Could you...forgive the killing of people? Are there cases when killing is absolutely necessary? Does killing to ensure your own survival come under self-defence? Can it be justified?
In other words, if you had to kill the people around you in order to live, would it be a crime?
I have no doubt that right now, the answer is clear and obvious to all of you. It would be better to die than to kill an innocent person to live.
Let me ask you another question. If vampires existed, and they killed the people around you in order to live, would it be a sin? No doubt it would. Then how can we justify our slaughter of farm animals to satisfy our own hunger? Isn't that too, a crime? Perhaps even more heinous, as we do not need meat in order to survive.
So why is it that killing of people by vampires is considered such an atrocity?
This, my reader, is the world of Shiki. A world where vampires exist, people exist, and you are never sure who is wrong or right. It's been a long time since I've had to question the morality of both sides in an anime, and the feeling that was inspired in me after I finished this great series was simply amazement.
Story (8/10)
Western Literature has seen a great up rise in vampire literature ever since the advent of Twilight. Gone are the vampires that used to haunt our nightmares; they are replaced by romanticized figures that often fall in love with mortals rather than hunt them. Some traditionalists, like myself, long for the days of Dracula, when vampires were who they are supposed to be.
Salem's Lot, Stephen King's amazing take on the original Dracula, was the first book that got me thoroughly interested in vampire literature; and since I haven't read the whole of Bram Stoker's novel, I'm going to have to compare Shiki with the occurrences in Salem's Lot, which may be my second favourite horror novel of all time, behind The Shining of course.
Shiki takes place in a mostly isolated village, where the people are peaceful and easy going, maintaining their traditional lifestyle even as the world around them advances rapidly. The first episode introduces us to Shimizu Megumi, a pink haired girl who hates everything about the town, except for two things: Natsuno, the boy she has a crush on, and the large house that was built on Kanemasa hill. Throughout her life she dreamt of escaping the slow, sleepy village and making it to the city life, where she believes that she can actually enjoy herself.
One day, a family moves in to the Kanemasa house. Intrigued, Megumi decides to go visit the family and say her greetings.
When the villagers find her next, she's lying half dead in a forest, with no visible external injuries except for two insect bites. She becomes the first victim of the village, succumbing to an unknown illness.
Natsuno, who was the victim of Megumi's stalking, thinks of it as somewhat of a relief, since he finds himself free to open his curtains once again without the fear of being watched from the bushes. But even as this relief comes, he soon finds himself closing his curtains again, unable to sleep at night as he feels as though something outside is watching him, watching his every move...
Meanwhile, the waka-sensei (young doctor) Ozaki is trying to figure out the truth behind the sudden epidemic that seems to be causing deaths all over the village. People die and the people around them disappear, moving out with no warning at all. His frustration builds up as he discovers that all suffer from anemia and its various symptoms, but he fails to piece it all together. One idea, one clue is all he needs to figure out the cause behind all the mysterious deaths..
The first half of Shiki is somewhat slow moving and works to build on the atmosphere of the situations and the characters themselves, making this similar to Monster in its own way. We follow Dr. Ozaki as he works furiously to determine the cause of the deaths, and Natsuno, as he discovers the truth in his own way and attempts to confront it. Both characters develop, but more attention is given to Ozaki as his frustration increases and he begins to lash out at his close associates, suffering under the pressure he has as the village's doctor. Meanwhile Natsuno joins hands with the few people who believe him and attempt to prove the existence of Shiki (corpse-demons), called the Risen in the village folk-lore.
However, once we reach the second half, the slow pace is removed and things start moving faster. The tension builds up rapidly, before the climax, and the gore-fest that follows it. All immensely satisfying.
One thing I absolutely love about Shiki, apart from how atmospheric and tense it is, is the fact that it follows traditional vampire folklore, while placed in an Eastern environment. This means that Shiki can't walk in broad daylight, they are weak around religious objects, and of course, they can't enter a house unless they are invited inside.
Characters (9/10)
This show has quite a large number of characters, but unlike Angel Beats!, they all are realistic, interesting, and fairly well developed to the point that you can understand why they do what they do.
Of course, my favourite character throughout the show is Ozaki himself, who is now one of my favourite anime heroes of all time. I say heroes subjectively, however. While he appears heroic to me, to many others he is seen as a villain. His morality, in the second half, is constantly in question, and you can see the characters choosing sides based on his actions. Ozaki isn't your classic perfect-white character; neither is he the dark gray that Light Yagami was. He's directly in the middle, with the shades of black equal to the shades of white, making him the most intriguing protagonist that I've seen in a while. In fact, the last time I thought so much about the main character was probably Code Geass.
I could sense some sort of darkness lurking behind his sarcastic attitude and him impatience, and as it built up before that episode, I was literally quivering in anticipation. Then it happened, and, for the first time since third episode of Higurashi, I got goosebumps on my arm. That scene was terrible in its own way. It will shock you to your core, and ultimately it is your view on it that will decide which side you prefer in the show.
On the other hand, Natsuno, who has relatively less importance, is given less development. At the beginning, he is an arrogant individual who refuses to even recognize Megumi even as she tries to talk to him, which probably gave him the whole stalking problem in the first place. In fact, the only thing that he even accepts about her is her wish to leave the town, which he reciprocates. However, as time goes on, he realizes the importance of the people around him and their support in his struggle against the Shikis.
Then there's the junior monk, Seishin. He is Ozaki's closest friend, yet their positions couldn't be more different. While Ozaki uses modern age medicine to cure people of illnesses, Seishin uses ritualistic traditions to give them proper send offs. Similarly, he is among the first to discover the existence of the Shiki; but rather than attack them and kill them all, he decides to try to understand them and their motives, which seem to be somehow resonate with the motives of a character in the book he is writing.
Surprisingly, even the Shiki are given development, enough for the watcher to understand and pity them as they are dragged to their inevitable deaths. A perfect example of this is Megumi, whose stalker syndrome becomes a full blown obsession after she rises, and she begins to attack those who she believes to be too close to Natsuno. Her death, in a way, was the most heartfelt of all the Shiki because she still displays her recognizable human traits until the very end, which invokes a sense of sorrow in the people who are hunting her down.
Others include Masao, the despicable self-obsessed person who turns into a Shiki displaying those same characteristics with that same annoying face; Tatsumi, who is one of the few vampires who can walk around in sunlight; Nao, whose undying love for her family caused her to attack them in the hope of allowing them to live an everlasting life as she does now; Sunako, and Chizuru.
Sunako, in her own way, is the Dracula of the series. She is the brains behind the operation, and fills the classic horror-anime role of the young girl who knows way too much at such a young age. If you know what I mean. Like Maria Ushiromiya from Umineko. She too, is given development, but anything beyond what I just said will be spoilers.
Chizuru, on the other hand, uses her looks to seduce unsuspecting men, and is always on the lookout for an interesting man who can entertain her. Hmmph.
An interesting idea that they added into the story is that the Shiki retain their consciousness and their pre-mortem (?) behaviour. This really adds to the emotional quotient of the show, besides letting Shiki appear neither truly good or bad, and also adding much more punch to the aforementioned scene.
Music and Sound (9/10)
I couldn't resist mentioning this in the review, because I absolutely love the music. It stands out among the various traditional instrumentals that we hear in most anime; the soundtrack of Shiki really shines since ethereal vocals power the background music. It really gets you on edge and adds to the tension of the situation. My favourite song in the whole soundtrack is definitely Eau de Vie (Water of Life in French) and Silent Night, beautiful tracks that will probably haunt me for the rest of my life.
Like most anime, you see that the opening song changes around episode 13. The original opening, Kuchikuzuke was strange, depressing, and haunting just like the anime itself; but I could never really warm up to it. On the other hand, the ending seemed out of place but catchy. In the second half, the roles were reversed and I found the opening catchy, but out of place, and the ending more haunting.
No doubt most of the voice actors are either very good or competent; however, I had problems listening to Masao's voice, whose voice actor kept stressing on all the 'k's and making them sound like 'kh's. It might match his personality, but at times it went overboard and I got irritated just listening to it.
Presentation (8/10)
As a whole, the animation is fairly fluid, but nothing really stands out, even in HD. It plays its part, which is good enough, but don't expect jaw dropping scenes from this anime. Just expect a whole lot of red in the last few episodes.
An important thing to mention is that this anime is extremely graphic. Not just blood all over place, even Higurashi has that (except with lolis). This anime has nearly no violence until the middle, when everything becomes clear to our main characters, and the sudden violence hits you hard just like it should, rather than the feeling that 'oh, people are going to die' that you get from Higurashi. When people die, they actually die. The show makes this brutally clear. Besides that, this is the first anime I've seen that shows decomposing bodies. No, literally decomposing. The first time I saw one, I got my first jumpscare since Higurashi. I've never seen any other anime do that, perhaps because its far too explicit.
Next about character designs....yeah about that. Most characters look alright, I mean Ozaki looks kinda weird at times, Natsuno has a strange hairstyle, Masao looks like an idiot, yeah we can live with those. My major gripe comes when the Shiki are involved. When we first see them, they look like complete idiots. No literally, they look retarded. Like they were pulled out of Disneyland. I mean, take a look at their hairstyles. Who even wears that kind of stuff? Shouldn't the villagers be wary of a strange man with strange white hair in a strange hair style? Yet it seems to bother them none.
Besides that, the hair colour of the main characters can be questionable, mostly involving Ricchan (who has green hair and another strange hair pattern), Natsuno (purple) and Megumi (neon pink). We see these hair colours in most anime but it seems kind of strange, considering how dark this anime really is. Some may consider it to show that it's a normal village in an abnormal situation, but it takes away from the shock factor in some situations, just looking at that glowing pink hair.
The story is presented in the normal suspense-thriller fashion, with the search for the culprit occupying the first half, and the resolution and subsequent, rampage to kill the culprits occupying the second half. However, this show takes care to tell you both sides of the story. As the humans lose control and kill all they view as suspicious, we see Shiki who fail to understand their sins, their only wish being to stay alive. They have no idea why they are being punished for living. At the same time, you see a mother's pain as her Shiki father-in-law slowly kills off her family, and her losing her grip on her sanity as her husband, mother in law, and her children is taken. It's hard hitting and true; you can easily imagine these reactions if such a thing were to occur in real life.
Final Verdict (9/10)
When I went into this show, I wasn't expecting something so deep and philosophical as Shiki is. The last vampire show I watched was Hellsing X Ultimate, which is basically the polar opposite of Shiki. It requires no brains at all; it simply involves an incredibly strong protagonist causing a sea of blood in his wake. Shiki, on the other hand, humanizes the Shiki and their fear of being ostracized and forsaken by God; while at the same time exposing the monster that lurks inside the mind of humans. We don't have the classic 'you shouldn't kill for revenge' that we see so often; Ozaki urges the people on by reminding them of their lost loved ones and telling them to massacre the Shiki in revenge. Shiki is a show that goes far from the classic formulaic anime; and it does it with such confidence and poise that you can't help but love it. When I started out, I wanted to watch Shiki as a possible anime adaptation of Salem's Lot, and while it has its similarities; by the end I am forced to accept Shiki's brilliance and accept it as not just an adaptation, but perhaps one of the most compelling versions of the classic Dracula story till date. It's not just mindless killing. It's a vampire show that requires you to question your own moralities, make your own decisions, and for me, it is the best suspense anime that I've ever seen. No, it's not fair to call it a vampire tale; it's a tale of Shiki.
