Review of Hell Girl: Three Vessels

Warning, minor spoilers. Oh, Hell Girl: Three Vessels, you really are a unique season, aren't you? I’ll admit that Hell Girl is not for everyone, what not with how repetitive a good chunk of the episodes is. Going into season three, I wasn’t expecting anything different from the first two seasons: each episode, someone gets sent to hell and the series has a bit of plot progression or character development. We saw this a lot more during season two with the principle cast being given proper histories as opposed to just being Ai’s companions. It was something that I was hoping to see more of thisseason since, as I mentioned, Hell Girl is VERY episodic.

So, what makes Hell Girl: Three Vessels (or Jigoku Shoujo Mitsuganae) so unique? Well, unlike the past two seasons which I thought were perfectly decent series, Three Vessels manages to be simultaneously one of the worst and best anime I’ve ever seen. There truly isn’t any anime that I’ve seen in recent memory that truly ascribe to the feeling that I felt while watching this. But wait, how can an anime be both one of the worst and one of the best?

Well, to put it bluntly, the first half of this season is abjectly terrible. First and foremost, Ai is back without any explanation. Don’t get me wrong, I really enjoy Ai’s character, but there is no effort to justify or explain how she returned after what happened to her at the end of season two. As for other non-principle characters in the first twelve episodes? Think of some of the dumbest and most terrible writing you’ve seen in anime and know that it doesn’t even come close to the idiocy that you see here. Back in the good ol’ days of seasons one and two, you had people being sent to Hell for murder, attempted rape, blackmail, abuse, slander, neglect, you name it. Rarely was there an instance of someone being sent to hell who didn’t deserve it. The series also did a decent job at showing how conflicted people (generally) were about condemning themselves to eternal damnation.

Now do you remember the three or so episodes of Two Mirrors where the citizens of Lovely Hills were sending other to Hell for incredibly trite and dumbass reasons? Well, that is almost exclusively what you find in Three Vessels.

Seriously, just to give you an idea, let’s look at some of the completely justified and 100% sound reasons people were sent to Hell in this season.

Ep 1: For telling students to behave in class.
Ep 3: For telling someone they can’t sing.
Ep 4: ?????????
Ep 5: For lying to her grandmother.
Ep 6: For liking a teacher.
Ep 7: For being helpful.
Ep 9: For existing (Yes, really).
Ep 10: For selling clothes.
Ep 11: For writing a book; also, returning a book.
Ep 12: For saving someone from suicide.

What? Did you think that the abusive mother or cheating boyfriend would be the targets of retribution? Ha! What are you? A normal, rational person?

So many of these plot contrivances in the first half of this season were caused by one of my biggest pet peeves in storytelling which is poor communication. More than half of the conflicts in these episodes could have been solved if people simply TALKED to each other. Even in episode 8, which I left out (because the woman in question deliberately poisons a dog), the ‘villain’ could have avoided her fate if she reasonably explained the problems she was having with her neighbor. But she doesn’t and pays the price for it.

I’d also like to point out that there is a scene that is repeated every episode and it takes up a FULL MINUTE of the run time. It was artistic and interesting if not disturbing in the first episode and was needless every episode afterward.

All that being said, the series becomes much more tolerable from episode thirteen onward. Not to say that there still aren’t stupid characters who make mind-numbingly delusional choices (looking at you Episode 18), but the justifications become a lot more in line with previous seasons and with realistic, emotional reactions.

After Episode 19, the season becomes truly incredible. Without spoiling anything, all I can say is that there is a very unexpected plot twist that you will not pick up on unless you give the show your complete and undivided attention. In terms of Western media, the twist is somewhat cliché, but in the context of the anime, it was something that I legitimately did not see coming. It can be a tad melodramatic at times, but considering the circumstances of these episodes, I’m willing to overlook it. Characters are fleshed out and believable for what is an otherwise unrealistic anime.

The art, sound and animation of this series are also pretty good. Nothing insanely spectacular or memorable, but consistent to what we’ve seen so far. It’s because of this consistency that I’m mad that Three Vessels even bothered with the poor writing quality of the first twelve episodes. Even simply changing the motives or personalities of a few people could have drastically altered how I viewed this show. But instead, I got stuck with this slog of dumb choices and idiotic characters.

I do recommend that in watching this series that you skip episodes 2-12 and possibly 18. They are not necessary in advancing the plot in any meaningful sense. But if you choose to watch it and stick it out, I guarantee that you will be rewarded with a truly outstanding conclusion to this arc.

The first half of this season was a 3, but the last half was a 9, so I'll be generous and average out my scores since it's wholly representative of what I thought about this season.