ykling - 2013-07-19 20:50:42

Ookami Kakushi was written by Ryukishi07, best known for Higurashi no Naku Koro Ni. That should pretty much tell you what to expect, since Ookami Kakushi is an obvious, shameless clone of its considerably superior ancestor.The premise goes as follows. Hiroshi Kuzumi, an unlikeable, spineless milquetoast, moves to a town known as Jouga with his occult fanatic father and annoying Tsundere sister, who is in a wheelchair for reasons that are never given passing explanation in the series. As they are moving in, Hiroshi meets the love interest, Isuzu Tsumuhana, who is supposed to be this series' Rena Ryuuguu despite having none of the likeability or humour that the Higurashi character possesses. For some bizarre reason, Isuzu is obsessed with Hiro, and the rest of Hiroshi's new class follows suit. However, one of them seems a little too attached, and begins to act strangely... then, we see a scene with him being killed by a girl with a scythe. The next morning, a girl who looks an awful lot like the girl with the scythe tells the class that he has "Transferred". Could it be that this town has a dark secret?If any of this is sounding familiar to you, then you've probably watched Higurashi, because this show is an absolute cut 'n' paste of it, only without any of the charm that made Higurashi great. It lacks the audience mindfuck that Higurashi gave us, completely misunderstands Higurashi's visual style, using all the creepy effects in all the wrong environments, and what seemed loveable there just feels stupid here. It doesn't help that almost every character here is completely unlikeable, being given little to no personality, backstory, or charisma, with only the villain having the latter trait making him somewhat likeable. And even that is hindered by the fact that his motivation is quite generic, and his plan makes no sense.On top of that, while Higurashi did a good job of tying up the loose ends (with only a couple of details left out, both of which were in the manga/VNs and relatively unimportant to the overall plot), Ookami Kakushi leaves several loose ends, for example, the aforementioned one with the wheelchair, and a character who is hinted to have some kind of disease that is never explained.The only thing that really redeem this show are the aforementioned antagonist, a relatively decent soundtrack, and the 12th episode, which is a random self-parody special taking place after all the plot is said and done. While it does come off as an enourmous BLAM Episode, it's still considerably more enjoyable than the remainder of this highly sub-par series.Final Words: A shameless ripoff of Higurashi, with none of what made Higurashi good.Animation/Graphics: 4/10Story/Plot: 1/10Music/Background: 7/10Overall: 2/10For Fans Of: Higurashi no Naku Koro Ni, Umineko No Naku Koro Ni