Nogizaka46: "Zambi" drama episode one recap

 Start Date: January 23rd on Hulu at 1:00 am
The following day it airs on NTV

Cast:

Asuka Saito as Kaede Yamamuro

Miona Hori as Minori Morodzumi

Manatsu Akimoto as Asumi Saijou

Yuki Yoda as Hijiri Kai

Mizuki Yamashita as Yui Kanenura

Ranze Terada as Sena Sakaki

Miria Watanabe as Suzune Sakura

Junna Ito as Rena Igarashi

Momoko Ozono as Yuzuki Sakikawa

Ayane Suzuki as Marina Fujusaki

Minami Umezawa as Kana Kiuchi

Kaede Sato as Azusa Seki

Shiori Kubo as Honoka Hanamura

Mai Shinuchi as The beautiful woman....

..... plus seven other third generation members.....

 Too early to tell how this show will end up being, there will be twelve(?) of them I think. Following this recap is the one for the second episode, an okay beginning to the series but all in all the two shows were just so-so except for a few scenes. These should be short recaps as the episodes are only 22+ minutes with about a minute of that being for the credits and preview of the next show. Let's get to this show which features half of the 1st to 3rd generation members, just one main star is featured.
 That's Asuka who plays the role of Kaede and is the star of the drama. Through two episodes though to me the best of the bunch has been Manatsu who plays Asumi, really like her character plus she does look much better with her brownish hair. The pair are the best of friends and as this episode opened up they were on a bus heading back to their high school along with about seventeen other students. The third member of the trio is Minoro who is played by Miona but after two shows her role hasn't been that huge though it's supposed to.
 The bus ran into some difficulties and had to stop for repairs in the middle of a dark forest, an excellent set up for a horror show. When Kaede looked out the foggy window her view was what you see above, a dilapidated cemetery with some hands sticking out of the ground! That didn't deter Kaede and the rest of the students as they began wandering through the dark forest, it's also getting close to dusk which makes the forest even creepier. One reason for the students wandering away is the bus had a crappy connection for their cellphones, perhaps the woods had better reception.... huh?

 Being teenagers of course having excellent cellphone reception is the #1 priority in their lives but the majority of the cast are all in their twenties. The connection of course was no better in the woods so the group of gals kept on their merry way. That stroll didn't turn out to be so merry as the skies quickly darkened with rain and lightning on the horizon. Luckily the group found an abandoned house in the middle of nowhere and headed in to escape the storm.
 Perhaps they weren't too lucky though what that means won't be revealed until later. As the gals are resting and waiting out the storm they began to hear an eerie voice. You can see that in the above screenshot, the voice was a female one and was singing an unknown song which had some creepy lyrics to it which put the girls all on edge. It being nighttime the large group eventually began nodding off, the next thing Kaede knew it was morning though all of her friends had disappeared.
 Kaede began to investigate the house a bit now that it was light out, she found a few disturbing notes flapping in the house which read.... The End! What they meant was a mystery to Kaede who didn't want to stick around anymore and went looking for the rest of the students. The question that was never asked was why did they all leave her alone in the house? On her journey to find her mates Kaede saw many odd figures near the house and in the woods. Two were creepy older people who tried to speak but couldn't, the other was a mysterious young girl who looked like she stepped right out of a horror movie.

 Don't know who that above guy is as his name was never mentioned. Kaede had run into him in the middle of the woods, he himself looked to be quite the odd character but he warned Kaede to leave the forest at once though she wouldn't until she could find her friends. That hunt didn't take too long as Kaede and this newcomer soon found the rest of the students at another abandoned place, it wasn't another house but an old temple.
 Wasn't a scary setting but it was a bit creepy, when Kaede asked her guide what the area was called he told her, 'Zambi Village'. At the location Kaede once again some flapping notes which had the same message as the ones she saw in the house.... The End. Seems as though the bus has finally been repaired and the girls are about to leave but one incident took place which may prove to be a very important event. Asumi had been taking some photos of the deserted temple and it's relics when an old man suddenly leapt out and screamed at her to stop. It seems what Asumi did would curse her and know we haven't heard the last of what she did.
 What the curse may be or why hasn't been explained yet after two shows but then again very little has been revealed. So it after almost a day in the remote forest it's finally time for the girls to head back to school and what a place it was. The name of the school is Freeasia Academy and it seems to be one exclusive place where only the elite of the elites go though the girl's backgrounds is another thing we now nothing of. The location of the school hasn't been revealed either but it's nowhere near a big city and the girls all live in dorms.

 There's one message we see on the screen which gets shown three times an episode, 'In seven days we will no longer exist in this world'. Could that mean that the girls have been cursed from visiting Zambi Village and will perish in seven days unless they can find out the meaning of the curse? No clue on that yet and as I've said often not many things have been told to us yet, biggest reason nay be is because of the shortness of the episodes.
 The above screenshots show Kaede finding some info out on the internet about the place they just visited. Zambi Village is in a remote region of Shinshu and it does have a long history of being a creepy place. As Kaede was in her room checking out that info Asumi was alone in her room when some disturbing happenings began to take place. She had brought back a flower toy from the temple which was supposed to spin though it wouldn't. But all of a sudden the flower began to spin on it's own which put much fear into Asumi.
 She wandered over to check it out which may have been the last action she took as a regular human. As Asumi was checking the flower over and trying to discover why it started spinning a hideous creature appeared silently behind her. Before Asumi could do anything the creature bit deeply into her neck as a vampire may do and perhaps it was a vampire though it's a zombie drama. The bite didn't kill Asumi who didn't remember much of what happened and she headed to the bathroom to check out her injury.
 There Asumi ran into her best friend Kaede who immediately knew something was wrong with Asumi as she had begun to scream and rant some nonsense. A vampire can't see their reflection in a mirror but Asumi can, when she looked at one her features had become distorted though it's only when she looks at a mirror. Asumi couldn't take viewing her gruesome face and fled the bathroom to her room where she locked the door. Once again Asumi saw her reflection in a mirror, it was too much to take so she quickly ran to the window and.... threw herself out!!!! Kaede was finally able to get into Asumi's room, she dashed over to the open window but she was too late as on the ground below her was the dead figure of Asumi with blood streaming out of her head. With that somewhat gruesome ending this episode came to it's conclusion.

Longer recap than I expected but most of the time the first post of a drama is. This episode did have a promising start and when doing the post realized it was a better show than I had originally thought. As is my MO have plenty of screenshots to view and the recap for episode two is below this one.