Mouryou no Hako

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Alternative Titles

Synonyms: Moryo no Hako, Box of Goblins

Japanese: 魍魎の匣

Information

Type: TV

Episodes: 13

Status: Finished Airing

Aired: Oct 8, 2008 to Dec 31, 2008

Premiered: Fall 2008

Broadcast: Unknown

Producers: VAP, Kadokawa Shoten, Nippon Television Network

Licensors: None found, add some

Studios: Madhouse

Source: Novel

Genres: Mystery, Supernatural, Suspense

Themes: Detective, Historical, Psychological

Duration: 23 min. per ep.

Rating: R - 17+ (violence & profanity)

Statistics

Score: 7.19¹ (scored by 16,162 users)

¹ indicates a weighted score.

Ranked: #3392²

² based on the top anime page. Please note that 'Not yet aired' and 'R18+' titles are excluded.

Popularity: #2770

Members: 62,706

Favorites: 257

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Synopsis

Absent-minded schoolgirl Yoriko Kusumoto only has eyes for Kanako Yuzuki. After planning for their summer trip, their journey comes to a premature and brutal end when Kanako is found severely wounded on train tracks and Yoriko in tears on the station's platform. Shuutarou Kiba, a detective who happened to be on the train that hit the girl, takes up the investigation. However, he discovers that the mystery behind this case is intertwined with an intricate network of deceptions involving the Yuzuki family, especially its most prominent member, Youko Yuzuki—a famous actress and Kanako's sister.

Although Kanako survives after surgery, her critical state prompts Youko to entrust a doctor, Dr. Koushirou Mimasaka, to take care of the girl in an ominous, box-shaped facility in the forest where she will receive experimental treatment. But soon after, on a night where Kiba and Yoriko visit Kanako, the convalescent suddenly vanished. Now searching for her whereabouts, the burden on Kiba dramatically grows when he learns about other gruesome discoveries: limbs of young girls in boxes.

Kiba is suggested by a colleague that the macabre findings are related not only to Kanako's disappearance but also to the truth behind her sister. As the investigation continues, the detective—enlisting the help of his partners Tatsumi Sekiguchi and Akihiko Chuuzenji—has to find a way to solve this series of crimes and find Kanako back.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

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Related Anime

Adaptation:	Mouryou no Hako
Side story:	Mouryou no Hako: Chuuzenji Atsuko no Jikenbo - Hako no Yurei no Koto

Minaguchi, Yuko
Japanese

More staff

Staff

Tamura, Manabu

Producer

Takahashi, Ryouhei

Producer

Nakamura, Ryousuke

Director, Storyboard

Ishizuka, Atsuko

Episode Director

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Opening Theme

"Lost in Blue" by Nightmare

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Ending Theme

"Naked Love" by Nightmare

Reviews

Sep 15, 2009

NurseNitsuj

Recommended

Score: 8.5

“..If you build an enclosure within your heart, evil things will brew. Those things he called “mouryou.”

Built upon calamities of emotion, Madhouse effectively released a series worthy of a masterpiece. Mouryou no Hako hits a delectable balance, with extensive background in supernatural folklore, mystery, and science fiction – all tying in to a well-done and extensive detective, mystery story. This is how horror and mystery should be done!

Story: 9

At first glance, the story seems to be about two girls – one girl who has problems at home and the other, a seemingly perfect girl, who tells her that she will be the reincarnation of ... the other and vice-versa. Then there’s a disturbing part where a mysterious man has a box in his hands, and voices coming out of it. Further down the road, you will follow detective Kiba as he tries to find out what’s going on. Do not be thrown off by the first episode’s foreshadow and its yuri themes (I might also add that Anime News Network found the first episode very compelling with “heart-achingly beautiful yuri.”) It is simply the preamble of Mouryou no Haku as to what you will see. There is also an amazing string of characters (A lot I might add) that tie in to the story and reveal connections. Indeed, Mouryou no Hako can be confusing at first, but as you follow the series, everything opens up in a mythological-like story. The story offers metaphors shrouded in secrecy, your mind questioning the whole box stuff (WTF moments too), and eventually leaving you blown as it all ties together in the end.

Mouryou no Hako is indeed a multi-layered mystery/detective story. It can be complex to the point where the viewer does not understand what’s going on. Of course, this series isn’t spoon-fed to you. You actually have to think, and that’s what makes this series so great.

Art: 10 Sound: 8

The animation, quality, and design were all nicely done. CLAMP finished off the designs with a professional touch while Madhouse did the animation wonderfully. If you thought Higurashi no Naku Koro ni was disturbing (It was actually), then you haven’t seen anything…yet. The gore, limbs, abstract scenes, and other “things” were certainly something. Not just enough for one to go all squeamish, though. The movements were detailed and subtle, with the backgrounds leaving a sense of awe for the viewer. Everything looked so amazing, crisp, and detailed therefore giving this piece a solid 10.

Opening theme: Lost in Blue by Nightmare

Ending theme: Naked Love by Nightmare

The music and insert sounds were also nicely played throughout the series. I actually bought the OST for this. The soundtrack is amazingly nice to listen to. With the opening and ending by Nightmare, it adds a nice touch to this prodigious piece. I would say that this was definitely one of Madhouse’s best OP/ED’s.

Overall: 8.5

No, I can’t rate this a 9. Mouryou no Hako is an amazing series, but everything is not perfect. It falls short due to its amount of talking and occasional scene changes with different characters. This certainly isn’t for everyone and thus, may turn people off. Regardless, the series storytelling is the main selling point that makes this anime so unique and refreshing. It is truly unfortunate this anime has been underrated and highly overlooked. One thing is for sure though. There’s something about this anime that leaves a lasting nostalgia or melancholy – and one that allows a few of us to treasure this wonderful rare jewel.

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Dec 21, 2016

ktulu007

Mixed Feelings

Mouryou no Hako was first published in 1995 as a horror mystery novel. It was written by Kyogoku Natsuhiko. The same writer who wrote the story that Kousetsu Hyaku Monogatari was based off of. Cut to more than a decade later, Madhouse picked the novel up for an adaptation. Which aired from October to December of ’08. I don’t really know anything about the series beyond the genre and studio. And Madhouse has been involved in some terrible, mediocre and stellar anime so that doesn’t say much. So, let’s take a look and see how this one fares.

Story:

Someone out there is dismembering young girls. Police ... have found limbs in boxes in a variety of places. A group of old friends find themselves drawn to the case. Can they resolve it and find an abducted teenage girl, Kanako, before it’s too late for her?

Let’s start by talking about the big flaw with the series. It’s slow and not in a good, suspense building way. No, it’s slow because the narrative comes to a grinding halt so that it can spend long stretches with these blokes sitting around a table talking about spirits or it grinds to a halt to spend a while talking about clairvoyance. And what do these elements do for the story? They allow the “mystery” to be solved without any actual investigation because… bullshit. I’m going to just put this forward as a possibility. Maybe, just maybe, the suspense and mystery elements would have been significantly stronger if there had been a proper investigation instead of long scenes with our heroes sitting around a table like a bunch of bloody nobs. That isn’t the only problem with the series. Some of its attempts at horror come across as more than a little silly and a lot of its “twists” are so heavily telegraphed that you can see them coming far before the reveal.

There are some aspects of the narrative that work well. The series does have some legitimately disturbing scenes. It also starts out pretty well, establishing the mystery and looking like it’s going to get interesting. If they’d kept the momentum and kept the mystery going well, then this could have been a compelling series. But then it all gets derailed for faffing about.

Characters:

The characters in this are all right. You get a sense of personality from them and they certainly aren’t just tropes. However, the are a bit under-developed and there are certainly points where they succumb to bad horror clichés. To give an example, there’s a girl who readily goes to meet the obvious villain, in spite of him being blatantly sketchy. There are also moments where the dialogue reaches purple prose levels of stilted and trying too hard to make the language sound grandiose.

Art:

There’s a lot about the artwork in this that looks good. The backgrounds look good. The characters are nicely designed and there are a few scenes with well done horror imagery. That being said, most of the horror imagery in this is bollocks. First off, there re the limbs themselves. There’s no sense of muscle, sinew or blood. Instead, you’re left with something that looks like a cheap plastic mannequin’s limb instead of an actual limb that came off of a person. Which results in a disconnect betwixt the disturbing concept and the non-threatening mediocrity of the image. There are also multiple occasions where the series tries to scare us with boxes. Because when I think of a frightening, grotesque image, I think of a room with boxes strewn about. In all seriousness, I don’t think that’s going to scare anyone unless they have pygmachophobia.

Sound:

The acting is competent, mostly. It is brought down a bit by the overly flowery moments and by those tedious stretches of our main characters doing exposition about spirits. However, there are a lot of good actors in this. Hirata Hiroaki, Morikawa Toshiyuki & Tomatsu Haruka to name a few. This is a series where there’s enough range to the characters that they can show their abilities but not so much that you could call it a great performance for any of them. The music was composed by Murai Shusei, the same bloke who did the music for Terra Formars. And he did do a pretty nice job with it.

Ho-yay:

There is quite a bit of it at the beginning. The early stuff with Kanako and Yoriko is full of les-yay. Then Kanako gets abducted from hospital and there’s no more ho-yay.

Final Thoughts:

This is a series that had a lot of potential. There are some strong ideas behind it. Unfortunately, the execution is weak. Ultimately, the series suffers from the mystery being poorly handled, the characters being under-developed, lousy horror imagery and long, boring interludes. There’s still some good stuff in there but not enough to make this a decent series. Ultimately, it ends up being average with its execution failing utterly to live up to the potential of its ideas. My final rating is a 5/10. Next week I’ll end the year with a look at Coppelion.

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Mar 16, 2012

makoa69

Not Recommended

Let me write and explain as best I can why I think Mouryou no Hako is bad. And I don’t mean simply bad, I mean absolutely awful. My friend (who greatly adores this anime might I add) sat with me and had me watch the entire thing just today. If not for him, there’s no way I would have watched more than a single episode of this murder mystery. Now be warned, this review is really fricken' long, so prepare yourself. The review is also written for people who have already seen the show, so it's full of juicy spoilers. So be warned.

So because ...

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Mouryou no Hako

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Chuuzenji, Akihiko

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Yuzuki, Kanako

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Kusumoto, Yoriko

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Chuuzenji, Chizuko

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