Review: Ookami Kakushi

Episode Reviewed In: Episode 33

Alternate Titles: Spirited Away by the Wolf

Original Japanese Release Date: January 7th, 2010

Episode Length/Run-time: 13

Summary:

A boy named Hiroshi moves in with the handicapped sister and his father to a city known as Jouga.   There are rumors that a species of large , dangerous wolves lived in the area long ago, which Hiroshi’s father is very interested in studying.  However, it soon becomes apparent that something is not right as people in the town start disappearing.

Review:

This series suffers from a number of problems that result in it being merely an average anime at best.  The first problem is the pacing of the series.  This show does almost NOTHING in the first 5 episodes.  That is almost half of the series!  Even the climax at the end of the series feels rather week and I almost found myself rooting for the villain in this one simply because I wanted to see everybody die. <.<

The characters in the show aren’t much better.  Hiroshi for some reason is giving off this pheromone that the people in the village just cannot resist.  You learn the reason for this but early on, it just looks like an excuse to put some fanservice into the show where it really REALLY doesn’t belong.  In addition, Hiroshi is one of the weakest protagonists I have ever seen.  His character is useless.  He does literally nothing in any of the shows more “dire” situations.  I definitely wanted him to die in the end.

One thing that the series does do well is its atmosphere and setting.  The setting of the show is quite rich and the atmosphere has this eerie feel because you know something bad is out there lurking in the darkness and for some reason, despite all of the show’s shortcomings, you just want to wait and find out what’s going on.  One thing I will mention that disappointed me was that in the trailers for the show there is a girl with a scythe that apparently kills things in the series.  However, I must say that she does this in just about the most boring way possible.  What this does is really ruin the tension built up by certain scenes in the series.  They all just end very boringly and largely in the same way.

In the end, it’s an average series.  It’s very slow so if you aren’t patient I would pass it up, however the animation, character designs and music are fairly nice so aesthetically I’d give it a pass.  Overall, you can find better anime to watch in all likelihood.