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I would consider myself a Higurashi fan, I've played through all of the VN's and was enjoying the anime up until this one. But Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Gou disappointed me.

Let's start with the positives, which is almost everything up until episode 17, these episodes really feel like the first two seasons of Higurashi despite being anime original. They start off feeling like a remake, but quickly make you realize that they are much more. The characters take actions that, in the original, would've made for a good world but here lead to disasters in this one. For example, in the original, Keiichi doesn't ... trust Rena and Mion and ends up killing them while they never had ill intentions. Here, Keiichi decides to trust them, and ends up getting killed for it. It makes you think 'so this is how Rika was feeling' as you really think it should go right this time, but then something surprising happens that ends the world in a new brutal way. So the first 17 episodes are really good, i would probably give them an eight overall, why then did I give the entire season such a low score?

That is for one big reason, Satoko. The last arc, which lasts from episode 18 until 24, completely ruins Satoko. Now, if this is your first shot at Higurashi, this probably won't bother you too much, but for someone who's spent this much time with these characters, it really sucks. I get where they were coming from, Satoko is the kind of character to never lose, she'll try everything she can to win, but she would never, in good conscience, kill Rika multiple times just to not have to go with her to school. I get that the first time at the school was a terrible experience for her, but this is just too much. Satoko in the VN's is meant as a smart, funny prankster who uses her traps to achieve victory in the club games, not to kill her friends. But in Gou, she does, she kills Rika time and time again, just to get her to not want to go to St. Lucia, which leads to a really unlikable version of a character I came to have a soft spot for in the previous seasons.

This last arc kind of ruins the entire season for me, but since I did enjoy the first part, it'll still get a five. This season is by no means bad, it just ruined a character I really liked, I hope Sotsu fixes this because if it doesn't, the last two Higurashi seasons will have really bad aftertaste.