October is here, and that means we all start thinking about scary subjects. Since zombie anime has become quite a popular genre, I thought it’d be fun to list the best ones to watch (or re-watch) this spooky season. Keep reading to see my ranking!
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Why We Love Zombie Anime
I was born in 1968, and I’ve got a minor obsession with watching every movie released in the year of my birth. There were many memorable films that came out that year: 2001, Planet of the Apes, and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. It was also the year of the first modern zombie movie, Night of the Living Dead, which I’m a fan of.
And it’s great that the familiar themes of a zombie apocalypse work so well in anime, which is the perfect format for telling all kinds of stories involving the undead. So let’s explore the 10 best zombie anime in this post!
Kabaneri Of the Iron Fortress
I was extremely happy to see Kabaneri come along, because it featured character designs by Haruhiko Mikimoto, who was responsible for the best anime of the 1980s. In this show, humans fight against humans afflicted with a virus that turns them into flesh-eating monsters.
Corpse Princess Offers Zombies, Boobs
I’m a huge Gainax fan, but as the company fell from grace, I missed watching a few of their later shows. One I failed to watch at the time was Shikabane Hime, aka Corpse Princess. I’ll try to catch it soon!
Zombie Land Saga Was a Zombie Idol Anime We Didn’t Know We Needed
Part idol anime and part advertisement for the city of Saga in Kyushu, this popular anime features five girls who get brought back from the dead as zombies so they can form an idol group.
ZOM 100 Is A Zombie Anime with an Important Message
What would you do if a zombie outbreak destroyed the world? Create a “Bucket List of the Dead” of things you want to do before your inevitable death? That’s the theme of ZOM 100, the colorful anime with an important message about work-life balance.
Is This A Zombie? Offers Many Hilarious Moments
This is a hilarious “supernatural comedy” about a boy who dies and then gets brought back to life as a zombie with a harem of supernatural girls.
Sankarea: Undying Love Is a Zombie Love Story
A love story with a zombie girl? Sankarea was a popular single-season show about a boy obsessed with zombies. He wanted an undead girlfriend…and he gets his wish!
Fucking a Zombie in Interspecies Reviewers
Since humans basically want to fuck anything they can think of, naturally zombies get fetishized, too. One of the episodes of Interspecies Reviewers involves sex with Furanpaa, a zombie prostitute who is ridiculously cute. The only problem is the smell of her rotting flesh.
Monster Musume Has a Zombie Girl
In a harem anime that has a giant snek, a centaur, a slime, an avian girl, a mermaid, and a giant spider, naturally they need a zombie girl to balance things out. Zombina’s gag is that her body parts are always falling off and she has to stitch them back on. Remember the time her boob fell off and Kimihito has to sew it back on?
School Live! Might Be the Perfect Zombie Anime
I consider School Live!, aka Gakkou Gurashi!, the perfect gateway anime for new fans. It has cute art and a familiar concept (a zombie outbreak). But the show is much deeper, with the story wrapped in a mystery (why is the school the girls go to specially designed to withstand a disaster?), and has some of the best writing in any anime I can think of, with twists and turns no one can guess.
Highschool of the Dead Gives Us Zombies and Pantsu
Finally, my beloved HOTD, the anime that will make you start writing “highschool” as one word. It offered some of the most over-the-top fan service moments with gripping action. Sadly we’ll never get a continuation as writer Daisuke Sato passed away in 2017.
Thanks for reading this blog post about the best zombie anime series to watch (or re-watch) this October. Did we miss any of your favorites? Tell us in the comments below!
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Great news! J-List’s inventory counting is at the end of the month, and since we’d rather sell our stock to you than count it, we’re having a huge sale! You can get 15% off all in-stock products shipping from Japan during the J-List Fiscal Year-End Sale. Through May 31st! There’s no coupon to enter and no minimum to buy, so start browsing here!
