Anime and Japanese Folklore
December 15, 2008 7:40 PM   Subscribe

Are these anime characters rooted in Japanese folklore?

I've recently been watching an anime series named Hell Girl. I've noticed that there are some striking similarities in some of characters in this series to another series that I've seen called Requiem from the Darkness. The characters Mataichi, Ogin, and Nagamimi from Requim are all too similar to Ai's companions Wanyūdō, Ren Ichimoku, and Hone Onna in Hell Girl. I figure since both series have similar themes and symbolism that these characters have to related to some sort of folklore in Japan. So any explanations or stories that anyone knows of would be most helpful.
posted by RubyDoom to Religion & Philosophy (3 answers total) 1 user marked this as a favorite
 
Best answer: Are these anime characters rooted in Japanese folklore?

The short answer, is, yes.

Here's what I found:

閻魔 あい, Enma Ai

Enma is the traditional ruler of Hell.

輪入道, Wanyūdō

骨女, Hone Onna

The Wikipedia page for Hell Girl talk a lot about the supernatural subtext of the series.

You might want to check out Yokai Attack.

If you have the chance, you should definitely take a look at Mizuki Shigeru's writings and illustrations.
posted by KokuRyu at 8:54 PM on December 15, 2008


Let me second Yokai Attack. Absolutely should be on your reading list if you want to learn about mystical Japanese folklore and scary monsters in Japan.
posted by gen at 10:53 PM on December 15, 2008


Reminds me that starting in 2003, I began getting dozens of visitors per day on my blog from Google and Yahoo searches for "Kurama" and "Hiei" and I can't remember what else, but I was puzzled as to why so many people were looking up the names of Kyoto mountains and checking out my pictures of them. I have no interest in manga, so I had no idea that these people were scouring my site in vain for anime characters.
posted by planetkyoto at 4:06 AM on December 16, 2008


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