Avalon: Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Kai

Time for the review of the 2nd season. This season takes a completely different route towards the end than the 1st season. While the 1st season was horror/mystery with plenty of blood, the 2nd season has hardly any violence or horror moments and even the mystery is greatly lowered because, obviously, the mystery is being revealed.

Animation – 8/10
The animation isn’t much different than the 1st season, but it does seem a little better. Not much else to say since most of what I said for the 1st season review can count for both seasons.

Run Rika run!!! (I’m still waiting for her to fall…should happen anytime now).

Hmm…now what could they be planning?

Apparently their above plan failed…

Sound – 9/10
Once again, the sounds fit the anime and the opening theme fits what the characters are trying to do in the anime very well. Again, not much else to say.

Story – 10/10
Here is where the creators showed us their stuff. The 1st season made absolutely no sense by itself, but with this season everything comes together in a nice blood-stained package. They manage to completely get rid of the confusion in 1 episode. The 1st season is more how the main group of characters are victims while the 2nd season is how they fight back. The two seasons are very different, but they complement each other making the other better. I haven’t really given any explanation of the actual story in either of my reviews and I don’t plan on telling you now, but the mystery surrounding the town in the Higurashi universe is coming to an end.

Characters – 10/10
Considering this season is how the characters fight back against the mysterious entity, they develop much better than in the 1st season. They all learn from their mistakes from the 1st season and use their knowledge to their advantage. The biggest character change is with Rika Furude who in the 1st season isn’t any more a main character than anyone else, while in the 2nd season, she takes center stage as the MAIN character and tells what’s really going on in the village and is the key piece to stopping the mysterious entity. Hanyu is also a new character introduced with a surprisingly big part, but that’s not bad at all since she is cute. It’s a nice change from the 1st season and a well thought out idea.

Rika: Left, Hanyu: Right

Here’s another picture

…if I didn’t know better I would be wondering if there was yuri in this anime, but there isn’t so sorry to disappoint you.

Overall: Average: 9.25/10…My Score: 9.5/10 The two seasons are a great watch and I liked watching it alone my first time through and with Wej my second time through. It’s not exactly an anime you can watch over and over and never get tired of it since the mysterious aspect is gone once you finished it the first time, but if you watch it again with someone else, then it can still be interesting. The 2nd season still has the lolies and it’s fun watching them kick ass.

WHERE WHERE I’LL KILL THE BASTARD…WAIT!…I’M NOT A PEDO DAMMIT!!!

~ by Avalon on July 31, 2008.