(L) Ayakashi ~ Japanese Classic Horror

[Sakuya]

Since I don't follow the raw for this series, would anyone care to state what episode the TV broadcast is currently on? I know [gg] just finished subbing episode 3.

Spoiler:

This is a very nice series. Episode 3 was really creepy in that one river scene where the corpses float back to Iemon. I mean, I can really see that happening in real life if this situation were to happen. That's just so scary!

[NoSanninWa]

Originally Posted by Sakuya

Since I don't follow the raw for this series, would anyone care to state what episode the TV broadcast is currently on? I know [gg] just finished subbing episode 3.

I believe episode 5 aired on 2-9

[Sakuya]

Originally Posted by NoSanninWa

I believe episode 5 aired on 2-9

Really? So they're not that far off. I thought the TV series would have ended by now. It feels so long and the first arc still haven't ended. It's so good though.

Spoiler:

However, i'm a bit confused in episode 3, as to why Osode had the urge to kill herself when she wants to avenge Oiwa so much?

[Jellyfish Marine]

Originally Posted by Sakuya

Spoiler:

However, i'm a bit confused in episode 3, as to why Osode had the urge to kill herself when she wants to avenge Oiwa so much?

Spoiler:

I think this was explained in her final message(the letter)to Naosuke. Osode-san knew right from the start that he was actually related to her (they had the same mother), that's one of the reasons why she refused to actually marry him. Grew up as a bushi's daughter, Osode-san kept her pride and was very loyal to her family, she must somehow felt guilty for...err, you know, doing that thing with Naosuke. Osode-san was also a kind and gentle lady, therefore she couldn't just scheme murdering someone, especially who appeared to be her brother, but she couldn't just let her true love got killed either. So, feeling dishonored to the point that conducting suicide popped up in her mind, and wanted to save both men, I think that was why she chose to do so.

[physics223]

I'm glad that it's not only me who likes this series. This series is slow, but it haunts one even in its pacing.

[Sakuya]

And so the subbed version of Ayakashi's first arc finally comes to an end. I thought that the latter half of episode 4 was much more creepier than the anime itself. The way they taped the dark theaters and Oiwa's shrines, AND that freaky mask. I was half expecting something to jump out at me. Yeah, that mask was the scariest part of the episode.

[physics223]

That reminds me to watch Ayakashi. Thank you.

[Fighter Volk]

I just watched Tokaido Yotsuya Kaidan (for the first time) in one sitting... and now I'm not sure whether I'll actually be able to get any sleep tonight. The first two episodes weren't very scary or even creepy, just disturbing in their portrayal of human nature. Three and four, on the other hand... especially four. Wow. The music also added leagues to all the already creepy scenes. Some particularly disturbing moments...

Spoiler:

Basically the whole encounter between Iemon and Iwa/Oiwa, *especially* the moment when Choubei peeks in through the hole in the wall and sees the corpse... ahhhhhhhhh scary o_O Then Iemon's mother, and later Iemon himself, being eaten by rats. WHAT THE HELL. SO SCARY.

And I agree with Sakuya wholeheartedly in that the whole post-story narrative was horrifying in this really subtle, but still very disturbing way. I loved/hated the part where our dear narrator Tsuruya Nanboku the Fourth goes, "and I passed away to the other world that year... so who is the Tsuruya Nanboku narrating this right now? Well... we'll get to that later." All the while, his voice is so calm and the music in the background is really creepy. Whoa.

AND THE MASK. o_O

Does anyone know whether all the descriptions of the supposed effects of Oiwa's curse in future retellings of Yotsuya Kaidan were true? The part about the Shibuya production crew all committing suicide was especially... eh, disquieting. Did all the stuff described by Tsuruya Nanboku happen...? How would one go about finding that out?

Anyway, this was awesome. Amano's character designs were wonderful for me, especially since I'm a long-time Amano fan, having fallen in love with his art because of his amazing original character designs for Final Fantasy VI. His illustrations for Elric made me interested in his other stuff, and it's all so incredible and inspiring. It's awesome to see him involved with anime again.

I really liked both the opening and ending songs. No surprise with the ending song, considering the composer, but I thought the hip-hop opening was a great touch as well. The lyrics were humorous in a kinda creepy way, heh. Musically, it was awesome, though. I love when the shamisen or whatever it is kicks in for the chorus and you see the shaking silhouette of Oiwa...

The preview for the next episode looks awesome, too. It looks like we'll actually have a little more dealing with those awesome "classic" Japanese monsters. I like the setting, too. I'll probably end up waiting for gg to sub the whole story before watching it, though, like I did with this one. Speaking of which, excellent job gg! You rock.

Now a very satisfied Fighter Volk can go happily to sleep.

Or not.

[NoSanninWa]

If the point of this arc is that the curse is created by the theatrical presentation of the story, then isn't it crazy to create an anime about it? This is a cursed anime!!

[runpsicat]

Originally Posted by Fighter Volk

Does anyone know whether all the descriptions of the supposed effects of Oiwa's curse in future retellings of Yotsuya Kaidan were true? The part about the Shibuya production crew all committing suicide was especially... eh, disquieting. Did all the stuff described by Tsuruya Nanboku happen...? How would one go about finding that out?

I don't know whether the specific details given in the anime are accurate, but it's true that Oiwa-san's curse is purported to come into effect should someone try to portray her story in a play/movie/drama series etc., so performers/actors always go to her affiliated shrine to pray for safety.

Anyway, the movie Tsuruya talks about in ep4 is this. It won high critical acclaim (awards). It's an awesome movie, never mind that it only got 6.1 on imdb.com - its use of Carl Orff's Carmina Burana during the climactic sequence alone merits a look. Don't think it was ever released with English subs, though... .

[Fel]

This show is a nice change of pace for me, and I like the OP song a lot. King of a poor man's Super Shooter

One thing that's freaking me out: why does the fat bald guy (Takuetsu) refer to himself as "atashi"?
I need some kind of convincing explanation for this.

[wao]

I had pretty much given up on this show (although I heard the 2nd story was okay, I haven't tried it yet), when I saw a Japanese blog highly recommending episode 9, which is the beginning of the 3rd story Bakeneko. There's this guy behind the designs who's a very good animator so I thought "might as well check it out" - and holy carp! I was totally blown away by it!!

The visuals were absolutely droolable - the characters may not have moved much but I love those designs! I like how they don't have any cel shadows but fit nicely in each image. The backgrounds are the most gobsmacking. They're impossibly detailed! It's 3DCG but the patterns are extremely beautiful. The first thing I thought was - what a lot of colours... The designs are detailed and yet simple at the same time. No dolloping of highlights and shadows and those unimportant things - more concentration on using lines to bring out the expressions in people's faces. I liked how the did Mizue's face the best. The way the objects are positioned - the layout - was extremely good.

I'd blather on about it but I have to fangirl about the voiceacting now. Can you say: TAKAHIRO SAKURAI?! OMG! Why didn't I know he was doing the lead role earlier?!! I love his voiceacting (Fakir FTW!), and in this it was just so sexy, I couldn't stand it . The character itself is so creepy and cool too... very fitting, it left a strong impression on me. The way he said "Mono no ke wo... kiru" just before the ad break was chilling. I could feel shivers running down my body when he said that...

And there's also a great host of seiyuu for the older majority of characters - Youko Soumi and her father-in-law Chikao Ohtsuka, Tetsu Inada and so on. I felt they made great use of their voices here - the lines felt very honest and full of personality. The best parts were when they were all screaming, and when Mizue (Soumi) was screaming at Yoshikuni. Amazing! Unlike in many anime where they don't use the effect of having voices in the background to their full potential, here you really get the feeling of commotion and activity because of it. Kayo, voiced by Yukana, also had a very lively feeling about her though I felt it was a little too anime-ish for a period story (still, it worked well enough).

As for the story itself, my interest is piqued - mostly because the characters are extremely worth watching (for now anyway), and you are led to want to know what's happening exactly. I didn't catch everything. I don't think they'll move to a different setting in the next episode so I'm looking forward to see what's going on.

By the way, if you want to see how l33t it looks (well, I think it does!), I prepared a set of 45 screenshots to give an idea of what it looks like. But you can't really figure out what exactly happened just by looking at them (or perhaps you'd think you did, but it's actually different..) I love the teeth! And Mizue's face. That is why you'll see a fair amount of them here.

It's extremely large though, 5 megs - so don't bother opening it in your browser... Here you go.

[Ialdaboth]

There have been a blurb on the Pelleas website praising the qualities of episode 9, too, and now I can't wait to resume my viewing of this anime.

Thanks a lot Wao for the screenshots

[wao]

I can't access the site (edit: Now I can. As usual, he can put it across much more brilliantly than I can... if you want to be convinced to try watching this ep, you got to go there!)

But I really liked the designs, like how the hair had spaces in it and they included the teeth and the way they draw the fingers - quite realistic.

And they're really very appealing - they can look beautiful without looking plastic. I'd think that the designs of the "uglier" people are beautiful too.
Ahh, but I could go off into another tangent about the medicine seller...

EDIT: By the way, anyone who hasn't watched the episode and clicked on the screenshots, found the porn? I was laughing a lot at that scene... I love the way things were balanced in this episode.

EDIT2: Episode 10 is great as well. It seems to go slowly at first, but it's actually slowly building up the tension... till that last quarter, holy crap! Mizue woke up and and and... This is REAL horror. I seriously got goosebumps for a little while, especially Mizue - from the last episode I was impressed with her voice acting and in this episode it made you want to clutch your head and hide somewhere. Those screams... And the way the danger comes closer to the huddled group, room by room by room - very effective. I definitely would not want to be in that position!!

The drawings didn't move as much today, but I maintain that the facial expressions and what not were brought across very well, much better than a lot of anime (certainly more than stuff like HOney and Clover, and Paradise Kiss).

There were a lot of charming things about this episode - Kayo and that scene with those little things that look like people with outstreched arms was extremely nice to watch. But the way they were used was extremely original - I'm really impressed by how they've structured the characters and concepts extremely well into just 3 mere episodes. To think they're used as some kind of signal as to where the bakeneko is moving...

Man, you just have to watch the episode to know it for yourself. I dearly wish this arc gets subbed soon, it really needs to be seen by more people. Very delightful. Now I should rewatch the episode because I didn't get the details - something up with Sato...

[daznsun]

Just watched episode 5. This new arc looks even more promising than the first.


It's kind of sad that Ayakashi isn't getting the recognition it deserves. The presentation of the show just screams quality. I definitely would rather watch a show like this than the next harem clone that comes out every other week and seems to always have 5 different groups subbing it.


Definitely one of the most under-rated series of the 2006 season. Thank you gg fansubs for subbing this terrific show!

[Sakuya]

Thanks for letting me know that episode 5 is out. I just watched it. It doesn't seem like this arc is very creepy. Compared to the previous arc, this arc is bright. Very bright and vibrant with all the colorful kimono.

I thought the Bakeneko arc was after the Yotsuya Kaidan? Anyway, is it just me or is the art design changing with every arc? It looks different.

[wao]

The arcs are Yotsuya Kaidan (by Nanboku Tsuruya), then Tenshu Monogatari (Kyouka Izumi), then Bakeneko (original)

They're three totally separate stories and the teams doing it are totally different so you can look at them as separate anime, which is what I'm doing...

I'm almost tempted to just sub Bakeneko on its own because it's so good and the subs won't get there any time soon (I think), but then again, school's about to start, and the raw quality isn't too good, and I can't do it on my own, and it's rude to butt in while another group is doing the rest of the series I guess...

[orion]

Wow! I just finished the first story. That was one scary episode 4. Oiwa was one vengeful spirit.

Spoiler:

Nailing those guys to the wall. Those rats were just gross! That husband of hers had absolutely no scruples. The second wife deserved what she got.
But I can't figure out why didn't that other girl just say,"Dude, you're my brother. Leave me alone." It would have solved half of the story and prevented 2 deaths.

Was the concept of marriage different back then? Did sleeping together = marriage or was there more to it?

[Capsule]

I just finished tha whole Bakeneko arc...wow..
It has great act, action, animation. I give triple A for this.
I wanna see other episode about "Tha man" (medi/exocist)

[Jellyfish Marine]

*drool...*
Japanese art in motion TTwTT
I'll definitely looking forward it!