Ghost Hunt: Season 1 - Part 2

Introduction

I've found a flaw with Manga Entertainment's new release schedule. It doesn't give a lot of time to develop an appreciation for a genre, whereas the single disc releases over a year may have done. Instead, we get all of Ghost Hunt in two instalments, barely two months apart. That's barely enough time to get into the show, let alone watch other shows in the same genre to develop a more rounded appreciation. Ghost Hunt Part 2 is upon us, and I'm still no closer to liking generic ghost stories. Instead, I have to marathon through twelve more episodes for this review. I consider that fair warning to horror anime fans that they may not get the review that they are looking for.


Mai Taniyama is a high school student who revels in telling tales of the supernatural. In fact it was one day after school when she and her friends Keiko and Michiru were swapping tales of a nearby abandoned school building that she first encountered Kazuya Shibuya. It turns out that Shibuya, nicknamed Naru for his narcissistic demeanour is the head of the Shibuya Paranormal Research group, and was investigating the abandoned school building for the principal for any evidence of paranormal presence, before it could be demolished and redeveloped. But the principal hedged his bets, and also hired a shrine maiden, monk, catholic priest and medium for the same purpose. When Mai got drawn into the search, she didn't expect to become an employee of the SPR, and wind up working with Naru and the others to investigate paranormal occurrences on a part time basis.

Manga Entertainment present the concluding 12 episodes across two discs.


Disc 1

14. Forbidden Pastime, Part 1
15. Forbidden Pastime, Part 2
16. Forbidden Pastime, Part 3
17. Forbidden Pastime, Part 4
Another high school, another haunting, but this time Naru is reluctant to get involved, especially with a case that has had significant media attention. He's convinced to change his mind when the Student Council President Osamu Yasuhara makes a personal plea. There's no beating around the bush with the idea of a hoax or media notoriety when the first thing they see before they even properly start the investigation, is a spectral dog attacking some of the students. The whole school has been suffering from all manner of spiritual disturbances, and it all began, following the suicide of a 1st year named Sakauchi. But another cause quickly becomes apparent with the Ouija craze that is sweeping through the student body. But this case proves to be perplexing. While the spirit presence is undeniable, the effects on everyone obvious, Masako can't 'see' any of the spirits, exorcisms have no effect, and Mai's sixth sense, the precognitive dreams are warning her in no uncertain terms to leave. This will be the SPR's toughest test yet.


18. The Blood Stained Labyrinth, Part 1
19. The Blood Stained Labyrinth, Part 2

Disc 2

20. The Blood Stained Labyrinth, Part 3
21. The Blood Stained Labyrinth, Part 4
The SPR are called to a palatial, but abandoned mansion to investigate some unexplained disappearances. The client is a man named Ohashi, but when it becomes clear just who he is representing, the reason for discretion becomes clear. What's harder to explain is why the leader of the SPR is Osamu Yasuhara all of a sudden. Given the nature of the job, and with a rival research team called in, Naru believes that a low profile will be more beneficial, which is why he has called in their previous client for a favour. But this mansion is truly sinister. First a child went missing in its complex of rooms and corridors, then a fireman sent in to find the boy vanished. The more they learn about the history of the place, the more ominous it becomes. A university professor named Igarashi conducts a séance, and then her assistant vanishes. The rival Minami group doesn't seem all that capable, especially when one of their number disappears, and renowned clairvoyant Oliver Davis seems flummoxed. Meanwhile, Mai's dreams have been looking to the Saw movies for inspiration.


22. The Cursed House, Part 1
23. The Cursed House, Part 2
24. The Cursed House, Part 3
25. The Cursed House, Part 4
A worried uncle brings his niece into the SPR offices, and he has good reason, given the ligature marks around her neck, and the worrying message raised in red welts on her back. The Yoshimi family has suffered under a curse for centuries. Whenever the head of family dies, the next generation suffers a horrific tragedy. The current head of family has just passed on, and his children and grandchildren are all fearful. The SPR are invited to the family inn, perched on a seaside cliff, to investigate. What they aren't told is that the curse also affects anyone else who happens to be staying at the inn during the period. It gets worse. Practically the first thing that happens is that they try exorcising one of the brothers, only for the vengeful spirit to possess Naru. Now the team have to work without their leader, as he's kept sedated to protect himself and everyone else. The Yoshimi children are all acting utterly bizarrely, and Mai is dreaming of a suicide pact with Naru.

Picture

Ghost Hunt gets a 1.78:1 anamorphic transfer, but unfortunately it's one that is afflicted by signs of an NTSC-PAL conversion more than most. The image is as clear and sharp as you would expect for such, with strong colours and no signs of ghosting. What are a little more than just niggles though, are the jerky pans and scrolls. There are quite a few scrolls and pans in this show, and the screen always feels like it's stuttering during these moments. It has to be said that the jerkiness isn't quite as glaring as in the first set, but it's still an annoying flaw in an otherwise decent transfer.

The animation is a tale of two halves really. The character designs are pleasant, if a little generic, and there's not a lot of budget spent on making them move. It's very much a static, talky piece, with a low frame count and not a lot of dynamism to it. That said, the character designs are easy on the eye, and there's more than a little effort put into making the world design distinctive, and keeping an attention to detail. Also, atmosphere plays a large part in this show, so mood, shadow and lighting have a significant effect. They may not move all that much, but the characters appear in the best light. Where the cel-animation is limited, that is more than compensated for in the digital effects. Editing is sharp and creative, there's plenty of use of devices like filters, negatives, split screen and so on, all to give the show an energy and pace that just the animation alone could never do. It's really quite effective. We get a new opening sequence for this collection of episodes with added spookiness.

Sound

You have a choice between DD 2.0 English and Japanese, alongside a sole translated English subtitles track. Manga Entertainment have apparently stripped out the signs only track that is usually standard on R1 Funimation releases. The audio is nice and clear, with a degree of ambience if you let prologic work its magic. Unlike most anime releases, Ghost Hunt gets orchestral instrumental pieces for its opening and closing themes, and very effective they are too, with just the right degree of Danny Elfman homage to them, to get you in the mood for the spookiness that is about to ensue. As always I prefer the Japanese version, and in this case it's recommended if you want to avoid a painfully bad Aussie accent for John Brown in the English dub, but other than the Aussie, it's pretty much par for the course for anime these days.

Just as in the recent Ouran High School Host Club Part 2 release, Ghost Hunt Part 2 definitely doesn't have dubtitles. However there are instances where subtitles appear for dialogue not spoken in the Japanese version, but for English language dialogue. But the subtitles offer the gist of the English dialogue, not an exact copy of it. Weird!

Extras

All the extras are on disc 2, but really only amount to 5 pages of the Del Rey manga to look at, trailers for Jyu-Oh-Sei, xxxHolic, and Black Blood Brothers, brief profiles for eleven of the characters, and a 60 second ghostly slideshow gallery.

Once again we miss out on a textless opening sequence that American customers got, and in this instance it would have been a nice inclusion.

Conclusion

The second half of Ghost Hunt is upon us, and it's as if I was watching a completely different show, a better show. This second half encompasses three complete stories, each of four episodes in length, and these stories are in a completely different league from what came before. If the first thirteen episodes of Ghost Hunt were Scooby Doo, these twelve are the X Files, and it's all the better for it. The mysteries are more complex, the stakes are much higher, and there is a palpable sense of danger throughout, something that was lacking in the first half. You could say that Mai completed her training in those earlier stories, before moving onto the real thing here.


I must admit that my heart did sink initially with Forbidden Pastime, as it seemed at face value just a rehash of previously covered themes, with bizarre occurrences in a high school for what must be the third time in the series. However the Rokyuro High School is unlike the previous two adventures. Practically the first thing that the team witnesses is a black spirit shaped like a dog attacking and terrorising students. It also turns out to be a convergence of various spiritual phenomena combining in an unexpected way to cause problems, and it turns out to be something that neither of them can solve alone. Then the phenomena physically attack the investigators.


That was really just a taster of what is yet to come, as after this, lives truly are at stake when they visit The Bloodstained Labyrinth in order to exorcise the demons within. People have already died when they are invited to investigate, and there seems to be no letup in body count when they do arrive. This has to be my favourite story of the series, starting off with ominous chills, with a scene reminiscent of the Saw movies, and eerie distressed voices echoing through a blood splattered room. It's a death trap of a house that they are in, and the investigation twists and turns in unexpected and unsettling directions.


The final story is almost as good, as the group try and help a family afflicted with a lethal curse. Here, with the spirits just as liable to possess the bodies of those they want to kill, the SPR are torn between helping and battling the very people they have been asked to protect. It gets much worse when Naru himself is possessed, and for reasons that are revealed in the episode, he has to be sedated to protect both himself, and everyone else around him. For most of this episode, he is out of the picture, and it's up to everyone else to step up to the mark to battle the psychic threat. The Monk Hosho Takigawa shows his leadership skills, and Mai also takes on a lot of responsibility in the investigation.


Of course I'm leaving out all the juicy bits, you'll have to watch the episodes yourself to see just how good it all gets. It becomes clear that the first half of the series was really more about character development and having fun, but that pays off here, as we come to care about the characters and have a vested interest in their well being. I have to admit that on more than one occasion with this set, I was at the edge of my seat, heart in my mouth, gnawing on my fingernails. Not because of the spooks, or the j-horror conventions, but because certain characters had been developed over the previous five or six hours, I had gotten to know them and had invested in them, and seeing them in peril was actually a little distressing. The cliffhanger at the end of episode 19 gave me more of a scare than any horror movie has in the last ten years, even though I already knew how it would be resolved. I just didn't like seeing the character in that sort of situation, and that's something few slasher pics can accomplish in their ninety-odd minute runtimes. The way that Ghost Hunt unfolds means that it has the space to work with these moments, leaven them with bits of levity and character comedy that don't seem out of place.


There is character development in this half as well, with Naru's assistant Lin getting some much needed attention. I also love the dual nature of Naru and Mai's relationship, and the two actually butt heads on a couple of occasions when Naru's cold and aloof nature rubs Mai the wrong way, and a couple of decisions he makes completely offend her. She gives as good as she gets, and it's interesting to see Naru taken aback on occasion, and forced to re-evaluate his approach to a case.


The flaws that I mentioned in the first half are still apparent here; it's just that the quality of the stories and the added peril diminishes their relevance. And when all is said and done, these are still horror stories, still not a genre I take all that seriously. Clichés do abound, ouija boards, séances, curses, vampires, zombies and scary children (Ok, the scary children do get to me), and Ghost Hunt works best when the threat is understated to the point of subliminal. There are points where the spooks become a little too corporeal, and I find them hard to take seriously. That's usually at the climax of a story, which isn't too good for me, and I find I appreciate these stories more for the build up and the mystery, than I do for the solutions.


It's also an anime adaptation of an ongoing manga, which means that while the stories are complete and there is a tangible ending, there are still one or two loose ends that need tying up, most notably Mai and Naru's relationship, and the exact meaning of her dreams. It won't be tied up in anime form, but it does compel me to seek out the manga. Ghost Hunt Part 2 is much better than Part 1, and if you are a fan of anime who likes things that go bump in the night, you'd be well advised to have this collection on a shelf somewhere. The stories are complete in and of themselves, but Part 1 would be useful in addition to this, to see the characters develop and to form an attachment to them.