Ookami Kakushi - Episode 10

Although the previous episode of Ookami Kakushi almost felt like a natural place to end this particular series in some respects, there is still a fair amount of unfinished business to attend to in the show's final few episodes, with the Hassaku Festival about to start and Sakaki still at large despite the failure of his previous plan involving Nemuru and Hiro.


Needless to say, the Hassaku Festival is the next target in Sakaki's plan of action, as in the midst of all the enjoyment he unleashes a beserk "demon" that shows all and sundry attending the festival the truth of Jouga's old town, thus sowing the seeds of distrust and dissent between old residents and new and bringing the situation to the brink of a "civil war" of sorts. However, even that isn't quite evil enough for Sakaki, as he also reveals the next part of his plot that puts the entire town in dire jeopardy.

Unfortunately for Sakaki, his evil streak also tends him towards some of the bad habits that bad guys always seem to have, meaning that he reveals his plans to a dying man only to have them relayed to the entire town and somewhat putting the brakes on the distrust he'd managed to build up just moments before. Oops. In fact, speaking of Sakaki it's a bit difficult to get a proper grip on his motivations full stop, as they swing from vengeance on behalf of his dead girlfriend to the opportunity to make some money - I suppose having dual motives isn't a bad thing, but it does feel a little odd here somehow.

That aside, this was a reasonably solid episode of Ookami Kakushi that didn't really deliver any huge shocks, thrills or spills but still progressed its plot simply and effectively enough - The trouble is that now all of the mystery has gone from the series there isn't a great deal left to prop it up beyond some kind of old-fashioned race against time premise to stop the town from being flooded. Given the lack of truly distinctive characters within the series, turning it into some kind of poor man's Atlantis doesn't seem like such a terrible idea either, although it does leave me wondering why Ryukishi07 has such a bee in his bonnet about dam construction between this series and Higurashi. Maybe the guy's allergic to water or something?