Tae Yamada

"I am your leader…the “ultimate office lady warrior”, YAMADA TAE!"

- Tae Yamada to Eikichi Hyodo,

Tae Yamada (山田 たえ, Yamada Tae) is the mysterious seventh member of the zombie idol group Franchouchou, with her title simply referring to her as The Legendary Tae Yamada (伝説の山田たえ, Densetsu no Yamada Tae). She is also the first zombiefied human to be successfully resurrected, though she has still to gain consciousness.

She was formerly the leader of the Saga Sagako Busters, a group dedicated to fighting the Sagako Curses and Saga's curse. She also worked part-time at her dad's food stand, Karatsu Burgers.

Human
Tae has a long and straight dark plum hair with two parts that stand out slightly with her bangs. Her usually baggy clothing hides a very well-endowed curvy figure that is proportionally identical to Sakura's, with only slight differences in measurements primarily due to Tae being much taller. Her impressive proportions are much more noticeable in her idol outfits.

Tae's side bangs tend to react to how hot her emotions are. When she's excited, angry, or worried, she sticks out like crazy; when she is more relaxed and at peace, they relax to frame her face.

In life, she used to wear a pale blue office outfit; her office clothes show off her rather long and shapely legs. As for her hair, she did not have the characteristic bangs and was completely straight. Her eyes were purple.

Zombie
From what can be seen under her clothing, everything except her face and hands are covered in bandages.

Tae usually has bandages on her neck, chest, head, and upper leg with a loose black dress tied with white rope. She also has gray over the knee socks with black shoes.

Idol
Her idol outfit changes throughout the series; In episodes 1-6, Tae wears a purple T-shirt with the word “Zero” written on it and a purple skirt with white ruffles. Using makeup, she and the other zombies make their skin look like an average human. Unlike the other girls, she doesn't wear contact lenses for her eyes.

After Saga rock, her idol outfit changed to a red jacket with a plaid decoration, a purple skirt with cotton inside it, and knee-high boots.

Before Death
When she was a girl, she was not much different from any child. She was always home alone because her parents spent their time doing their research, so she wanted to spend time with them. One day, her mother found a strange “baby” and since then, they spend even more time at the university. Tae she spent the day alone at home doing nothing, and she got upset when her parents mentioned the project they were working on because she felt that they always left her aside. Even on her birthday, when she was given a beautiful stuffed bunny, they did not stop talking about the child, which made her angry and reject their gift.



Despite not getting along with her parents, deep down, she just wanted to spend time with them. On her birthday, the government found out about her parents' unauthorized investigations. And when they were about to take the child away, Sagako was born, killing her parents. After that day, Tae lives with a feeling of revenge against Sagako and will fight with her life to redeem herself and avenge the life of her parents, taken away by forces other than this world. From that moment on, she only lives to avenge her parents, which causes her to develop a much harsher and colder attitude towards other people. Since that incident, she becomes mysterious and closed with others.

She commanded the group of Sagako hunters “Saga Sagako Busters” that is responsible for dealing with Sagako's curses. As the leader of this group, she was quite a tough woman and straightforward in her missions. Tae fights Sagakos with nothing more than her strength and her own shovel, as she cannot seal curses and she has to rely on the Hyodo twins to do that. No matter who she has to deal with, she will make everyone follow her orders.

Before Anna's arrival in the group, Tae constantly argued with Hanako about how to deal with certain troublesome Sagako, which slowed down the group's progress. When Anna arrived in the group, her good analysis of the details of her things helped them come up with more efficient strategies against Sagako. Without her on the team, it's clear that Tae still has trouble strategizing against curses.



Tae had a very Stoic composure and remained cool when expressing her emotions. Yuko Hyodo is one of the few people that Tae shows a kind side to. With her, she was entirely different, since Tae always felt comfortable next to her. Losing her parents because of the Sagako, she only lived with resentment and revenge in her heart until she met her, who showed Tae other feelings that she had never experienced. Yuko always showed Tae a positive side of life, and she always brought prosperity to wherever she went, even to the Sagako Busters. When Yuko Hyodo turns into an onion by using all of her energy, she literally kidnaps Eikichi Hyodo, Yuko's brother, hoping that he has inherited his sister's powers to seal Sagako through onions.



She also begins to show this side to Yuko's brother, Eikichi. She was very hostile towards Eikichi at first, constantly scolded him and thought that he wouldn't measure up to what her sister achieved, but also gave him the chance to leave if he feels he is unfit for the job. After his first mission, she decides on her own to train Eikichi to be a better Sagako Buster. As the missions come and go, Tae begins to understand that Eikichi and Yuko are entirely different people and there is no point in comparing them. Even if she didn't get along with Eikichi from the beginning, she manages to connect with him, showing herself to be someone understanding who wants to help her friends.

Normally, she is quite collected, but can be just as flashy and flamboyant as her fellow Busters, particularly Hanako, all while maintaining her stern confidence. Despite being bossy at first, her relationship with Eikichi improves over time. Going from being someone cold and without feelings towards him, to someone more open and understanding of situations.



Mission after mission and battle after battle, she becomes close to him. Although she at first treated him as cannon fodder for her angry moments, she begins to accept Eikichi as an essential member of the group. They both manage to start a normal conversation after a long time, being the first time that she talks normally with Eikichi, as if they both hardly knew each other. When she trusts him enough, she reveals her innermost dreams to him. Other than Sagako and Saga, Tae was a normal person with dreams and ambitions, and in this case, Tae dreamed of being an idol like Junko Konno used to be. A dream that she longed to fulfill at some point after ending the Sagako plague.

Now that she fully trusts Eikichi, she works together with him when Anna and Hanako mysteriously disappear. The two works together and even joke with each other. More than ever, Saga needs them to work together. When it is time for the final battle against the Spider Sagako, Tae is willing to fight with all her might against this curse, no matter what. Despite that, she is still willing to try to get Eikichi to communicate with the Sagako, as that is something Yuko would do.



In her final moments, Eikichi manages to fully connect with her, to the point where Yuko's onion passes all of her and Eikichi's combined power to Tae. Knowing what she must do, she goes up to where Magatsuhi is, to, with the power of the onions, forgive herself and accept Magatsuhi to seal the curse inside her own body. The sealing process fuses the souls of Tae and Magatsuhi in the process, killing her immediately.

Afterlife
She tends to bite and gnaw on anyone or anything she can get her hands on, including her own hair. However, according to Kotaro, she is completely harmless. Tae lacks the class and intellect that she had as a human, being reduced to a swaying corpse with base and instinctive behaviors, even after the other girls besides Sakura are stimulated after the heavy metal concert in Episode 1. While she starts out by simply biting anything she can put in her mouth out of the mindless zombie habit, as her intelligence grows she starts biting things less frequently and intentionally. One reason to do so is the happiness and affection of the other girls.

Tae is the only one of the girls who hasn't fully regained consciousness, which is why she's still a mindless zombie. As such, Tae is unpredictable and driven by pure instinct, doing things like biting the other members and launching herself into the crowd. However, she seems to have some semblance of conscience, at least being able to understand the members to some degree, and being cooperative enough to participate in practices and performances. She also seems smart enough to have a caring side to her fellow zombie idols.

In Episode 5 in particular, she shows her extreme appetite, going so far as to attack a guy in a chicken suit because she thinks he's a real chicken. Not to mention consuming a whole plate of raw meat before this, and a plate of eels on a stick (including the plate) followed by five eel sticks later.

She started as a wild animal that attacks and bites people. Little by little she becomes a bit more civilized, being able to understand human language and communicate through moans or gestures, showing curiosity about the world like a girl would and imitating the dance moves of the other girls. She can even imitate a rooster crowing for the Drive-In Tori ad. Later, she begins to mimic the other girls' expressions and speech (albeit in a rather confusing manner) and gains enough theory of mind to try to lie.

Although she hasn't spoken, she can already imitate the girls' movements and learn to do them herself, even trying to get Sakura to repeat them with her. There is also an advance in speech because in that same episode she tries to repeat “One, two, one, two” in Japanese, a phrase that Sakura taught her when she was distracted. It is probable that in the future she will begin to formulate more concrete words.

As the only zombie who hasn't woken up, she makes little contribution to the team and often gets in the way with her attempts to bite people or when her head falls off. On the other hand, she is surprisingly useful in a pinch, such as when she bites into one of Maria Amabuki's buns when she tries to threaten Sakura and Lily and scares a large boar after he attacks the girls.

When she sees a squid, she will jump on top of it, even though it is not a squid itself and only has its shape. If it wasn't for Sakura, she would have eaten countless things. She is quite playful and is skilled enough to build a snow sculpture alone with Romero. Lily usually treats her like her pet and plays with her. She has very little sense of personal space around the other girls, and at times, she can be aggressive and overbearing towards them, such as chasing and biting Junko. But she also displays very puppy-like affection for those she cares for, such as playfully biting and trying to cheer up her groupmates if they're upset.

In episode 11, she's emotionally aware enough that Sakura's current situation hits her hard, sending her into a corner of depression; In the next episode, she is shown that she remembers her past moments and tries to talk Sakura into remembering them.

Tae's zombie antics and childish behavior are often sources of comedy. However, in episode 12, when Sakura, blinded by depression, vehemently pushes her away too many times, Tae reaches her breaking point in anger and proves that even if she is ultimately a harmless zombie, she can actually be quite scary when she's really mad. She does her best to help Sakura remember her successes. Sakura had previously acted as her caretaker, so she wouldn't end up biting people, and had also taught her to pay attention and dance, earning her undying loyalty. So, when Sakura sulks in the attic, Tae goes to great lengths to storm inside the attic and drags her into the dance studio to try to jog her memories of her. Once Sakura's memories come back and mix with her past memories, Tae happily bites her head off.

When Franchouchou makes an opening for Iron Frill, she is tasked with playing the drums. She adjusts very quickly and opens the act with a full drum solo. The episode focusing on her shows how she unknowingly becomes involved in a series of events that led to her earning enough money to pay off Franchouchou's debt.

Tae within her universe is quite popular. In some episodes of seasons 1 and 2, Tae is shown to be extremely popular on the internet for her quirky behavior. And Franchouchou fans love the fact that Tae never sings or speaks, and more or less does her own things during the concerts. As shown in Revenge Episode 6, most outsiders familiar with Tae take her strange behavior in stride, even when it comes to things that living people normally don't do, like eating food that's still in the wrapper.

As a zombie, she has an adorable open-mouthed smile that shows off her cute fangs. This occurs when she is excited or enjoying a happy moment with her groupmates. In fact, if it wasn't for Tae's help, the group wouldn't have been able to start working to pay off their bankruptcy debt to the EFS. As she was the one who, on her own initiative, bought dried squid from a store by putting on her own makeup. This action of Tae motivates the other girls to find work by themselves, and pay the debt by themselves.

Skillset

 * Dancing - Although Tae cannot sing, she can move her body to the beat of any song.
 * Snowman Building - In the tenth episode, Tae has built an accurate snowman of Romero that is thrice the size of the girls.
 * Hula Hooping - Tae and the rest of the girls can perform while twirling hoops made of electricity during their performance in "Episode 16".
 * Drumming - Tae is shown to stand on her own when she is seen playing the drums during their performance in "Episode 16".
 * Cooking - Since she worked as a cook in a sales cart, she knows how to make good hamburgers.
 * Shrewd Leadership - Leader of the Saga Sagako Busters group, Tae carried the burden of what it entailed to physically fight the curse and had to make sure that each of the team members was mentally prepared for the burden. When Eikichi joins, she is willing to train him not to succumb to the effects of the curse sooner.
 * Sagako-slaying - With the help of Yuko Hyodo, they could contain the Sagakos in onions of the great of the Hyodo and thus constantly reduce the number of curses that haunted Saga.
 * Endurance - Despite having her own house fall on her and being struck down by a gigantic Sagako, Tae is still able to stand despite her injuries.

Natural Abilities

 * Non-senescence - Due to being a zombie, Tae retains her age and physical appearance at the time of her death forever and is immune against death. As she, along with the other girls, can endure circumstances that human bodies normally cannot handle, like the lightning bolt in the seventh episode, and instead of suffering a third-degree burn, the girls end up becoming luminous and self-possessed - tuned voices.
 * Detachable Limbs - As a zombie, Tae can detach and reattach parts of her body from their sockets with little to no effort, either intentionally or accidentally. She is the zombie whose limbs fall the most, which is a potential danger if she performs a sudden act of force in public as she can expose the secret.
 * Phosphorescent Vision - Like the rest of the girls, Tae's undead eyes are shown to be able to glow in the dark.
 * Element Absorption - Their zombie bodies can speed up the process of absorbing chemicals like those seen in Episode 4, where they instantly absorb the medicinal patches, causing their muscles to relax and not be as stiff. In addition to their subsequent concerts and practices, they continue to use the patches. In Episode 7, their bodies demonstrate a battery-like characteristic by receiving an electrical discharge from lightning, glowing a pale blue, and releasing laser beams with their fingers.
 * Good Luck - Seemingly blessed only as a zombie, saving Franchouchou on several occasions and being of great help in an indirect way.

Unique Abilities

 * Monstrous Form - After having had enough of Sakura Minamoto's self-deprecation and sulking, Tae briefly morphs into a terrifying form of herself with a larger and pointer set of teeth, and her glowing eyes are more prominent. This form also makes her more agile.
 * Superhuman Strength - As shown in the eleventh episode, Tae can drag Sakura out of the room Sakura locked herself in and into another area in the mansion just by hanging onto the collar of her pajamas with her mouth.
 * Cross-species Communication - Tae can communicate with Romero using canine language and often howls with him at the moon.

Etymology

 * The name Tae is written in hiragana (たえ), which has no special meaning. However, when written in kanji (多恵), it could mean "many" (多) (ta) and "favor, blessing" (恵) (e).
 * Tae's surname Yamada means "mountain, hill" (山) (yama) and "field, rice paddy" (田) (ta/da).



Anime

 * The staff has said they wanted Tae's image to be "sexy onee-san who comes for your blood;" they wanted to give her the impression of a beautiful long-haired Japanese horror character. They thought it would be cute if the hair moved like dogs' ears and could move independently. They also enjoyed designing the clothes, choosing prisoner-style shirts and pajamas that they really liked.
 * Tae's seiyu, Kotono Mitsuishi, said that the first emotion born in Tae's heart was familial love for Sakura and that she also found her conscience in episode 11, when Sakura suffered amnesia, all this in an interview with Kotono Mitsuishi.
 * This is later supported by the spin-off manga, as revealed in the last chapter, where Magatsuhi and Tae willingly fused because of their bond over their craving for maternal love.
 * Up to the third episode, Tae's voice actress was credited as "???".
 * This was to excite the fact that she shares the same Japanese voice actor as Sailor Moon.
 * In "Episode 9", Tae chews on Maria Amabuki's odango-like hair.
 * The primary role of voice actress Kotono Mitsuishi was Usagi Tsukino/Sailor Moon, who wore buns in her civilian and sailor costume.
 * It is later confirmed that she bites them because they look like onions, the fact that she takes more relevance in Gaiden.
 * Tae is the only member of Franchouchou who does not have any lead songs as she cannot speak properly.
 * Tae's hair resembles the head of her favorite food, squid.
 * By actual age at death, Tae is the oldest of the girls as she died at the age of 29.
 * Tae's zombie outfit closely resembles that of Buddhist Motsuke Koromo style robes.
 * Tae is one of the four with the most curvaceous figures in the group. Sharing same cup size and body type with Sakura Minamoto and beaten only by Yugiri and Maimai Yuzuriha.
 * As of "Episode 13", she "works" part-time alongside Sakura for a local pasture farm.
 * She currently has one episode centered around her, that being "Episode 18".
 * The episode also revealed that her family's gravestones are positioned right next to the Minamoto family gravestones.
 * Similar to Kotaro in "Episode 13", Tae is also hinted to be the only one of the girls to harbor good luck instead of terrible luck throughout the episode.
 * In the last episode of Revenge, she makes a reference to Freddy Mercury with her classic sneeze that gave the group its name Franchouchou.
 * It is implied that Tae is a Queen fan, this is because her part in the song "We are FranChouChou!" starts with the same beat as the song "We Will Rock You" by Queen.

Manga

 * Tae's biological parents were killed by Sagako years ago leaving Tae with a great grudge towards them and the curse.
 * Jofuku raised her as his own, just like he did with Kiichi some 100 years earlier.
 * Jofuku finds Tae wandering around town after her parents' death, causing him to adopt her and train her for a plan to combat Sagako. Plan that seems to bear the acronym: ZLS.
 * Tae's parents were in charge of an investigation into strange creatures in Saga, which later led to their deaths at the hands of the curse . This is the reason why Tae hates these creatures, having taken away her parents who, because of their research, spent little time with her.
 * Tae more or less knows the origin of Saga's curse, searching for the elixir of immortality 2,200 years ago.
 * Onions have properties that counteract the power of Saga's curse, by meeting Yuko and the onions from her farm, the Busters were able to seal Sagako and save Saga's inhabitants.
 * Tae with the help of Jofuku, could be the creator or at least propose the idea for the Zombie Land Saga project and possibly this project was embraced by Kotaro in the future to avoid the apocalypse mentioned in Gaiden.
 * The mansion, the truck, the shovels, makeup and even the sunglasses are in Tae's possession, and it is currently unknown how Kotaro managed to gain access to all of this.
 * Tae says that Yuko Hyodo does the purification ritual for miko (巫女の禊). The reason Tae thinks it's ridiculous for a child to do it is that miko (shrine maidens) are traditionally young maidens.
 * Her past with Yuko goes beyond as just a "friendship" from Tae's point of view, Yuko helped Tae a lot since she felt alone and without a purpose in life beyond revenge on Sagako, Yuko's emotional support made Tae soften her heart to others.
 * Tae's Sagako-hunting past also explains other little things.
 * Among the zombies who had not awakened in the first episode, she acted much more violently compared to the rest, while the other zombies did not do much more than walk threateningly towards Sakura, Tae rushed to pounce on her.
 * She also immediately went direct to launch herself against a death metal fan because she probably associated his hair with a Sagako.
 * Her tendency to chase Junko and bite into Maria's bows could be that her hairstyles resemble onions that Gaiden's manga reveals as purifying.
 * Looking closely at the list of people that Tae has chased or been aggressive towards (Zombie Sakura and Junko, Coco, and a kappa pet in episode 6), the only thing they all have in common is that they could be mistaken for Sagako, this could be Tae unconsciously recalling an encounter from her past life.
 * The Kasuien Hotel that appeared in Episode 4, and one of Tae's group missions, could also be the reason why the company's spokesperson got so scared when she saw the girls.
 * Some of the places that appear in Gaiden also appear in the gastronomic adventures of Kotaro in the manga which may indicate that he was not only looking for food/inspiration in those places.
 * In Chapter 27 of the Zombie Land Saga manga, Tae recognizes an old lady from a food store, this lady mentions working in a group to save Saga, presumably a former member of the Busters.
 * One of Tae's dreams in life was to be an idol together with Yuko, all inspired by Showa idol, Junko Konno.
 * The fact that Tae is a fan of Junko explains why throughout the series she is constantly chased by Tae, this is because in her life, Tae was a big fan of Junko and, even as a zombie, is able to recognize her.
 * Tae is the only zombie whose death is revealed in the manga, wherein she willingly fused with Magatsuhi, leading to both of their demise.
 * Though, this does not explain why her head is detachable, nor does it explain the fullbody bandages she has, as well as the giant scar across her leg, as she is shown to have died peacefully immediately after fusing with her surrogate sister while sustaining no physical injuries, whatsoever.
 * She, alongside, Yuko Hyodo, are the only humans to have been fused with Sagako.
 * In Yuko's case, she was unintentionally fused with the Niji-no matsubara Sagako after she sealed it away in an onion whilst sacrificing her own body. After being released from the onion, she is revealed to have absorbed the antlers of the Pine Sagako.