Shiki – First Episode Review

Episode Summary: Megumi is a girl out of her element.  She's got an eye for high fashion and a desire to spend her days sipping tea with cultured human beings, but the rural village in which she lives provides zero opportunity for those sorts of activities.  She hates the locals, mostly elderly farmers, and she hates the village.  The only joys she has are gazing at the newly-built European style house atop the hill and fantasizing about its residents, and crushing on her attractive neighbor, an aloof boy named Yuuki.

Police discover the death of three elderly residents in the same home, an event which is blamed on the oppressive Summer heat rather that foul play.  News of the deaths reaches Megumi, and it's the last straw.  While entertaining fantasies about the residents of the house on the hill, she marches to their front door, then disappears.  She's found later on in the woods at night, listless and exhausted. Over the course of a couple of days, she grows weaker and finally passes away.

Thoughts: Ever since watching the first season of Higurashi no Naku Koro ni, I've been a bit skeptical of any horror or supernatural anime series.  Higurashi has been the poster child in my mind for why the people who create and produce anime need to be very conscious of the tone they're trying to establish.  I'm sure the thought behind that now-famous visual-novel adaptation was to contrast its lighthearted moments with its brutal, horrific deaths, but the end product seemed forcibly grotesque, its impact wasted on shock value and cheap tonal dissonance.  So when I first caught wind of Shiki, a series with decent pedigree but an eerily similar setting and story elements to Higurashi, one can hardly blame me for not jumping for joy right away.  While not all of my misgivings were dispelled by the end of the first episode, I'm already positive that there are elements that will keep me around for the long haul.

First and foremost, this show is being broadcast as part of Fuji TV's noitaminA programming block, and is the first series since season 1 of Nodame Cantabile to be given more than 11 or 12 episodes to tell its story (just as reference, not even the brilliant Eden of the East series was allowed two seasons, and was forced to tell the second half of its story with two films). Secondly, it's based on a novel by Fuyumi Ono, probably better known for both her 12 Kingdoms series of fantasy novels and the Ghost Hunt novel series, which both spawned anime adaptations. These two reasons are why I still have a pretty intense interest in the series in spite of the fact that the first episode had a few stylistic missteps and, like some other horror stories, had a difficult time establishing its creepy tone.

The character designs are honestly more than a little bit unusual, and don't really fit my image of what a horror anime should look like (a conceit which I realize comes across as petty).  Mariko is a pink-haired fashion-conscious teen, something that sets her apart from the relatively normal-looking old folks that populate the farmland of her village.  It's not just Mariko whose looks stand out, however; the show broadcasts who the important characters are by how weird they look and how distinct they are from the background characters.  Many have bizarre hairstyles that disrupt the mood simply by how silly they look.  The man driving the moving truck has blue hair with "cat ears."  Mariko's friend has pigtails that end in five-pointed sakura-shaped poofs.  Strange and unique character designs are something to be celebrated in my opinion, but in this case the characters look so strikingly goofy that their existence alone sometimes serves to disrupt the more serious elements of the episode, and with that in mind I sort of wonder if they won't end up being a major misstep.  One positive contrast this creates is that Mariko's quick descent into death and the way her vitality is sucked away is dramatic and shocking - she becomes a sunken husk before our very eyes, the indignant teenage girl having vanished due to some yet-to-be-revealed horrific event.

Despite having major misgivings about many of the character designs, it should also be noted that some of them do serve a productive purpose.  There are brief moments that introduce characters who I assume are the "enemy" characters of the show, and their eyes, which are entirely black holes, give them a really otherworldly, frightening look.  Once again, though, that kind of broadcasts who the bad guys are, when perhaps keeping that a mystery might serve the story a bit better.

Despite some trouble in the character design department and the trouble of maintaining the proper tone that comes along with that, the positives definitely outweigh the negatives already.  The setting of the series is already well-realized, with its farmland stretching as far as the eye can see, and the tiny, isolated "downtown" region where most of the shops seem to be closed up on the weekend.  This emphasizes just how locked-away the location is, the perfect setting for someone so inclined to commit a few murders. The old folks standing around chatting along the street or tending to their farm animals help to add a flavor to certain scenes that most anime that take place in a similar setting can't seem to attain. There are also some visual flourishes that add a little something special to the episode and suggest that there were certainly some artistically-minded people on the production staff.  When Mariko approaches the European-style house on the hill, she feels as if she's being watched from inside, and this is represented by sets of huge, frightening eyes appearing above her.  When she's falling towards death, she has a feverish recollection of her time inside the house, and the "beauty" of the woman living there; the image that appears, however, is freakishly distorted and frightening.  When the search team goes out at night to find Mariko, there's a shot which looks down on the men in the foggy woods, only the lights of their flashlights revealing where they are.  There's some very cool imagery even in the first episode and I'd like to think that it will carry throughout the show.

This show is certainly no House of Five Leaves or Tatami Galaxy... yet.  But because I have faith in the author of the story and the noitaminA "brand," I'm willing to go along with the ride for a while and see how the story unfolds.  My only worry is that others will watch the relatively slow first episode and be put off by some of the elements that I've let slide for now, and potentially miss out on a good horror mystery yarn.

Pros:

• There are some artistic flourishes that help to give the first episode some visual character.
• The atmosphere of the town is well-realized.

Cons:

• The character designs of the important characters look pretty goofy, and this sometimes upsets the tone.

Recommended? Yes, especially since I can really see the seed of a great mystery story planted and growing.  Only time will tell if minor stylistic annoyances will turn into major criticisms, but at the very least it has a better start than Higurashi.