Subculture Anime Blog

Attack of the naked shouta and mushrooms.

Summary:

• Yamawaro volunteers to accompany Ai in order to meet the Jigoku Tsushin’s current client. This happens to be someone who he once considered his mother.
• Yuzuki visits the client’s home after seeing a vision, but instead of finding the old woman she suspects to be there, she only finds a middle aged couple.
• When the Jigoku Tsushin investigates the client and her husband, they learn that the couple once had a son named Hikaru, However, he had died quite some time ago.
• When Kikuri visits Yamaro in the house, she hears about the past he had while still living in the house and nearby mountain.
• Coming from the mountain, Yamaro had visited the woman several years after her son had died. She quickly became attached to him, treating him as Hikaru.
• The woman’s husband had been developing a serum that would prevent aging in the meantime, and as he realized that Yamawaro wasn’t human, he used his body to perfect it. This concoction allowed he and his wife to return to their youthful appearances.
• The woman eventually realized what Yamawaro was going through, having him escape the house.
• Denying to take any more of the potion, the woman sent her husband to hell.
• As Yamawaro seeks to learn the fate of his old family, he watches as the woman falls in the collapsing house while embracing a young boy.

Preview: Hamano Chiriko and Chotaro, in Special Radio.

Impression:

I would say I don’t have enough time to properly blog this episode because of the other pile of shows I have to cover this week (as well as the real work I have to do), but that would only be half true. I was honestly thoroughly confused after watching this episode the first time around. With flashbacks, aging serums that made present scenes appear to be flashbacks, and nonsensical science exposition, this episode ended up being really hard to follow with a single watch. It doesn’t help that Jigoku Shoujo isn’t one of those shows that I typically view with a lot of priority, and that I was only half paying attention most of the time. Still, for what it’s worth, this episode did give Yamawaro a proper backstory. Most of the other Jigoku Tsushin members had their moments in the second season.

Yamawaro’s mountain story reflected directly with the origin and concept of his character from Gazu Hyakki Yako, who shares the same name. (Yes, I use Wikipedia for reference. In high school, they say it isn’t a valid source. In college, they say it’s a good place to start!) Without that background in lore, I probably would have been confused for quite some time. Still, I’m not sure if I liked the whole eternal youth theme. I know this is a show about a group from hell carrying out tortures, but it has at least had an overall sense of reality for the most part. I never thought I would say this, but I’m looking forward to going back to the usual next week.