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Higurashi: When They Cry (reboot) (TV) (all seasons).


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Stark700



Joined: 30 Jan 2012
Posts: 11762
Location: Earth
PostPosted: Thu Oct 01, 2020 10:12 am Reply with quote


Season 1 - Higurashi: When They Cry - GOU (TV)
Season 2 - Higurashi: When They Cry - SOTSU (TV) (discussion starts here)

Genres: drama, horror, mystery, psychological, supernatural, thriller
Themes: dementia

Plot Summary: Keiichi Maebara has transferred from the city to the village of Hinamizawa that lies deep in the wilderness. The village was spared from a plan to build a dam that would have sunk it under a lake, and it is now surrounded by nature and following its ancient customs. Keiichi makes new friends there and lives an ordinary life. But once a year, Hinamizawa village celebrates its festival, Watanagashi, and with it Keiichi's calm days are over, and a chain of unending tragedy begins.
----------------------------------

Remake of the original series. First episode aired today.
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Blood-
Bargain Hunter



Joined: 07 Mar 2009
Posts: 24165
PostPosted: Thu Oct 01, 2020 6:38 pm Reply with quote
Episode 1

Enjoyed the original series so I really don't see how this one can go astray. Homicidal kiddies, yay! Still cracks me up that Mion can walk around openly with a holstered gun and nobody says a word about it... in Japan! I mean, I get it if the show was set in an "open carry" state...
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Animegomaniac



Joined: 16 Feb 2012
Posts: 4158
PostPosted: Thu Oct 01, 2020 8:35 pm Reply with quote
I can gush for hours on end about the first season, first series. Going by the last image of... just the first episode? Really guys?... this is not going to go as well.
Someone watching someone... good, good... being watched by someone else! With scary eyes!

And this is yet another situation where I have no idea where spoilers begin or not and I think the show was redone explicitly to exploit that kind of knowledge to make foreshadowing into in jokes.

spoiler["Ha, ha, she has a body hidden in the junkyard."]
... how out of order is this order going to be? That didn't come out until much later.
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15576
Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Fri Oct 02, 2020 1:32 am Reply with quote
I actually have not see the original series, I do know that it has violence with youths in a rural town, but my closest experience to watching the anime was an episode of an anime called Last Period that had a random crossover episode. I know none of the story beats, my experience of the story is going to be just off of what shows up here, so I would encourage anyone who posts to really hold back on revealing spoilers, and even if you use a spoiler tag can you please mark what the spoiler is in regards to, like (old anime)Spoiler.

So, I don't know if there is just a weird subtitle thing with what I watched, but the teenage girl, who apparently can walk around with a gun, said us "old timers", presumably when she was referring to herself and the little blue haired girl (I will try to learn the names at some point). I don't know if it was just bad or confusing subtitles, just a joke, or some secret clue like some of the characters have been there much longer than they appear. I know that there is a mystery of some sort going on, and I am going to have some fun trying to figure it out just by what happens in the show.

It is set in 1983, he apparently just go back from a trip for a funeral, the main character will apparently kill at some point, the girls occasionally look crazy, and so on. So my running theory based on the idea that him killing them won't be the end, is maybe some level of time loops, maybe he was actually at his own funeral and everyone is already dead or something. I don't know if the girl at the end of the episode is going to try and kill the main character with sword because he is snooping around a place she did not want him to see, or play it off like how he said he would like something such as an axe to get Sanders out of his trash prison.
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Joshua Zarate



Joined: 12 Jan 2017
Posts: 2062
PostPosted: Fri Oct 02, 2020 1:37 am Reply with quote
Episode 1:

The original anime is one of my all-time favorites and so if I had to heavily summarize my reaction for this first episode to just one sentence, it would be thus: It gives me lovely wobbly feelings in my tummy tum because Higurashi is my boo.

Besides that, I’m really digging the animation in this remake and hearing the first OP of the original anime play at the end of the episode gave me goosebumps. Rika pranking Satoko with that KO present was the most amusing moment of the episode for me and I loved it. That last frame with Rika freaked me out and I’m very curious to see how exactly the remake will follow through on that. Next week can’t come soon enough. Very Happy
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killjoy_the



Joined: 30 May 2015
Posts: 2480
PostPosted: Fri Oct 02, 2020 7:24 am Reply with quote
DuskyPredator wrote:
So, I don't know if there is just a weird subtitle thing with what I watched, but the teenage girl, who apparently can walk around with a gun, said us "old timers", presumably when she was referring to herself and the little blue haired girl (I will try to learn the names at some point)


That's just Mio's way of talking.
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ACxS



Joined: 03 Aug 2019
Posts: 961
PostPosted: Fri Oct 02, 2020 11:28 pm Reply with quote
1:

Aww sh*t, here we go again.

Nostalgia is big business. Just adapt an old classic, and you're bound to make some dough, whether or not you're adapting it right. Higurashi's a classic, mostly because of the shock value. You came in expecting Sesame Street, but you got a Wes Craven horror film instead. It had a lot of storytelling novelty back then, and I would say, it set precedence to shows like Re:Zero. Reason: the narrative where you had to figure out WTF's going on in alternate timelines.

(now, if you think I'm going to compare this new adaptation with the old series... you're damn right.)

I always feel ambivalent about adaptations. "Why mess with a classic?". The first episode doesn't help to ease my concerns, either. It certainly feels nostalgic to see the same sequence of events taking place. Good. Character designs are a little different. That's expected, although I must admit I need to get used to Keiichi's new look. The artwork and animation are kinda shoddy. Oh boy, not good. So far in the first episode, nothing different happened compared to the old series. Hmm.

Despite just making the comparisons above, I always state that any adaptation deserves to be assessed based on its own merit. I'm not expecting much from this one. Speaking of which...

DuskyPredator wrote:
I actually have not see the original series, I do know that it has violence with youths in a rural town, but my closest experience to watching the anime was an episode of an anime called Last Period that had a random crossover episode. I know none of the story beats, my experience of the story is going to be just off of what shows up here, so I would encourage anyone who posts to really hold back on revealing spoilers, and even if you use a spoiler tag can you please mark what the spoiler is in regards to, like (old anime)Spoiler.


I wished I hadn't watched the old series; that way, I can assess whether it's going to be a good one without comparing. Ambivalence, again. Sigh.

I'm very cautious about this adaptation. I better not expect anything amazing from it, and just roll with it.

P.S. Honest question: is the show re-adapted because the original source (manga) was still ongoing so there's new content, à la Fruits Basket? Or is it just a rehashing? I don't read manga/LN/VN/whatever at all so I don't know.
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killjoy_the



Joined: 30 May 2015
Posts: 2480
PostPosted: Sat Oct 03, 2020 1:41 am Reply with quote
The original Higurashi is a VN. It's been complete for really, really long, and the original anime adapts the original VNs. There were already manga adaptations of all the arcs. There have been new stories released here and there since, but we don't know how much this new anime is going to adapt.
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ACxS



Joined: 03 Aug 2019
Posts: 961
PostPosted: Sat Oct 10, 2020 7:45 am Reply with quote
2:

They're speeding up the plot.

Not that I can blame it. In the first adaptation, there were 2 seasons in total and each is 2 cours (24-26 episodes) long. This time, it's (probably?) going for 1 season that's 2 cours long. Simply put, it's going to cover the whole story with half the time. Imagine that.

Without giving spoilers away, the first season of the original was basically where all the shock value took place and making audience wonder WTF is going on. You know, the things that made the show famous. Second season was where the truth is revealed. So in this new adaptation, they're gonna have to hussle and just show you Hanyu and

spoiler[the presence of parallel worlds.] (it's actually obvious what's going on by now, but I'm putting in spoiler tags, just in case.)

Correct me if I'm wrong—I'm relying only on memory here—but Hanyu was revealed only in the second season of the original adaptation, after 26 episodes. They had a lot of time to cover all the relevant arcs, and put in the entertainment value. If my suspicions are right, with much shorter time, the new adaptation's gonna have to skimp on many things. The 2 seasons were essential to each other in terms of storytelling, so if this adaptation is going down the single season route, they have to entirely change the format. That won't be good.

I hope my hunch is wrong.
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Animegomaniac



Joined: 16 Feb 2012
Posts: 4158
PostPosted: Sat Oct 10, 2020 10:12 am Reply with quote
Ok so this is complicated. It was already reported on ANN that Higurashi GOU isn't a remake but it's a third series. The director said that knowing the previous seasons wasn't necessary but...
...
and
...

To put it mildly, I disagree.

Anyway, episode 2, Zombie Tag and Mion fakes being a zombie. That's so not going to come up later... But the question is spoiler[why is the gang being redrawn... I'm stealing the phrase from Stephen King's Dark Tower series because I don't where else such a plot happens... but the constant, the ABSOLUTE constant of every story is that the photographer dies at the Cotton Drifting festival. However, so far... not yet. So if he's a member of their ka-tet... more Dark Tower... they're not done until they're all fully safe at home. That's the funny thing about Infinity, it's actually always larger than you think it is.]
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xJc1



Joined: 02 Jun 2008
Posts: 3
PostPosted: Sun Oct 11, 2020 6:53 pm Reply with quote
I guess I have to watch this series after all, since it's not a remake but a sequel or a retelling

I loved the originals so much and I've rewatched Kai and the last arc of the original anime series several times. I didn't rewatch most of the originals (question arcs) much because I am bad with horror.
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ACxS



Joined: 03 Aug 2019
Posts: 961
PostPosted: Sun Oct 18, 2020 7:46 am Reply with quote
3:

...I'm pretty sure cosplay cafes weren't a thing in the early 80s.

If the series is taking a detour in the story from the original adaptation, then I'm going to treat it like an entirely new series. That's what the director wants us to do, anyway. Every day, every year, the same sh*t happens and the mechanics are the same. And for those who watched the original series, spoiler[we know that Rena and Mion are the "culprits" in this arc... we also know that Takano is the true culprit in all the murders]. I'm just sitting back and watching how this all plays out.

Animation is much better compared to the first two episodes, so that's a relief. For this adaptation's shock value, it's a different approach. Like the character design, it's something I need to get used to. Not bad, but not that shocking either (partially because I already know that this show is about shock value, so there's no surprise).
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15576
Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Fri Oct 23, 2020 1:48 am Reply with quote
Episode 4

So he was told that the best thing he can do is just trust Rena, looked like an important moment there, and then Rena was insane and stabbed him at least a dozen times, but he managed to win by slamming a clock into her head.

A little concerned how Mion apparently what word was on how the other two died. Did the police inform her that the exact same knife used on Keiichi was used on the girls, and apparently theorise between home robbery and suicide? These are teens, right?

And so symptoms around the neck are relevant, like how he scratched his own in the first scene of the show of him using the bat, Rena scratched hers, and the questioned whether he was itchy at the end. I am not entirely sure of why he screamed though.
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Animegomaniac



Joined: 16 Feb 2012
Posts: 4158
PostPosted: Fri Oct 23, 2020 12:18 pm Reply with quote
Episode 4
What was that?

Of all the things they took from the first season, I wish one of them was a director as capable as Chiaki Kon. I never laughed during the conclusions of the first season because there was no space in them, they were relentless, this was wrong in the wrong sort of way.

Guy gets stabbed with a kitchen knife more then ten times, misses every vital organ each time even after hitting vital organs?! Meanwhile, Rena gets brained from a clock and dies... scene missing, obvious scene missing but I have no idea what difference it would make...

DP, the flashback Keiichi had was the ending of the first story while the epilogue was, spoiler for Higurashi's second story spoiler[taking indirectly from the "So you thought you were safe in a hospital?" conclusion where the killer survives being killed and tracks Keiichi down while he recuperates.]... I can not stress this enough, just watch the first season before this series ruins some of the best twist endings in anime.

As to what the ending meant here... I have a feeling that instead of doing the "We have to save another person" route for a sequel, they're doing the far more annoying "There's yet another villain who's..."
I don't how to explain this without spoiling the second season so I'll be vague. It is possible that the nurse was the primary villain just in disguise but as Keiichi didn't know that person at all, the disguise would be more for the audience than the plot. At least, she looked a lot taller... I think?... and that's pretty hard to fake convincingly.

Mion was rather happy for someone who lost three friends to violent deaths two days ago. There could be a reason for that and that also ties into the second story... which was also spoiled by the opener but I won't spell it out until the show does.

As for Mion knowing things about the shady happenings around town, it ties into how she can openly carry a gun around so what you're thinking now should be about right.

Anyone else scream "Kick the knife away or take it, do something correct for once, Jamie Lee Curtis!" or was it just me? Oh yeah, that knife was from Halloween, no wonder I kept thinking Rena should try nailing Keichi to a door with it.
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ACxS



Joined: 03 Aug 2019
Posts: 961
PostPosted: Sat Oct 24, 2020 9:30 am Reply with quote
4:

It's really difficult to explain or discuss what happened (or what's really going on) in this arc without spoiling, so for the sake of those who didn't watch the original series, all I will say is this: we're looking at a very different show. Many things that happened in the old series didn't happen here, so in the end these are two very different stories. I can see why the director said those who didn't watch the old series can watch this one on a clean slate. Those who have watched the old series might find be surprised by how different things went down this time.

Now we're on to the next arc, and from the title, we know it's not going to be the same as the one in the original series. The title alone is apparently different.
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