Mononoke 1: A black dude, white chick, an old lady, and a Vulcan go to an inn…

The Phantom Pharmacist rides again! There is a Goddess and she wears a yellow ribbon.

The white chick declares that, “Zero is dead, but his cause lives on.” The black dude and Vulcan have nothing to say, but the old lady responds, “I would prefer it the other way around.” Sorry folks I got no better punchline…Zing! So after a most agonizing wait my flagship series has finally been adopted by some nice fansubbers. You know who you are and this Imperial Trooper loves you even more.

I won’t include a summary since I wish to force encourage people to watch it themselves. That being said the art style certainly is different. It gives it more of olde ancient scrap book look which is okay since this takes place in the Edo period. The standard format looks to be consisted of arcs roughly 2-3 episodes long which is not a bad thing if you like short stories that are loosely connected. That being said there are no fillers.

I know that most kids born are often adorable, but I must be honest that is one ugly fat kid.

The choice of color pallet was interesting since its much more garish that what I imagined feudal Japan to be since dyes were not cheap then and color paint was a luxury as far as I know. While the exterior looks perfectly normal the inside seems much more vast with the long flight of stairs. When the room spins it makes it look even bigger. I guess the whole huge space motif is going to figure in heavily as Bake Neko used the same technique to portray the rape room.

Shinsen Subs has added a nice little infomercial at the end which is very informative though I think that it should have been placed first. Not that I am complaining or anything.

Tough as nails assassins are cool.

Even their deaths are teh awesome.

This was a very nice build up to what should prove to be an interesting end. We learn that the mononoke is a zashiki-warashiki normally a spirit that brings good fortune to a house. However this is Sparta Mononoke and here spirits can and do kill. Since form is confirmed all that is left are the truth and the regret. Given how Bake Neko was pure win and awesome there should be a nice twist in store.

We know that the inn was not always and inn and given that the prominence of the red cloth as umbilical cords the spirit is either a child or a group of children. Given the decor the room where the exorcism takes place was birthing chamber. Now what I find strange are those faceless people in purple garb. Were they the fathers of those dead children? It’s very likely that the place was once a brothel and abortions were carried out there since pregnancy was probably a drain on resources.

Ghost busting the old school way.

The simplest conclusion is that the presence of a pregnant woman roused the zashiki-warashi into action as the inn must have supplanted the brothel for a long time. The owner of the inn shows us that the room was not often used if at all. It seems silly that she had an under utilized room if she wanted to maximize profit. What is not known however if the old woman actually performed abortion or had one herself. As it stands the only obvious one who can regret is the old lady since Tokuji (the black guy) could not have been there as long, and the pregnant woman just came in for the first time.

Unless of course she wants to have the kid this time as she may have aborted another child a while back. Hence why she is insistent on having this child despite the seemingly bleak future. I wonder if there is any significance to the attempted murder of the pregnant lady, as the family that wants her dead is ostensibly wealthy or of noble lineage, perhaps they killed one too many illegitimate children there? Tokuji knows that the room is and oddity if not out right cursed. Still I doubt that the haunting began during his tenure as bouncer, but one can never be sure.

These guys have got to be big wigs purple dye ain’t cheap in Edo Japan. Their presence is unsettling to say the least.

There must be more to the old lady than meets the eye since her spiel on raising the kid had many good points. She must have seem a lot more during her younger years the mystery is what could she have been privy to that we are not. I only have question at the end and cannot wait for the conclusion, I have no idea what the whole truth is or who precisely needs to regret. A series that leave me with more questions than answers must have something good going for it.

This may not be the run of the mill series, but Mononoke may prove to be the best series this summer since it is very unique and feels more like a creepy Ghibli anime than your average harem series. So far they have delivered the suspense that I was hoping for and its not likely they can ruin it. If nothing else it beats gnashing my teeth at how stupid the School Days cast is.

Lastly multi racial cast 4TW!