The movie features members of idol groups Berryz Kobo and °C-ute, as well as few others from the same company.
Provides Examples Of:
- All for Nothing: Nobuaki desperately attempts to save everyone and stop the game, to no avail. Chiemi, being its vessel, commits suicide by jumping out of the window, in a last-ditch desperate attempt to stop the game also, but gets revived by The King to continue the game regardless.
- Anyone Can Die: More like, everyone do die.
- The Ageless: Chiemi is made biologically immortal by The King, to play its game forever, and doesn't age. If she does die by any other means, The King simply resurrects her to bring her back into the game again.
- Adaptational Villainy: Maybe not villainy per se, but Ria is much more apathetic, uncaring and callous towards the whole situation and students themselves and much less invested in it than in the anime and manga. She barely even reacts to what is going on, including deaths, perpetually having a bored look. She makes it clear that she isn't even really bothered by it that much. She snarks at the last few survivors and shows no apparent empathy to their plight, all the while seemingly holding The King in high regard. She never directly tries to help with the situation, never tries to do anything against the game, despite clearly knowing about it more than anyone else, and despite clearly knowing about it from the start, before anyone else does, she never tries to warn anyone, she just sits in the sidelines, calmly observing as it transpires. Only when people begin to die does she start giving Chiemi, Nobuaki and Naoya some scarce bits of information about the game. The most she does is rather passively fill in Chiemi on the game and the curse and its nature and purpose, but her conversations with her only seems serve it in the end anyway. Until the very end, it's not clear, just who's side she is on, if any. If anything, she might lean more to The King's side.
- Asshole Victim: Masami, who hated Kana with a passion for reasons unclear and, when the Game begins, she takes advantage of it and the situation and makes it kill Kana by stealing her vote. She even gets called out and then punished by The King, of all things, for this.
- Big Bad: The King Curse.
- Break the Cutie: Naturally, happens a lot. But notable examples are Nami, who commits suicide when ordered to send killing messages to other two students, and Chiemi, when she discovers (in both the manga and the film) that it's because of her that The King targeted her class.
- Class Representative: Nami seems to be one and looks and acts the part, even if not outright stated to be. With Kamoshita and Nobuaki becoming her assistants midway through.
- Curse: The King and its game turn out to be something of a sentient curse. If Ria is to be believed.
- Childhood Friends: Chiemi, Nobuaki and Naoya. Subverted with Chiemi and Nobuaki, as it turns out to be a fake memory created by The King.
- Deadly Game: The movie's whole premise. The titular King's Game is the main way in which the curse manifests.
- Deader than Dead: Unlike other iterations of the story, the movie takes a more original approach and everyone killed by The King don't just die, but get erased, with all memory and traces of their existence being erased as well, with no one outside the game knowing they ever existed.
- Downer Ending: Everyone targeted by The King and subjected to the game are killed and erased by it, one way or another. Nobuaki loses his best friends because of it and reluctantly tries to kill Chiemi after learning that she's the cause of the game. Chiemi kills him instead partly in self-defence, partly by accident, and mourns him afterwards. She then commits suicide out of sorrow, trying to end the game, but is resurrected and has her memory changed again by The King to continue it in other classes indefinitely. It's implied it's what happens each time in the end of the game. It doesn't get more "downer" than this.
- Deadpan Snarker: Ria has a few caustic remarks throughout the movie. Which, considering her apathetic disposition, is quite notable.
- Driven to Suicide: Kana, Nami and Chiemi.
- Evil Phone: The King communicates and sends orders through cell phones. It's literally its only apparent form of communication.
- Emotionless Girl: Iwamura Ria is the definition of the word. The only emotions she shows are boredom and mild, subtle interest. She barely even reacts to the horror and death going on around her and is not fazed by the Game in the slightest, treating it as routine. She even remains completely unfazed by the King's decision to erase her too in the end, calmly commenting on it as the "next step".
- Eldritch Abomination: The King itself, aka The King's Game Curse. The reality warping unseen invisible supernatural entity behind the game, capable of erasing things and people from existence on a whim and changing memories on a global level. It is never seen or heard, has no actual form and its only direct manifestation are its effects. It's not really known, just what it is, the notion of it being a curse coming from the closest reliable source, Ria Iwamura.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Amazingly, even the Eldritch Abomination The King evidently did not like Masami orchestrating Kana's death due to petty irrational hate and it even called her out on this and ordered her to confess her sin. And then erased her for refusing.
- "Everybody Dies" Ending: Naturally, none of the characters survive by the end, though Chiemi gets revived later.
- Foil: Ria is clearly meant to be this to Chiemi, being her opposite and darker counterpart. Chiemi is friendly and sociable and tries to help and save others, while Ria is extremely aloof and solitary and couldn't care less about them, being completely unfased by them dying right in front of her. Ria is also deeply knowledgeable about things around her, notably the curse and the game, whereas Chiemi is mostly oblivious. In fact, if it wasn't for Ria, Chiemi would have remained totally clueless to the true nature and purpose of the game. While Ria knew it from the start.
- Gorn: Largely averted, in contrast to anime. The curse erases and kills people, without spilling any blood. The only relative exceptions are Kana's and Nami's deaths, which have a little blood, but are self induced.
- Mysterious Informant: Ria provides the heroes with information about the King and the game, mysteriously having knowledge of things no one should know about.
- Huge Schoolgirl: Chiemi is this in the movie, noticeably dwarfing every other female character and even being taller than her two male friends. Granted, her actress, Yurina Kumai, is about 5‘10“.
- Haunted Heroine: Chiemi. The entire game is said to be a curse put on her and its purpose, apart from simply killing people, is to make her suffer forever. She can't even die. If she does, the curse just resurrects her and forces her back into the game, all the while changing and manipulating her memory each time.
- Last Survivor Suicide: Chiemi, who jumps out of window out of guilt and to try and end the game, after losing her entire class to it and killing Nobuaki. Implied to happen at the end of each game.
- Really 700 Years Old: Downplayed, but Chiemi is apparently much older than she appears.
- New Transfer Student: Hanamura Reiko in the end. It looks as if it may be Chiemi or Ria themselves at first. Turns out Chiemi's already there.
- Never Found the Body: In stark contrast to anime and manga. Considering The King's preferred way of killing, it's obviously this. As it erases the body, along with every other trace of existence.
- Pragmatic Adaptation: The film boils down the story to its base elements, including seemingly changing the origin of the King's Game to the outright supernatural one. Which, for many, made it better and less non-sensical.
- The Stoic: Ria.
