[Anime] Umineko - Spoilers & Expectations (for experienced VN readers only)

[Avisch]

Originally Posted by BakaOnna

I've been hearing various rumors that Ryuukishi is working with the anime team more on this than with Higurashi. Is this true? Because if it is, that'll be better news for how the anime will be.

I would like to know aswell. It's not impossible cause he did work with the team during Higurashi's second run.

[Christen]

If I were on the production team's staff I would really suggest working with Ryukishi-san. Involvement with the original author ensures that everything will go well even if there are needed cuts.

Also, meta-world cannot be cut out.

Originally Posted by confused_kitsune

I'm disappointed. Natsuhi is way too evil, and Eva looks unpleasant instead of sly. Hideyoshi seems to be in his 30s and Krauss looks like he needs some sleeping pills.

Remember that Natsuhi was supposed to give a first impression of that. Krauss is also old, it makes sense to look like that, specially with the money problems.

I don't find anything wrong with adult character designs really. Most of my peeves go to the children, but we'll see once they get animated (here's to wishing I don't see thin limbs).

[Coruja]

Pfffft they cannot possibly cut the meta-world. The story wouldn't make any sense without it. It's a HUGE part of the plot.
And I am happy to hear that rumor about Ryukishi getting really involved in this one.

[Matrim]

If I were on the production team's staff I would really suggest working with Ryukishi-san. Involvement with the original author ensures that everything will go well even if there are needed cuts.

I wouldn't say that everything would certainly go well but it urely will help. Especially considering the soultion of the mystery is not yet known to anyone but Ryukishi. If he is not involved, it's quite likely that crucial clues might be missing from the anime.

Remember that Natsuhi was supposed to give a first impression of that.

She was? When? Battler's first impression of her is that she was somewhat cold and distant, not, you know, evil.

[Christen]

Sorry for not being clear but I wasn't really referring to the post but to the artwork ^^;;

[Rias]

Allow me to be really negative for a bit:

Ryukishi has as much of an involvement in the higurashi anime as the higurashi video game: not much (not counting the fact that the anime/game is based on his work). Sure reports had been saying that he was working closely with the team (or the team was working close with him), but look what came out. I seriously do not think that Ryukishi07, being a person who often goes overboard with details, would allow core elements to be cut out in the anime if he had a "strong involvement".

If you think certain elements cannot to cut out, then think again. If they can cut out dice rolling motif in higurashi, they can cut out gyakuten saiban elements. If they can butcher Tatarigoroshi-hen, they can cut out meta world in ep2. If they can cut out Tomitake's graffiti shirt in Higurashi, they can cut out red text in Umineko. If dessert festival can be cut out, Rosa Musou can also be cut out. And so on.

Of course, I personally don't want to see another butchering, and they have been improving since season 1. I think it depends what the director decides to do again (is it Kon Chiaki again? Kawase did such a better job with Rei so far...), and how many episodes they have alotted for this.

[Blazemaker]

Originally Posted by Rias

If you think certain elements cannot to cut out, then think again. If they can cut out dice rolling motif in higurashi, they can cut out gyakuten saiban elements. If they can butcher Tatarigoroshi-hen, they can cut out meta world in ep2. If they can cut out Tomitake's graffiti shirt in Higurashi, they can cut out red text in Umineko. If dessert festival can be cut out, Rosa Musou can also be cut out. And so on.

Please, you cant really compare the graffiti scene with one of the most important elements in the game. The one we base ALL our assumptions in.

You can cut the dessert festival scene, but to cut rosa musou is like cutting the fight between rena and keiichi.

Yes they butchered tatarigoroshi, but to cut the meta world is like making a anime of higurashi but not remembering to add Oyashiro-sama =/

I mean, there is a limit to pessimism.

[Rias]

I was extraggrating, but

Tomitake's scene at the festival was a hint to the solution which they cut out. Red texts are also hints to the solution.

Dessert Fes is just a fun scene that doesn't serve much purpose besides moving the relationship of Keiichi and Shion. Rosa Musou is just a scene where Rosa fights. It's not something important like Keiichi and Rena's fight scene becuase that's a pivotal scene where it shows Rena recovering from L5 and Keiichi beating fate. Rosa just fought some goats, and realized that she should've been better with her daughter. Maybe it's a super-forshadowing moment, but right now I would say it's not that important at all.

Cutting out core elements to ruin an arc: cut out ep2's meta world and we're done.

If I'm really pessimistic, I wouldn't be hoping for Kawase to be the director, but just give up on Umineko anime as a whole.

[chronotrig]

Well, I personally think that the badness of the first anime has been a little exaggerated.
Not that I don't think they missed massive amounts of essential stuff, but I don't think that was the main problem.

Basically, they tried to do the story too fast. Way too fast. When they first started, they could have no idea just how popular Higurashi would end up being, which might have made them careless.
Considering the length of the first season, I think they did a fairly good job with including the most important parts. ...It's just that they didn't give themselves nearly enough time to do everything.

Since the second season was much more accurate to the original (except for the size of Takano's head), I'm willing to bet that they include most of the essential scenes in the Umi anime.

...But if they try to do more than the first 3 games for the first season, I'll have to side with Rias.

[Blazemaker]

Originally Posted by Rias

I was extraggrating, but

Tomitake's scene at the festival was a hint to the solution which they cut out. Red texts are also hints to the solution.

Dessert Fes is just a fun scene that doesn't serve much purpose besides moving the relationship of Keiichi and Shion. Rosa Musou is just a scene where Rosa fights. It's not something important like Keiichi and Rena's fight scene becuase that's a pivotal scene where it shows Rena recovering from L5 and Keiichi beating fate. Rosa just fought some goats, and realized that she should've been better with her daughter. Maybe it's a super-forshadowing moment, but right now I would say it's not that important at all.

Red texts are in the base of umineko and in the base of anti-mistery x anti-fantasy. If they simply butchered it, it wouldnt be umineko, just something that looks like umineko.
Same for meta world.

Rosa musou is NOT just a fight scene, its the climax of EP2, its in this scene that rosa finally accepts maria after all events that ocurred in the episode...its the scene where maria finally says that she doesnt believe in ''bad mama'' and ''good mama''. Its a very powerful and important scene. Not just a fun scene =P

Im not saying that they wont cut scenes. Of course they will.
They always do.
Even in Kai where they did most things right they skipped some scenes.
Maybe they will cut something like eva's and hideyoshi conversation before the 2nd twilight in ep1.
Maybe they will compress some longs scenes into simple things.
Maybe they will fast foward some of the battler fights and reasonings.
Maybe, if they do it really poorly, they could cut the tsurupettan scene.

But really...red text and meta world are almost as untouchable as oyashiro sama and yamainu appearing out of nowhere.
They simply cant screw this up.
Ryuukishi wouldnt let them do this and neither the fanbase.
It would simply kill umineko.

And anyway... after the sucess of higurashi i bet they wont do something as stupid as that =P

[Jan-Poo]

I think that several cuts will be unavoidable however the metaworld is an important part of the story and i can't really see how could they remove it without completely destroy the plot.

As for the "red truth" it's debatable, however it's not like it isn't possible to realize in an anime. For example Beatrice could summon a sort of magical screen where the red truths can appear and be visible.

About the music, i think there's a high chance that they'll make a completely different OST and they will, at the very least, change the opening and ending themes. The only thing i hope for, is that they will keep at least some of the best music from the games, just a few would be fine to please the fans.

[Nabiki Asakura]

I have a question
IF Umineko anime will be in the same way as Higurashi ( one season to QA and another to AA), then they will show us soon the rest of the chars, right?o3o
Warugiria, Ronove, the seven sisters and etc....right?I'm curious about it because I'm planning a Warugiria cosplay, so, since the beatrice anime design is helping cosplayers(it's the first time that we see beato's back oficially =D/) i'm thinking if it'll be better to wait...

And, btw, I loved the choice of seyuu to Beato, I can perfectly imagine her talking in the same way as Yuuko S2

[Cola91]

the funniest thing about the new designs is that you can try to match the expressions with the events from the game XD

Kyrie's bottom-left expression for example would probably be during

Spoiler for ep3:

the battle against Leviathan

[Christen]

I think it's the fact that Kumasawa doesn't have her eyes closed in the design.

Spoiler for Episode 3:

So deciding whether to have Virgilia's eyes constantly closed will probably have a factor?

[momobunny]

Originally Posted by Christen

I think it's the fact that Kumasawa doesn't have her eyes closed in the design.

Spoiler for Episode 3:

So deciding whether to have Virgilia's eyes constantly closed will probably have a factor?

Kumasawa doesn't have her eyes closed all of the time, even on the character page of the website her eyes are open. They're just not very big or wide or anything, giving Virgilia constantly opened eyes wouldn't be as acceptable for me. >.>

[Mizuno]

Virgilia is perfectly fine with shut eyes... yes perfectly fine.

[Mizuno]

I wonder if Oohara Sayaka is going to have a mouthful saying Battler's name so much.

Originally Posted by maximilianjenus

That's somethign that worries mea bit, sicne the cut out several sex-retaled jokes from higurashi (such as sending rika to a brothel).

Yeah,

Spoiler for ep 3:

his joke about balls which made Natsuhi blushed, and what he said to Lucifer about how she would make a good wife was awesome.

[maximilianjenus]

Originally Posted by Klashikari

Again, the manga (episode 1 of course) is a very nice indicator of each character design and "feel".

I disagree with George and shanon's manga designs, I think those were horrible, let alone them being not like the novel's, they also made them too different from each other.

Spoiler for couples:

Making them look as a horrible couple with a loli shanon and an old guy george.

[Klashikari]

I'm talking about Episode 1, not the atrocious design of Episode 2 manga...
I believe both really match their respective age of 16 and 23, unlike episode 2 with arguably a bigger age gap look.

Obviously, they drastically changed few things with these 2 in Episode 2 (especially the degree of Shanon's timidity), but Episode 1 is hardly far from the novel, especially the ring scene and the first twilight.

[Mizuno]

Isn't Shannon 18 and Kanon 16?