"O miserable shadow clad in darkness! Hurting and disdaining people, a karmic soul drowning in sin...Would you try dying for once?"Jigoku Shōjo, also known as Girl From Hell or also known as Hell Girl, is an anime series, produced by Aniplex and Studio Deen. It premiered across Japan on the anime satellite television network, Animax, between October 4, 2005, and April 4, 2006. Following the success of the first season, the series was followed soon after into a second, Jigoku Shōjo Futakomori, which premiered October 7, 2006 across Japan on Animax. A live-action version started airing in Japan on November 4.
Story
"At midnight every night, you can access Jigoku Tsūshin online. If you type in the name of someone who you have a grudge against there, Jigoku Shōjo will appear and send that person to hell. Rumors of the site spread among children living in cities. However, no one speaks of one thing, that you must make a contract with the Jigoku Shōjo to carry out revenge against your grudge."
The series is mainly a collection of short stories. Each of them describes the suffering of a different individual caused by one or more antagonist, and the subsequent punishment inflicted on the antagonists with the help of Enma Ai, aka the "Jigoku Shōjo" (Hell Girl).
During each story, the protagonists' dramas are explained in detail from the start of their grudges, through the escalation of their torment until it becomes unbearable and they resort to the "Jigoku Tsūshin"(correspondence with Hell)- a mysterious black colored web site only accessible at midnight. The contents of the site are only a text: We will take revenge on your behalf.", a text box where the grudge's object must be written, and a "Send" button. Some time after the post, they are visited by Enma Ai, a young red eyed girl wearing a traditional sailor school uniform. She delivers them a black straw doll (In the second season, the doll may also be red or dark blue depending on who turns into it) with a red string tied to its neck, and she tells them that if they want their vengeance to be delivered, they must remove the string from the doll, and their enemies will be immediately taken to Hell. However, a crest shaped mark will appear on the protagonists' chests, always reminding them that after their lives come to an end, they must give compensation by having their own souls also sent to Hell.
Enma Ai doesn't work alone. She lives in a house in an unknown world that is in eternal sunset with her grandmother who orders her around and whose face never appears. Ai also counts on the help of her three assistants. When they are not under her services, they stay in the form of three straw dolls, otherwise they assume the form of Ichimoku Ren, a handsome young man in casual clothes, Hone-Onna, a beautiful woman wearing a kimono and Wanyūdō, an old man wearing a hat and a red scarf. They help her during the event when their victims are confronted with their own sins, prior to the moment when Ai (dressed in traditional kimono with floral patterns) ferries them to hell. Also, the trio helps her investigate the true nature of their cases when something seems suspicious.
In episode 8 of the series, two other recurring characters are introduced: A journalist named Shibata Hajime who is investigating the stories involving the Jigoku Shōjo, and his daughter Tsugumi. After an encounter with Enma Ai, Tsugumi starts to have visions of what Ai sees and thus the two become more and more involved in Ai's matters. The fact is Hajime doesn't agree with Ai's methods; he believes people should solve their problems by other means than resorting to vengeance, and tries to stop those who contracted to the Jigoku Shōjo from sending their grudges to Hell with Tsugumi's help. As the story progresses, Tsugumi begins to question if Ai's ways are as wrong as her father believes, but little do they know about the true reason why their thoughts are connected.
It turns out that Hajime and Tsugumi were the descendant of a man named Sentaro Shibata. Sentaro and Ai were very close friends and were cousins. Because of Ai's powers, she was hated and feared among the villagers in the village that they lived in. When it was time to sacrifice a seven year old child for the mountain god, Ai was chosen. Sentaro was enraged when he knew she was to be sacrificed to the mountain god, and argued that she was chosen on purpose because of her powers. Therefore, he and Ai's parents decided to hide her instead. This went perfectly well for about 6 years. During those years, there was a great famine and the villagers were terrified. They thought that the mountain god was angry at them.
Then the terrible day arrived. While Ai and Sentaro were having fun in the water, the village men that had bullied Ai in the past caught them and brought them to the village. They tied up Ai and her parents and knocked them out. After that, they threw them in a pit and forced Sentaro to bury them as repentance. Ai was conscious at this time and felt betrayed by him, as he has sworn to protect her. As he ran away from the confusion, the villagers buried Ai.
After Ai was buried, Sentaro woke one night, and went in the fields for a walk. When he returned, he saw the whole village burning and in the fire was Ai, singing a song they used to sing (it was cute when they sang it but scary when she sings it in this scene) while setting the houses on fire. Out of insanity and guilt, Sentaro ran away, never to be seen again.
Having failed to directly kill Hajime and Tsugumi, Ai decided to settle the score using Tsugumi's dead mother. After showing how her mother died and her father's denial of his responsibility, Tsugumi was left shaken and unsure. While Ai kept pressing her on to pull the string, Hajime came just in time for another trip to the past. This time, he admitted his faults and told Tsugumi to pull the string. The angered Tsugumi threw her arms around her father and after a few tearful moments, she returned the straw doll back to Ai and said she didn't need it, which in turn moved Ai to let go of the grudge against the Shibata family. At that realization, she incinerated the temple that Sentaro built for her as a symbol of regret. The season ends with Hajime and Tsugumi going back to normality and Ai continuing what she's been doing for centuries - sending people to hell.
Season 2 of Jigoku Shōjo (named Jigoku Shōjo Futakomori) started by revealing that Ai is to be punished by hell for the massacre of her village. If she refuses, her parents shall wonder in darkness for eternity. It was known that her punishment is to deliver the vengeance of others.
In the beginning of season 2, there is a mysterious girl who shows up in glimpses during the first episode that has a kimono similar to Ai's and seems to smile after the people who make the covenant review their situation, as in episode 1 where she appears just after Ai walks away. After episode 4 the girl's name is revealed to be Kikuri.
In season 2, the origins of Ai's assistants are revealed.
The major arc of season 2 revolves around Takuma Kurebayashi, a boy from Lovely Hills who is blamed by his townfolks for causing dissapearances around the town, which was actually caused by the villagers who used Jigoku Tsūshin. The unfair treatment received by Takuma from his townfolks awoke Ai's memory of her own past and she refuses a request to send Takuma to hell. By doing so, Ai has broken the law of Hell and her role as Jigoku Shōjo was relieved. Nonetheless, as she is relieved of her duty, she is returned to life by the cruel Lord of Hell and sent back to the real world in a near death situation, experiencing the aging of 400 years all at once. Ren, Onna, and Wanyuudou tried to help the mortal Ai, only to discover that her memories of them have been erased by the Lord of Hell.
Ai tries to stop the villagers from killing Takuma and succeed for the moment. However, a frightened user of the Jigoku Tsūshin, in hope of saving himself from going to hell when he dies, beats Ai in the back of her head with a shovel. Other townfolks of Lovely Hills, all whom have used her service, joins in with the assault in a fit of rage. As Ai succumbs to her death, in a relieved way, says, "This is the end." She disappears into a wind of Sakura shortly after death and her parents' souls are set free from Hell. Kikuri, on the boat (the one to Hell), says as she pokes a cherry of the color of Ai's eyes in a childish way: "It's over. That was Ai's answer...Well done." The season ends Ren, Onna, and Wanyuudou going their separate ways in the real world, Takuma's life returning to normality, and an anonymous girl receiving a message from Hell Girl on her cellphone.
Resource: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jigoku_Sh%C5%8Djo
posted by F at 10:00 PM
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