Category: Hakaba Kitarou

Hakaba Kitarou – 02

by psgels, posted in Hakaba Kitarou


And with Hakaba Kitarou, my schedule for the winter-season is complete. Seriously, this season has proven to be awesome.
Monday: Gunslinger Girl Il Teatrino, Gundam 00
Tuesday: Suteki Tantei Labyrinth
Wednesday: Wellber no Monogatari
Thursday: none
Friday: Hakaba Kitarou, Ghost Hound
Saturday: Saiunkoku Monogatari, Shion no Ou, True Tears
Sunday: Shigofumi, Porfy no Nagai Tabi
And depending on when the subs will come out: Gambling Apocalypse Kaiji

In any case, I just knew that I was going to blog Hakaba Kitarou, the first moment I saw it. For those who haven’t read my first impression:
– Hakaba Kitarou is by no means a kid’s show.
– Hakaba Kitarou’s atmosphere nothing like its predecessor, Gegege no Kitarou.
– Hakaba Kitarou is part of the Noitamina-series, which previously featured series as Mononoke, Moyashimon and Honey and Clover and is known to be one of the most viewed late-night time-slots in Japan.
– Hakaba Kitarou is a fully fledged horror-series.

If you like horror-series, then I seriously recommend you to check out this series. It’s going to take a lot of effort to make this series lose the bad reputation that Gegege no Kitarou gave it.

This episode introduces Nezumi-otoko, or mouse-man. He works for a vampire called Dracula, though this Dracula is a bit different from what you usually see. He likes to eat any kind of human, an doesn’t just limit himself young women. He also ends up eating Kitarou’s father at one point. ^^; In any case, he and Nezumi-otoko end up along with Mizuki’s employer, in Kitarou’s house, while Kitarou has been possessed by a strange demon who likes to eat human flesh as well. This demon ends up fighting with Dracula, killing off both of them and leaving Nezumi-otoko without a master, which probably explains why he keeps hanging around Kitarou.

Mizuki’s employer seems to be something like the mayor, who has come to find out where the guy went due to some bad publicity he’s been getting because of it. He’s the one who ends up saving Kitarou, and drives off a cliff afterwards after seeing yet another scary-looking demon at the side of the road.

We then turn to the netherworld, and we see Mizuki return. It turns out that because he volunteered to go to the netherworld, he doesn’t have to go to the place of the dead, and instead he is doomed to see the dead head into the deeper parts of hell, where they’ll dwell forever (much like Jigoku Shoujo). He immediately blames Kitarou for it, but the fact remains that he died in an accident. Still, I doubt that it was just a coincidence that the guy died, with Kitarou inside his car. 😛

And if that didn’t convince you to check out this series, perhaps this will. Seriously, I had lost my faith in good OPs after the Autumn-season, but the Winter-season has so many new shows with excellent OPs.

Some quick first impressions: Spice and Wolf, Noramimi and Hakaba Kitarou

by psgels, posted in Hakaba Kitarou, Some Quick First Impressions

Spice and Wolf

So… this is what you get if you hand an award-winning novel to an animation-company like Imagin: an authentic atmosphere, interesting characters, and a main female lead who spends nearly the entire episode without any clothes whatsoever and basically ruins the entire series. Still, I do admit that this series turned out better than I originally expected. I can see the potential here in this series, and this episode also took its time in telling the story. At times, I’m just not sure whether the creators’ minds were on storytelling or cheap fanservice, and seeing their reputation (Love Love, Cosmopolitan Prayers, Smash Hit…) there is enough reason to worry about this one to fall into a fanservice-fest.

Noramimi

Ooh, this reminds me so much of Tetsuko no Tabi! Not in terms of story, but in terms of execution. The graphics again are simple and again there’s great chemistry between the characters. Basically, in this series people live together with things called mascots. Noramimi is about a sort-of dating-service company, which basically matches people and mascots so they can live together. It works quite well, but yet again, I don’t see this one getting any chance of being subbed. Still, any series that features a hamster smoking a cigarette deserves to be watched.

Hakaba Kitarou

Oh my god! Oh my god! Oh my god! I can’t believe I was wrong in my entry about Shigofumi! The best first episode of the season definitely belongs to Hakaba Kitarou, and yes, I’m serious about it. Gegege no Kitarou, which aired last year, got dull quite fast, but Hakaba Kitarou turned into a really well-done and freakish horror-series. Whether it can keep up with the same quality for the rest of the series remains another question, but still the fact remains that this episode absolutely ROCKED. If you’re tired of all the moe-shows, you should definitely give this one a chance. I LOVE what noitaminA has been doing for anime for the past few years!!!