|
Fear and Loathing▲▼
|
Rating▲▼
|
Comment▲▼
|
| Another (TV) |
So-so |
Not really . It opens with a veritable STORM of horror cliches (Creepy dolls! Dark corridors! My name is Mei as in SHRIEK!), plus conveniently forewarning references to "The Omen", but luckily it becomes not so much a horror story per se as a relatively honest mystery, perfectly soluble to those interested. The utterly over the top ending is a disappointment, as it manages to give a perfectly good solution to the core mystery without explaining the more significant questions, like the massive Buffy problem: how do they run a middle school with casualty rates between 25 to 50% per annum without attracting some regulatory or PTA attention? The background art, all rust and grays and desaturated colors is more unsettling than scary. Winner of the NYFD Award for Worse Fire Disaster Reaction Student Training Program. |
| Ayakashi - Samurai Horror Tales (TV) |
Very good |
The three arcs have variable interest. The first one is a rather meta-narrative take on the Yotsuya Kaidan and its ancillary sub-legends: very useful, given this story's status as the paragon of Japanese horror tales. The second is a relatively banal adaptation of yet another oft-played classic. It is the third ("Bakeneko"), however, where the strongest visual and narrative flair combines for something both exciting and unsettling. Winner of the Home Depot Award for Most Creative Wall Decorations. |
| Blood: The Last Vampire (movie) |
Good |
Buffy does Yokota! Can't be all bad. It'll be interesting to see Saya's attitude problem unfold in the TV series. Winner of the NAACP Special Award for Racial Sensitivity. |
| Boogiepop and Others (live-action movie) |
Good |
Very useful in clarifying the obscurities of the anime series. The acting oscilates from horrendous to rather fetching, but I cannot figure out why they didn't use the excellent sound effects of its anime counterpart. |
| Boogiepop Phantom (TV) |
Very good |
Intriguing and eerie. Piecing the fractured plot together is made unnecessarily hard by the hard-to-tell-apart character design: there ARE times when green hair comes handy. Excellent sound edition. |
| Hell Girl (TV) |
Good |
|
| Mermaid Forest (OAV) |
Very good |
|
| Monster (TV) |
Very good |
They probably pitched the live-action film option as “The Fugitive meets The Omen.” Not wholly inaccurate, but that description is a disservice to this tautly scripted thriller, which methodically wrings out despair from an array of unhinged obsessives. Placed at its core is a darkness so colossal that it mocks the best efforts of humans to mimic its evil: Nazis and the Communist Stasi are pathetic amateurs in his presence. The steady but slow pace will either irritate you or increase the tension of the story, depending on whether you have a T-personality or not. |
| Onmyoji (live-action movie) |
Decent |
Useful primer to what we could call "Magical Boys" films. Supercilious magicians are always a draw, for some obscure psychic reason. Essential for Abenobashi fans. |
| Pet Shop of Horrors (TV) |
So-so |
A study on the close relationship between gay Chinese vampires and the Washington Convention. |
| (Le) Portrait de Petite Cossette (OAV) |
Very good |
A.k.a “Zendouji mahou shoutengai” This OVA has a spoonful of plot spread over a bushel of style. Neither does its fragmented narrative structure do much to further a scary atmosphere. What does work are the artwork and animation. It cleverly evokes the famous style of UPA’s “the Tell-tale Heart”, and effectively uses all the tricks of modern horror filmmaking −jagged camera angles, sharp shadows, cutting color schemes, the works. |
| Requiem from the Darkness (TV) |
Very good |
Ah, good old fashioned horror in a very Kolchak-y format. The storytelling has a pleasant meat-and-potatoes (or rather fish-and-rice) feel: just solid, creepy ghost stories and no nonsense. Excellent artwork and character design, plus some nicely incongruous music. |
| Tactics (TV) |
Decent |
Not even vaguely scary, but it is a very thorough primer in the extensive biodiversity of Japanese youkai & bakemono. Technically competent, but it unluckily sports the absolute flattest character arcs possible: it's all high and down the middle of the plate. On the plus side, you’re not really expecting a very exciting climax, so you’re not very disappointed by the poor performance. Call it the Resigned Housewife Effect. |
| Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust (movie) |
Very good |
Existential angst and vampires go together like a horse and carriage. If Midori married... ok, *really* forget that. |
| Vampire Princess Miyu (OAV) |
So-so |
Watched an episode recently, and it's even more boring than I remembered. |
| Vampire Princess Miyu (TV) |
Good |
Better that the OAV. And there is *something* about enslaved, be-masked and be-clawed bishounen with weird SM vibes, plus an even weirder sugar daddy relationship with a teenaged bloodsucker with issues. Or maybe it's just me. |
| When They Cry - Higurashi (TV) |
Excellent |
|
