Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei" uses "vertical" and "horizontal" writing styles to depict the characters. Nostalgic Anime Retrospective No. 66

Koji Kumeda's manga "Kakushigoto" has been adapted into an anime and began airing last month. One of Kumeida's original hit anime works is "Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei," which was adapted into an anime for TV three times between 2007 and 2009, as well as an OVA in five volumes. Let's take a look at the first episode from the first "Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei" (2007).

Visualizing a Dangerous Gag, Completed Only by Characters

A high school student, Kafuka Fuura, saves a man who is hanging himself while on his way to school. Kafuka later learns that the hanged man is her new homeroom teacher, Nozomi Itoshiki. Itoshiki explains that his name is written vertically on the blackboard and reads "Itoshiki Nozomu," but Kanoka proves that it reads "Zetsubou" when written horizontally. Because of this, Itoshiki is nicknamed "Zetsubou-sensei." ...... This is the plot of the first episode. It's a pun-like fallacy using letters.
In order to visually express the fact that the word "zetsubou" cannot be read when written vertically but can be read as "zetsubou" when written horizontally, the letters inevitably take center stage. Rather, the character "Itoshiki Nozomu" written on the blackboard alone is enough to complete the gag.

In the work directed by Akiyuki Shinbo, who was responsible for the animated adaptation of "Zetsubou-sensei," the following year's "Bakemonogatari" (2009) became characterized by an enormous collage of letters, and in "Zetsubou-sensei" too, the letters are consciously used as design elements.
In the first episode, Kanoka's line to Itoshiki, "I... must not," and Itoshiki's line, "I was ready to die," fill the screen as typography (designed characters). In addition, the nickname that Kanoka gives to Itoshiki, "Chief Momoshiki," is also shown in large typography. Before the story begins, a passage from Stendhal's "Theory of Love" is quoted, also in old-fashioned typography.
It is important to note that all of these characters are written vertically. By frequently inserting vertically written characters from the beginning, the artist seems to be trying to alleviate the abruptness of the "gag that is completed only with letters" of writing "Itoshiki Nozomu" vertically on the blackboard (this is not necessary in the manga, since all lines are written vertically in the manga). (In the manga, all lines are written vertically, so there is no need to do so.) In the visualization, it was necessary to visually insert the vertically written characters anew.

Vertical and horizontal movement in relation to the screen

The shift to talkies (films with sound) began in the late 1920s and gradually spread through the 1930s, but silent films remained strong. Silent films, which lasted for almost 30 years, often used subtitles to express their dialogues.
After the spread of talkies and the eradication of subtitles, Jean-Luc Godard emerged in 1960, when dramatic film direction had matured sufficiently. Godard, who broke all over the completed style of dramatic films, filled the screen with typography and utilized text as a visual expression. His experimental attempts are parodied in "Bakemonogatari.

In the first episode of "Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei," as mentioned above, "vertical writing" is emphasized as a gag fallout. If we pay attention to the arrangement of the characters, a new aspect of "Zetsubou Sensei" as a visual design emerges.
For example, at the beginning of this episode, Itoshiki hangs himself. Hanging with a rope" is a "vertical movement. The rope from which he hangs himself breaks, but that too is a vertical movement.
In contrast, Kanika slides "horizontally" in the cut when she thinks of the name of Itoshiki. Negative Itoshiki and positive Kanoka. Vertical and horizontal writing. The two characters' personalities may be depicted in a schematic manner on the screen.


(Text by Keisuke Hirota)