My 2012 spring anime lineup included a few titles featuring the strange girlfriend genre, such as Sankarea and Nazo no Kanojo X. The former featured a girl who was turned into a zombie, while the latter showcased a relationship born from a drool bond (uhm... I still don't know how to explain this).
The third is the anime adaptation of Maybe's manga Tasogare Otome x Amnesia or Dusk Maiden of Amnesia, and the girl love interest in mention is a ghost who have forgotten her past.
Throughout the years, the Seikyou Private Academy became a maze after many renovations, with the interconnected old and new school buildings yielding strange corridors, blocked staircases and sudden dead ends. For some reason, Niiya Teiichi ends up wandering the old buildings and meets ghost Kanoe Yuko, who figures in many of the school's ghost stories. Yuko tells Teiichi that she doesn't remember her past or how she died. Setting up at the room where they found Yuko's remains, Teiichi and Yuko create the Paranormal Investigations Club in order to investigate the school's mysteries and to find out how Yuko died. They are joined by the enthusiastic Okonogi Momoe and the stern Kanoe Kirie, who is Yuko's great niece and can also see her ghost.
While not quite as oppressive in overall feel as Another, Tasogare Otome x Amnesia also features dark settings most of the time, with overcast skies tinged with unnatural hues that just add to the creepy vibe whenever the topic discussed in the anime series is serious or scary in nature. Not that it's serious or scary all the time. In fact, most of the series's light moments are courtesy of the supernatural Yuko, who exhibits playfulness in many things she does and naughtiness every time she is with Teiichi.
The overarching plot revolves around trying to figure out the mysteries of the school and discovering clues about Yuko's death, but the series also focuses on the undeniable chemistry between Teiichi and Yuko. Many of their struggles throughout the series, especially in its latter part, tests the strength of their relationship.
While there are antagonists to contend with, the biggest conflict of the series comes from Yuko herself. The series features a heroine who shields herself from the ugly truths, both about her past and herself. Every mystery they look into and solve only adds to her doubts and fears, reminding viewers that sometimes the biggest monsters are actually in us. It also reminds us that sometimes the people with the brightest smiles hide the deepest insecurities about themselves. All these negative aspects of Yuko's psyche is a monstrous being to contend with. And I mean that in the literal sense.
Part horror story and part story of self discovery, albeit aided by a loved one, Tasogare Otome x Amnesia combines elements of comedy, drama, romance, ecchi, mystery and the supernatural to good effect. I say good and not great because there's a rushed quality to its storytelling, with only twelve episodes in the season. But despite the swiftness of the series and its occasional light moments, it serves up the mystery in a great creepy way that you are not left to doubt as to the original genre of the series.
The final episode of the series aims to touch and it does, at first giving us a look of how Teiichi and Yuko's relationship should have been if it weren't for the horrendous specter of her past. There's a moment of heartbreak that aims to move the audience. At this point, I'm on the fence on whether they should have ended the series right then and there or if the scenes that followed led to an ending that I actually wanted to see. Either way, Teiichi and Yuko is about as cute as a human and ghost couple can get.
Happy viewing!!Labels: Adaptation, Anime, Ecchi, Must-Watch, Mystery, Romance, Supernatural, Tasogare Otome X Amnesia, TV
