Forum - View topicEP. REVIEW: Higurashi: When They Cry – GOU
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Zerreth
 Posts: 207 Location: E6 |
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Episode 16 has left me incredibly disappointed.
This just doesn't feel like Ryukishi07's work. There's a lot of incredibly strange handwaving going on that flat out doesn't make sense. For starters: Irie is pretty much a non-existence in this show but there aren't any indications history has ever changed throughout the loops.spoiler[This means Satoshi still went L5. The virus STILL exists, and in turn, Rika very much still has a reason to hate Hinamizawa and the entire project involving the town.] There's so much appeal to emotion to the surface level aspects of this work as a whole that I'm a bit put off. Granted there's still 6-8 episodes left spoiler[ and I'm still convinced that LambaDelta is involved in very much sabotaging Bernkastel ] but we still don't have any answers or even acknowledgements of notable/logical discrepancies from previous loops. My enjoyment of Higurashi isn't the shock value of kids suddenly turning into killing freaks, but that there was a layered calculated buildup of psychological horror with scattered information that helps the audience understand what went wrong before and what to look for next. Gou hasn't been that thus far, and the character breaking is not helping. |
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kyokun47
 Posts: 231 |
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spoiler[Ep. 16 thankfully dissuades most of my suspicions on Satoko, and now we have a good jumping point as to what's been going on involving Tomitake, Takano, and the Irie Clinic. Satoshi has also been barely mentioned, so I'm hoping we'll get that info soon too. As for the content of the episode.... I'm genuinely wondering what the broadcast version of this show looks like. Extended shots of Rika's intestines, her body in two pieces when Satoko picks her up - it must have been a nightmare for people who didn't have the streaming version. Also these hard cuts from happy times to brutality are getting me every time lol. I'll be on my toes from now on.]
I also have not played/watched/read anything from Umineko, as it's not incredibly accessible anymore besides digital copies of the manga and the visual novel (unfortunately only on steam, and I don't have a computer at the moment). I'm selfishly hoping that the inevitable Umineko ties are less necessary and more cute nods to another Ryukishi07 work, but if they are as plot-important as people are saying it's most likely going to be, then I'll just have to dig in to the manga. |
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gsilver
Posts: 618 |
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Well...spoiler[I guess I semi-called it when I said that it should have been impossible for Rika to leave Hinamizawa? I'm still not really buying the Satako-is-a-looper theory, but at least being presented with the facts by the looper while level 5 is enough to set her off in a bad way.
But at any rate, it's good to have it confirmed that the things in this show are indeed the consequence for the "good end" of Kai. It'll be interesting to see what happens after the cliffhanger this time. This is the big one.] |
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Gem-Bug
 Posts: 1217 |
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Episode 16:
spoiler[Not sure what to say about this one. I'm not super into the overly-gratuitous content we've been getting these last two episodes. Before getting into Higurashi as a whole months ago, my previous preconception of the series was just "murder-moe". I feel this is likely common with folks who have not delved too deeply into the series, and it really seems like Gou is leaning heavily into that preconception as far as the blood and gore is concerned. I don't really feel as though Rika is actually being punished for leaving the village; rather, it was probably a trauma response to being slowly killed by Satoko. She began agreeing with her syndrome-afflicted rambling to try an make sense of what was happening. They really needlessly stretched this part of the episode out way too long, especially as it looks like we're going to get into Takano/Kai plot stuff. I would've liked more focus on that instead of 20 minutes of guts. I agree with Zerreth that there's a -lot- more to this series than what we got this week, and that's a shame. ] |
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ThatGuyWhoLikesThings
Posts: 1010 |
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Honestly, I don't think the discrepancies matter all that much, because this new Hinamizawa doesn't seem to operate under any specific rules. Anyone, and I do mean anyone, can go crazy at any random time for any random reason, with the only constant being that they always go after Rika. What matters is figuring out why this is happening and why Rika is here, why this has to be Rika's punishment, as opposed to figuring out the specific logistics of it, and we have plenty to go off of in that regard. There's plenty of room to theorize, it's just that this new Higu isn't terribly concerned with the how, but moreso the who and why. It took 100 years for Rika to find a way out of the ioriginal loop, she's certainly not gonna find answers immediately because she's not used to the more chaotic nature of this new one. Also all the brutal deaths she's suffered and is trying to avoid. spoiler[And honestly i think it's clear that there isn't gonna be any involvement from anything Umineko-related. At best it'll be tangential.] |
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Sven Viking
Posts: 1039 |
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I actually wonder if Rika is spoiler[pretending to have had a complete change of heart in order to deceive Satoko and therefore others indirectly. That would explain some of the emotional stuff seeming out of place and out of character.]
Anyway, yeah, while I thought the previous episode used repellent violence to reasonably good effect, this one seemed very gratuitous. |
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Roadwarior2
 Posts: 45 |
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I must say, as a layman of the franchise I really liked this episode, not just because they had the balls to have 90s OVA tier blood and guts on 20s television for an entire episode. It was such a powerful and visceral sequence, it'll stay with me for long to come.
Also, that was a positively Orwellian take on psychological conditioning and attempting escape from a dystopian nightmare realm. Well done. 
Also, it is always a treat to see the Sonozaki twins in swimwear. 
   
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Sven Viking
Posts: 1039 |
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It was impactful, I admit.
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ThatGuyWhoLikesThings
Posts: 1010 |
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Now, theoretically I could agree with this, but personally I think it pretty clear that Rika being gaslit into never leaving Hinamizawa and being forced to believe that her horrible fate is somehow her own fault was something we're obviously meant to find horrifically tragic and evil. This isn't a moral we're meant to take at face value because A. We have 8 episodes left. B. This is called the "Nekodamashi" arc. As in, the cat-deceiving arc. With Rika meant to represent the cat (because that's always been her motif). Rika coming down with a heavy case of Stockholm Syndrome is part of the deception C. it's in diametric opposition to a recurring theme of Umineko This absolutely isn't her fault, and no one has any right to fault her for wanting some degree of freedom, and I'm 99% certain that is what we're meant to take away from this, no matter how severely Rika is manipulated into thinking otherwise. |
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Florete
Posts: 363 |
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Came here to basically say this. On the surface I completely agree that the moral posited in the episode is totally backwards and wrong, and if the series ends on that note I'll be disappointed, but I don't think it will. |
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gsilver
Posts: 618 |
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Well, given that she's being forced to stay by the other looper, *the true villain of the show* I'm pretty sure that the audience is supposed to be uncomfortable with Rika's conclusion here. She's being coerced, and there are plenty of episodes left for her to get out of the (literal) cycle of violence and abuse that she's currently resigned to. I mean, the entire first half of the episode was more-or-less to point out how messed up it is and how far some people will go.
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ANN_Lynzee
ANN Executive Editor
 Posts: 2948 Location: Email for assistance only |
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That's a really interesting point, and I hope you're right.
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whiskeyii
 Posts: 2248 |
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+1 for this being when the True Villain is simply gaslighting Rika—which does beg the question of why; my Satako suspicions are honestly only getting more severe at this point, and that’s in large part because the flashback seemed to frame Satoko as the person Rika confided her desire in. Maybe this is a Monkey’s Paw wish gone wrong, with Satoko fervently wishing she and Rika would always be together or something? It’s a little hard to tell when Rika left Hinamizawa, since she could’ve completed elementary school there before going to St. Lucia, which might explain why Rika was just fine for five whole years.
But my real question here is Takano. In these loops she’s distinctly been kept out of the action, so in my mind, that could mean a few things: either Takano herself can sense something is “wrong” with this world (and given the original series’ display of her tenacity, I could see her pointing to her expectations not being met as a sign of conspiracy), or spoiler[the witch who blessed Takano with “certainty” can only bestow that gift on one person at a time, and as a result it’s drastically altered Takano’s role in the project.] Either way, my gut tells me we’re in for a genuinely helpful Takano this time around. |
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DeTroyes
 Posts: 520 |
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Episode #16 was incredibly hard for me to watch. In fact, for parts of it, I didn't - holding my hand up to obscure the screen and just tried to read the subtitles. Even that didn't help in parts of it, such was spoiler[the gore and torture].
Honestly, if there was ever an episode of an anime that needed a MA warning at the start, this episode was it. I'm not really in favor of anime censorship, but I do think warnings should be posted when something crosses a line. As this episode clearly did. |
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Gem-Bug
Posts: 1217 |
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Umineko theories:
spoiler[Perhaps the timeline/universe where Kai happens and Rika escapes the loops prevents Bernkastel(the witch) from being born? Since Featherine is clearly in the OP, and is Bernkastel's Guardian, maybe she's trying to create/recreate her Miko. As whiskeyii said, it could also be Lambadelta interferring(possibly with the same goal in mind). Every loop so far has been an absolute loss with "certainty"(or certain victory for someone else). ] |
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