Ghost Hound Episode 1

Ghost Hound is a show made for Production I.G’s 20th anniversary. It’s listed as mainly being a psychological thriller, though some also find it to be a horror (the weenies). Well, lets take a look if this show is as good as people say it is.

The show starts off with you flying through some trees, and eventually hovering over a lake (all in first person of course). It was… strange to say the least.

Only 30 seconds in and it already feels like a shroomfest.

After this, the OP song plays. It was… alright I guess. It wasn’t that bad, but it wasn’t exactly the catchiest song ever either.

Anyways, it then returns us to more flying around random places, one of them being a pretty creepy jail cell-like room with a girl in it.

Given what was shown, it's somewhat obvious she's dead.

We spend more time in this room than anywhere else, which suggests that this area and/or girl is important. Eventually, we move on though. This time to some stairs leading to a shrine. A girl is walking up the stairs, but suddenly…

Maybe she wants in on the shroom action?

She. Can. See. You… Creepy. Those eyes that are supposedly the ones you’re looking through kinda have the same reaction of, “Wait, she can see me?!” Then you watch some more random crap and the scene changes.

Now Tarou (I will refer to characters by their last name, as the Japanese do so as to not cause confusion. Unless they switch to using the characters first name when they become close to someone, then I’ll do the same. It just so happens that Tarou wasn’t called by his last name (Komori) pretty much at all this episode). wakes up from sleeping on the floor and we learn about our little shroom trip.

You have some ball-tripping dreams, dude.

Then Tarou goes around and talks to people in his family and such so we can learn some backstory. Nothing that interesting except that his dad is a brewer, and expects him to take over the business. Tarou isn’t too happy about this, because apparently his sister was supposed to be the one taking over the business. Judging by the conversation, it seems she died. My mind was quickly drawn back to that girl we saw on the shroom trip.

Anyways, yeah. Not too many interesting things happened.

That's one HUGE bottle of alcohol.

Tarou then goes to school, and everyone in his class goes all bananas since they see Oogami out of the window arriving at school. Apparently he’s a delinquent who hasn’t shown up to class in the last two weeks or so.

Then class starts and it’s obvious nobody in the classroom is paying any attention whatsoever. Tarou also falls asleep. More ball-tripping happens.

Talk about an "out-of-body" experience. O_o

We fly around and see some of the same stuff, and some new stuff too. The main new thing they added was the mysteriously tall figure. It was pretty creepy.

Schrodinger's Catbox?

Tarou wakes up shortly after, and then has to go to the Principal’s Office after class. On his way out, he locks eyes with Oogami.

*Glare*

Oogami then leaves to do clearly more important things, like staring at small children or possibly kittens. Before Tarou can move, the new kid, Nakajima,  stops him.

Oh baby.

Nakajima then flirts with Tarou for a bit, before Tarou gets all anal and brushes him off so he can go see the principal. Nakajima just watches him leave with a playful smile at first, and then a more… dissatisfied one? He’s up to something.

Devious Plotting: Phase 1 Initiated

Turns out Tarou had to go to the Principal’s Office to meet the new psychiatrist.

So creepy... >_<

Despite the creepy appearance, there’s nothing really bad about the psychiatrist, he seems like a pretty chill dude. Turns out Tarou has narcolepsy, which would explain why he’s always sleeping. After a bit of conversation, we find out he sees a psychiatrist because of his shroom dreams he’s been having, which have been caused by an incident from 11 years ago.

Oh my god! It's... It's... BACKSTORY!

Seems like Tarou and his sister were kidnapped 11 years ago. That would explain the girl in his dreams, along with some other things.

The scene changes to Oogami walking home from school, and it looks like Nakajima is following and pestering him. Oogami is doing a fine job of not giving a crap, until Nakajimi steps the line.

Wait... what?!

It seems like Tarou and Oogami are connected, and it’s most likely about the kidnapping incident. We aren’t given any more details though, because Oogami gets pissed and decides that beating up Nakajima sounds like more fun than glaring at small creatures.

FALCON PUNCH CHARGING...

Oogami quickly decides that beating Nakajima’s face in isn’t actually the best idea though, and walks off. Nakajima gives a satisfied smile. Is the guy a masochist or something? If he keeps prying, he’s bound to get the beating of his life.

Once again, the scene changes. This time it’s… the stair girl from the beginning of the episode?! She’s at the bottom of those same stairs, and is staring at something.

Well, the show IS called "Ghost Hound."

Tarou shows up not much later, but can’t see whatever it is the girl is looking at. Before he can ask her any questions about who she is or why it seemed like she could see him during his dream at the beginning of the episode, she heads off up the stairs. Tarou decides he should leave it be for now and starts peddling past the stairs. However, as he goes, he swerves around the area where we saw the ghost. He stops almost right after doing so and looks back at the spot, as if he can’t understand why he just avoided that area. Then the episode ends.

CONCLUSIONS: That was a really nice touch at the end with him unconsciously avoiding where we assume the ghost or whatever it is is standing. The episode didn’t really have anything amazing thrown out there, but that’s expected. The first few episodes have to set everything up before the awesome can begin, after all.

Also, we know that Oogami likes to glare at things and that Nakajima acts homoerotic as a false pretense.

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