Jigoku shôjo

Especially from the aspect of enjoyment this show is real hell. Every single episode presents an enclosed story where we can ALWAYS see new characters that can be right away fitted into a pigeon-hole of a victim and a villain, and that ALWAYS evolves according to the same pattern. In the end, Enma Ai — Jigoku Shoujo — intervenes like "deus ex machina" to resolve the story saying ALWAYS the same phrase. Since this pattern never changes, it becomes terribly boring after some while, regrettably, we are to suffer it to the very end, because of the absence of any continual story. Moreover, we don't learn anything much about Enma Ai, nor about her partners from the hell ride. The animation itself is very good, as well as music by Takanashi Yasuharu which is well worth listening to. Weaker characters that can be driven crazy by boredom from the monotony are not recommended to watch it.

I'm a latecomer to anime in general, but after thoroughly enjoying titles like Dororo, The Promised Neverland, Boku dake ga inai machi, and Kino's Journey I was off to a really good start. I found Hell Girl on a list of supposedly cerebral anime with dark themes. Unfortunately it's not particularly dark or cerebral, more repetitive and sappy. I lost interest around episode 17. I feel like the whole series is an exercise in waiting for something that never materializes. 5/10.

This may not be for everyone that wants a consistent plot and character developments. Its like an anthology series with a different case in each episode. The thing that makes this show intriguing to watch is what these characters do in the situation that presents them in.

Overall I enjoyed Hell Girl but the first about 10 episodes are really, really repetitive and... yes... become even kinda boring at some point.

After that rough start the series turns out to be more and more enjoyable though, the animation is beautiful and the grand themes of this Anime were quite interesting:

How far are you willing to go for vengeance? Is vengeance ever the right answer? Do some people rightfully deserve to go to hell for what they have done?

6/10, solid but not a must see in my opinion. I would recommend it half-heartedly to people really interested in the story but as I said don't expect to be blown away right from the beginning.

So Jigoku shojo or 'Hell Girl' as it's known in English, I found to be an enjoyable series. I'll admit that the first 10/15 episodes -so most of series 1- follow a shortly recognisable narrative. Someone is clearly being mistreated or hurt by another, so through the "hell communication" they write on the website the name of their tormentor, and the Hell Girl will take revenge for them. There are 2 series after this and they delve into the back story much more and we finally learn more about the Hell Girl -how she came to be- and her assistants.

Overall give it a chance it's worth a watch, the character of Hell Girl is one of my favourites out of all the anime series I've watched. I'd stick to watching it subbed- the dub isn't great. The animation is very lovely too.