History YMMV / SchoolLive

** Takahito isn't very well-liked either. While he is suppose to be a {{Hate Sink}}, some of the hate he gets goes beyond that, with criticism towards him being that he's a dull and uninteresting character who [[SpotlightStealingSquad nonetheless takes page time from better characters]]. His {{Wangst}} backstory, [[TooDumbToLive sheer stupidity]] and [[spoiler:how patheticly he's ultimately killed]] doesn't earn him any fans either.

* WhatAnIdiot: Apparently the militants have problems with supplies…. And yet three girls (the fourth doesn’t count at that point) were able to gather up means to survive all by themselves. This highlights just how stupid the former is. Instead of making use of high numbers, the militant’s best idea is to kill off the weak and look out for only the self righteous. This comes back to bite them in more ways than one.

** The university arc has divided the fandom as well. Some people think that it's a interesting and fresh direction to take the series in, with plenty of new characters to expand on the story, actual human antagonists and plenty of twists and turns. Others find it inferiour to the first 30 chapters, think that there's too many characters {With some further diversion on whether any of the new characters are interesting or boring}, that the Militants are flat and boring antagonists who hog screentime from other more interesting characters and plotlines, and {{The Reveal}} that [[spoiler:the virus is possibly airborne and thus able to infect anyone at any time]] pushes the series into TooBleakStoppedCaring territory. It doesn't help that the University arc is almost entirely lacking the {{Slice Of Life}} and Psychological elements that originally made this series stand out from most other zombie works.
** As to be expected, the clips for the anime's English Dub have gained a mixed reaction. Some people find the dub to be fine and the voices spot-on. Others aren't too keen on it, with Yuki's dub voice in particular gaining some criticism for being too low-pitched and scratchy, and not cheerful and energetic enough to suit her. And then there's the third camp that thinks the fanbase should wait until the full dub is released, since most of the clips don't touch upon the more serious moments in the series.

* CriticalResearchFailure: Yuki doesn't fit any criteria for Dissociative Identity Disorder despite Miki accusing her of it. Yuki has auditory and visual hallucinations, not any sort of SplitPersonality. It acts more like a form of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, kicked into gear by [[spoiler:Megu-nee dying and everything going to hell]].
** This may be more of an in-universe research failure on Miki's part more than anything. There's really no one-to-one diagnosis for what Yuki has due to the specific nature of her trauma and symptoms. An argument could be made that Miki maybe thought that Yuki talking about Megu-nee as a protective figure who kept her from getting in trouble was reminiscent in her mind to how dissociative identities usually exist to protect the primary personality from trauma and danger. Though, of course, Miki would have been incorrect regardless.

* WhatAnIdiot: Takahito's choice to kill off most of his own team to preserve food comes off as horribly idiotic. For one thing the food problem could have easily been solved by rationing, hunting for animals {Particularly since the Militants have Crossbows} and/or starting up a garden to grow food, the last of which Touko ends up deciding to do. Secondly, killing off most of his people results in having far less allies around in case either zombies or a bigger survivor group attacks. And doing so also had potential to make his own surviving teammates paranoid about him offing them next.
** His stupidity increases after [[spoiler:he gets infected. First he decides to let in a massive horde of zombies into the University so that the girls will take an antidote he thinks they had so that he can snatch it for himself, ignoring that this could have gotten everyone else killed and would have left him surrounded by several zombies if he had succeeded. Then when Shino betrays him, he tries to attack her despite her being the toughest MFC member who's easily killed several zombies by herself, and almost gets stabbed in the eye for his troubles. Lastly, despite his paranoia about everyone else, he still trusts Ayaka and thinks she's on his side, ''even though she betrayed him earlier and was excited at the prospect of killing him''. That last idiotic mistake is what finally gets him killed when she decides to murder him for fun]].

** Is Takahito remorseful about [[spoiler: leaving Kougami alone and, as far as he knows, indirectly causing his death]] due to genuinely feeling sad about losing a friend and ally? Or is he only regretful about it due to pragmatic reasons {Namely [[spoiler: losing a valuable member of the MFC who Shino, an even more important member, cares dearly about]]}? Considering that he usually [[JerkAss only views other people as tools to be used in order to keep himself alive]] and [[BadBoss will kill his own allies if it suits his needs]], the latter interpretation is very possible.
** Ayaka's exact reason for [[spoiler: killing Takahito]] is up for interpretation. [[spoiler: It's very likely that she did indeed kill him just to satisfy her own sadism and then just lit his corpse on fire for fun, but she also made a comment about him suffering due to the virus's effects shortly beforehand and was also pleased with his efforts at killing the other students. This combined with her giving him a quick death and how they were on good terms up to this point could instead paint her murder of him as a unwanted {{Mercy Kill}} and then burning his body as a cremation attempt, and her smiling at it would just be due to her enjoying death in general, making the whole scenario a very twisted {{Pet The Dog}} moment on her part if this is all true]].

** The university arc has divided the fandom as well. Some people think that it's a interesting and fresh direction to take the series in, with plenty of new characters to expand on the story, actual human antagonists and plenty of twists and turns. Others find it inferiour to the first 30 chapters, think that there's too many characters {With some further diversion on whether any of the new characters are interesting or boring}, that the Militants are flat and boring antagonists who hog screentime from other more interesting characters and plotlines, and {{The Reveal}} that [[spoiler: the virus is possibly airborne and thus able to infect anyone at any time]] pushes the series into TooBleakStoppedCaring territory. It doesn't help that the University arc is almost entirely lacking the {{Slice Of Life}} and Psychological elements that originally made this series stand out from most other zombie works.

** In a retroactive way, [[spoiler: seeing Takashige getting cornered by several zombies and practically crying for Kurumi to save him, only to be ignored and promptly torn to shreds is ''really'' satisfying after not only his attempts to murder her, but also seeing how much of a bastard he was in the flashbacks shown in the following chapter. It especially counts as this [[KarmicDeath if some of the zombies who killed him were the very same teammates he and the rest of the Militants betrayed and killed]].]]
** Takahito's {{Humiliation Conga}} [[spoiler: and violent death that borders on overkill]] also counts as this, especially since [[spoiler: he's ultimately betrayed by both of his remaining allies and killed in the very same "Zombie Graveyard" where some of his zombified teammates he betrayed are]].
* CriticalResearchFailure: Yuki doesn't fit any criteria for Dissociative Identity Disorder despite Miki accusing her of it. Yuki has auditory and visual hallucinations, not any sort of SplitPersonality. It acts more like a form of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, kicked into gear by [[spoiler: Megu-nee dying and everything going to hell]].

* EnsembleDarkhorse: Out of all the University characters, Shino is arguably the fan-favorite of the bunch. This is due to her being the only truly badass member of the Militants instead of a {{Dirty Coward}} like the rest, being a very sympathetic {{Anti Villain}} who has a full character arc, [[spoiler: and her ultimate {{Heel Face Turn}} where she not only saves Yuuri and Miki right in the nick of time, but also [[TakeThatScrappy stabs Takahito and ruins his one chance at getting something resembling a victory]].]]

** Even though [[spoiler: Kurumi]] has gotten a ton of death flags throughout the later half of the manga and has resulted in some people thinking that she'll die, there's still plenty of people who think that [[spoiler: she'll either be cured permanently, find more samples of the temporary cure, or will end up becoming a zombie hybrid instead of being killed off {In fact the Zombie Hyrbid theory is a very popular fan theory}. The fact that she's arguably the most popular character in the series probably plays a role in this as well]].

** While many of Takahito's actions are utterly despicable, he becomes truly irredeemable in Chapter 51, [[spoiler: when he deliberately opens up the gate keeping the zombies out of the university, knowing full well that this could kill everyone there ''including his own teammates'', just so he can try and get a supposed antidote to save himself. It's further cemented later on when he tries to murder Miki in cold blood and threatens to do the same to Aki. Thankfully Shino stops him, the zombies he let inside end up killing nobody, and he dies accomplishing nothing]].
** Takashige crosses this [[spoiler: when he attempts to murder Kurumi, a young teenage girl, in cold-blood just because she's infected]].

** Yuuri in the second arc got flak for her [[spoiler:deepening delusions about Ruu. Unlike Yuki, whose condition makes her more sympathetic and endearing, Yuuri's delusions make her outright unstable and unlikable. It doesn't help that she still believes that Ruu is still alive even after seeing Ayaka "Kill" her (In reality she just stepped on the head of the teddy bear that Yuuri thinks is Ruu).]] And Chapter 49 makes her even ''worse'', [[spoiler: as she's more concerned about a teddy bear than ''her actual living friends'', to where she has to be reminded that Kurumi is still missing]]. By the time the final arc rolls around though, [[spoiler:she's slowly starting to [[RescuedFromTheScrappyHeap grow out of this]]]].
** Takahito isn't very well-liked either. While he is suppose to be a {{Hate Sink}}, some of the hate he gets goes beyond that, with criticism towards him being that he's a dull and uninteresting character who [[SpotlightStealingSquad nonetheless takes page time from better characters]]. His {{Wangst}} backstory, [[TooDumbToLive sheer stupidity]] and [[spoiler: how patheticly he's ultimately killed]] doesn't earn him any fans either.

** One primary criticism that the University arc gets [[BrokenBase from some fans]] is that it focuses far too much on the Militants, with the actual main characters being {{Out of Focus}} aside from Miki. The fact that they ultimately end up being pointless to the manga's story {Due to Sino staying behind at the University [[spoiler: and the rest of the group being killed off]] over the course of the arc} only makes the huge amount of of focus they had here even worse.

** When more information is revealed about the Militants, we find out that their lifestyle and moralities are the polar opposite of the School Living Club, with the SL Club trying to do more than just survive while also still trying to live a normal life, while the Militants have resorted to brutality and have gained a {{Social Darwinist}} mentality. The story could have been very interesting if these two opposite viewpoints and ways of handling things had clashed more, but in the actual manga it only comes up briefly once, and the Militants aren't defeated in a way that directly proves their viewpoints wrong. And it's unlikely to come up again now, [[spoiler: given how Shino has made a {{Heel Face Turn}} and the rest of the Militants were killed off over the course of the University arc]].
** In Chapter 46, [[spoiler: Kurumi ends up killing Takashige in self defense by luring a zombie horde to him, and is shown in tears about it]]. This being the first time one of the girls kills a living human, it could've been interesting to explore and delve into psychologically. But instead, once Yuki cheers up [[spoiler: Kurumi]] with a pep talk, it's completely forgotten about and never brought up again.

** His stupidity increases after [[spoiler: he gets infected. First he decides to let in a massive horde of zombies into the University so that the girls will take an antidote he thinks they had so that he can snatch it for himself, ignoring that this could have gotten everyone else killed and would have left him surrounded by several zombies if he had succeeded. Then when Shino betrays him, he tries to attack her despite her being the toughest MFC member who's easily killed several zombies by herself, and almost gets stabbed in the eye for his troubles. Lastly, despite his paranoia about everyone else, he still trusts Ayaka and thinks she's on his side, ''even though she betrayed him earlier and was excited at the prospect of killing him''. That last idiotic mistake is what finally gets him killed when she decides to murder him for fun]].

* SeasonalRot: The School Life arc (Chapters 1-30/anime) is widely considered to be the best of the series. In contrast, the University arc and those that followed are more contentious, mainly for introducing [[ReplacementScrappy widely-reviled new characters]] while also [[TheyWastedaPerfectlyGoodCharacter underusing other new characters who had potential]], increasing the TooBleakStoppedCaring to ridiculous levels, and [[ClicheStorm playing zombie media cliches straight]] when the first arc sought to be a unique take on the genre.

** Yuuri in the second arc onward got flak for her [[spoiler:deepening delusions about Ruu. Unlike Yuki, whose condition makes her more sympathetic and endearing, Yuuri's delusions make her outright unstable and unlikable. It doesn't help that she still believes that Ruu is still alive even after seeing Ayaka "Kill" her (In reality she just stepped on the head of the teddy bear that Yuuri thinks is Ruu).]] And Chapter 49 makes her even ''worse'', [[spoiler: as she's more concerned about a teddy bear than ''her actual living friends'', to where she has to be reminded that Kurumi is still missing]].

* FirstInstallmentWins: The manga's first main story arc (Chapters 1-30) and the anime are far more well-known and acclaimed then the chapters that came out afterwards. In particular that portion of the series is what most fanart is based on and what most people talk about.

* {{Narm}}: Chapter 47 and it's backstory for the Militants comes off as cringey and unintentionally goofy due to Takahito and Ayaka constantly ranting about how "Chosen" they were and how edgy they end up coming off as. Ayaka in particular ends up seeming more like an edgy, {{wangst}}y teenager rather then a scary and unpredictable sociopath.

** Yuuri in the second arc onward got flak for her [[spoiler:deepening delusions about Ruu. Unlike Yuki, whose condition makes her more sympathetic and endearing, Yuuri's delusions make her outright unstable and unlikable. It doesn't help that she still believes that Ruu is still alive even after seeing Ayaka "Kill" her (In reality she just stepped on the head of the teddy bear that Yuuri thinks is Ruu).]] And Chapter 49 makes her even ''worse'', [[spoiler: as she's more concerned about a teddy bear then ''her actual living friends'', to where she has to be reminded that Kurumi is still missing]].

** When more information is revealed about the Militants, we find out that their lifestyle and moralities are the polar opposite of the School Living Club, with the SL Club trying to do more then just survive while also still trying to live a normal life, while the Militants have resorted to brutality and have gained a {{Social Darwinist}} mentality. The story could have been very interesting if these two opposite viewpoints and ways of handling things had clashed more, but in the actual manga it only comes up briefly once, and the Militants aren't defeated in a way that directly proves their viewpoints wrong. And it's unlikely to come up again now, [[spoiler: given how Shino has made a {{Heel Face Turn}} and the rest of the Militants were killed off over the course of the University arc]].

* SeasonalRot: The School Life arc (Chapters 1-30/anime) is widely considered to be the best of the series. In contrast, the University arc and those that followed are more contentious, mainly for introducing [[ReplacementScrappy widely-reviled new characters]] while also [[TheyWastedaPerfectlyGoodCharacter underusing other new characters who had potential]], increasing the TooBleakStoppedcaring to ridiculous levels, and [[ClicheStorm playing zombie media cliches straight]] when the first arc sought to be a unique take on the genre.

** In a MaybeMagicMaybeMundane case, is [[spoiler:Megu-nee]] just another hallucination or is really her ghost acting as the club's SpiritAdvisor, while trying to [[spoiler:keep her zombified form at bay from [[MamaBear harming them]], which also make viewers wonder in a subverted UsefulNotes/SchrodingersCat situation if Megu-nee is present as both a ghost that Yuki can only see and interact and a zombie lurking in the basement are each a LiteralSplitPersonality]].

** The university arc has divided the fandom as well. Some people think that it's a interesting and fresh direction to take the series in, with plenty of new characters to expand on the story, actual human antagonists and plenty of twists and turns. Others find it inferiour to the first 30 chapters, think that there's too many characters {With some further diversion on whether any of the new characters are interesting or boring}, that the Militants are flat and boring antagonists who hog screentime from other more interesting characters and plotlines, and {{The Reveal}} that [[spoiler: the virus is possibly airborne and thus able to infect anyone at any time]] pushes the series into {{Darkness Induced Audience Apathy}} territory. It doesn't help that the University arc is almost entirely lacking the {{Slice Of Life}} and Psychological elements that originally made this series stand out from most other zombie works.

* DarknessInducedAudienceApathy: The Randall Corporation arc is so bleak, with nearly every breakthrough the characters achieve [[ShaggyDogStory turning out to be pointless]], that is just gets hard to stomach for many fans. [[spoiler:The girls eventually do [[EarnYourHappyEnding earn their happy ending]], but have to go through a lot of pointless suffering to get there]].

* SeasonalRot: The School Life arc (Chapters 1-30/anime) is widely considered to be the best of the series. In contrast, the University arc and those that followed are more contentious, mainly for introducing [[ReplacementScrappy widely-reviled new characters]] while also [[TheyWastedaPerfectlyGoodCharacter underusing other new characters who had potential]], increasing the DarknessInducedAudienceApathy to ridiculous levels, and [[ClicheStorm playing zombie media cliches straight]] when the first arc sought to be a unique take on the genre.

* VindicatedByHistory: The anime adaptation; when it first came out, many fans of the series called foul on it for its AdaptationDecay, [[{{Flanderization}} cutting out characterization and backstory of the leads]] and adding a SpotlightStealingSquad KidAppealCharacter in the form of Taroumaru, who ended up changing the context of many scenes just by his presence. Fans nearly universally preferred the manga then, but as it entered its own SeasonalRot with the University arc, the anime has started to be reevaluated. One of the biggest sticking points in its favor is that unlike the manga, which dove deep into DarknessInducedAudienceApathy, the anime at least gave the girls an optimistic ending by ending at the point many believe was best to end it (the equivalent of Chapter 30 at the end of the High School Life arc), and for as much of a spotlight hog as Taroumaru could be, he was still just a mascot character and nowhere near as obnoxious as Takahito and the Militants. As such, the anime has become viewed as a good series in its own right instead of a butchering of the manga.

** Is Yuki ''really'' completely trapped in this happy self-delusion as both a defensive reaction as well as a consequence [[spoiler:of Megu-nee's death]]? Or is she just ''pretending'' to be this delusional ditz, as Miki thinks she is? In the manga, it certainly ''started'' as the former. [[spoiler:However in the wake of the helicopter crash, and Yuri's increasing mental instability, it's now clear that Yuki's shrugged off her delusions somewhat, but seems to be content to continue playing the part, as it seems to keep ''Yuuri'' in check.]]

* MemeticLoser: Takahito is quickly being regarded as this as of lately. Despite being the {{Big Bad}} of the University arc, he's shown [[TooDumbToLive constantly making idotic choices that only make things worse for himself]], is unable to back up his own claims about how he was "Chosen" to lead and survive, and [[spoiler: not only do he and the zombies he let inside end up killing absolutely ''nobody'', but he ultimately dies a anti-climatic death without accomplishing anything]].