Higurashi: When They Cry - Sotsu

For the most part, I can say that this is better than Gou, but it is still with its issues. The first being that since we now know the killer, their motives, and the twists, it almost feels like a chore to rewatch the same arcs, albeit with slight alterations to recontextualize them. It doesn't help matters where one arc I had in mind would have still ended up in the same results.

The animation is still good, but it kind of feels like a waste to see them being reused for the sole purpose of adding context to them. If anything, I saw a lot of the scenes coming after seeing the events of Gou play out with a few genuine surprises that caught me off guard. But I do like the visuals of the opening theme and the ending theme which again resembles a watercolor painting of Rika and Satoko just living their best lives together.

Once more, the characters were placed to the wayside since the show is really more about the conflict between Rika and Satoko. And even then, I'm just getting bored with that as the driving theme.

I did like the OP and ED themes, though.

1. Higurashi no naku koro ni 2006

2. Higurashi no naku koro ni Kai 2007

3. Higurashi no naku koro ni Rei (OVA series)

4. Higurashi no naku koro ni Gou 2020

5. Higurashi no naku koro ni Sotsu 2021.

Rika's nightmare will never end, not with her betrayal of Oyashiro-sama...

Not as long as the cicadas cry...

This show is amazing, I've been hearing since a while now till I watched, I took so long to watch because of IMDb they gave it such a low rating so I thought it boring as they suggested but boy... Was I wrong, this show deserves an 8.5 or above but I totally understand why it has such a low rating, the show is a mess and unsettling and that's exactly why I like it, gou was confusing but everything makes sense in the answer arc, and this probably the most unique shows I've watched this year, but I guess when something tries too hard to be unique many people don't understand and simply give it a low rating, the writer totally knows what he's doing at first I thought it was just gonna feel like milking up the og Kai but nope I was wrong, this was completely different, there are no jump scares it's straight up scary it's not like all those awful corny horror movies we're tired it's completely different, such an underrated show imho, what's more things don't just happen out of the bloom like how most horror shows are portraid almost anything has an explanation, we even get an episode where we get a little bit of Heisenberg principle of uncertainty but that part subtle they don't exactly eplain it, which is a good thing.

Amazing. The fact that its the first original arc (as in not being in the game) makes it exciting for those who have played it. Even more, it strengthens the connection with When They Cry Umineko, which is a game made by the same creator of Higurashi. So far so good, keeping the gory and despair, the trademarks of the Higurashi series, as well as dropping hints for theories to come. Anyhow, great anime.