The first time I watched this I felt a bit overwhelmed by the visuals so didn’t really grasp what it was trying to say. I guess it was slightly wasted on me at the time but watching the three episodes again, across as many days, worked better for me so now I really feel I appreciate it more than I did then.

I was also shopping around for music recently and picked up the OST. Oddly enough, the fact that it’s Kajiura helped a bit in understanding the message behind the story because the similarities in the music, and the aesthetic of the OAV overall, reminded me of my beloved Rakkyo and the themes surrounding it, in a roundabout way. The excessive amount of thought I’ve poured into that series in recent months helped get my analysis of Cossette into order at last.

Both stories involve an unconventional romance subplot and are accompanied by gorgeous blood-spattered imagery that reflects this (the fact that it’s gory but still beautiful is I think an achievement in itself). In both cases the main relationship is tested by the two protagonists’ inner conflicts and supernatural external forces that also influence how it progresses. I found the issue of self-sacrifice particularly interesting because Eiri’s suffering for Cossette’s sake reminds me a lot of what Mikiya goes through for Shiki by the end of the seventh KnK film.

Granted, it was a similarity in BGM that forced me to make the connection and the parallels are limited, but in both series the romantic bonds between the lead characters are very different from the feelings of friendship and/or infatuation that everyday life and more conventional pieces of fiction work with. The unusual idea of demonstrating your love by suffering on another’s behalf is another area in which the themes of both titles overlap.

Cossette emphasises this more perhaps, but I felt both that and KnK examine how far people are prepared to go in the name of love, and additionally demonstrate how such experiences affect their relationships with others. I also noticed that Shinbo’s story and Nasu’s portray the overwhelming, blinding effects of romance by leading an innocent, ordinary soul out of his own world and into harm’s way.

The Mikiya/Shiki dynamic is a wonderful thing and I hope I’m able to discuss it at greater length soon (hint: someone, get the full novel published in English already. I BEG OF YOU). I found Mikiya’s steadfast faith in her innocence to be deeply moving, and the way in which he was ironically the last to realise how deeply he’d fallen for her was realistically portrayed too. That business of declaring how he was prepared to bear her sins in her place was I felt Nasu’s typically idiosyncratic way of highlighting, among other things, how true love involves accepting the other’s faults.

Eiri’s bearing of his love interest’s sins is a little different, however. She superimposes her former fiancé’s soul onto him and redirects the curses that resulted from the betrayal and her tragic death, in the hope that the pain inflicted on him will somehow atone for the wrongs committed against her. This later takes a surprising turn as Cossette begins to fall in love with Eiri too: she begins to regret using him in this way and, as he points out, he may have inherited Marcelo’s soul, fate or whatever it is, but he isn’t Marcelo.

I initially thought Cossette was a tale of obsession, and given how disorientating the visuals often are it’s all too easy to be distracted (as much as I love Shinbo’s approach in this OAV, I will concede that this can be a problem for some). Now I believe that it’s more of a tale which asks us what true love means: Marcelo was supposed to be in love with Cossette but he selfishly killed her in order to prevent her growing old and becoming someone different from his image of her.

Eiri on the other hand is entranced by the story of Cossette as played out in the Venetian glass and later captivated by the enigmatic image of Marcelo’s portraits; I suppose you can debate the validity of an attraction based on what Eiri’s love for Cossette is based on, but the fact remains that Marcelo murdered her over an ideal while Eiri wants to seek out the ‘true’ Cossette and save her.

That twist in the final episode flew over my head the first time but now I’ve had a second chance, it makes the narrative more satisfying. The contrasting art styles of Marcelo and Eiri are a metaphor for their attraction to the heroine of the title because Marcelo wanted an eternal unchanging image while Eiri is inspired by a living, moving character trapped in an unlikely place. The most dramatic piece of symbolism for me is when Eiri paints a portrait of her - in his own blood for crying out loud! – which lifts the curse. I don’t know about you, but I thought that was pretty hardcore.

I’m still a little undecided over the effectiveness of the ending though, assuming the interpretation of Cossette’s spirit living on in Shoko is correct. The running time prevents much development of the supporting characters sadly, but from what little I saw of Shoko I liked her: she was the girl-next-door and crucially was, well, real. For that reason I was kinda rooting for a Eiri/Shoko End but after learning the full tragedy of Cossette’s backstory…who wouldn’t feel sorry for the girl trapped in the afterlife for being murdered by the one she loved?

Cossette is convoluted, unsettling, disorientating and obtuse…the fact that it’s intentionally so makes the sentiment of people who don’t like it all the more understandable. Perhaps because I’ve come back to it after watching several of Shinbo’s other shows I was able to go along with its more eccentric moments with less conscious effort. The music heightened my enjoyment a lot too, and I’m still amazed at how Marina Inoue produces such a deep, complex singing voice that’s so different from her vivacious dialogue delivery. Gem is a lovely song by the way.

As in quite a lot of stories like this, the overall aim of the OAV was to create something that looked beautiful and captivating as opposed to encouraging the viewer to dwell on the details, so in that sense it succeeds…but then, I always felt that way about it. Only when I caught one particular train of thought by chance thanks to the weird way my brain makes connections with certain things did I think beyond that. I suppose that’s the thing I really want to get across here…Eiri had to see past the superficial image to understand the depth of his fascination with Cossette, and I ended up doing the same.

Not many of the scenes were brightly-lit enough to give decent screencaps

I believe it’s unfair to judge the Kara no Kyoukai adaptations against the other Type Moon productions when its source material pre-dates them all, but the fact remains that in terms of storytelling, presentation and character dynamics it’s a classic in the making. I’m not using that term lightly either: I’m choosing my words carefully here, even though I’m using so bloody many.

It’s just as well that there will be an epilogue chapter since there are a few nagging feelings in the back of my mind that all begin with, “Yes, but what about…?” and won’t settle until I see them resolved. How did Mikiya survive a supposedly lethal dose of drugs (unless the Bloodchip he’d had earlier gave him the resistance already)? Who was the nameless woman on the street with such detailed knowledge of the criminal underworld? Where was Touko planning on going when discussing it with Azaka? Who was the girl briefly mentioned in the final scene who could see into the future?

Animation and soundtrack quality alone can’t make a masterpiece but they do create an immersive experience that draws the viewer in; vital when the setting and subject matter are so far removed from our relatively safe, comfortable society. Yuki Kajiura’s contribution can’t be ignored here: the haunting and textured score achieves far more than you’d expect from a pianist, three pretty girls and a high-spec reverb unit; Seventh Heaven is a beautifully fitting end but the opening sequence and BGM meld perfectly with Ufotable’s vivid, grungey imagery.

What a haunting intro sequence it was

The script is an acquired taste I think. Nasu often comes over as obtuse and melodramatic like a Robert Smith or Billy Corgan song lyric with his introspection and gothic-inspired contrast of angst and sentimentality. This series is dialogue-heavy but you really need to pay attention because every line is important in understanding the overall narrative; again, it’s an aspect that you’ll either love or hate but then the whole production is one that you either surrender yourself to or ignore completely with little choice of the middle ground.

My rewatch was essential in that it cemented themes and ideas that the previous outings built on and allowed me to bring the tangled plot threads together, especially since the shuffled chronology gives such a sense of disorientation. The outwardly odd concept of a person being able to only murder once in a lifetime, for instance, makes more sense alongside Mikiya’s monologue in the fourth film that describes how the murderer is both victim and assailant: I took it to mean they no longer value others’ lives so kill their own humanity along with their victim.

I think this is why Mikiya is so desparate to believe in Shiki’s innocence. He alone appreciates her softer side; it’s returning to his dilemma in the second movie when he decides to have faith in her and keep his image of her intact when the evidence is inconclusive. The gripping thriller aspect then stems from that question of how she is involved in the serial killings (paying close attention to the second film with the benefit of hindsight pretty much proved her innocence to me), but she is portrayed as having a grip on her humanity that is constantly tenuous.

I loved the attention to detail in portraying the changes between their flashback and present-day selves – she really does *look* younger here

The recurring description of her conflict is that of the gentle and almost ordinary girl versus the cold-blooded killer, the product of the Ryougi bloodline (be it taught or inherant…the root cause isn’t clear). This isn’t divided along the line between the male and female personas either: she continued to feel the urge to kill after her male personality disappeared, after all. I get the impression that he sacrificed himself to allow Mikiya to take his place as the soulmate and companion to the Shiki who remained.

At this stage the usual course is to bring about the dere-dere breakdown; the best that we can usually hope for from that familiar device is a naturally-paced progression. Here, the complexity of Shiki’s character makes the tsundere archetype seem lazy and simplistic in comparison: she has an unconventional kind of grace and beauty but personality-wise she’s wholly unpredictable and her character development feels more…mature? Which does of course make the resolution all the more cathartic and satisfying.

Mikiya was always the moral anchor – the one to offer a kindly smile, accept the bizarre without prejudice, show compassion but also demonstrate righteous indignation on behalf of the viewer at those who prey on the innocent. He was also the source of Shiki’s redemption and sacrifices much to that end…the typical spineless Anime Male Lead? Hardly. His mantra was to bear Shiki’s sins in her place – a statement typical of Nasu’s idosyncratic turns of phrase, but interpreted by me as a demonstration to compromise and find middle ground outside of both his world and hers.

I’m guessing his life was ordinary up until that night on the snowy hillside. After this he dropped out of college, fell out with his parents, worked for a sorceress and found himself crossing a number of strange and dangerous people…yet he was devoted to Shiki throughout: the one who visited her hospital room every week, the one who kept her company before and after and the one who did his utmost to keep the hope of her innocence alive. By the time he faced Shirazumi he was a bad-ass hero but did so without being gar, macho or even entirely fearless.

Ultimately Shirazumi was a reflection not of what she was, but what she could’ve become. He didn’t have anyone’s helping hand to hold him back from the brink, nor the inner strength Shiki had that allowed her to grasp that hand and save herself. He gave in completely to the destructive impulse and willingly cast aside his humanity; next to the other antagonists we’d seen so far he was the most menacing, least sympathetic and ultimately most frightening (sadly the most cartoonish…that CGI saliva was a bit overdone). If a murderer is both victim and assailant then that applies to Asagami and Fujyou, two humans who killed other humans but were also victims; Shirazumi was just a nutcase who took lives; the homicidal maniac.

As I rewatched I noticed something obvious that ironically never clicked before: Shiki always referred to herself as a natural-born killer so I assumed she was proficient at it. As a destroyer of inamimate objects and creatures that were dead to begin with, it was a natural assumption but she never actually killed another human until the fifth movie – the opportunity presented itself on a number of occasions but the fact that she never went through with it until that point says a lot about how her perspective on the matter shifted.

Shirazumi’s death felt like she acted on the human motives of revenge and love rather than a subconscious urge. I’d like to think the true trigger for Shirazumi’s murder was out of love and self-defence, at least: she was avenging her loved one’s death rather than giving in to that murderous impulse that she had tried so hard to suppress. Mikiya didn’t agree with her decision afterwards but his acceptance and understanding are what matters.

The fact remains though that ‘Shiki the human being’ won over ‘Shiki the killer’ at that point, and even after this I think she walked away with her humanity intact. That uncomfortable scene in which she was bound and helpless was also one in which she grasped the value of life at last: the fourth film showed her First Breath After Coma, as it were, but this was the final stage in her realisation of that Boundary of the title and its significance.

I believe it refers to how Shiki teetered on the knife-edge between the warmth and companionship found in life and the meaningless nothing-ness of oblivion, and how she decided on the former. Her dere-dere breakdown (an understatement, I know) is that of coming to terms with her contradictions and what she loses during the course of the story; Ray had the benefit of reading a translation of the original novel which apparently gives a slightly shifted emphasis at the end. The subtitle of ‘Garden of Sinners’ on the other hand perhaps serves to remind us how subjective morality can be to the outside observer.

I won’t go as far as saying the film plays down the importance of what Shiki lost but perhaps because I’m a sentimental old fool deep down I was happy to accept a peaceful hopeful atmosphere at the end. The stylised sakura blooms, such a contrast to the grim and claustrophobic alleyways and abandoned buildings that formed the backdrop to most of the film, were the welcome relief. Excessively so? What I really wanted was to see Shiki and Mikiya together and happy which is what I got, so can hardly complain now. But then, I still don’t know how the novel handled it.

What am I left with after the dust has settled and I’m no longer waiting for another instalment (alleged epilogue aside)? A few minor doubts about how the final act played out and one or two open ends that fortunately don’t hinder things as much as those of Oblivion Recorder did, for a start. I can’t judge this purely on its own though: even if it were genuinely disappointing it the series was outstanding overall.

The mystery-thriller aspect is brought round full circle with a masterful triple-bluff – that of “Did she/didn’t she?” revealing itself to be more of “Did she/didn’t she/she would’ve done if True Love hadn’t prevailed.” I must admit that the romantic drama aspect meshed very well with this, taking an unlikely pairing and finishing with that pairing feeling like the most natural thing in the world.

What pleasantly surprised me though was that this relative levity and the shift in character focus offered so much to enjoy on their own. Azaka has always been a bit, well, overprotective of her elder brother but this is where she is given the opportunity to explain why as best she can. The mystery thriller side of things is still present, of course, but it’s more character- rather than plot-driven. With a some FIRE to spice it up a bit.

I thought the the storyline could’ve been handled a bit better, however. The inexperience of the director may be the cause here because it didn’t progress as fluidly or realise the potential of the themes as fully as they might have been; I’ll wait for that eagerly-awaited English language translation of the original novel, allegedy reaching the shelves sometime this autumn, before judging that aspect too harshly though (more info on this from Ray over at Anime Diet). Complexity and maturity aren’t the name of the game here anyway: after the heavy-going fifth instalment it’s probably a good thing that we’re treated to a shorter piece that’s more ‘fun’ and easier to digest.

Broadly speaking, each successive chapter of the Kara no Kyoukai story alternates between a challenging, plot-driven narrative and a more sedate one that deals with the personalities and motives. It’s a good way to keep the viewers on their toes and prevents the tone falling into a rut but in practice it means that as a general rule of thumb the odd-numbered movies are of the psychological headfuck variety while the even-numbered ones, such as Boukyaku Rokuon, act as interludes and bring us up to speed on the character development.

That said, there are some great moments of supernatural combat as well as those that continue to build up my impression of Shiki’s fascinating personality. The final battle that Azaka waged in particular looked and sounded wonderful – rounded off with an axe kick to a giant flower. Really. It’s all in the details as always: the sizzle of embers and splashes of water, nuances in body language and detail of animation that lesser production teams would either choose to or be forced to ignore.

Fundamentally this is Azaka’s story and as such fills in the gaps that explain the peculiar relationships she shares with Mikiya and Shiki. As a supporting character you might question how important she really is but quite honestly I found her time on screen to be too entertaining to care. The dynamic between her and Shiki had me grinning like the fanboy that I am but the viewpoint that Nasu’s storytelling takes is especially appropriate here. That is to say, it takes a morally neutral stance in letting people who are very strange by the standards and conventions of society state their feelings without condemning them or making excuses on their behalf; which is particularly important when the character in question has an onii-chan complex that governs many of her actions.

Rather than trying to force the viewer into accepting Azaka’s misplaced affections by making you sit through scenes that would make many viewers feel uncomfortable, the film instead depicts how her emotions have influenced her life in a more general sense (which inevitably leads to moments where she butts heads with Shiki to hilarious effect). It’s impossible to completely bring the average viewer round to the same way of thinking as a character who is markedly abnormal but it does at least allow you to see where she’s coming from.

Behind the verbal sparring and moments of straightforward action-orientated entertainment there’s still the mass of subtexts that leave you thinking afterwards, which is why I find Kara no Kyoukai to be such a success on multiple levels. This isn’t the best demonstration of that in the series so far, sadly, but once the true nature of the events is in the light of day it becomes clear how it’s all trying to make some statements about the importance of, and problems associated with, human memory.

Shiki and Azaka are both trying to recover memories they had lost while in contrast the Fairy Incident was the result of memories born from misunderstandings and motivated by the mistaken idea that erasing them will somehow set things right. I’ll be a smartass at this point and say I thought something was wrong with that teacher right from when, for a split second during one scene, his eyes were shown as unnaturally bloodshot. Anyway. I didn’t think Ouji’s character was particularly well-explained either but there was just enough to allow me to grasp how she had taken things on herself and how this caused events to take an even more serious turn for the worse.

As wonderfully entertaining as Flaming Imouto Rage proved to be in the end, the God’s Word thing was still a neat ability and made the showdowns more interesting; it’s a shame that Kurogiri probably won’t turn up in the last film because the writers could have had a lot more fun with his character. The subtleties of his dialogue left me a bit stumped but again the issue of memories that refuse to truly go away causes Shiki as much trouble as it does for Azaka. It leads me to suspect we haven’t seen the back of Araya either, which makes me wonder if he is indeed the final adversary to be faced before the story draws to a close.

So yeah, unless the novel miraculously turns up in the meantime I reckon this will be all we have to satisfy ourselves for a while yet. A few minor things could’ve been done better but when we have a character as lively as Azaka and when the action set-pieces are so wonderfully married to a stellar soundtrack, I can’t bring myself to complain too much. I noticed a brief Fujino Asagami appearance in school too. Good to know the poor lass is doing okay!

I also see what they did in using Fairytale as the theme song; obvious allusions to the story aside (like they did with Sprinter in part five), it has a wonderful restful and dreamlike feel, appropriately like a melancholic childhood memory. Wonderful stuff.

Be honest now. would YOU live there?!

The editing and scene compositions, in addition to the tense atmospherics and poetic dialogue that have already made the series memorable for me, are particularly outstanding. I don’t want to over-emphasise a certain point I made a while back but even next to the previous four this one comes across as particularly cinematic and sophisticated. It takes longer to set out its intentions and see them through, throws out more intertwining story threads and also has a brazen desire to play mind games with the viewer on a scale that Satoshi Kon would be proud of.

The spiral motif crops up a lot here: there’s certainly something compelling, hypnotic and dizzying about it at the best of times (Junji Ito did after all make a whole horror story about the things) but Mujun Rasen uses it as a metaphor in several different ways and explores more avenues that tie in with what we’ve seen from the story to date. The most obvious one is disorientation: this instalment is particularly fond of sleight of hand, deception and showing things from unusual angles to give differing perspectives and get its messages across.

The dychotomy of Shiki’s personality is likened to the symbol of yin and yang, the graphical representation of which being itself somewhat like a spiral; the confusion in the building in which many of this episode’s events take place is also caused by a mechanism that uses spirals to exploit the ease by which we can be fooled and manipulated. The mechanics involved are pretty clever actually – it reminds me of the Jonathan Creek TV show in the way that an elegantly simple illusion can leave almost everyone baffled, even when it’s not using anything magical or otherwise supernatural.

The moments where we’ve seen Araya going about his shady business were all in aid of the events in this film: unless he crops up later on I reckon this is the culmination of many of the incidents that have previously occured. The story arcs involving Kirie and Fujino were apparently intended to put Shiki into a certain position at a certain time of his choosing; it paints Araya as the calculating type who tries to control people like chess pieces to reach his goal…a scary bastard indeed.

Tomoe Enjou takes centre stage as the emotional foil to Shiki’s tsunderisms but sadly at Mikiya’s expense…with the exception of the hilarious flying book incident thanks to his sister Azaka. Tomoe’s appearance in the bigger picture, as brief as it was, is nevertheless memorable (not just because he’s a spitting image of F/S N‘s Shirou!) and additionally highlighted another facet of Shiki’s fascinating psyche. The dynamic between them was a nice change of pace: seeing her spend time with someone other than Mikiya meant she behaved slightly differently and spoke of issues that wouldn’t have been discussed otherwise.

The quality of the screenplay writing shines through here in that, after making up your mind about Tomoe’s parents, your opinion does a full 180 degrees; at least mine did. They’re not so much bad people as good people who made bad decisions I suppose, although Tomoe’s final moments lead me to disagree with Araya’s declaration that his origin is that of worthlessness.

It saddens me to think how rare it is these days to see a lead character who’s genuinely a break from the norm – even within the Nasuverse there isn’t anyone quite like Shiki. The tsundere aretype has been well-used over the years since the Kara no Kyoukai novels were first published but the wonderful thing about Shiki is that it’s a mere component part of a multi-layered personality coloured with family duties, inner conflict, a dual identity and a peculiar penchant for cold-blooded murder. It’s testament to how well-written she is as a character, really, that a stand-offish individual who has homicidal tendancies can be so damned appealing!

These occasions are the most unlikely “Squee~!” moments I’ve ever experienced

The moments where Shiki engages the Stringy Vision and takes out a corridor full of zombies never gets old it seems: I was grinning like an idiot just like I did during the first movie. The fact is, Ufotable have animated all this so beautifully which means it all moves along with fluidity and energy; even in the more unsettling moments the severed body parts are rendered with convincing anatomical detail. They certainly don’t pull their punches: there’s plenty more gore and mutiliation here, wowing you with the stunning visuals and shocking you with its brutality the next.

Given the amount of symbolism and exposition on offer, I think it’s actually important to have moments where the viewer can give his or her brain a rest and simply enjoy watching Shiki do her dance of death. Finding beauty and poetry in violence and destruction is no mean feat…a guilty pleasure perhaps but I’d be lying if I said it isn’t awesome.

Although Mikiya doesn’t get as much screen time as he has done in the past Touko is given plenty of attention, and not just in the sense that both antagonists of the piece are old acquaintances of hers either. Her supposed murder by Araya was particularly brutal, and Mikiya’s injuries at the hands of Alba were unflinchingly unpleasant too. It shows – to beautiful yet somewhat sickening effect – how messed-up Alba and Araya are but Touko comes across as being really switched-on and in control.

If there’s one thing that didn’t really work it’s Cornelius Alba: to be honest his character didn’t sit right with me at all. The madness and eccentricity at least were marvellous; I’d put money on him being British by birth, not just because he, Touko and Araya studied in London, but the fact that the best stereotypical Gentlemanly Mad Villains in cinema always seem to be British…it’s one area we still excel at I guess. Unfortunately his appearance looked like something copied out of a J K Rowling novel, so all the way through I was wishing he’d step back into the Harry Potter universe where he belonged and be replaced with someone more menacing instead.

Don’t ya know, PEOPLE DIE WHEN THEY’RE KILLED LOL, etc., etc.

With the exception of this one thing, the film works wonderfully as a whole for me. The scene cuts flow with an audacity and maturity missing from even its live-action counterparts; the montage segments that depict the routine of Tomoe’s time spent with Shiki save time for jumping back and forth to build up that tension and disorientation when things get more eventful. The symbolism and subtexts reward repeat viewings too, not least because the time frames are revisited and little bits of foreshadowing catch your attention the second time around. The only question I have now is, how can the last two possibly match this?

I’m beginning to see why Shiki Ryougi is one of Takeuchi’s most loved creations. She isn’t a character who exudes the typical bishoujo femininity: she’s sullen and introverted, flattens her bust down with bandages and wears a leather jacket incongruously over her kimono, and is the opposite of clumsy…oh yeah, she also goes on the occasional homicidal rampage. Despite all this making her the anti-moe she has legions of loyal fans. And I’m one of them.

This movie is, more than any so far, all about Shiki. Mikiya takes a bit of a back seat (I think know what the Singing in the Rain segment was trying to do from a cinematography standpoint, but the Engrish didn’t really work for me); despite his pivotal role thematically it’s pretty much all about Shiki’s accident that gave her the Stringy Vision™ and its aftermath. The mind-bending nature of that plot point is depicted to excellent effect: the Tsukihime VN shows it like this and as for the anime adaptation…I can’t recall, sorry. The overwhelming, so-beautiful-it-hurts quality of the Mystic Eyes is lovingly rendered here though, to the point where I too felt a bit uncomfortable looking at a bunch of flowers or Shiki’s view of the supporting characters with those maddening lines all over the place.

Most of the movie is set in a hospital and with extensive personal experience of such environments (not often at night, mercifully) I can say the background artists have done their homework: I even noticed they included little details like medical instruments and the bottles of disinfectant hand gel hanging outside the wards. A hospital in the dead of night is indeed creepy and this film really conveys that: the deserted corridors and empty rooms are as unsettling as hearing Vincent Price reading you a bedtime story. Ufotable also deliver on the music…oh, the music. Heavenly (listening to the OST as I type). It’s the best end theme so far, although Kalafina keep setting the bar high every time.

What’s most interesting is the idea that Shiki loses part of herself, to paraphrase the dialogue used. I’m guessing it’s that ‘other’ personality of hers that falls away during her coma, and inevitably leaves a sense of loss behind. What results is a feeling of not wanting to live but being afraid to die – culminating in her discovery of a new sense of purpose when she hacks her hair into her trademark tomboyish but more practical bob and slices a zombie to pieces. Even the dead die when they’re killed, it would seem.

The sight of a post-op Shiki lying unconscious on the operating table, Mikiya attending the graduation ceremony without her then Shiki trying to put her own eyes out in a deserted recovery room sent shivers down my spine. In a physical sense she was examined and patched up with literally surgical precision but the fact that she’s comatose then temporarily blinded and isolated in an empty, soulless-looking room with Mikiya, arguably the one who cares about her most, waiting patiently outside for her recovery spoke volumes without words. Shiki is utterly alone and at the mercy of her supernatural demons, no matter what those around her do for her.

I’m getting the feeling that this story is more character-driven than the arcane jargon and rivetting action scenes suggest: as jaw-dropping as it was to see a newly-revived Shiki battle a zombie the underlying message seems to be on the character dynamics and the philosophies that govern them. It’s dialogue-heavy yet simultaneously reliant on imagery that conveys ideas that mere words cannot: the conversations demand your full attention to understand why the characters think and feel the way they do yet the animation and set-pieces carry the story at points without anyone saying a damn thing.

Speaking of people saying stuff, I thought Touko was portrayed really well here. That swaggering confidence of a mage she projects (think Fate/Stay Night‘s Rin, only grown up) neatly explained her capabilities and the limitations to her power and the voice-altering spell of hers was effectively conveyed by her VA. If Mikiya is the moral anchor of the story Touko is the source of advice and exposition: her role in Shiki’s (so-far temporary) salvation is as important in a practical sense as Mikiya’s is in an emotional one. How did Shiki’s other self disappear…and more importantly, why? At least some questions are left tantalisingly unanswered for now.

As a parting shot after the closing credits the film seems to be compensating for its short running-time by not only addressing an important moment in Shiki’s story, but also tying together a number of plot threads from the previous three films. A shady guy called Ayara Souren approaches each of the main characters of the first and third films (Kirie Fujyou and Fujino Asagami, respectively), which suggests that there’s an overall antagonist behind it all. The shuffled chronology works well I think in that you get this realisation hitting you in one shot: there’s a suspicious looking magus whose presence puts a lot of the story so far into perspective, and a lot of things begin to make a teeny bit of sense all at once. Neat.

Coming up: assuming the swine flu scare doesn’t derail everything, my impressions of the fifth movie, seen through the lens of in-flight alcoholic beverages and jet lag. Then I join the others in waiting for part #6…

It also looks spectacular: ufotable are doing a wonderful job of recreating Nasu’s vision and Takeuchi’s iconic characters. The rumours I’ve read about how they were consulted more than they were for either of the TV adaptations of Tsukihime and Fate/Stay Night seem to be right on the money: it has the visceral, borderline-sadistic but ultimately exhilerating atmosphere of their visual novels that neither TV outing fully captured. At the same time it has a tangible quality; a feeling that’s akin to the ‘synesthaesia’ that Gaguri and IKnight noted in Mononoke and Gankutsuou. Oh yeah, it has another Kajiura-penned music score that ups the ante from previous outings too.

There’s much to enjoy on the characterisation front but I have to get my astonishment of the visuals out of my system first. The one thing that sticks in my mind about how great Vexille is visually was the meticulous way in which they rendered snowflakes hitting a car windscreen; similarly I was knocked out by the little details here, such as the raindrops on Touko’s car window. When the animators are going so far in getting the little things right, it goes without saying that when a BIG thing happens, such as an entire bridge getting twisted into a pile of crumbling rubble, you can rest assured that it gets those things spot-on too.

I’ve heard that there was a bit of controversy regarding the decision to open the movie in such a brutal and quite frankly disturbing way; while I won’t disagree for a split second that it’s unpleasant I think the creative team were fully justified in portraying it in such graphic detail. It’s a recurring theme in the Nasuverse that we’re encouraged to see things from unlikely points of view: namely siding with the supposed villain of the piece. A scene like that is instrumental in bringing the viewer around to an unusual position: that of feeling sympathy for a serial killer.

I’ve often wondered about the significance of the title being ‘Garden of Sinners’; it evokes for me an image of a locale that carries a sense of serene beauty but features a contrasting darker side as well. The task for a story such as this is that of making us see the world from the perspective of characters who carry the sins; the moral burdens that distance them from the rest of society and incite feelings that go as far as self-hatred. In order to get a clear picture of why Fujino has become a crazed killer for instance you have to see at least some of the events that put her on that path, as distasteful and upsetting as they may be.

Both in terms of backstory and physical appearance, I saw a lot of similarity between Fujino and Sakura in Fate/Stay Night‘s Heaven’s Feel in that there’s a character who has a dual personality because of prior mental/emotional trauma; it then goes on to question who should take responsibility for her and how she can be rescued from the murderous impulse that results. I suspect it’s possible to look upon Sakura or Fujino as a weak-willed individual who gives in to her sin to escape from the unpleasant realities; my view however is that neither of them asked for, nor deserved, the cruelty they received and the changes it made to them. The chain of events that gave them this lust for murder and destruction was caused by the actions of others – while it’s impossible to deny the fact that they are killers they are also victims themselves.

Shiki’s hatred for Fujino highlights the difference between them: the thing I love about the characterisation here is that rather than black and white, they’re presented to us in shades of grey. Shiki’s inner conflict stems from the fact that she too is a killer – and as such is burdened with a sin of her own – but because she keeps her impulse under control she feels a sense of superiority over Fujino. Even so, the moment where she shows mercy towards her enemy highlights the idea that, more than anyone else, she understands the true pain that Fujino is going through. Who but a killer can understand a killer?

Mikiya on the other hand compensates for his lack of understanding with his irrepressible sense of compassion: he’s willing to protect not only Fujino the serial murderer but also one of the men who asaulted her and pushed her towards being the (literally) twisted character she becomes. His devotion to Shiki – I can’t find a more appropriate term for the peculiar relationship they share – means he can overlook the side of her that even she is unhappy with, and is prepared to risk even his own safety to that end.

It’s a combination of her encounter with Fujino and Shiki’s unshakable, unconditional, faith in her humanity that leads to Shiki’s minor dere-dere breakdown at the end of this episode – I know a line such as “… just a slight murderous impulse that’s leaning towards you…” doesn’t sound like an affirmation of affection but when delivered with that particular dialogue exchange and a rare smile from Shiki, it says a lot. I think she rediscovered a bit of her own humanity in seeing so much of herself in Fujino, which I found to be a wonderful way to finish off a story that was disturbing and fucked-up but insightful and dazzling too.

Like its predecessor Kara no Kyoukai: Satsujin Kohatsu expects patience and open-mindedness from the viewer but in return I was rewarded with a viewing experience that is more mature than either of the other Nasu/Takeuchi animated adaptations; I was once again left speechless at the marriage of visuals and music but the storytelling goes further into the characters’ heads, and is all the more satisfying for that. There are plenty of supernatural thrillers around these days but it’s not often that it’s handled in this way: namely portraying events from the point of view of the supposed killer as well as those caught up in the investigations that ensue.

The second instalment of Kara no Kyoukai also feels more like a component part of a larger whole than the first one did. I’m not quite sure why it jumps back in time like this but the healthy dose of character background is most welcome: rather than being thrown headlong into a day in the life of the characters it traces the friendship between Shiki and Mikiya back to their first meeting. It also leaves more loose ends open than Fuukan Fukei did but on the plus side I got a better grasp of the human element.

In any other situation I wouldn’t feel comfortable saying a story involving serial killings and copious quantities of blood spillage could ever be sweet and moving, but this one certainly was. One criticism I could level at Satsujin Kousatsu however is the fact that Mikiya stubbornly refuses to believe that Shiki could be in any way responsible for the spate of murders: the evidence is against her and he doesn’t know her too well either. Is he trying to convince himself or am I just jumping to the conclusion that he’s a Dense Anime Male Lead^TM?

Takeuchi’s all-iris-no-pupil technique on the eyes again creates a sense of heightened femininity and all-out creepiness simultaneously

You could take this film to be a cautionary tale about how your best friend could end up holding a knife to your throat if you don’t keep your wits about you but in the Nasuverse there’s more to such things than that. I guess you have to exercise a suspension of disbelief to a certain degree, not to mention the fact that the seventh instalment will allegedly wrap up this particular story arc, but if you let yourself be immersed in its worldview without any reservations or cynical piss-taking you will I’m sure be able to appreciate its numerous merits.

I guess that’s half the reason why I’m so enamoured by Kara no Kyoukai: you don’t so much watch as feel every movement, nuance or camera pan. In the first film I was torn between shock and ironic laughter as a dog walks through a pool of blood surrounding a fallen corpse, oblivious to the dead human being as it leaves a trail of blood-stained footprints behind it. In this feature we see a kimono-clad Shiki kneeling down and dipping her hands in the pool of blood collecting under a (her?) murder victim and smearing the vivid crimson on her lips with a mixture of sadistic enjoyment and childlike fascination.

This film not only portrays murder in a stylised way but it also makes a violent, sudden and tragic premature demise seem somehow beautiful and poetic. It’s not showing serial killings merely in the conventional way – as wastes of life that should be feared and condemned on one hand and be made subject of public discussion and a boost to newspaper sales on the other – but as a part of the world itself, as almost-natural occurrences. First and foremost it’s showing these incidents as milestones in the Shiki/Mikiya relationship, often glossing over the newsflashes and panic that result.

There’s a wonderful juxtaposition between the shocking and brutal moments of gory violence, which would look gratuitous and exploitative were they not presented in such an artsy fashion, and that of a bond developing between the two leads. Shiki’s dichotomy was fascinating, not least because it takes the split personality thing further than the usual tsundere plot device into the territory where two personalities are literally competing for dominance. It makes me wonder who the ‘real’ Shiki is, which I think is precisely the point that is being made here…illustrated with two cat plushies too. Nice touch.

In all seriousness though, it effectively sets up the story as a whole as a tale of Shiki looking for her true internal identity, and how this may affect her relationship with Mikiya. Somewhat related to my earlier niggle is how I found his character background to be a bit wanting in comparison with Shiki’s: he’s a decent enough kid but his motives for standing by her didn’t convince me so his resolve came across as aimless, which I’m sure was the opposite of what was intended. It’s still early days yet of course so I daresay we’ll learn more about him in later outings.

Above all else it’s the fact that Satsujin Kohatsu is treated more seriously than many anime shows that makes it special from my point of view. I’d say it’s handled in a manner closer to Tsukihime than Fate/Stay Night, albeit staying closer to the source material than the former (according to fan reactions so far) and painting events in a more serious and less action-packed light than the latter. When anime is directed in this way, like a live-action movie, it’s one of those moments where I see the distinction between ‘animation’ and ‘cartoon’ – a rare treat, even having sat through as much as I have in recent years.

Does anyone else see some significance of the drinking fountain taps? I thought the fact that two point in a different direction was symbolic of something. Thoughts?

There are extended moments of dialogue or contemplative silence that are devoid of action; moments that, rather than feeling like budget-saving measures stalling for time, are instead moments of reflection that add to the mood of the piece rather than detract from it. It’s more in the style of Oshii, Shinkai or Kon in that sense – a truly cinematic piece that’s a cut above the type of supernatural thriller, or anime in general, that I initially expected it to be. Kara no Kyoukai delivers once again.

I’ve actually been working back through the Type-Moon stuff in reverse order: anime adaptations before VNs, and sampling the later VN before the earlier one. Taking a step back though I’m seeing an evolution of the recurring themes and character types, noticing Kinoko Nasu’s and Takashi Takeuchi’s trademark flourishes respectively. Back when I first reviewed Tsukihime I thought there was nothing really amiss with it apart from the pacing and obvious gaps in character backgrounds but what that, and everything from these guys that I’ve seen so far, had by way of compensation were atmospherics and underpinning concepts. Kara no Kyoukai floored me straight away on these two things alone.

Although it’s marketed as a feature film this feels like the opener for an OAV series much like, say, Bubblegum Crisis or Macross Plus/Zero. The story is in the style of a film noir-style murder-mystery but as far as I can tell it isn’t exactly case closed so leaves things pretty open in terms of who, or what, is ultimately causing the series of mysterious deaths. So then, I can’t really say it’s sold me on the storyline when I feel that these fifty minutes are just an appetiser for what will follow in the subsequent movies.

I hesitantly gave it a glowing 9/10 score, mindful that it didn’t whisk me on a Chandler-esque trail of clues and huge casts of characters; it was just a jaw-dropping introduction to the supernatural nasuverse that I’ve come to know and love. I’ve felt inclined to defend Akira in much the same way, not because its story makes complete sense to me (it doesn’t) but because the overall viewing experience is so rich and immersive. The screenies (whose proportions don’t look right, I know EDIT: resized to maintain the correct aspect ratio and hence look a bit better now) scarcely do it justice.

The premise is a series of apparent suicides: young women who have thrown themselves off the roof of an abandoned building for no clear reason. Shiki Ryougi (she’s a girl, by the way. I suggest you get used to the Type Moon character recycling policy) begins to investigate who is responsible but I’ll admit at this point that I didn’t actually understand the specifics so can’t even say for sure whether it was crappy storytelling or not. I merely opened a beer, turned out the lights and hit Fullscreen. And was astounded.

I don’t think it has to all make much sense at this point. The grungey background art is so textured it’s almost tangible; the claustrophobic sense of foreboding and unease was nigh-on perfect given the subject at hand. I almost felt like I could smell the polish on the floor and the paint on the walls of Shiki’s apartment, and the music was spot-on too (I pretty much knew it was Yuki Kajiura before looking it up. It reminded me a lot of Cosette). The appearance of Touko Aozaki’s dolls, lifeless shells devoid of souls, made a creepy but compelling parallel to the deserted streets and disused high-rise buildings that had lost their occupants and purpose yet continued to stand, in plain view yet somehow forgotten.

The whole movie sells itself on a combination of the haunting sense of mystery and the assumption that existing fans spot the connections with other TM works. I certainly felt a comforting sense of familiarity in Takeuchi’s character designs, which I’ve come to recognise with the same ease as those of ABe and Sadamoto. The fact that Kara no Kyoukai‘s Shiki shares the Mystic Eyes of Death Perception (a.k.a.: Stringy Vision™) with the Shiki of Tsukihime can’t be a coincidence I think; incidentally the way in which the lines themselves, and their destruction, are rendered looked much more impressive on-screen than in either the Tsukihime VN or TV adaptation, but I digress.

Although I flippantly call it recycling there’s a conscious effort on the part of Nasu to purposefully revisit certain themes and ideas in both an aesthetic and thematic sense. I noticed the issues of mortality and morality immediately but even the details like the Stringy Vision and certain characters’ names are given a more solid grounding because they’ve cropped up before (or since, depending on whether you’ve experienced the works chronologically, or in a jumbled way like I have). Similarly the supernatural side of things really benefits from the fact that its background spans a number of different novels and games.

It’s easy to become hooked on the arcane jargon of the Nasuverse; it reminds me of the way in which magic is portrayed in the Earthsea novels in that a raft of specialist terms and underlying logic control the supernatural goings-on which means all the ghosts, pretty-shiny explosions and fantastical phenomena fit into a defined framework. I mean this in the sense that magic is not a means to paper over plot holes; even when people don’t die when they’re killed there’s a convincing explanation for it that fits in with the story (and related stories) as a whole. In this case though, death from falling off a skyscraper really will kill you. Obviously.

If I’m interpreting it correctly the reason for the deaths is explainable in the context of its worldview and leaves a nice opening for whatever might happen next. Part of me was only partly satisfied for the reasons given but the rest of me was content with soaking up the combination of the visuals and music. In any case the emphasis is more on the overall…sentiment? of the events and draws significance from that more than anything.

By that I mean the idiosyncracies of Nasu’s prose bleed into the script, which might not be welcome to some but to me fits with the feel of the piece. I’m a huge fan of gothic-tinged aesthetics and storytelling anyway, so maybe I’m forgiving towards things like the ‘pretentious’ dialogue and philosophical chin-scratching, so they are welcome additions rather than distractions for me.

Of course, if you are familiar with Type-Moon’s MO you’ll know how they are unafraid to hold back on blood-soaked violence, love a good gothic backdrop, cram in food references (check out the product placement!) and deal with the significance of life, death and what lies in between. Not only are these things here in abundance they are all wrapped up in a manageable package that looks and sounds like it’s had a lot of hard work put into it, so I’m happy. Very.