Higurashi is one of my very FAVOURITE animes ever. I started watching this at about the time that I was starting to watch anime again (after a several year long break), and I think it really helped to springboard me into becoming a lot more aware of anime again... This is incredibly cliche, but it made me laugh, it made me cry, it moved me like no other! It also had AMAZING, perfectly fitting OPs. I listen to them always. :)
I remember I became interested in Higurashi because I had this strange sense of deja vu with the name, so I started looking it up to see what it was about....Everything said it was a "bloodbath". And me, being the girl attracted to horror stories and gore I am, decided to watch it. I wasn't expecting too much from the show when I started watching...And even by the end of the first episode I wasn't sure what to make of it. I wanted to keep watching an episode or two more to see this "bloodbath" people were talking about... And so I did. By the end of the fourth episode, I was hooked. Absolutely hooked. It was like a drug. And confused...since I didn't understand how the main character could be killed off at only episode 4 of a 26-episode series.
Yes, Higurashi is a bloodbath. It even got too much sometimes that I would have to turn away from the screen and cover my eyes! It's scary, but not just because of the gore, but because of the characters and the energy that the amazing voice actors infuse into the characters. This is one anime where there were characters I hated at the beginning of the series, and I grew to love them and feel like I knew them by the end, because every facet of them is explored throughout the series.
Throughout the series, I felt every character's hardship and pain as if they were my best friend. To see the degeneration of some of these characters from perfectly normal to a schizophrenic like state is moving and...well, enjoyable is the wrong word... But I definitely could not pull my eyes from the screen, and I finished the whole series in probably a week.
Higurashi TASTEFULLY delivers when it comes to the gore that many fans are looking for, but it goes far beyond that. The gore is just one facet of the whole series, and is more a means to an end than an actual end. The characters' motivations are what drive the storyline and not just mindless killing. If you're not weak of stomach, I definitely suggest you watch the whole series--I rarely re-watch series and this is one I've been itching to see again. The anime is even MORE chilling when you realize that the town they live in, Hinamizawa, looks the EXACT same as a real town in Japan. You don't believe me? Look it up on Youtube.
p.s. Watch it in Japanese, not English. Only the Japanese actors can do it justice. :)
