天下制覇

No Za Worldo! *sigh*

Impressions:

First off, yes yes, they announced a third season. Of what… I’m not entirely sure. Maybe they’ll animate the Daybreak stuff, or are just looking to milk this cash cow as much as possible before its udder turns into a dried leather sack. I imagine they’re also looking for a way to drag Natsumi and Akira into it too. Or maybe they’re just calling the live action version the third season. Who knows. All I know is that this cow probably can’t hold out for too much longer.

I’m a bit disappointed that they went back to Hanyuu for the miracle bullet thing. In the original story, back in the previous "Takano kills everybody" chapter, Hanyuu tried to use her powers to stop a bullet and failed (hence knowing her powers are weakening and hence her manifesting). Then, at the end of this one, Rika ends up being the one to stop time and pluck the bullet out of the air. I suppose without the setup of Hanyuu failing, Rika using her powers would have had less impact, but it was still a somewhat more subtle event than "gunfire-DEMON EYES-bullet sails clear."

It wasn’t a bad ending, but it was fairly anti-climactic, which seemed to be the theme for this last arc. Everything went more or less perfectly, and even an elite squad of heavily armed men was chased off by a single unarmed detective. All that, plus I get to feel justified about complaining that Takano’s sad past gets diluted/partially wiped away by the fact that she’s got the Hinamizawa syndrome. Being crazy just isn’t enough… let’s also see if we can’t make her a doubly tragic character by making her have a virus that makes you crazy as well. You’d think that the hospital would at least run regular scans on their personnel who are in contact with a highly dangerous virus every day, but apparently 1983 is not up to date on their health codes.

Don’t even get me started on the last little bit at the very end either, indicating that none of this will ever happen. This is why we can’t have nice things, like time travel. Stop mucking up the space-time continuum, damn it.

Final thoughts at the end.

Akasaka grits his teeth and accelerates. Before the bazookateer can fire, he’s taken down by a sniper. The remaining men in the van open fire, but the car is apparently bulletproof and speeds right past. Shion happily remarks that this is the Sonozaki’s power as Kasai continues sniping at them. The Yamainu try to give chase, but their tires are shot out.

In the neighboring town, Tomitake calls in the Banken from a public phone. Akasaka wonders if they’ll be enough, but Tomitake tells him that it’ll be fine. They wonder what to do next. Akasaka wants to go back to Hinamizawa. He promised to protect Rika. Tomitake says that he’ll go with him as well.

Okonogi runs through the forest. His men are exhausted, so he tells them that they can head back. Takano catches up as they’re leaving and gets pissed.

Okonogi says that they don’t need them, and Takano looks up to see the kids standing on the hill above. She immediately orders Okonogi to seize them, but he tells her to shut up.

He shouts up to the kids, saying that he’s the leader of the Yamainu and asks them their leader. Mion steps forward. Okonogi tells her that this fight is their’s. Takano gets increasingly pissed. Okonogi tells them that things have been reprioritized, and that he’s impressed by them. Mion laughs and announces that they’re the aces of Hinamizawa, complete with giving everybody their titles, half in English.

Okonogi thinks this is hilarious. Takano orders her to eliminate them again. Okonogi looks back, but then says that he can’t go against a direct order from their princess, and pulls his gun. The kids immediately crowd around Rika.

A copter flies overhead and announces that the Yamainu are to surrender immediately. Okonogi lowers his gun and walks off. Soldiers start rapelling out of the copter and deploying. Satoko thinks that it’s all over, but Rika doesn’t know. Akasaka calls out to Rika and she leaps from the hilltop into his arms, crying all the while. Akasaka tells them that everybody else is fine too.

He also says that ‘the boy’ is fine too. Satoko is confused, but Rika is happy for her. Keiichi suddenly notices that Hanyuu is missing.

Elsewhere, Takano and Okonogi are arguing. He tells her that the Banken outclass the Yamainu and there’s no use fighting them. Takano can’t believe it, and he further explains that it’s Tomitake’s connections that got the Banken involved. Okonogi gets a report, telling him that the situation is hopeless. He orders his troops to stand down and surrender peacefully.

Takano gets even more pissed, telling them that they can’t leave Rika alive. Okonogi says that they can’t win, and it doesn’t matter anyway. He takes her notes and throws them aside. Takano chases after them, saying that they’re the future. Okonogi doesn’t care and reveals that nobody believes that, not him not Tokyo.

He hands her a gun with a single bullet and tells her all about Tokyo’s actual plans, that they were using her all along, not trying to further her research. Takano breaks down in tears. He tells her that she should know what to do. In her  despair, she starts clawing at her throat. Okonogi takes out his gun and shoots the area around her, sending her fleeing in tears.

The Banken have the last of the Yamainu in custody and are just missing Takano.

She runs through the forest and trips, sending her notes flying. It starts to rain and she stumbles onward, still clawing at her throat. Hanyuu appears in front of her, demanding to know what she wanted. Takano tearfully says that she just wanted her happy life while remembering her childhood. He throat is becoming raw and torn.

She looks at the gun while Hanyuu tells her that there are some sins that are unforgiveable, but sometimes you still have to try because the unforgiveable can be forgiven. Possibly. It was rather philosophical for a horned little loli.

The rest of the kids run up, and Takano loses the fear from her eyes. She levels her gun at the crowd and demands that the leader step forward. Mion wordlessly walks to the front. Takano goes even more crazy, saying that she has been forgiven, but she can’t let things stay like this, that’d just be too sad.

Wet Mion spreads her arms and tells Takano that she’ll protect them all. None of her companions will fall to Takano’s folly. Everybody is scared for Mion, but she tells them to stay behind her. Takano wonders what the stakes should be for this game. Takano starts going on about the rules for the game. She’s in full-on crazy mode.

Hanyuu steps in front of Mion, saying that it’s over. Rika is surprised, but Hanyuu reverts to ‘human’ mode and thanks Rika for everything they had together, their happiness, the fun, everything.

She goes back to demon mode and tells Takano to shoot. Takano fires, but the bullet is deflected right in front of Hanyuu’s face.

Everybody is amazed. Takano collapses in defeat. Rika tells her that it was never a game. Because Hanyuu and them took it seriously and fought to their utmost, they were able to create a miracle.

The Banken arrive and take Takano into custody.

She starts scratching at her throat again. As they carry her off, she tries to grab her scrapbook. Tomitake and Akasaka arrive, telling them that she’s displaying advanced levels of the Hinamizawa syndrome and needs to be treated. The Banken pull away, surprised. Tomitake takes her into his arms and she sobs openly.

Rika looks up, and announces that today is the Watanagashi Festival.

At the festival, Mion fails to get the big bear, so she shoot Keiichi instead. Everybody rushes off to the shrine to watch the ceremony.

Rika does her little shrine maiden dance while the ED plays.

Shion meets up with the rest at the cotton ceremony.

The next day, Hanyuu and Rika are woken up by Satoko. Rika gets up and goes to the calender. She happily tears away the page. She and Hanyuu laugh in joy as it finally reaches July 1st, 1983.

Miyoko runs from her house. She slams into a long haired woman.

The woman wonders if the person here will live or die. Miyoko thinks that she’s just making things up. Miyoko runs back to her parents, but asks the woman what she meant. The woman tells her that she’s a bully, so she won’t tell Miyoko. Miyoko isn’t scared though, because she’ll always be with her parents.

Miyoko and her parents wait at the bus station. As expected, the driver has a heart attack and the bus crashes.

Miyoko opens up her box of flags and puts another one in. Her mother’s voice calls her from downstairs. Outside, the woman smiles and walks away.

Final Thoughts:

I was never a huge fan of Higurashi in general and if you remember way back to the start, somebody else was supposed to be writing this for me. I ended up taking it over since every other blogger who was covering it with any sort of speed aside from myself and Hinano disappeared for reasons I don’t really understand. Still, I did like the direction this season took a lot more than the previous one. Things were a lot more cohesive and since the main goal was to make things try to make sense, there was a lot fewer attempts at mindfuckery. Yeah, it was a huge ret-con for the most part, but at least they just overwrote the continuity errors instead of adding to them. The later parts of Minagoroshi were especially delightful.

Overall, it was mostly enjoyable, but I certainly could have done with far far less posturing and philosophical ramblings about miracles. I swear, if you string every speech about fighting for a miracle back to back, then you probably have at least two or three episodes of that alone. I still absolutely despise them giving Takano the virus instead of just letting her be a normal crazy villain, but what can you do? Apparently there’s hope for everybody in Hinamizawa, even crazy mass-murdering nurses. Well, aside from the "Takano gets a happy life" ending. Oi.