blog好き

Sep 26 2006

Categories: anime, episodic review, higurashi
Tagged: higurashi

30 Comments »

So what is forgiveness you are willing to withhold?
What is the well-being you are willing to make?

We kick off our continued tour of “Phones of Hinamizawa” with Rena trying to seek help from Ooishi in trying to protect her. Isn’t this like asking the Bush administration to not spy on you? The combined Rena-Ooishi theory currently stands that the Sonozakis do not want the contents of Takano’s books to be leaked out and that they are the ones after her. Mysteriously, Ooishi comments that when they CSI’ed Takano’s body, she was dead for over a day… which means that she was dead prior to Watanagashi… yet she was talking with Rena during Watanagashi. Time paradox. I think my head is going to explode, and it’s only been one screenshot.

(Question: why doesn’t anyone talk about Tomitake? Anyone wonder, “Who would want to kill a crappy photographer?”)

I love how they call this episode “Invasion of Earth.” I feel like I’m watching Keroro Gunso.

Mion lets K1 know that the bodies of Rina and Satoko’s uncle have been moved by her family to a safer place (the well, I guess… I mean, let the professions do their job), and the two wonder where Rena could have gone off to. They’re genuinely worried about her. I’m genuinely worried that we’ll never see Crazy Shion again.

But we all know where Rena is– hiding in the trash. Trash Hiding is a new moe mode! Rena looks so cute, I’m sure she’ll have a kawaiigasm looking at her own screenshot here.

But her sanctuary is being invade by Ooishi’s men, who are looking for now, and, man, this van in the junkyard is a really, really sad place for Rena. Reminds me of poor Binchou-tan.

Rena overhears the cops talking about how Rena was just spotted elsewhere, and she wonders how is this possible? And then she members how Ooishi said that Takano was wandering around after she’s dead… at this point, we’re beyond a murder mystery. We’re in Blade Runner “Am I a Replicant?” territory, only Blade Runner did a much, much better job. Harrison Ford >> Kira Yamato.

Rena scratches her neck as if she were bitten by yet another vampire…

… only to find those maggots crawling around as described in the previous episode. Real? Or just paranoia/drug/psychosis delusions? Or a sinister Pekopon-conquering scheme?

(I think I will give up anime if it turns out that everything in Higurashi happens because of vampires. I’m not saying that this is a viable ending, just a horrible, horrible cop out if it did end this way. But it does explain people coming back from the dead.)

(Um, why is Rena’s neck bloody and itchy anyway? And where’d she get the bandages? She’s in a junkyard.)

K1 catches up with Rena at the junkyard, but things do not go well. He asks about her neck, only to be rebuffed with Rena’s accusations that he’s a liar. Rena knows about the missing bodies… and she doesn’t trust K1 or Mion as to why they’re no longer there. Drug-induced paranoia seems very possible…

… especially with the Takano-eyes Rena is showing off here.

(I love how she’s playing around with her machete this whole time. K1 isn’t scared? She has already hacked two people to death where you’re standing K1. He either has balls of steel or a mind of cluelessness.)

“Yappari sou ja nai!” (Though I think “Mune ka?!? Yappari mune ka?!?” would have worked just as well, with Rena tossing a dish or something at K1.)

Rena reveals to K1 the truth– the parasites are from outer space! She’s really lost it. The writers have really lost it. It’s sad that K1 seems like the most reasonable and logical person around. It’s like watching an episode of Battlestar Galactica where the humans outsmart the Cylons.

(I wonder at this point if K1 can see the maggots.)

But K1 doesn’t care about aliens and parasites… he just wants to know what is wrong with Rena… because he’s her nakama. “Nakama, hun?” finds Rena increduously. You’d never see Nami question Luffy’s ability as a friend like that. True, Nami does disparge Luffy in many ways, but all of those lines always ends, “… but he always looks after his nakama.” Big ass difference. Luffy is like Brady to K1’s Culpepper.

“URASAI! URASAI! URASAI!”

“Can I ask you something? Friends don’t keep secrets from each other?”

“Of course. We don’t keep secrets from each other.”

“USO DA! USO DA! USO DA!”

(As much as I enjoy “USO DA!”, they really only have three emo phrases during this whole run… “URASAI!” “USO DA!” and “GOMEN NASAI!” Still, Rena going emo makes me happy. Good times. Possibly not good times for K1.)

Looks like Rena has some dirt (illegally) obtained from Ooishi. It seems like before K1 moved here, he had a hobby of stalking little girls… and shooting them with his BB gun. Just a completely random and ridiculous piece of information– first off, shouldn’t this information be completely sealed? How’d Ooishi know about it? And what does it have to do with being Rena’s nakama? She should be happy that she hasn’t been shot yet with a BB pellet.

(I think that they should have taken the NHK route and made K1 into an over-the-top h-game creator. I can imagine K1 hiding in the bushes with his digital camera.)

The next day at school, the entire Killer Loli SOS Brigade looks bummed out because Rena has apparently run away. Mion makes a casual remark dismissing this nonsense of “demoning away,” which just so happens to be the central plot of like two-thirds of the series. Is this some writer’s way of subtling telling us, “This script has been a mess!” Rika, in her bummed out state, only tosses out a “ni…”.

K1 decides to tell everyone of his past, and no one seems to care– “Friends should be able to keep secrets from friends,” Mion explains. Probably because she’s really Shion with Mion’s blood on her hands, but whatever. Satoko, though, has the funniest line that I’ve heard in a while… “Sore wa, ima wa subarashi ningen” referring to K1 a wonderful person. Now, first off, Satoko tosses out “subarashi,” which should only be used to describe Yuji and his flame. Secondly, she uses “ningen” instead of “hito.” Basically, “he’s a spectacular human” rather than “he’s a great person.” With Rena’s discussion of aliens earlier, maybe Satoko’s choice of words is connected? Or maybe not.

(Probably not. It would give the writers too much credit.)

K1, though, suddenly gets flooded with memories of the first arc… just slighted edited. It’s good to see the writers desperately trying to tie everything together. I feel like I’m watching Mai Otome all over again.

K1 reveals that he killed Mion and Rena. Rika asks, “K1, you remember? That you killed Mion and Rena?”

“Yes, but not in this world, but in a different, yet similar world.”

The funny thing is that my theory is coming true. I argued a few months ago that Higurashi no Naku Koro ni ceased to be a murder mystery when it decided to not have consistent facts throughout it’s reboots. Instead, it became a sci-fi series. I even tossed out the old TNG episode Cause and Effect as the prototype to Higurashi no Naku Koro ni, and if what Rika is saying is true, it’s all coming together as that.

(Every single time the Enterprise was going to be destroyed, it was because Picard picked Data’s suggestion on how to save the Enterprise over Riker’s. Every single time the mass murderings beings in Hinamizawa, it was because K1 didn’t show enough faith and trust in his nakama. In Star Trek, Data tries different things each reboot to warn the Enterprise in the next reboot what is exactly going on, but fails until his final and simpliest solution. Rika, similarily, is trying to avoid dying, trying to manipulate her surroundings to let her live. Did she finally find her champion in K1 this time around?)

K1 is sorry for his sins, and Rika forgives him but mentions that others (Rena) may not be as forgiving. K1 resolves that he will fight the future and fate. Rika decides to join him and lend him his support.

As I have maintained throughout my blogging for Higurashi, the only way that the writers have to wrap things up is to resort to sci-fi nonsense. There’s just too many inconsistancies throughout the arcs, and I’m sure some of this can be salvaged if they just played out each arc separately in separate worlds– but with Rika waiting for the cop back in Himatsubishi, it pretty much implies that Rika has lived through this ordeal already– which no longer suggests rashoman-like device but instead some sort of time loop-like device. With Rika and K1 admiting now that they have memories of a previous reboot, the writers have been basically pulling our chains with the “mystery” all along… inviting us to guess what was going on, knowing full well that no explaination could be complete using a normal set of rules. Using the reboots, they suck us in and present with contradictary information that made us second guess our guesses.

(Or maybe they just forgot what they did before and are making it up as they go along. Can’t overlook that possiblity either.)

K1 continues his apologies, yet Mion and Satoko don’t seem to know what he’s apologizing about. Maybe they are aware of the reboots– or maybe not– maybe Rika is the only Guinan in the whole cast. Switching gears, I love the blushing… especially on Satoko. She looks like a kid watching her parents get lovey-dovey in public.

“K1! I’m not prepared for this! It’s too sudden! I’ve never done anything like this before!”

Ooishi comes and bothers the Sonozakis about their pursuit of Rena, and I’m wondering where’s Onibaba as well as the guy whose suit has no buttons. Though it makes a lot more sense to me if Akane Sonozaki was next in line and not Shion/Mion Sonozaki… do crime syndicates skip generations?

Ooishi has his Takano’s writings will hurt the Sonozaki family theory blow up in his face when Akane and Mion call his bluff and deliver to him the writings that were not given to Rena– basically Takano is a hack b-movie sci-fi writer. Parasites? Zombies? Underground molemen? Zohar? Flame Hazes and Guzes? Frog aliens taking over the world? Yeah, we’ve got that.

(I’m not sure what is the best part of this exchange– the look on Ooishi’s face or the fact that Kasai could be Mion’s biological father.)

And then Mion lays the smackdown, “Well, if we killed Takano, wouldn’t you think that you’d be looking for the bodies still?” Ouch. She’s got a very good point.

One episode left.

… to get my happiness, I had done everything…

(I just noticed that there’s a thank you to Type Moon at the end of this episode. I went back and checked, and Type Moon has only appeared in episodes 24 and 25. Isn’t asking Type Moon, “How do I adopt my best-selling doujinshi game into an anime?” like asking “Got any child care advice?” to Kevin Federline?)