Higurashi no Naku Koro ni: Onikakushihen - When The Cicadas Cry
Title: Higurashi no Naku Koro ni: Onikakushihen - When The Cicadas Cry
Type: Manga
Author(s): Ryukishi 07
Artist(s): SUZURAGI Karin, HOJO Yutori, JIRO Suzuki, Kido En, TONOGAI Yoshiki, Momoyama Hinase
Status in Home Country: Complete (2 Volumes)
Scanslation Status: Complete
Scan Groups: Gaku Gaku Animal Land, The Higurashi Project, NESS, Eternal Bunny Love, When they do not deserve, Enigma!, slowmanga
Genre(s): Drama, Horror, Mystery, Psychological, School Life, Supernatural, Suspense, Tragedy
Summary: It is the 58th year of Showa. The summer started earlier than usual. In June, people enjoy the sound of cicadas at noon and buzz of higurashi in the evening. Here, located on the border of the XX prefecture, is the Hinamizawa Village, whose popularion is less than 2,000. However, "it" repeats every year.
Hinamizawa Village Consecutive Unnatural Murders (1979 ~ 1983).
Every year, on the same day of June, one person dies and one person disappears. It is a chain of death, beginning with a fight related to a big dam construction plan. The incident that was hidden in the middle of Showa revives. Is it a plot? An accident? ...Or a curse?
Keiichi Maebara has just moved to a seemingly peaceful new town. He’s making friends and generally enjoying his life until one day he learns of a grisly murder that took place in the little village. His friends won’t give him any details which only adds to Keiichi’s uneasiness. After learning at the town’s annual festival that a death has occurred on that night every year for the past four years, Keiichi is drawn into a web of intrigue to help unravel the mystery of these murders. Things only get more dangerous when he learns that some of his new friends may be involved!
The story is divided into a total of eight chapters: four "Question" arcs and four "Answer" arcs. Each chapter keeps the same main characters, but ends in a different way. However, each chapter gives valuable answers, hints, and clues to the previous one, while at the same time bringing forth even more mysteries.
The question arcs are:
- Onikakushi-hen
- Watanagashi-hen
- Tatarigoroshi-hen
- Himatsubushi-hen
The answer arcs are:
- Meakashi-hen
- Tsumihoroboshi-hen
- Minagoroshi-hen
- Matsuribayashi-hen
The side story arcs are:
- Onisarashi-hen
- Yoigoshi-hen
- Utsutsukowashi-hen
- Kokoroiyashi-hen.
Review: I really hated the first 2.5 chapters of this arc (each chapter is really long too). I barely hung in there to complete it because it bored me to tears about reading slice of life school stuff. All that happens is the new boy in school is happy to play games w/ his harem at school. It's the best time of his life, yada, yada, yada. Even the artwork was kind of bleh. I didn't care for the girl's art styles.
The story doesn't pick up until about the end of chapter 3 when the murder mystery gets introduced. At first, Keiichi is completely into denial about what he sees and feels from his so called harem friends. To be honest, they were freaky w/ the too innocent act anyways. W/ the whole split personality persona, they doubled that freakiness. If I was Keiichi, I would have hightailed out of that village earlier, but he's like those stupid victims in horror films.
In the end, all the main players get killed and you don't know what the hell happened. WTF? I didn't find out until later that there are a whole series of arcs w/ all sorts of alternate endings. So the ending on this arc was just a possibility and supposedly gives a clue to who the murder is. If the series is going to be like this, they should just label each arc w/ damn numbers. How the hell is a normal reader able to find the sequence of those series? It's an absurd way to label the series. I didn't have any pressing urge to find which series was next. I may in the future just read the last one to see who the murder is, but I probably won't understand much.
Honestly, I really didn't care for any of the characters.
Rate: 4/10