The only reason I watched this series was because of the good rating this series got and a few awards this show received. And honestly, I wanted a change of pace for anime… lately I had been watching pure romance or action or ecchi anime series, so watching something I’d normally wouldn’t watch was good for me (horror genre)… well, that is what I had initially thought.
For those reading this review and have not started watching the series or barely started watching it and are somewhat confused, because I was, let me explain how this anime series is broken down. This anime series is broken down into arcs (mini-series). Basically, you have 4-5 episodes related to each other and then there is a conclusion and then a new plot is brought up. Think of it as “Law and Order” the TV show (this is not anime), every week there is a new episode, however with each new episode, that episode does not continue from the previous episode plot, instead it is a brand new one. Now arcs are exactly this, the only difference is that instead of 1 episode, it’s more like 4-5 episodes. It might seem silly for me to explain it, but if this can bring some light to how the structure of this anime series is, then it was worth me mentioning.
Now with the anime structure identified, I will break down each arc.
1) Spirited Away by the Demon Chapter (Rating for this arc - 10/10)
When I first saw this, I was like “wow, this is some scary stuff”. When I saw this first arc, I wasn’t aware that this anime series was broken down into arcs, so I expected this plot to carry through 20+ episodes. This first arc has it all… suspense, thrills, horror, blood, a little comedy (only at the very beginning), murders and the paranoia factor.
The thing that got me with this arc were the girls. They start out all cute and innocent, then out of nowhere those same cute girls change their face to an evil murderous look that says “I’m gonna cut open your stomach and rip out your guts”, I do not exaggerate with this, that look is deadly, it truly catches you off guard for the first time, and sends chills down your spine.
The first arc is about Keiichi who just moved to a very low populated town and starts going to a new school. Since it’s a low populated town, there is only 1 school for all grades; this is where he meets up with all the girls that are younger and older than him. One day, Keiichi and a few of his friends are walking down the road and he asks a question about a dumpster area that was supposed to be a dam. The girls tell him a clean version story of what happened in that area, which he later learns that murders took place in that area. From this point, the girls start stalking Keiichi with those evil murderous looks until… well, you’re gonna have to watch it to figure that out ^_-
2) Cotton Drifting Chapter (Rating for this arc – 6/10)
By this point, 5 episodes into this anime series, you should be used to those evil murderous looks (at least I was) and because I got use to those looks, this arc lost its edge or wow factor in my opinion. The reason I say those looks lost its pop is because they do that look very often to the point where you yawn when they do it or don’t care about it.
Not only that, but the overall plot for this arc was meh. It is nothing compared to the first arc. The first 2 episodes of this arc are all happy and comedic. However, the last 2 episode which are supposed to be scary were not, nor did they make me think. When this arc was finished, I was glad that this anime series was structured based on arcs, because a completely different arc would begin.
The second arc is focused around a festival, however 4 people choose to skip the festival and break into a shrine. However, the people that went into the shrine… unexpected events happen to them.
3) Curse Killing Chapter (Rating for this arc – 4/10)
If you thought the second arc sucked, this third arc is even lamer. First of all, those evil murderous looks are gone or they hardly happen in this arc, it’s like the writers or animators realized they were overusing that look and decided to lay low with the look.
Another reason why I did not like this arc is because normally it’s the girls that are the aggressors, but this time it’s Keiichi being the aggressor but totally sucks at it. He keeps doing a psycho look but it is over used too much that makes you think “stop”, yet it keeps coming. Keiichi loses his cool way too easily and gets angry, which makes you think “wow dude, you need meds”. Also, whenever Keiichi gave us his psycho look (too many times), the camera always had to zoom up to his eyeball and move in ultra slow motion showing us his eyeball from different angles (yippe). I wouldn’t have cared if this was done every now and then, however this camera action is done almost every time he does his psycho look which is too much in this arc.
The third arc is about one of his little friends having an abusive uncle and he tries to fix the problem, his way.
4) The Time Wasting Chapter (Rating for this arc – 5/10)
By this point, the first arc is becoming a distant memory because to this point it is by far the best arc. Nothing really exciting happens in this arc. In fact, most of the main characters are not used in the entirety of this arc. The only interesting events that happen in this arc are that some events that happened in the previous arcs get mentioned in this 4th arc, so the connection of arcs are starting to appear.
The fourth arc is about a police officer in Tokyo coming to the low populated town/village to do some investigation and that’s about it.
5) The Detective Chapter (Rating for this arc – 7/10)
Being the second to last arc of the 1st season, this arc connects all the other arcs together. All the holes in the previous arcs that might make you say “huh, I wonder why this happened or I wonder how this happened but from a different perspective”.
This arc begins before Keiichi is introduced. The plot for this arc is focused around Shion (green haired girl) and how she falls for a boy (Satoshi). However, after some events, Satoshi disappears and to this point it is not clear what happened to him. Shion was madly in love with Satoshi and starts killing/torturing villagers to get information on what happened to Satoshi. Eventually, Keiichi is introduced about 2 or 3 episodes into this arc. But by this point, it’s nothing new, because this arc is the same as the other arcs; it just fills in the holes left by the other arcs. Basically, the first few arcs were through Keiichi’s perspective and this one is through Shion’s perspective.
Since this is the longest arc so far, there were some annoyances that I did not like in this arc.
a) Shion is torturing a subject, but the subject is talking casually as the torture is being performed. It’s like the subject was thinking “yeah, I’m getting tortured to death, but let me not show pain and talk casually like nothing is happening”, I mean come on… that scene lost all credibility.
b) Towards the end of this arc I was so sick and tired of Shion, always doing that evil laughter. I mean by the end it got so bad that you could have said to her “2+2=4” and she would laugh her ass off. Sorry, but to me this laughter was heavily overused and got very annoying fast. I am very glad this arc is over because of this annoyance.
6) The Atonement Chapter (Rating for this arc – 7/10)
This is the final arc for the 1st season. Now that I have watched the complete 1st season, I can see what the writers were trying to accomplish. They were trying to give mysterious through multiple perspectives and by that I mean by different main characters. This arc was focused around Rena accompanied with happy episodes then mystery/horror.
The final arc as mentioned deals with Rena and starts off focusing on her and her parents, and how her parents are going through a divorce. In order not to give too much away in this arc… there is a murder (isn’t there always), but everyone is involved… what I mean is that there is a murder which all the friends need to keep a secret about. However, slowly Rena starts going psycho and, and, and… gotta watch!
InformationAnimation
Very basic. There is a lot of blood and gore in this series and that is portrayed well, but if you wanted to see breath taking scenery and awe dropping animation for characters, then look elsewhere.
Sound
Mediocre! To be blunt, there is none. Take out the OP/ED, there is absolutely zero music or soundtrack throughout the anime series.
Conclusion
When I first saw this series I thought this was the scariest and thrilling horror anime series that I have watched in years. I truly believe the first arc was that impactful on me… like I mentioned before, those evil murderous looks got me completely off guard during that first arc. Unfortunately, I watched the rest of the anime series and was not satisfied. I guess in a way I kept comparing all the other arcs to the first arc and none of those arcs got close in quality or impact like the first one did.
The more I watched this anime series, the more irritated and fed up I was getting with this series. I would like to mention that I did watch the entire series, so please don’t assume I gave up on it because I didn’t. I would like to state that all the arcs except for the last arc were on par with each other (plot wise), however the last arc completely did it for me in terms of completely giving up with this series, because the last arc started to mention about aliens/dimensional worlds. For me this was too much and considering this was the last arc, it left me with a bad aftertaste for this anime.
Even though this was an up and down anime series for me, I think eventually I will watch the 2nd season, but I’m gonna watch some other anime series before I do, to kinda rinse my mind of this bad aftertaste. By the way, I heard that the 2nd season would clear up some unanswered issues from the 1st season, but to me, it seemed like there weren’t any unsolved questions out there. It seemed as if everything was solved. Only mystery I could think about was Satoshi and his disappearance, but oh well.
Verdict
Even though this was somewhat ok for me personally, I would still recommend this anime series, because it’s one of those unique shows that make you think. Not to mention that first arc is completely out of this world and those evil murderous looks completely get you.
