| “The nail that sticks out is hammered down”. From the society that gave the world that particularly despicable metaphor about conformity, "Queen of the Classroom" is an engrossing but often surprisingly painful to watch series, as the particularly vile sensei humiliates and demeans her students to make them obey and submit. The series is shown from the point of view of Kazumi, one of the students in the class, and follows her heroic efforts to not be crushed by the pressure to kowtow to unjustified authority.
Throughout the series the teacher offers up some choice monologues outlining her position and viewpoint on the teacher’s role as an educator and what she is there to do, and these scenes were fascinating and maddening, as in every conceivable way I’m philosophically opposed to her perspective. Which is fine, as she is the villain of the piece. We’re not meant to like her. (Although the end credits to each episode are quite funny, as it shows the actress who plays the teacher, Amami Yuki, literally letting her hair down and relaxing, smiling and dancing, things her character never does in the show.)
I enjoyed this series a great deal and was perhaps taking it too seriously, but there are many affecting moments and heart-breaking situations, but then it’s easy to be moved by the plight of children, especially those forced into repressive educational regimes that may not fit their individual modes of learning, a ‘liberal’ conceit that Maya-sensei would dismiss as foolish and lead to a society breaking down and becoming weak. As someone who resented every second of their ineffective and rigidly inflexible high school education, I can empathize greatly with Kazumi and the other students and fume with rage at the Maya-sensei’s Wicked Witch style approach to teaching. |
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