Ghost Hound – 04

I think that this episode marks the end of the introduction for this series, and next episode should really start this series off. I’m also glad to see that Ghost Hound has been getting better and better with every episode, and I loved the things that happened in the current one. The horror-elements really work. The one who surprised me the most was Masayuki. Due to the phobia-exposure, all three of the main characters have an out-of-body experience, and you could see how Oogami and Tarou were used to it, while the experience was entirely new for Masayuki, and this showed. Once he loses his control over the situation, he freaks out and doesn’t know what to do, but follow the others. His personality seemed to have developed in quite an unstable way, though this could also be because he suffered from his trauma only a few months before, instead o Oogami and Tarou, who’ve had their horrible experiences since childhood, and have learned to live with their fears a bit. There were a few moments in the animation where the animators took a bit more than they could chew. The breathing-scenes may have looked god on paper, they looked kind-of fake to me. The rest of the animation for this episode was nice and crisp, though, but perhaps the CG was a bit intrusive here and there. I also wonder why Masayuki was so scared to get his hair cut off, at the end of the episode as a cleansing ritual. He could be just scared of all the things that happened to him, or is there something to his background that has yet to be revealed? I loved Miyako at that moment, though, when she scolded the guy. Her role can become quite interesting for the future episodes. She also reminds me of Jigoku Shoujo: not Enma Ai, but Tsugumi. The only difference between the two of them would be that she’s way more serious and less playful. Apart from that, though: she lacks a mother, has out-of-body-experiences and knows what happens at locations, miles away from hers, while she does, she freaks out and gets comforted by her father, and the two do have similar character-designs as well.]]>