Prison School (Kangoku Gakuen), Akira Hiramoto’s legendary ecchi black comedy, is the single most unhinged, offensive, and hysterically brilliant 12-episode trainwreck ever produced by J.C. Staff in 2015. If you thought anime couldn’t get any more depraved than High School DxD or To Love-Ru, you clearly haven’t met the underground student council and their sadistic BDSM prison regime.
Welcome to Hachimitsu Academy, once an all-girls private school that just opened its doors to male students for the first time in history. Only five boys enroll, making them the most hated minority on campus. Kiyoshi, Gakuto, Shingo, Joe, and André are your average perverted high school virgins, until they get caught peeping in the girls’ bath. Instead of expulsion, they’re sentenced to the school’s secret Prison Block, a hellhole run by the Underground Student Council: the sadistic vice-president Meiko Shiraki, the cold dominatrix president Mari Kurihara, and the masochistic secretary Hana Midorikawa.
What follows is twelve episodes of pure, uncensored insanity.
This is not subtle comedy. This is not safe comedy. This is a show that opens with a grown woman cracking a whip on teenage boys’ asses so hard the sound barrier breaks, features a prison break planned around a detailed diagram of Meiko’s sweat patterns, and has an entire episode dedicated to a golden shower scene that somehow becomes the emotional climax of the season.
And it’s absolutely brilliant.
The genius of Prison School lies in how it commits 1000% to its premise. Every character is a walking fetish caricature, yet they all have depth. Kiyoshi is the straight man trying to survive with his dignity intact (and failing miserably). Gakuto is a Three Kingdoms-obsessed strategist who sacrifices his hair and dignity for the cause. André is a silent mountain of repressed rage and masochism. Meiko is the terrifying dominatrix who secretly cries when her authority is challenged. Mari is the ice queen with daddy issues and a crow fetish. Hana is the shy girl who accidentally becomes the most dangerous person on campus when pushed too far.
The animation by J.C. Staff is shockingly good for a show this obscene. The character designs are exaggerated to grotesque perfection, the slapstick violence is choreographed like a Jackie Chan fight scene, and the facial expressions are some of the most expressive in anime history. When Meiko’s sweat finally drips in episode 9, you can feel the entire fandom collectively lose their minds.
The plot revolves around the boys’ increasingly desperate attempts to escape prison before the school expels them permanently. Every plan is more ridiculous than the last: stealing Meiko’s uniform, framing the above-ground student council, using Gakuto’s piss as a distraction. The show somehow makes these plans feel like high-stakes military operations while never letting you forget that it’s all because five virgins wanted to see boobs.
The uncensored version (Blu-ray/AT-X) is mandatory. The TV broadcast was censored to hell with black bars and glowing lights, but the home release shows everything in glorious, depraved detail. This is one of the few anime where the censorship genuinely ruins the experience.
The ending delivers one of the most cathartic payoffs in comedy history. After eleven episodes of pure suffering, the boys finally get their revenge in the most spectacularly over-the-top sports festival you will ever witness. The crow shit scene. The ass-sumō match. Meiko’s breakdown. It’s beautiful.
Final Score: 9.4/10 – A depraved masterpiece
Prison School is not for the faint of heart. It is offensive, perverted, and proud of it. But beneath the piss, sweat, and dominatrix outfits lies a comedy with perfect timing, genuine character growth, and some of the most memorable moments in anime history.
If you can handle the extreme content, this is one of the funniest shows ever made. If you can’t, stay far away, because Prison School doesn’t care about your comfort zone. It will kick it in the balls and laugh while doing it.
Stream the censored version on Crunchyroll if you must.
Hunt down the uncensored Blu-ray if you want the real experience.
Just don’t watch it with your parents.
You’ve been warned.