Many anime producers have taken to reissuing their shows in boxed sets.  It's a nice trend and I'm happy to see it continue.  One of the latest such releases is Requiem from the Darkness, an eerie show that has a unique look and feel to it.  This isn't a case of style over substance though, this series has a good story to go along with the interesting visuals.

Taking place during the Edo period in Japan, this show concerns that travels of Momosuke, an aspiring writer.  This young man makes his living by writing children's riddles, but what he really wants to do is write a book of 100 ghost stories.  So he travels the countryside compiling the local legends of hauntings and such.

At the beginning of the first episode, Momosuke gets caught in a heavy rain storm and seeks shelter in a run down old store.   There he encounters a trio of strange people:  Mataichi an old monk who is very adepts at using charms, Ogin the puppeteer, and Nagamimi a shape-shifter.  These three people have the job of dealing out punishment to those who have eluded the law.  They do their job effectively and with a certain amount of relish.

Momosuke doesn't follow the trio, but as he chases down his ghost stories, he finds his path intersecting the group's quite often.  He's looking for horror stories, and they are punishing those who have committed horrific crimes.  Momosuke ends up watching, and occasionally helping, this group more than he should.

This is an episodic program with each show telling another ghost story, and it is very well done.  The shows themselves are scary, but not in an Audition like guy-in-a-bag-rolling-around scary, more of an eerie scary that keeps your eyes glued to the screen.  Many of the episodes had scenes of segments that surprised me too, which added to my enjoyment a lot.

There are a lot of violent parts to this show, but the vast majority of them are implied rather than shown, and it works well.  When you see a thin, sharp line pass over the silhouette of a woman, and then the image falls into two parts, you know what happened and it is spooky.  Much more fear inducing than any Go Nagi gore-fest.

Another reason that this show works so well is because of its unique artistic style.  Some people might not enjoy it, but it really is quite effective.  The images are all dark and angular, with a distorted style that fits the horrific nature of the series to a tee.  Thick bold lines outline many characters and building and objects look a little bit foreign and different adding to the creepy feel of the show.

The music to the show is also just a little off kilter which adds to the uneasy feeling.  The songs used for background music sometimes don't really mesh with the show as a whole and this has a disquieting effect. Sometimes the music to horrific scenes is just a bit too up and light or too funky.  At first I thought it was just odd, but as the show progressed I realized that it really helps keep the viewer unbalanced.

This show was just the right length.  A short thirteen episode series, the viewer doesn't have time to grow bored with the formula or tire of the horror/mysteries.  Though there isn't much in the way of an overall story, what there is comes to a nice conclusion in the final two-part story.

All thirteen episodes of this show are presented on four DVDs.  These are housed in a book, with one page for each disc.  The cover has a nice wrap around picture of the main characters.  The book itself comes in a thin slipcase that is quite attractive.  I really prefer this book style of storing DVDs over the more frequently seen fold out pack.  It's also much thinner than standard cases.  A nice looking package.

Audio:

This disc has the original Japanese soundtrack and an English dub, both in surround stereo.  I alternated between the languages every episode at the start, but decided I enjoyed the Japanese track more and finished the series reading the subtitles.  I thought the English dub was good, but the Japanese voices were more eerie and spooky, adding a lot to atmosphere of the story.  The audio quality was very good (though I think a 5.1 track would have worked really well with this show.)  The audio for both tracks were clear and free from noise and the music came through full and strong.  I was very pleased with the way these shows sounded.

Video:

The full frame image looked good too.  This is a very stylized show and the dark and grey colors were strong and the areas in shadows had sufficient detail.  The blacks were very solid which is important for this series, and the occasional bright colors were vivid.  There was some minor aliasing but no other digital defects.  A nice looking disc.

Extras:

Like the original releases of this show, there wasn't a lot of bonus material in this boxed set.  The first disc has a clean opening and closing, and all four have a line art gallery as well as a gallery of background art.  Aside from previews and DVD credits, that's it.

Final Thoughts:

This horror based show isn't in the Go Nagi style of grotesque monsters and flying limbs.  Most, but not all, of the violence is implied and it works very well.  The stylized art and music come together with the eerie stories to make a rather spooky show.  Just about every episode has something the made me jump, even if just a little.  Though the show only last for 13 episodes, it's just the right length.  The stories are still fresh at the end, but if it had lasted any longer they would have started to get a little stale.  A show that's a little different from the other anime that I've seen, and that's a good thing.  My main complaint is that the price is pretty steep.  I wish that Geneon would have discounted it some.  As it is this retails for the same price that the original volumes did.  Even so, this set is Recommended, especially for fans who are looking for something a little different and eerie.