Ah, finally Ghost Hound is back after its holiday-hiatus, and it did a good job of reminding me why it turned into one of my favourite series for the fall-season. It’s so delightfully down to earth, and doesn’t try to force anything. This episode also made things even better when it finally provides lots of answers. And of course, even more questions. ^^;

First of all: the mouse finally appears! Turns out to be an experimental rat from the female scientist (name?), she uses it in this episode in an experiment where she connects the brain to a little robot, making the robot move, based on the rat’s though-patterns. Quite interesting, though I wonder whether it’ll play any future role for this series. Speaking of this doctor, the end of the episode sees her making out with Masayuki’s father. Now that I mention it, we haven’t seen the guy’s mother, have we? Perhaps that would explain why Masayuki hates his father so much, because he forcefully separated him from his mother when he divorced.

In any case, the real meat for this episode was about Makoto’s parents. It all starts when an unidentified corpse shows up in the dammed lake. News like this travels fast, especially with a bunch of psychics like Tarou and Miyako in the neighbourhood, and very soon half of the town is gathered around the site of the murder. One of these people was Makoto’s mother. I actually thought that she died as well, but it seems that they too divorced at some point. Makoto hates her as well.

After seeing this, Miyako’s father (by the way, what happened to his wife?) decided to let the main characters know a few things about his past with Makoto’s parents and the mayor, as they used to be good friends in the past. They too went to visit the old hospital, just like Makoto, Masayuki and Tarou did in episode four. At one point, they found one very strange looking entrance, where Makoto’s father was the only one who entered it. Miyako’s father and the future mayor were too scared to go in, and prevented Makoto’s mother from following her future husband. In the end, Makoto’s father ended up somewhere that made no sense at all, though I didn’t quite catch the exact spot. Still, it has to be quite strange if this is the only thing that Miyuki’s father managed to find weird about the time he spent with the guy as a teenager. Still, he doesn’t know why Makoto’s father committed suicide, but I think that the Mayor can answer those questions.

I liked the small details in this episode as well, like when Masayuki’s bullies returned with their sempai, and this sempai turning out to be the guy from the convenience-store in the previous episode. I also like how he made friends with the fourth guy, and basically involved him with the story. I don’t think anyone would have guessed that the guy would get so much screen-time when he first appeared, and just got bullied by his classmates.

Oh, and it also seems that Tarou can now transform his entire body into his out-of-body experience, instead of the strange babboon-like creatures. I also liked how when Miyuki’s father told is story, Tarou and Makoto (but not Masayuki) got sucked right into the story, as if they were there themselves. It’s interesting how Masayuki didn’t come along with them. After all, he’s probably still in babboon-form in his out-of-body experience, and apart from his little video-game weapons, he hasn’t really tried to search for the borders in these experiences, unlike Tarou, who went to the other side and Makoto, who basically has been running around as a giant ghost hound. The thing also is that we’re only halfway up the series now, so there are still lots of directions that this series can explore.

Now I know for sure: Kaiji is one of these anime that has a lot of things to like, but also quite a few points to dislike. The looks it gives at human nature are astounding. Ishida was amazing in this episode. Same with Sahara: the two of them were absolutely amazing to watch. The amazing intensity of the past few episodes is unbelievable and Tonegawa’s commentary was as fascinating as ever.

But still, don’t tell me that you didn’t see this episode coming. At one point, everyone falls off the beams at once, apart from the special Sahara, Kaiji and Ishida. When the series started, I remember noting how Kaiji was in no way special from the others. He was just another loser who wasted away his life, and I loved that part. Still, I can’t say that about this series anymore. Another problem with this series is the soap-opera-like cliff-hangers. They just don’t fit the series at all, and all they make me think is “god, not another week”, though that may be because this series is better watched as a marathon, rather than once every week.

Another small point of critique is that I didn’t quite buy the sense of balance of the characters, and how Kaiji kept his balance at all times, despite everything that happened. This is just a small detail, though. Overall, this was a very good episode, but really, the creators need to gear up the pacing very soon now. Slow pacing is just something that doesn’t fit this anime.

Spice and Wolf

So… this is what you get if you hand an award-winning novel to an animation-company like Imagin: an authentic atmosphere, interesting characters, and a main female lead who spends nearly the entire episode without any clothes whatsoever and basically ruins the entire series. Still, I do admit that this series turned out better than I originally expected. I can see the potential here in this series, and this episode also took its time in telling the story. At times, I’m just not sure whether the creators’ minds were on storytelling or cheap fanservice, and seeing their reputation (Love Love, Cosmopolitan Prayers, Smash Hit…) there is enough reason to worry about this one to fall into a fanservice-fest.

Noramimi

Ooh, this reminds me so much of Tetsuko no Tabi! Not in terms of story, but in terms of execution. The graphics again are simple and again there’s great chemistry between the characters. Basically, in this series people live together with things called mascots. Noramimi is about a sort-of dating-service company, which basically matches people and mascots so they can live together. It works quite well, but yet again, I don’t see this one getting any chance of being subbed. Still, any series that features a hamster smoking a cigarette deserves to be watched.

Hakaba Kitarou

Oh my god! Oh my god! Oh my god! I can’t believe I was wrong in my entry about Shigofumi! The best first episode of the season definitely belongs to Hakaba Kitarou, and yes, I’m serious about it. Gegege no Kitarou, which aired last year, got dull quite fast, but Hakaba Kitarou turned into a really well-done and freakish horror-series. Whether it can keep up with the same quality for the rest of the series remains another question, but still the fact remains that this episode absolutely ROCKED. If you’re tired of all the moe-shows, you should definitely give this one a chance. I LOVE what noitaminA has been doing for anime for the past few years!!!