Jigoku Shoujo

Yeah, Ren, Honne Onna and Wanyuudou love her. Oh, and the new kid whose name escapes me.

x4 I see. Thanks. It does sound somewhat interesting to me, so I'll probably start on that after I finish Betterman or get bored with it. Whichever comes first.

edited 4th Jun '11 12:49:20 AM by Thenamelesssamurai

Yamawaro. Or Kikuri (who is kind of annoying, but also kind of funny.)

That scene in Mistuganae where Ai tells Kikuri to stop pestering her and forcibly unwinds her key was actually quite funny and sweet.

Ai's almost taken Kikuri under her wing as an errant, bratty little sister.

Yeah, considering Kikuri's One-Winged Angel form in Futakomori...

^I think that was Enma-Oh asserting his possession of Kikuri; he's treating her as some kind of host.

edited 4th Jun '11 1:49:30 AM by zeroplusalpha

That was the impression I got too.

I have found myself wondering if we would ever see an Enma Ai vs Enma Oh showdown. It's not the right type of show for that, but I am curious as to how that would turn out. ("Badly", is a probably a good guess.)

I might check out the manga. It's in a more shoujo-y style, and apparently the vengeance is a bit more involved in that version, with Ai and crew doing a sort of "Mission: Impossible" con per job.

Hmm, I don't think that kind of showdown is in the spirit of the show, which is first and foremost a social commentary.

No, sure, I agree, it's just an idle flight of fancy.

There's some Buddhism in there as well. I think might be well up Aondeug's alley. I might mention it to her if I see her around #yackfest.

Also, a couple of yuri moments.

I'm a bit late to the discussion of the spider, but the spider is the most ambiguous character in the series. Is he a Complete Monster bent on dragging as many souls to Hell as possible, or is he a case of Blue-and-Orange Morality? Did he make Ai into the Hell Girl out of sadism and a desire for more souls or is it actually a punishment? Neither the anime nor the manga go into any detail about him.

first the greeting - hello to all of you! keep up the amazing work.

and then the disclaimer: i realize that it might be 2 years too late but after the first season i kinda completely forgot to follow up this anime, so after finally finishing there are few questions i am itching to ask and if anybody indulges my curiosity i will be eternally grateful. so here is where i state that my knowledge of japanese culture and mythology is limited and that is precisely what and why i would appreciate a discussion.

i'm under a distinct impression that this anime is overflowing with mythological/religious references and in advance i apologize for being overly elaborate, so here it goes:

1. jigoku - should be an underworld or more precisely the realm of the dead, all dead. so from Buddhist/Sikh perspective it should be something like Naraka combined with local afterlife beliefs. according to buddhism the length of a being's stay in a naraka is not eternal, though it is usually very long. instead, a being is born into naraka as a direct result of his or her previous karma, and resides there for a finite length of time until his karma has exhausted its cumulative effect or according chinese/japanese mythology it can also be some sort of a purgatory place which serves not only to punish but also to renew spirits ready for their next incarnation. on the other hand according to sikh beliefs one's soul is confined to xy million life cycles before taking birth as a human, the point of human life being one where one attains salvation. the idea of hell is like it comes in multiple levels, and hell itself can manifest within human life itself *(this i find relevant for story arcs of enma-ai, tsugumi, takuma, yuzuki and a bunch of other suffering wretched souls)..

from all of this i got to the conclusion of a)heaven is not a place but an award of sorts that comes to those that attain salvation throughout multiple cycles of reincarnation and b)humans that go through life disregarding the chance they had been given and drown themselves in sin for any reason whatsoever should be according to this logic pushed back to jigoku to start anew atoning for their existence. throughout all 3 seasons the only two humans fit to overcome vindictive reasoning and bear with literal hell in their lives are tsugumi and takuma. to some extent it feels like life (or greater power, maybe even enma-o?) is testing/pushing them to the ultimate limits in order to prove this.

2. enma/emma-o/yama - should be a deity that judges souls in the kingdom of the waiting dead. from there some are sent to hell, a land of eternal toil and punishment, some remain in meido for a period awaiting reincarnation and some become honored ancestors, watching over their descendants. that is one of the myths, but there are so many different ones - for instance in some stories he was the first person to die and has the power to bring dead people back to life and/or can decide when life should end. so i find him as a being that pulls the strings of life and fate in obvious as well as covert ways. also there are 4 more myths i find relevant in regard to this series:

a)there is a story where enma is tricked and subsequently replaced in the role of god of the dead by an actor he wanted to condemn to hell *(question arising from this possibility is whether the lord of hell is not the real lord of hell? or in case he is an actor could he be multitasking in different forms and for that purpose there is kikuri/spinster granny/spider roles? if so than can it be possible that enma-ai is cast as an actress in this charade of sorts?)

b)story of the first love of enma, where he tries to escape hell and falls in love with a dead woman along the way

c)the sword of enma

d)significance of a mirror - according to one of the stories when judging a sinner enma sits on a throne between two heads (don't know whose, but would love to speculate about that) and looks in a mirror that shows all of the dead persons sins and then passes a judgement accordingly. so the second arc is called 2 mirrors and my guess is that the reason behind this is because sins of any given person in this story arc reflect sins of another person and so on, like two mirrors reflecting each-other into infinity - that is to say sins reflecting each other with no beginning and no end and no hope of resolving personal grudges that spread like cancer around takuma where he is the focal point between them. or even maybe two mirrors being enma-ai and takuma reflecting their own experiences back and from each other?

from that i kinda jumped to conclusion that enma is neither good nor bad, or cruel and compassionate at the same time, and has several manifestations one of them being the grandmother weaving the threads of life/fate, but would love to hear your thoughts about it.

3. enma ai - this name sounds way too indicative to be overlooked - basically i understand it as enma+love so is she his love as in the woman he fell in love with? is she the manifestation of his heart/compassion toward humans and their predicament? or does she bear that name because despite of what it looks like she bears profound love and understanding of humans behind that expressionless eyes or to put it even more cheesy - does she bear their pain?

4. ren ichimoku - to be honest i could not dig up the proper story about the sword of enma, but i don't find it a coincidence that he was a katana. if anyone does know the story i would appreciate it. one thing also, as a sword he was subjected to severe abuse from humans being forced to bear witness and and at the same time be the weapon of execution so his life as a sword bears uncanny resemblance to the pain enma-ai bears after becoming jigoku shoujo.

5. yuzuki mikage - and for that matter the whole 3rd series. i'm not sure what is actually real in this story arc. better part of this season feels like artificial design whose sole purpose is to mislead yuzuki.

first, i don't find it strange that enma ai is back, this is a world heavily intertwined with the idea of reincarnation so if sacrificing herself for a suffering kid does not grant her a bunch of karma points, i don't know what does. but in WMG there are some very good points.

second, i don't think that the intention was to ever let yuzuki become jigoku shoujo, more than that, i think this whole arc was constructed in order for her not to (and maybe even more - to test her). now the tricky part is - was it designed by enma-ai? it looks like she goes out of her way to paint herself villain and the job as something she takes frivolously through ridiculous over-the-top scenes she shows yuzuki. doing so i think she ensures an endgame where she is the hated party and yuzuki is itching for a chance to take revenge or to finally act. so here comes the question what was enma-ai's punishment? was it actually to be separated from the people she has come to love and to rely on during past 400 years by being pushed out of her role? was it to watch another girl with a past similar to her own be forced to bear witness to the never-ending pain of human existence? could it be that the whole plot was designed as a test for yuzuki, in a manner similar to tsugumi and takuma? so yuzuki's character - all the opportunities she supposedly had (i'm not sure any of the people were actually ferried away or that she even had an opportunity) and did nothing in comparison to tsugumi who fought like hell when she was in the same position? why is that? why does she repeat the circumstances that befell her own family (does she know it subconsciously?)? could that be the reason tsugumi doesn't know how to help her? or is she aware that yuzuki is not alive? could it be that tsugumi was summoned to bear witness to yuzuki's predicament/life story? could it be that what happened at the end of first season made her realize that the meaning of this relentless cycle is to elevate/distinguish between the people who will not succumb to its pressure?

my thoughts are that there should be a 4th season that bears potential revelations..

..so, these are some thoughts that were going through my mind.. again, sorry for not being able to be more concise or if i was stating things that were obvious. anyways if you find the time to answer me/argue for or against i would sincerely appreciate it.

edited 18th Dec '13 6:32:31 PM by .niamh.