“Thank you, Makina. Spending my days fighting alongside you, means everything to me. The pact we made was worth all of this – and more.” – Keisei Tagami You know when you go into a show and expect it to be mediocre at best and bad at worst, and it completely surprises you? That what´s happened when I watched “Shikabane Hime” (aka Corpse Princess). I expected flat and stereotypic characters, incoherent plot and plot holes, suspensions less fights, and shit loads of un-necessary fanservice. But boy was I wrong, it´s not often that I get so emotional during a watch as I became during mytime with “Shikabane Hime”. It gripped me on a deeper level then I thought possible, considering the genres (action, horror, martial art). And it has one of my all-time favourite openings – if not watch the show, watch the opening for the music and visuals alone.
So, what was it that surprised me so positively? I will explain that now.
Story: 9/10
The plot has a clear path in its narrative and layout. Each episode giving clues and information to upcoming important events, and head enemies. I didn´t perceived the show as episodic, it´s just smoothly builds up the story and characters to the climax, with some suspense and tensions filled moments along the way.
I would definitely not call the plot especially unique or ground-breaking, but it´s for shore executed in a special way. As so many horror anime out there, death is an essential part – and not the physical death only, but the philosophical part of it as well. It has been in myth and folk lore for a long time, that if you die with regrets your spirit can´t pass on, and the spirit is stuck here in our world. This theme has been pondered many times in pretty much all mediums, but it never seems to get old, and can always be interpreted in new ways.
“Shikabane Hime” takes the approach, if you die with strong regrets, then you get stuck in the living world, and this regret or obsession will turn you into a “Shikabane” (Shikabane literally means Dead body or Corpse) – a monster that has a physical form, and completely stripped off its former humanity. The only drive left is the Shikabane´s regrets or obsessions. Which inevitably turns the former human evil, and it will havoc upon the still living world with their super human strength. And of course, it has a counterpart, a group of people that has tasked them self with the non-so pleasant job to protect the living from these Shikabanes. They are called the Kougon Clan, and the members are monks that been trained for this special task of destroying these monsters, and keep the truth about them hidden from the rest of the world. To their help, they have Shikabane Hime´s, female Shikabanes, that they formed contract with. Together they form a team, and the Shikabane Hime takes life energy from her contracted monk to heal herself, and pretty much becomes undefeatable – and keeps her sanity and human form. After the Shikabane Hime has killed 108 Shikabanes, she can go peacefully to heaven with no regrets.
As a base, this can sound very cliché, but in Shikabane Hime´s case, it made me reflect on some deeper subjects. What´s defines being human? Is it a beating heart and ageing body? Or is it much more complicated than that? Is it our emotions, actions, and thoughts that defines us as human? Because, the Hime´s are treated in many cases as something non-human, more like a tool with an expiration date.
I think how the relationships between the Shikabane Hime´s and their monks, really brought up these questions. Yes, the Hime´s are dead. No pulse, no aging, and very time limited to this world. And the monks, are very alive, ageing, and bound to this world for unknown time. And still they both look human, act human, and feel emotions like humans. And they are absolutely forbidden to have any romantic relationships. And that was another surprising part of the show, how it displayed these complicated relationships and the character’s feelings, or rather how they supressed these strong feeling for each other. What I expected to be a gore fest, with cliché fights, and empty character interactions, became something much more. It became a story of living on, even if dead, with the means of fighting, meaningful and touching character relationships, and the fights had meaning and emotional drive behind them. But of course, it contains lot of gore, it is a horror anime after all. As for the expected fanservice, it was actually very limited. Most of the fanservice is provided in the ending song, and it’s used sparingly during the actual show. Huge plus for me.
Note: Worth having in mind, is that this is the first season of two so all your questions will not be answered in this season. Also worth mentioning is that the manga was still ongoing when the 2: nd season was released, so if you want a conclusive ending, you have to read the manga.
Character: 9/10
As mentioned before, I expected empty stereotypes, doing and saying cliché and dumb thing, with non-exciting development. I was wrong. They all had a certain depth to them, with specific personalities, backed up by their past experiences. All the main and main supporting characters, get some important development and backstory (Ouri get his in the second season). The dynamic between the characters was very defined and meaningful, even scenes there Keisei just goofing around with his adopted little brother Ouri, and making him angry and embarrassed, becomes an important part of the show. Also, as mentioned before, the relationships between the Hime´s and their monks are a central part. All or of them are unique personas, who has established a specific dynamic between them. The interactions and dynamic with other human characters and Shikabane´s, is also an essential part to really get to the depth of what these Hime´s and Monk´s go through.
Which brings me to Shikabane Hime´s main charcaters.
We get to follow the Shikabane Hime, Makina, contracted to Keisei, and his adopted little brother Ouri. Keisei never wanted to make a contract with a Hime in the first place, but as he knew Makina in the past, he couldn’t turn her down after she and her family was brutally murdered by a group Shikabane´s. Makina´s regret is a burning hatred for her and her family’s murderers, and she want her revenge. So, they make a pact to always fight to together, and give Makina her revenge.
Makina can at first glance be labelled a tsundere, but her harsh way and words is just a protective shell she´s created. She´s keeping her true feelings and emotions on a tight leash, due to that she knows that some things just can´t be – even though she wishes otherwise. Makina is simply put a badass realist, not a true bread tsundere. Which gives her softer moments a lot more value and emotional impact. Keisei is a character with two very distinct sides – the goofy older brother monk that pretends that nothing is going on, and the more serious and high level Shikabane fighter. Keisei has a heart of gold, and his protectiveness of Makina is nothing but heart clenching. You can clearly see that they harbour strong feeling towards each other. Their relationship and interactions, brought me to tears multiple times during this watch. Sense when did horror anime become such a tear-jerker? Ouri isn´t a monk, and has no clue about what´s his brother is really doing in the beginning, but he is like a moth to light, when it´s comes to death. He seems to be drawn automatically to it. Ouri is very emotionally cut off, much of what he sees and experience almost never faces him in ways that you would expect. He just goes with most of it, and the key to it lays in his past (of course!). And just in he´s case as in Makina´s, his more emotional moments have a lot of more impact, because of his usual lack of response. His loyalty to his brother and those his think of as friends, are nicely portrayed. He´s is the weakling in the beginning, the person all people tells to “Stay out of it, you just going to be in the way!”, but constantly interfere – he just can´t stay away after he came to know about Makina. He´s drawn to her, and sees her as normal girl – which is a huge taboo. Makina tries her best to scare Ouri off, but a time comes there they have to lean heavily on each other. To see there bound slowly grow, also was one of the show´s strong holds for me.
All the supporting characters are in some way interesting, with pretty solid personalities, development, and backstories. I came to care for all the teams, and be emotionally invested in them to the point there I was like, “Please, don´t let one of them die!”. Even if I knew that in this kind of show, deaths will occur frequently. I enjoyed their stories and screen time just much as Makina´s, Keisei´s, and Ouri´s.
Art: 8/10
I personally really liked the art and animation, but it´s clearly out dated, compared to this day’s anime. Shikabane Hime, is a 2008 production by studio Gainax and feel. I think they managed to catch the atmosphere for the show very well, with carefully chosen colours and light setting. I came to love the character designs, even if some can appear lazily drawn at first. It´s was the small details of them, who made them stand out to regular anime designs. Like, Makina´s thick, pinched eyebrows when irritate or mad, or her evil death smile before she blasts her enemy to oblivion with her uzi´s. Or like Keisei´s spikey hair and shaded glasses. All details that defined their personality and mad them stand out from the norm.
The backgrounds are beautifully done and coloured, it really could give you an emotional contrast. For example, the cast been out hunting Shikabane´s, and bathed in blood in the dark of night, to watch a stunning sunrise or sunset and have nice small talk. It provided a nice balance, the beauty of life and death, night and day, and violence and peace.
The animation is mostly well done, but some parts feel a bit sloppy. Personally, I really liked the action scenes, with their special angles and explosiveness. The actually tension in the fights, was brought by the characters and highlighted by the animation. No complains form my point of view.
Sound: 9/10
I have already stated that Shikabane Hime, has one of my all-time favourite openings. The song “Beautiful fighter” by angela, is not just suiting the show amazingly well, it´s a masterpiece on its own. I listen to it several times a day, I just can´t stop myself. The two ED´s are also surprisingly good, with my favourite being “My Story” also by angela. There is also where most of the fanservice I provided, but I watched it every time anyway, because the song was so good. Top notch OP and ED.
As for the OST, it was great. Dramatic instrumental music during intense filled scenes, and it´s softer counterpart during more emotional scenes. No complains what so ever.
I watched the dubbed version, and I liked all the VA´s. Ouri´s VA can sound a bit emotionless or flat, but don´t forget, that Ouri´s character pretty much demand that kind of voice.
All background sound was absolutely fine, I could really hear the bullets popping, blood splatter on the ground, rasp of fabric against fabric, and the impact a collapsing structure made. Above standard for shore.
Enjoyment: 10/10
If you not guessed it so far, I enjoyed Shikabane Hime a hell of a lot. I was taken by surprise of the fact, that just after 2 episodes, I was emotionally invested and highly entertained. Makina as the female lead was a treat, not your typical simplistic main girl, but had a lot of badass traits together with a hidden softer and loving side. Huge plus that they used her very little for fanservice, she was often treated with much more respect. I haven´t explored the horror genre that thoroughly, but I can imagine that this will be one of my favourites in the genre for all time, due to its emotional impact on me – the drama behind it all was well portrayed in my opinion. It made me feel intrigued, interested, engaged in the plot and characters, and excited. And not to mention the river of tears.
Overall: 9/10
Even do I can see that the show isn´t perfect, with every angle covered, it felt filled with important content and interesting characters, and character dynamics and relationships. Shikabane Hime, also contains some unrequired love aspects, expressed in a very nice and touching way. So, to me the show is much more than an action/horror train going to one destination. It contains, emotional hardships, the importance of the present time, forbidden love, and fighting to stay alive, and not for just the sake of fighting. So I would recommend the show if you like the themes, and haven´t had the pleasure to dig in to this piece that is Shikabane Hime yet.
“Look at that. You are scared of me now.” – Makina Hoshimura
