Romero

"“A zombie dog?!”"

Romero (ロメロ,) is the undead pet toy poodle of Kotaro Tatsumi and the mascot for Franchouchou who is revealed to once belong to the Momosaki Family in "Episode 20" before being picked up by Kotaro at some point, thus also becoming the animal companion of the group of girls.

Regular Form
Romero is a zombie dog with stitches and bandages over its body, it has different fur in two shades of blue, as well as what appears to be a bruise in its right elbow. He has a doll-like right eye and has long blood-stained fangs sticking out of its mouth.

Monstrous Form
In his monstrous form, Romero grows larger and appears more detailed. His only eye is shown to stick out of the socket and the Saga-shaped scar on the right side of his body is more visible.

Personality
Due to Romero's zombie appearance, he seems to look and act aggressive, but he actually behaves like a normal dog majority of the time. As he spends more time with the Franchouchou idols, he becomes attached to them.

Like Tae Yamada, he generally tries to eat things that aren't even meant to be edible. As shown in the fifth episode, wherein he swallows a baseball whole, and again in the tenth episode wherein he ate a grasshopper that was unlucky enough to get close to him.

He is also shown to be very loyal to both Kotaro Tatsumi and the girls.

Natural Abilities

 * Enhanced Senses - As a dog, Romero has better senses compared to humans.
 * Immortality - Similar to the girls, Romero is given the ability to not physically age and stay the same appearance as the age he died as well as immunity to circumstances that could normally be fatal to humans and animals.
 * Detachable Limbs - Parts of Romero's body are detachable and can easily be reattached.
 * Phosphorescent Vision - Although Romero has not shown this feat yet, it is assumed that his eye can also glow in the dark.
 * Wide Intellect - Romero is shown to be smarter than the average dog.

Skillset

 * Fishing - As shown in "Episode 10", Romero can swiftly hunt for aquatic life in his savage form.

Unique Abilities

 * Monstrous Form - A feat Romero and Tae Yamada shares, they can both morph into scarier versions of themselves that highlights their aggressiveness.

Etymology

 * The surname Romero is a Spanish and Italian surname meaning: A person on a religious journey or pilgrimage from Rome (possibly to Jerusalem); procession of elevated holy items.
 * Romero is likely a reference to George A. Romero, a film director that is well known for the cult classic zombie movie called Night of the Living Dead.

Trivia



 * Romeo's first drawings came out like this and ended up leaving the design as it is. It was purely out of instinct, although they weren't sure if that "instinct" was good or not. But it was his favorite. It goes alongside the zombie-like Franchouchou, but it was conceived at a time when we weren't really sure what kind of image we'd go with. The stories of everyday life are difficult anyway, so they followed the current form. They added the sakura ribbon and all that to give it some distinction during the time when the other characters were zombies.
 * Romero died one month after his third birthday.
 * Additionally, he shares his date of death with Junko Konno.
 * Like the girls, it is also unknown how Romero got resurrected.
 * It is also worth noting that, alongside Tae Yamada, his cause of death is also unknown.
 * The only times wherein Romero does not make an appearance (excluding the previous episode recap, next episode preview and outro) is in the fourth, seventh and seventeenth episodes.
 * Technically speaking, Romero is the first to wake up amongst the eight zombies Kotaro Tatsumi has resurrected with Sakura Minamoto only being the first in terms of the zombie humans he has resurrected.
 * Both Romero and the floor of the basement of the Abandoned Mansion share markings that resemble the Saga Prefecture on them. The basement floor of the mansion has a stain in the shape of the prefecture whereas Romero's is his bruise.
 * In "Episode 20", it is revealed that Romero was once the pet dog of the Momosaki Family during the late 1800s. And that, at the time, he was already living as a zombie.
 * Despite being also being a zombie, Romero does not seem to need to hide the fact that he is undead whenever he joins Kotaro and the girls in public as he can be seen without his head during the shooting for The Drive-In Tori commercial in the fifth episode.