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Jul 16, 2021
First of all, I need to make it clear that I'm not here to bash or praise HigeHiro as a work of fiction, but rather, present to you my personal take on my understanding of the situation, the reasons why or why it is not being regarded as a work with a negative connotation by some.
Your mileage may vary, but I'll just try to stay away from subjective moral values as an assessment tool for this review, as I have a fairly neutral opinion on the moral context in which this takes place admittedly, do note that it is indeed controversial.
So this work apparently starts
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as a LN, making this anime an adaptation, a 1-cour adaptation, this already spells trouble, add the genre being slice of life, with the possibility of devolving into harem, and to top it off, a potential romance tag for a relationship with a considerable age gap, this was obviously going straight to hell from the get-go and I'm assuming the author was fully aware of this fact and the dark territory he was treading into, so this series of unfortunate events are probably intended, this being done in hopes of achieving some ephemeral recognition, if only because of how much controversy it would stir in the media.
Controversy ensues. [REDACTED]
We also need to consider that this work in particular, even as a work of fiction has decided to include sources of moral conflict which derive from real life circumstances and as such, it establishes a frame in which the viewer will need to look at the plot from a realistic perspective, using their own personal values and moral conscience in order to understand what is going on, there's no other way around it, this is not a world with magical demi-human beings, this story takes place in our world, and the only way to understand the motives and resulting actions of the characters therein is to employ value judgements which are determined on the basis of what we believe is right or wrong.
Bias ensues. [REDACTED]
Another very important point regarding the story and setting in HigeHiro is that it will be endowed with a fairly large psycho-social subtext, Japanese society and its specific roles as determined by the individual will be a most relevant item in the introspective analysis of the characters, once again, there is absolutely no way to rationalize actions without at least a vague understanding on the perceived roles of Japanese family prototypes, you will be looking at each character and they will need to be passed through this filter, in which a role has to be assigned to them, family being the core concept and also crucial to understand specific character development, and besides that of course, you also have the definition of a girlfriend, significant other, life partner, concubine, you name it.
All that is also needed in order to understand the different iterations of characters and their instances for specific interactions.
This will make people misjudge characters as well as the author's intent as this is already going too far into the uncharted territory that is individual mindset on familial roles and family dynamics, as well as ethics, personal philosophy of life, since there are no predefined rules with regards to that, and cultural idiosyncratic factors that may pose a bias may also play a huge role in here.
Inter-observer variance ensues. [REDACTED]
Not to say, that things are impossible to look in a way that is not subjective, because in this work, each character exhibits at least some behavioural pattern that correlates with universal perceived social constructs which do not have an open interpretation, moreover, a lot of them are common patterns found in different personalities that have a very straightforward and typical presentation, this is the same no matter where or what you are in the world, just off the top of my head, lack of affection in early childhood leading to poorly understood displays of social conduct which are interpreted by the subject as a form of affection, this is a common problem since forever, and it is one of the possible outcomes for adults who grew up in broken and/or not very emotionally supportive families.
Bottom line being, these characters can be understood, but only if you know what you're looking for, in that sense, you could say the anime does a great job on characterization but for the average person, talking about these things in-depth is probably too much and it will just fly over their heads.
Idealization ensues. [REDACTED]
Now this might also be a judgement of value on my part, but I would say most of the interactions that take place, and the consequences resulting from said events do not necessarily lead towards an "ideal" or "standard" outcome, as a matter of fact the conclusion in the anime is conveniently open-ended; in this anime, characters are not portrayed in a didactic manner in order to learn and/or teach life lessons, they stand and react based on their expected characterization but development is not even close to be a guarantee, pretty much like real life, these people might just not learn absolutely anything from their own experiences, the main focus is on the interaction itself and what each character can exhibit from their assortment of psychological defense mechanisms as defined by their role, as well as how emotionally intelligent they might be, in order to fulfill their personal goal and or selfish desires.
Realism kicks in. [REDACTED]
The resulting mess is what we have in HigeHiro, in which we sit here and watch all these convoluted, intertwined, set of seemingly undecipherable misguided actions, which at the end of the day actually can be either justified and or decoded on the basis of either characterization and/or transition that leads into some form of development.
WARNING JUDGEMENT OF VALUE
Everythingexceptforwhathappenedinepisode9, causethatwasjusthorse****andhaszeroexplanation.
/WARNING JUDGEMENT OF VALUE
Now onto character development, one would think Sayu is the winner in this regard, but actually, upon doing some research on the LN, it might just be that Yoshida himself is the center of actual conflict here, an introspective conflict taking place behind the scenes, worth noting that this is not possible to infer if you only watch the anime, as the actual changes taking place here are related to a certain narrative which is only present in the original work, as expected it's a tie between MC and the titular heroine on who gets the most out of this, and of course there are some parts in which there is gratuitious erotic content which seems to serve no purpouse other than being scandalous, and/or pleasing the fans who are getting what they came here for, honestly speaking, in a couple of such scenes, I can't say I found any real added value to the story or the events taking place, and if I had to be specific, I didn't get why they would show Sayu fingering herself, that one scene didn't really add anything of value to the character or the story, that scene being added was almost as if they were saying "we didn't know what to put in here so here's Sayu fapping lel" to me, it was already a known fact Sayu was engaging in hypersexual behaviour, this doesn't really tell me anything I didn't already know, it's redundant, but in some other cases it might seems like they're adding fanservice but it actually tells you something about the character, if I had to be specific, Sayu asking Yoshida to have sex at the end for one, was a sad confirmation about her relapse, just thinking that, even at that point in the story she still hadn't abandoned the thought of seducing this man who had been so obstinate on trying to teach her that there's much more to love other than just sex, it changes your perception of the character.
That of course, or maybe the author thought it's just a turn on when a cute teenager just walks up to you asking for goodbye sex upfront. -justsaying-
But back to the reasons why this anime might not be regarded as "good" I have to bring up what I call the "Misaki Effect" and by that, I mean, this phenomenon taking place when idealization is inevitable, this one comes from way back, when Welcome to the NHK was airing, I guess some of us remember how more than half of the viewers were expressing their most heartfelt desire to have a "Misaki" in their lives, incidentally this anime has a lot to do with that, because on both sides, there are people suffering from this bias, delusion, whatever you want to call it, you see, in here we observe a character who is portrayed as an ideal, unreacheable concept which personifies all of the main character's (and possibly also the audience's) desires condensed into a walking, human utopia, for Welcome to the NHK, it was Misaki, and for Higehiro, it was Sayu.
These characters have the unwanted, side effect, of arousing in the audience a yearning sense of longing, they feel that these characters are the solution to the conflict but actually what the story is showing you is the whole opposite of that notion, not going into spoilers here, but it's obvious, that many people saw this hypersexual kawaii teenager female student and thought that it's just what they needed in their lives, it was the solution all along like -- how did I even manage to survive this long without a hypersexual kawaii teenager female student in my life? but actually the ending to HigeHiro challenges that notion, and rather goes onto giving the main character a rather sad reality check, in the sense that, maybe something was already wrong before you met Sayu, and you just came to realize it now, had you two not met you'd probably gone carrying this problem the rest of your life without realizing, but now you know it's there, so what are you going to do?
And this is not only on the field of the sad otaku virgin living in their basement, because some other people were also complaining about Sayu becoming a cute little wallflower, being a goody-goody pleaser wife, cooking dinner and having great sex everyday, just living her life by the book now that she met Yoshida, because that's also the same delusion, what the story tells you is that even after meeting Yoshida her problems hadn't really disappeared, she keeps failing to realize that the abyss is within herself and Yoshida is not going to be the magic spell to seal away that voice that keeps calling her name, this is just what she believes but the reality is different, and the audience can see it clearly, this conflict is not solved and what you have been doing until now is just a subterfuge that leads you nowhere.
We know how it ended in Welcome to the NHK -- bit more on the pragmatic pessimistic side, but in HigeHiro, things are somewhat different and that's what makes it unique, a little bit too feelgood-y for my taste? maybe, but that's also a judgement of value.
In short, it's obvious people will have to like or dislike this, and in that sense, the author has achieved his goal, he managed to stir a reaction from people, which is probably the one thing that can be considered "success" in terms of artistic expression, not necessarily objective, but that's my takeaway from all this, I feel these are the main obstacles that prevent and/or make it difficult for people to enjoy HigeHiro for what it is, those obstacles are also a charm point in and by themselves, so I challenge you to try and look past the barriers, and try to understand, beyond the fact you like it or not, WHY or WHY not.
The result might surprise you and give you some quality introspective self-criticism, I know I did, and found it amusing and refreshing.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Sep 4, 2018
Hataraku Saibou is a Japanese animated show which could be considered an example of the "anime de wakaru" genre in which the main focus is to explain -- in a brief and concise manner, the basic outline pertaining specific subjects or topics, the aforementioned being human physiology, in this case.
Just like every other work of its kind, it employs its characters and/or anthropomorphic beings to represent concepts or ideas which are necessary to convey the meaning behind what is being explained, this is essentially an alternative way of learning which relies on visual input rather than a pragmatic approach, but my complaints with these kind
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of shows are always the same, not enough information -- which is the most common problem rather than oversaturation or irrelevant information, and also the fact that some of them treat their audiences like "dummies", hence the name of this sort of works in English "[subject] for dummies" those two points are pretty much my only two problems with Hataraku Saibou.
I'm fairly sure that at some point when I was a pre-grad I was reading this book on human physiology and thinking to myself "wow, the whole opsonization and antigen presentation process in cell-mediated immunity sounds like a huge police taskforce performing a raid on some organized criminal organization" because it felt to me as if the major histocompatibility complex was essentially like, a preset identification system for every citizen who was born in the human body, so whenever there was something that didn't seem like it belonged in there they would go like "hey you, we need to ask you some questions" and then it was like sometimes bacteria can get away with showing something similar to an ID that would allow them to enter the body bypassing the macrophages in the epithelial cell barrier or actually using them, maybe hiding inside one of the law-abiding citizens or on the other hand they would be stopped by one of these officers somewhere around one the checkpoints within the reticuloendothelial system and then they would discover they don't have an ID and they would get killed on the spot else they get an arrest warrant, which is proliferation in a nutshell, everything seems so suitable for a professional police investigation team that can use high-end technology like genetic profiling and other cool intelligent weapons like complement, cytokines and basically hack into the machinery of the human body on a mollecular level in order to create an inflammatory cascade and thwart the strategies used by the different pathogens that could invade the human body, because I feel that at the same time most bacteria don't even "break into" the bloodstream killing everything they see, they are more like silent, sneaky criminals that operate in the margin of society, unbeknownst to the unsuspecting citizens working under the direction of the central nervous system and its respective administrative branches, the endocrine, respiratory and circulatory division, an extremely organized system functioning everyday for the greater good (homeostasis), everything seemed to fit so perfectly in my mental image of some kind of hive-like society fighting against foreign criminals.
And that is the exact reason why looking at this whimsical portrayal of the human physiology leaves me a bit disappointed, because I feel that it clashes with my own vision of what I learned back in med school, that which I consider to be factual, but at the end of the day, I feel it would be unfair to judge this anime as a work with educational value for people like me, because we already know the immune system, the hypothesized/demonstrated workings behind infection and inflammation, the pathogenic mechanisms of virulence, the Bohr effect, haematosis, hypersensitivity, humoral and cellular immunity, glyconeogenesis, we know more or less how it goes, we don't need anyone acting it out in front of us to understand it.
But there those out there who don't have the slightest clue, and this sure helps some of them to, start understanding how it works at a very basic level, without delving too deep into the details, which isn't necessarily a good thing, you see, now we have people R34'ing platelets because they are small and cute.
Technical:
Though I have to make it clear, I can't say I'm absolutely disappointed, the fact my personal view of gijinka acting out human physiology doesn't match the one of this show doesn't make it garbage per se, and at the same time I could spend a lot of time rambling on how this doesn't work the way they did it because it's nonsense (like how there's a distinct lack of professional APCs doing some kind of work, it's like they don't care about their function besides the B cell "using" antibodies), but I won't.
Instead I'll just say that the enucleation ceremony made me all giddy inside because it was so damn cute but then again I couldn't help but to wonder how the hell did a pathogen get into the bone marrow (and a pseudomonas at that), viruses depicted as fungi was hilarious to see but it's strange how it works, the macrophage depiction was more or less spot on, and while I think the professional phagocytic cell line could use some work, most of them had a very aesthetically pleasant design even if they didn't use half of all their known cytotoxic weapons, the naive Lymphocyte antigen recognition without any background on thymic selection part was awkward I don't think people understood what it meant or what was actually happening, I had a lot of problems wrapping my head around the "allergic" immune response, like how does a RBC even carry corticosteroids? they are transported by proteins but the fact it was a robot was a nice touch even if it was overly demonized .. probably, now I didn't like that the neoplastic cell was so plain, they normally can do all sort of things, even replicate the "abilities" of other cells.
I can only praise what they did with pulmonary/peripheral circulation, I got to know the names in Japanese without having to look them up, but then I was a bit disappointed that they left the coronary arteries out, it should be priority 1 when exiting the thoraxic aorta, overall, I'd say it was great to see, the use of the imagery was creative and memorable, which I believe is key in explaining haemodynamics, and Mamiko Noto's voice narrating in the background .. 10/10, so props for that (obviously auditive learner here *wink*).
Animation:
"At least it's not CG" and unfortunately that's all about I can say, and this is a problem in the sense that, the strong point of this show can only be be its visuals, I can't stress this enough because it already happened to other shows like Inuyashiki, this is where it was meant to go full power and shine, it's all about those looks, the impressions that it will create on people who learn visually, but regrettably I didn't feel especially impressed by anyone in particular (.. except the macrophage .. and only to an extent because of the frills which remind me a lot of the pseudopodia) things I can praise, the RBCs were fairly detailed, you can tell they put a lot of thought in their character design plus the ID tag for adult hemoglobin erythrocyte was a nice touch but still.
Recently the quality of animation has been dropping and being an old timer I can notice when you're skimping on resources, but they did keep the CG to a bare minimum, which is something I can appreciate, I personally wouldn't have minded if this show had been only 15 minutes per episode with the sort of quality we got in Shinryounaika, but that's my personal opinion, other people will look back and say this is the animation they got when they were growing up probably, fighting scenes were awfully simple at times, with still frames and everything, though I have to say bacteria in general were lackluster, I'm guessing it's because the work itself is meant to be about physiology rather than pathophysiology but I'm an infectiologist and this kinda hurts me (.. bacteria can be cute too you know ..), the clot formation was nice but lacking in technical terms because platelet activation was not emphasized enough, and once again, one of the most memorable scenes was the one with the erythrocytes in the right atrium -- very nice and aesthetically pleasant.
Final Thoughts:
All in all, I can't say I consider this a very educational show, but I would say that it almost does the job in a way, children will probably look at this and think about how cells are so cute (..and maybe some adults will too), but there's a lot more to it than what you see and at the same time it's more about the entertainment and the visuals than the educational factor (which is the reason why I'm substracting a bit from the final score) but hey, you get to learn new names that you probably didn't know before, and the next time you look at a blood test results, you can finally put a face on each of those names and remember what they do, course things like RDW and MCH are just not gonna make any sense to you so don't expect too much either.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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Sep 30, 2017
This anime is the fourth and most likely final season of the Hell Girl animated series which began airing in 2005.
For those who haven't watched the previous installments, I highly recommend you take the time to watch the first season at the very least, even if I don't think it makes a difference to know Ai's backstory, it gives a nice perspective when you compare the humble beginnings to what it has became today, I mean, it's been over a decade, almost 14% of an adult male's mean life expectancy nowadays. (just let that sink in)
The Hell Girl (Jigoku Shoujo) series can be considered a
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collection of short stories that never span for longer than one episode, with one exception in which it is divided in two parts, where different characters are involved in a number of events linked to the Hell Correspondence (Jigoku Tsuushin) a group of supernatural entities that have been tasked with providing humans with a "service" of sorts that allows them to send people to hell, provided that they have accepted the conditions of the contract that is formed between them and Enma Ai, who is a mysterious, emotionless girl playing the role of the protagonist in every season.
The premise remains unchanged but there's always a deuteragonist, a character whose story takes place in a different context which develops independently or even tangentially from each of the stories, yet they invariably find themselves sharing a unique kind of relationship with Enma Ai.
In Yoi no Togi, we are presented with one of those new characters, a nameless girl wearing a green dress, whose existence appears to be similar to that of Enma Ai and as such is infered to be that of a supernatural entity in the human world.
In all seasons, the different short stories deal with an assorted variety of dark themes such as dysfunctional families, abusive relationships, physical and psychological torture, deep resentment and sentimental conflicts which cause major distress to those who are subject to them, but always with a focus on the pain that builds up and festers a desperate need for an individual to accept the eradication of another person as the solution to an inescapable conflict even on the face of the prospect of spending an eternity in 'Hell', which is then accepted as a more desirable fate than enduring the present state of affairs. In that sense, the only common underlying theme to all of the stories appears to be that tragic fate which awaits both the victim and the aggresor and the internalization of the concept of 'Hell' as a state of endless damnation and suffering of the soul, and with little to no mention of a 'Heaven' throughout the series it becomes evident that there's an interest on the part of the Hell Correspondence (and Ai herself especially) for these people to actively choose hell as the only alternative instead of finding a different (if any) solution to the conflict, as there are only exceptional cases where sending someone to hell was not the ultimate and decisive goal set by either the victim or Enma Ai's team even when the option existed for them to solve the conflict without sending anyone to hell.
Now if you'd ask me, I'd say the stories themselves might be the best part of the entire show, they are like urban legends, things that may or may not have happened, but such as all urban legends, you just know it has that bit of truth somewhere in there, and makes you wonder what would have actually happened without the added supernatural aspect of the Hell Correspondence as the cop-out method to reach that much needed "closure" and solve the problems that its clients face, those times you feel the need to take a side, and decide for yourself which one is in the right, it gives you that sense of foreboding that resembles the expectations of a human drama as you follow it closely to the end, and even when you know that the only possible conclusion is the obvious one (i.e someone will go to hell), it's often never as simple as agreeing that what the victim did was the right thing, simply for the fact that he/she was being victimized or made to endure a living hell, there's the anticipation and realization that the outcome isn't going to be exactly what you were expecting, and the theoretical contrast between the concept of hell and whether life can be worse or the same.
But at the same time, there are those episodes where stories are just barely realistic, and or, loosely based on existing stories that are commonplace in the horror and mystery lore even when they are not carbon copies, episode 13 and 17 from season one come to mind, and don't seem to serve much purpouse other than filling a time slot, this might be a problem for some but as I see it, the only people that would enjoy Hell Girl would be those willing to sit through a slow paced development, the dark themes alone demand of the viewer a certain measure of contemplation and deep thought and there's barely any room for entertainment sometimes even when the third season tried to be a bit less serious on the punishment sequences and gave Ai a bit of a (sick) humor sense mixed with some strange "fanservice" bits, you can forget about that in Yoi no Togi though, this one went back to the first season in that department.
Incidentally, I feel that the themes pertaining the nature of hell itself versus life in the living world once again becomes a central theme in Yoi no Togi, which I believe fell somewhat short on its execution compared to the other seasons, maybe has something to do with the time they actually dedicated to developing the character of Michiru, who went from nameless amnesiac girl, to what she would become in what? 3-4 episodes? now this is probably not a bad thing, but taking half a cour to build up the character and their motives and then following with an abrupt conclusion wasn't probably the best way to come back after 3 seasons with almost 25 episodes each, though in all honesty I'm biased for Hajime's story so I could be setting the bar too high here.
Animation on the other hand, has never been exceptionally great, but for this type of work the visuals are not the main attraction, so I can forgive that much, even then in Yoi no Togi, there has been a significant improvement from the type of animation we are used to, looking back to the first season, you can see how the animation team in studio Deen has moved up from the early 2000 digital animation techniques to the current animation programs with the typical crisp lineart you see in 2012 and up anime, and yet the character designs remain consistent with the previous seasons which is already a lot considering it's been well over 10 years.
All things considered, I don't feel disappointed revisiting this series in what will probably be the last season, I'm glad to be met with the same lovely Hell Girl I remember from a while back, but nostalgia aside, I feel this type of work being preserved as it was with little to no changes is probably for the best, a rare hybrid between a slice of life and a horror supernatural drama that never gets old, a timeless anthology of misery and tragedy.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Jun 21, 2017
If you are an avid follower of Japanese media and culture you will probably be acquainted with the problems caused by intrusive salespeople in Japan, the blame is often placed on poor regulations within the legal system to protect the consumer and in a society like the Japanese society, where people generally embrace the concept of minimalistic and frugal lifestyles, the more unscrupulous and sagacious people need to find better ways to reach out to the market and make the best out of every little chance they can get.
This is what I believe inspires the character of Moguro Fukuzou, the "Warau Salesman" (adding the good
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ol' "NEW" to the title because it works everytime)
So this could be considered a formulaic, episodic animated work with a defined structure to deliver a "punchline" showcasing the flaws of the different "clients" and how their actions invariably devolve in unpleasant outcomes for them, now this seems simple enough, almost too simple even, so the execution is the only selling point that this show can offer for those that don't get a kick out of plain black humor or what is essentially a fleeting moment of sadistic schadenfreude for those who are into that, because as I see it, there isn't even much of a comedic value to the series, and there's also the fact that it tends to give itself a little bit too much to nonsensical portrayals while dealing with the hard hitting, dark themes it's supposed to delve into.
So essentially, even when the show is dark and ugly it doesn't takes itself seriously on that subject, which would then disappoint those looking for a serious, grim and crude depiction of real life conflicts, so it comes off as light-hearted, even on the face of unethical and sometimes outright malicious and fraudulent bussiness practices.
Even with that, I can at least praise the accurate depiction of actual marketing stratagems, in this show you see examples of loss leading, decoy effects, razor and blades, locked-in consumerism, and other common underhanded (yet legal) methods of catering and marketing used by many great and successful companies around the world, it's a great watch for those wanting to "deconstruct the method" behind (unethical?) bussiness practices, which is the part of the anime I probably enjoyed the most, admittedly.
But that leads me to another aspect which I consider a flaw, because even when the circumstances in which the events take place are often presented without leaving much to the imagination (for a 15 minutes per episode format it's actually hard to cram all that information within the time frame) from time to time it still leaves out small details which, might or not be very obvious, but would probably escape the grasp of the untrained mind, and take out that special realistic feeling out of the story.
Again, this is probably because it tries to stay away from getting too dark, but it affects the enjoyment factor for those who want to see a well-written and well-executed story even if it's just a formulaic XYZ type of narrative.
And lastly on that note, the fact this is a dark, sordid type of humor tale that doesn't even takes itself seriously can potentially leave viewers feeling with that sense of discontent and emptiness, mainly because there's no sense of closure upon reaching the punchline, and for those who are morally uptight this can be borderline upsetting even, so watch out for that, it's not something like Jigoku Shoujo or Yamishibai where you can expect something 'fulfilling' to happen by the end, as in, something to close the cycle or answer questions, there's not gonna be any of that surely.
But one thing's clear to me, the character of Moguro is most definitely evil, and while the actual instances where his devious need to cause harm are actually evident are pretty scarce, you can see that his dark intent is more than just hinted throughout the series if you look close enough.
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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