Koushan Takami’s Battle Royale series tests the limits of human compassion and selfishness. Japan as a national socialist state isolates fifty classes of junior high third years and send them off to what’s called the “The Program:” the students are told that they are on their way to graduate. On the bus ride there, they are knocked out with potent cookies only to wake up in just another classroom. Except this time their necks are bound with detonating collars. A creepily happy teacher explains the rules of “The Program.” They have a map, a flashlight, a compass, scant food, water, and a random weapon. Paper fans count. So do pistols. They must fight to the death, and if no student is killed within any 24-hour period, all of the collars will detonate. Regular television is interrupted so that everyone gets to watch. Imagine if you had to kill your classmates in WR100, CH101 (some people do this anyway) or PS101 in order to survive.
You would do it.
Darwin said it, “survival of the fittest.” Do you remember how fit you were when you were fourteen, before Fitrec, before protein shakes, maybe even before puberty?
Each sequel goes into depth about the lives of each student that the reader has watched die. Every family and every orphanage lives in fear that one day, when their sons and daughters are old enough, that “The Program” will take them. The national socialist state justifies this game; the fact that it leaves Japan’s inhabitants paranoid, terrified, and unprotected means that they will be too disorganized to rebel against the state. No on likes political rebellions. People can get hurt.
In The Fountainhead, by Ayn Rand, socialism tears down a brilliant architect. In Atlas Shrugged, by Ayn Rand, it shatters American industry. In Battle Royale it destroys the lives of fourteen-year-old junior high kids.
The 1999 Battle Royale series has been translated to five languages, including English. It also as a 2000 film adaptation directed by Kinji Fukasaku.
