Yes, this show is meant for children. And thus, it suffers from the flaws most of the children-shows suffer from. Laharl just wanders around aimlessly and runs into random things for no apparent reason. At least, the bad guy (girl in this case) is the only one who knows this reason, as she’s apparently been waiting for him. The fights are also extremely simple. One slash or one blow and it’s over. Ah well, at least it beats Bleach’s fights. The characters also like to sing and act at random times (look back to episode three, and this episode had Laharl imitating an old Japanese-theatre). Characters also don’t need reasons, and when they do, they usually are based out of boredom (still, in Laharl’s case, they do give him a character). It also works with lots of reused-scenes. Especially the ones reused 20 times can get a bit on my nerves.

Still, the fact that it’s a children’s show also has a few good signs. To begin with, the repetition really works at times. Just take a look at Mid-Boss’ ramblings, Sardia’s continious use of the word ‘maybe’, and Etna’s struggles to not being found out by Laharl. I also notice that persons are incredibly dependant on each other. It offers a nice variation when compared to all the other anime, which try to make their characters as independant as possible. I especially love Etna in this issue. She wants the king dead, but still she clings to him for protection. It’s so cute to see. It’s also a good thing that this show knows that it’s horribly predictable, as it makes use of this at times. I’m referring to the dinner-scene. The scene’s so obvious, and Etna indeed makes indeed a comment about this, and how he’s the easiest to poison in the entire demon-world. This is quite funny, as she was the one who poisoned him in the first place.

Also, because we’re dealing with a children’s show, the art of the backgrounds has become a little brighter. Combine that with the fact that this show’s supposed to play in hell, and you get an interesting concept, which really shows. A dark forest is suddenly vibrant with colors, the desert has been more yellow than it ever was, giving it a very warm feeling, and a small lake really contrasts well with its blue water against the green grass. I found myself enjoying these backgrounds whenever a scene was taking place outside.

Makai Senki Disgaea is indeed not the best anime out there, but I love the characters somehow. They’re all like a couple of little children, with each of them trying to be something. In Laharl’s case, he wants to be cool. In Etna’s case, she wants to be with Laharl, though she tries to deny it completely. In Flonna’s case, she wants Laharl to learn about the beauties of life, even though she doesn’t understand these herself yet. These characters are each so adorable to watch, even though the show itself might be totally ridiculous.

Now that I found out about the premisse of the show, a lot of questions are suddenly answered. What we have here, is a story, that keeps repeating over the same timeline, though each time, the characters take different actions, which lead to different results, and in the end, different people getting killed.

While the last arc was focused on Keiichi and Rena, it seems that this arc will be focused on Keiichi and Mion. It also seems that Rika, the blue-haired girl, will play some kind of role, as we see her killing herself in the preview of this arc. I’m not too happy about the creators showing this. It spoils a bit too much, in my opinion, and it takes away a bit of the power of the scene.

I’m wondering if there’ll also be arcs at which Keiichi won’t be the one to play the role of main-character. It’d give some interesting perspective, but then again, I think that each of the other characters has her own mystery, so that idea also has some backfires.

Anyway, this episode, we are introduced to another character: Shion, Mion’s younger twin sister. This also explains the two mions next to each other in the still amazing OP. Both of them have total different personalities, and it seems that in this arc, both of them have fallen in love with Keiichi. I had a good time watching Keiichi, who originally believed that Mion and Shion were the same person, suddenly became aware that there were two of them.

I also had to get used to the fact that Rena’ll probably play a small role in this arc, so there’ll be no paranoia attacks from her for a while, in huge contrast to the previous arcs. We also get our first small part of information about Rika: she may look cute, but in fact, she’s really strong. Keiichi may not like this in future episodes.

This episode was, with ease, the quietest one of Higurashi no Naku Koro ni yet, though I think that each beginning of an arc will be like this. I wonder what the Watanagashi will bring us this time. (Interesting note the only total similarity with the previous arc so far was Rika abandoning the club-meeting to practice for her role at that time).

Hmm, for some reason, the creators like to put Syaoran in the middle of explosions right before the cliffhanger. That’s the second time in two episodes he’s doing that.

Anyway, either Shougo or Nokoru is the culprit, or the both of them are involved, that can also be. The other contestants don’t have any introduction whatsoever, and I don’t see Ryuuoh being any form of bad guy, after what happened this episode. Tomoyo’s probably also involved, though I do believe that she’s still on the good side. She probably used the feather as prize to lure out a couple of criminals, because of the moment she said that certain people took the bait. Still, I wonder who this bad guy might be, who keeps pulling all of these traps.

This arc was very cleverly built up. Last time, we saw a number of people finishing the preliminaries, and qualifying for the race, but apart from Syaoran, Sakura, Kyrogane and Fye, we didn’t learn anything yet about their personalities, and who was important and who wasn’t. The introductions of the three most important contestants only followed this episode. Another interesting thing is, that even though the other contestants haven’t been introduced, you know about their personalities a bit, from the previous arcs. This way, they don’t fall like random goons, so you do feel that our protagonists are racing against other human beings. A very clever trick from the creators.

About the race: for some reason, the musicians managed to create the perfect background music to accompany it. It sounded awesome, just like last episode, and when you combine it with the other events, ranging from Kurogane getting angry because the announcer keeps calling him Kuro-tan and him and Fye finding out about how the first checkpoint works to Syaoran trying to accompany Sakura, who hasn’t mastered the flying cars yet and Shougo being the first one, along with a random contestant to clear the second checkpoint. I love it how the side-characters all get to play a very subtle role in this race, instead of being fated to go under. You also see that the best one range among the best, and the lesser ones are also the first to fall (the best example for this is the wizard from the second arc in the first season).

So far, this series hasn’t been disappointing. It shows huge premisse, both for the next episode as for the show in general. I’ve got a small issue with some coincidences which seem a bit too coincidental, though it was to be expected, as the first series suffered from this as well.

This episode wasn’t as serious as the previous ones, it was a bit more relaxed. here weren’t any serious problems like in the previous episodes, and it basically consisted of telling the story of two supernatural foxes, a lucky arrow and Shiritori.

We start out with Watanuki and Himawari attending one of Domeki’s arrow-shooting tournaments. Domeki wins, and he gives Watanuki the end of his winning arrow, as a memento. Watanuki, of course, doesn’t like this. When he walks to Yuuko’s place in order to make her some food, he runs into a strange food-stand, and two badly drawn human-like foxes. One old, and one just a child.

He eats a bit from their stand, and gives the small fox Domeki’s arrow, which appears to be a strong fortune-bringer, keeping away evil spirits (this is logical, as it comes from Domeki, after all). The food appears to taste delicious. Watanuki then remembers that Yuuko’s still waiting for him to make her food, so he leaves. The foxes give him a little meal as thanks for the arrow.

Yuuko, of course, has run into the foxes before, as she’s totally excited when Watanuki brings their food. This has to be, of course, celebrated, involving lots of sake. We also see a couple of screens of a nearly full-moon, meaning that the next night’ll probably feature a full one.

The next day, Yuuko requests Watanuki to go back to the foxes and deliver a package (remember her policies? ^^). Though, as it will be full moon, such as hinted, in combination with friday the thirteenth, and Watanuki’s little problem, he has to be very careful. Therefore, she gives him a little backpack with wings. I don’t know where I’ve seen this, but I got a serious deja-vue with this item.

Anyway, Watanuki heads out, and indeed, he runs into evil spirits, cleverly disguised as poorly-placed shadows. The backpack seemed to contain Mokona, who starts playing Shiritori. Shiritori works like this: you start with a japanese word, and the person next to you has to say another word, beginning with the same letter the first one ended with. This seems to repel all of the evil spirits, though Mokona can’t resist to make Watanuki’s job hard by ending all of his (her? what kind of gender is Mokona actually?) words with “Ri”. We also see Mokona for the first time serious, well, at least semi-serious. I have to say that I liked this play of Shiritori, while running away from the evil spirits.

They arrive at the fox, and then it became clear that Shiritori originated from people who had to walk through evil forest-like surroundings. The Shiritori would keep away all of the evil spirits and danger. Yuuko’s package appeared to be two rare shadow-birds, who only seem to appear in the light of the full moon. The old fox seems to be quite fond of them.

For a laid-back episode like this, I liked it. xxxHolic seems to be following the same pattern Jigoku Shoujo and Mushishi did, only with a lot more emphasis on the main characters, so laid-back episodes seem to be perfect to have been included once in a while.