Being a prison guard for death row prisoners is not easy. You spend long periods of time interacting with the prisoners and in the end, have a hand in ending their lives. This is the conundrum faced by the young guard Shimoda, who has gotten to know the prisoner Satake, as the two often discussed books together. Shimoda has the unenviable task of holding the rope used to hang prisoners, ensuring it doesn’t sway around. Such a job must do a lot of mental damage and Shimoda will have to struggle with it for a long time. But that’s not the focus of this series. Satake somehow survives his execution and, being legally dead now, is given over to the care of “The Professor” who studies people like Satake—people who seem to have weird quirks to them. But even among the others in this program, Satake is unique, having survived a multitude of events that should have killed him. While the characters discuss how he’s continued to survive, I’m left wondering why this guy is so unlucky as to have experienced so many near-fatal events. What will they discover about Satake’s survival ability and what kind of other unusual people will we meet as the story progresses?

The initial premise of prison guards dealing with ending the life of inmates sounded like an interesting idea. While the actual plot is also pretty intriguing, it was a shame to see that concept swept under the rug so quickly. DLE is known for fairly simple animation but this series came off looking rather amateurish, seeming more like a low-level YouTube animation than a professionally executed anime. The interaction between Satake and the Professor was fun and built up some interest around the former’s ability and the tease of other such characters, but will it be enough? This first episode didn’t come off in a very positive light but I’ll probably go with the three-episode rule to see if it manages to draw me in.

---

The Human Crazy University is streaming on Crunchyroll.