9.13.2014

Television: Persona 4 (2011)

Started watching this on Hulu and (if you'll excuse the pun) got sucked in. I haven't watched anime in a really long time, but hey, this one has Tarot cards! And like so many anime, it has a convoluted plot that still somehow manages to be highly entertaining.

The story, best as I can follow, goes something like this: Narukami Yu (I'm doing this in the Japanese style with surname first) moves out of the big city to live with his uncle and cousin for a year while his parents are abroad. The town he moves to is sometimes covered in fog, and this usually coincides with some kind of death or murder. There's also something called "Midnight TV," where if you watch at midnight on a rainy night, you will supposedly see your soul mate. Narukami tries this one night and nearly gets sucked into the television set, but (luckily?) the set is too small for him to fit through.

When he mentions as much to the two classmates who have more or less adopted him as a new friend, they suggest going to the Junes—basically their version of a Wal-Mart—and trying one of the big-screen TVs on display. And so all three promptly get sucked in. Well, in Fushigi Yuugi it was an ancient book or scroll or whatever, so . . . ::shrug::

Shadow creatures attack. Tarot cards begin turning up to lend their "personas" to our adventurous heroes. And Narukami realizes the girl he saw on the television was the next to die; turns out, the person you see is not your soul mate so much as the next victim.

Has all the markings of a Japanese horror movie, really. But with a fantasy/anime twist.

The anime is based on a video game, but since I don't play video games, I can't really say much about the connection(s) between the two. I only know I find the anime very good, and am grateful Hulu offers it subtitled because I hate dubs.

I'm already sad thinking I'll eventually catch up and won't have any more episodes to watch . . .

No comments: