Trigger warning! This post is about physical, emotional, and child abuse in a fictional TV show episode. In addition, I will be describing some very disturbing abuse scenes. Even though it is fictional it can be upsetting.

For this blog post, I am going to talk about Assassination Classroom.

Although this show is fiction and an anime I feel it is a perfect example of how not to depict abuse. Now Assassination Classroom is an anime that is pretty much impossible to describe. But here is anime planet’s description of season one “A humorous and action-packed story about a class of misfits who are trying to kill their new teacher – an alien octopus with bizarre powers and super strength! The teacher has just destroyed the moon and is threatening to destroy the earth – unless his students can destroy him first. What makes things more complicated is that he’s the best teacher they’ve ever had!” So that is the show condensed in a nutshell. Also, keep in mind these students are in junior high school (similar to middle school). Now season one is very good. Is it the best? No, but it does have some excellent moments. However, season two is a completely different story. The last straw for me was episode 31 (Season 2) Round Two Time. This is the episode we see the main character’s Nagisa’s home life.

To be honest I had doubts about this blog post because this episode makes me feel physically sick even thinking about it.

The first scene to look at is when Nagisa goes home from school. In the previous episodes, the show was always focused on school life. It was very rare to see any student’s home life. Also one important note. Watching back I realized there was a major red flag right off the bat. Nagisa’s home is too sterile. Think hospital in terms of color (white) and neatness. Moving on when Nagisa gets home his mom Hiromi talks to him about his bad grades. She seems like a normal concerned parent. Then it starts getting uncomfortable. Hiromi literally plans on bribing the school to get him into a better more prestigious class. Red flag #2 is not normal behavior. When Nagisa protest she snaps. As he talks Hiromi gets a dark cloud and crazy eyes. He suddenly stops and thinks quote “Uh oh she’s in one of her moods again. Not good! Here it comes.” She leaps up and grabs Nagisa by the hair and starts shaking him around while screaming horrible things at him.

It’s honestly really hard to watch even as a fiction show. Seeing an adult treated like this would be hard enough. Seeing a child is even worse. Especially when Nagisa blames himself for upsetting her. It is awful to see a child in a victim mindset. “I caused the abuse. This is my fault.” When he apologizes and calls himself selfish she calms down. And starts in with the emotional abuse (Think Mother knows best from Tangled) and states he doesn’t want to be like his dad (Abandoned the family). So only a few minutes into Nagisa’s home life and there is physical abuse, emotional abuse, and parental alienation. And then it gets so much worse. Hiromi starts in on how much she wanted a girl. And then pulls out a dress and holds it up to Nagisa while commenting how nice it looks with his long hair. Throughout the series, it has been an ongoing joke about how much Nagisa looked like a girl. He has long hair and androgynous features.

And well this made things very clear and extremely uncomfortable. Summed up Hiromi sees him as a do-over life for herself. In real life that is never healthily. And here it’s extremely abusive. Because Hiromi treats him like a girl. Any mentions of him being a boy upset her and she forced Nagisa to have long hair. Extremely emotionally abusive behavior.

The next scene to look at is when Hiromi has a conference with Koro Sensei. She shows red flags and Koro Sensei defends Nagisa’s right to decide and tells her off. Hiromi starts screaming insanely loud at Koro Sensei and storms off. Now, what would you do in this situation? A. Check in with the kid about his home life B. Call Japan’s version of CPS because something isn’t right here or C. Lecture the kid about needing to communicate better with a probably abusive parent? Well, the answer is C. And it’s sick. I believe it was meant as encouragement for Nagisa to reclaim himself. But it came across as blame the victim mentality. The whole episode highlights the damage Hiromi did to Nagisa mentally. I can’t help but feel if Nagisa had visible injuries this whole situation would have been much different. Or if the abuser was his dad and not his mother. And it highlights a major problem with our society. Our society thinks emotional abuse isn’t seen as bad as physical. Just because a kid isn’t bleeding externally doesn’t mean they aren’t bleeding mentally. The really scary thing is I feel like this is a common situation in real life for abused kids. No visible marks = no help. And female abusers often aren’t taken seriously especially with male victims. In fact, it’s really rare for any form of fiction to show to have the mother as the primary/dominant abuser. Let alone to this level of abuse. And I wish this episode did better.

The final scene to look at is the ending. It is pretty complicated but all you need to know is Hiromi drugs Nagisa and decides to burn the school down. She gets stopped and Nagisa takes the advice and breaks free of Shiota’s abuse. Koro Sensei just drives them home while lecturing Nagisa on communication again. The episode ends with Nagisa making Hiromi dinner. It is so wrong on so many levels. #1 If Hiromi wants to end the abuse then she needs serious professional help. And until/ if that happens Nagisa can’t live with her. Just ending the episode like that means the abuse will likely continue. #2 Showing Nagisa breaking free from Hiromi’s abuse in less than twenty-four hours simply from encouragement is complete and utter garbage. Abuse survivors usually need time, distance, and years of therapy to overcome the damage. And even then some people will always have scars on their body, emotionally and/ or physically. #3 Koro Sensei just driving them home. Hiromi clearly snapped mentally. And goodness knows what drugs Nagisa was given. Both of them would need immediate medical attention.

Overall this episode was a complete failure. Later episodes deal with Nagisa’s parents more and their just as bad if not worse. A lot of why this is bad is because it’s a fantasy view of abuse. A person can’t suddenly get over years of abuse. Some “families” shouldn’t stay together. Just encouraging isn’t enough sometimes you need to report situations to the proper authorities. It would have been far better if Koro Sensei tried and failed to get help. From the outside Nagisa has clean clothes, no physical marks on his body are well-fed, and has a clean house. Sadly I can easily see how officials would dismiss him. That happens far too often in real life. And most importantly sometimes there is no happy or encouraging ending. The episode tries to end positively. But realistically without help or intervention, Nagisa will continue to be abused by Hiromi.