of gambling on rich people, as well as how the whole thing is a social experiment aiming to create a new breed of super humans. There is some of that present but it’s overshadowed by the constant ahegao faces everyone is making while playing these random games. It’s almost entirely a shitty ecchi series about people getting orgasms while gambling and the animation makes sure to point that out every 10 seconds. It’s sleazy fetishism with little to no substance, and those claiming it’s more than that, do it for the sole purpose of making it sound like the deviant crap they are watching are intellectual masterpieces.

Rewatch Kaiji and don’t even bother with this one.