Higurashi no Naku Koro ni/Nightmare Fuel



Ahh Higurashi...how you rival Evangelion in terms of insanity, mind rapes, and wet-the-bed scariness... -
 * One scene where a young Lolita with a speech impediment, kidnapped by a psychopath, picks up a knife. Obviously she's going to go down swinging, right? WRONG. She picks up the knife, starts speaking in perfect adult Japanese, braces the knife's handle against the wall and headbutts it seven times before she dies. This being Higurashi, absolutely no explanation is given for this at all until late in the same season.
 * The First of all, when  When she falls to the floor she stares at  before dying while in a giant pool of her own blood. The look  face throughout it sums it up.
 * Speaking of which, that laugh and subsequent ear-piercing scream. Dear god is it hard to fall asleep after that.
 * In the Tatarigoroshi-hen story arc, the audience knows just what Watanagashi is all about. That doesn't make the opening to the first chapter any easier: A man is poking a bag in a canal with a stick, complaining that it stinks. When it bursts, the camera pans slowly across a decaying, maggot-infested corpse whose hands had freakishly long nails driven through EVERY SINGLE JOINT. Later on, you learn that
 * The scene where Satoko left to get soy sauce from a neighbor and never returned.
 * The ending of Watanagashi-hen itself has one of the most bed-wetting Nightmare Fuel scenes in history. After the main character evades two different attempts on his life by the same person and is told she was found dead, he's left alone in his hospital room. All of a sudden, someone grasps his wrist. GUESS WHO??? Not just her after she's supposed to be dead, though. Her with blood running down her face and over her body. She says that she changed her mind about her promise not to kill him (pictured above), and even the subtitles get into the game here, fading from white to bright red. Then she readies her nail, and the last thing you see before the screen goes red is her hammer coming down right at you as she laughs hysterically.
 * In the english dub, she asks Keiichi if he really thought she'd give him that third wish (to not kill him), calling him a "silly, silly boy" before ramming the hammer into his face a nail into his finger. Of course we find out that by this time, Shmion is/are dead, and the Shion we see (which points to the Backup Twin point) is actually a delusion, and Keiichi suffers a heart attack and dies.
 * Which makes much worse: you're not only losing your mind and your life, you're having fucked up hallucinations. Your last moments of life are full of madness and horror.
 * It was handled fantastically in the manga. He's left alone, and there's a full-page spread of Keiichi just sitting there and Oh Crap why is there a hand there? You flip the page, and you find the exact same shot, only that a terrifying face has emerged to accompany the bloody hand, rising from under the bed. The final two pages are, to be blunt, EXTREMELY DISTURBING.
 * There's a point where Keiichi is on the phone in his room, speaking to the police. He's been keeping this correspondence a secret from his friends, because he knows they're hiding something from him and have been getting increasingly creepy. After he hangs up the phone, his father comes in to ask what he and Rena were talking about. When Keiichi says that he wasn't on the phone with Rena, his father responds with something like, "Not on the phone, she showed up an hour ago and went right up to your room. I passed her on the stairs just a moment ago." This is when Keiichi figures out that Rena was standing outside his room, listening in on a phone conversation he explicitly told her he was not having.
 * In the anime this point is even more horrific if you re-watch the scene where Keichii is on the phone. The camera takes various points of view, first from the ceiling, then from behind the telephone. This is done to add a circling atmosphere of paranoia and disorientation. Then it shows from the ceiling, a crack in the door, the floor, etc. When you find out that Rena was spying on the conversation, you realize the crack was her vantage point.
 * The original game and manga version of the door scene has Rena explaining how she knows what Keiichi is eating for dinner: she was stalking him at the supermarket where he bought his dinner.
 * As told in one of the TIPS of Tatarigoroshi-hen, there's a recording of an interview found between a reporter and the hospitilized Keiichi. The reporter asks him what happened after he got pushed off the bridge and how he escaped the gas cloud that killed everyone else in Hinamizawa. As the reporter begins poking holes into Keiichi's story, he descends further and further into insanity. Finally, Keiichi rants about how he can wish death upon people and how he caused the disaster by wishing for Hinamizawa to die as he fell of the bridge. After mentioning hearing Oyashiro-sama's footsteps behind him, he wished "death by water" on the reporter, and the tape cuts off as he starts laughing psychotically. The TIPS then notes that Keiichi died a few days later, and the reporter drowned while on a fishing trip several years afterwards.
 * This is handled superbly in the manga where you really see how mad Keiichi has gotten, the death by water comment is more a Fridge Horror as it is noted a few pages earlier that the reporter died when his boat capsized. Then after 10-15 pages of creepiness they top it of in the last 3 pages first with Keiichi suddenly screaming out to the reporter: Don't let yourself be killed by a curse from the likes of me with his completly crazed face in the background. Then the creepiest thing of the all is the final page where it is noted that Keiichi died a few days later and there are records of him saying There's an extra footstep again... complete with a pair of legs walking across a completely black floor.


 * In Onikakushi-hen, we made to believe that the two girls in the arc are psychopathic killers, only for the answer arc to come along as show us how wrong we are. Keiichi himself was delusional, and hallucinated many of the things in that arc. The ohagi was Tabasco sauce, for example.
 * And then there are those times when Rena thinks there are maggots under her skin...
 * "I thought that I wanted to harm myself. I even cut myself. Back then, when I slashed my wrists with a razor blade, mixed with my blood, a countless number of maggots came oozing out of me. Moreover, if they didn't overflow out of me, they would once again return inside of my wounds, wriggling their way back in. I scratched at the wounds on my wrist, trying to dig them out of me. It was just... so itchy."
 * Shion and the fingernail punishment.
 * And the music during the scene.
 * There's a scene in Onikakushi-hen where Keiichi slams Rena's hands in his front door and screams at her to go away as she pleads with him to stop. The scene feels quite long, but in actuality only lasts about twenty seconds. Keiichi then returns to his room and looks out the window to see Rena standing just outside his house in the rain, looking up at him and mouthing, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry..."
 * Even worse in the manga is where Rena is still at the door in pain, and keeps chanting "I'm sorry" in a muffled voice, all the while possibly scratching at the door doing so.
 * In the Visual Novel, Keiichi smashing the bat against the ground during his practice swings. The sound effects and the way the camera shakes made it scarier.
 * Keiichi takes a phone call from a distressed Shion, who supposedly went missing a number of days previously. He has only recently found this out, and pleads with her to tell him that he's wrong. All she can do is sob. He then begins to poke holes in her confession that she spoke to another person who went missing around the same time; if she's telling the truth, the only way she could have spoken to them is to have done so after they went missing. There's a moment of silence after he points this out to her, and then she begins to laugh hysterically. Without another word, she hangs up.
 * The PS 2 version of the scene is much creepier. The scene plays out the same right up until the moment of silence. Then Shion starts laughing in a more psychotic style than the anime, then out of nowhere, the volume suddenly become ten times louder as the screen goes, black, is then filled up with text that is Shion's laughter, and then we get a shot of Shion in a completely dark room where all that can be seen is her face, which can be only describe as a clown-esque deranged smile, all while the laughter goes on.
 * The PC visual novels weren't a slouch in the nightmare department, either. Sure, there's no voice acting at all, but it doesn't even matter. Before that point, every silent moment was punctuated by cicadas, crickets, or something else. When you scroll through the text with ENTER, piece by piece and then the laugh suddenly fills lines of text with nightmarish speed, the program suddenly wrestles control away from you and shows those scary eyes with a Scare Chord... and then silence. Utter and absolute. The loudest and most disturbing silence.
 * The manga version of the Orphanage of Fear from Takano's childhood in Matsuribayashi-hen. The anime version is awful, yes, but most of the violence there is implied...
 * The next page,
 * "She kept talking about a ghost-like being, 'Oyashiro-sama.' Night after night, it came to her. It would stand by her bedside and look down at her."
 * Even WHILE knowing that's Hanyuu, in the manga when Keiichi is going insane himself, there's a couple of scenes where he is thinking about how he feels someone is watching him, and behind him in the darkness are a pair of faint glowing eyes. And then the darkness breathes.
 * Hanyuu has a strange tendency to follow people who are going insane. Lunatics claiming to hear 'I'm sorry' over and over again when there's no one there, that was her apologizing for not being able to stop it. Imagine being in Hanyuu's position, who is completely helpless to do anything but watch people go insane; Pleading for forgiveness only makes it worse...
 * Rena's curt "Shiranai" when asked about a dismembered body in the rubbish heap in Onikakushi-hen.
 * Satoko's uncle, Teppei Houjou.
 * killing in The Atonement Chapter, manga version. She dies quickly in the anime, no problem. A few smashes and she's dead, no real pain. In the manga, it's a slow and painful death, where we hear her begging for life as she realizes Rena isn't just beating her, but killing her. It makes even her sympathetic.
 * Not only Rena's bipolar face-changes from dull to smiley to serious, but the Eye Scream when she checks to see if Rina's really dead! And her cold calculation: "Rina...has become completely immobile."
 * Even in the anime, the death of her and her pimp are JUST A TAD on the graphic side, to the point where Rina's face is just a mashed up thing with teeth falling out. The shadow that falls over half her face in the censored version did nothing to shield us from the horror. And the uncensored version...*shudders*
 * In the manga where you see the toothless corpse with broken arms and fingers, complete with eyes bulging out.
 * The two-page spread in the second volume of Tatarigoroshi-hen about Keiichi's maddening rants and thoughts about killing Satoko's uncle, and how to make it a perfect crime. It was hard to read the sentences not just because it was all vertical and close together, but because of how frightening it was to read through a mental breakdown.
 * Onikakushi-hen itself.
 * Even the original is bad enough, before you realize what's actually going on. This kid moves to a town. For absolutely no reason, the two best friends he's made start
 * Even worse is the
 * Coupled with the parts of that scene that were left out in Onikakushi-hen but brought back for Keiichi's flashback, specifically
 * repeatedly stabbing.
 * And in that same episode, the moment where
 * The lyrics for the PS 2 port of the original novel contain what could be part of the creepiest nursery rhyme in human history:
 * "Be good little children and go to sleep, OR ELSE THE HANDS WILL DRAG YOU DOWN."
 * YOU LIAR!! Now with ten times more facial contortion.
 * More generally, people on this show have an unnerving tendency to die by clawing their own throats out with their fingernails. * shudder*
 * The opening song has a line that translates roughly as "I'll cut off your fingers and leave them in the forest."
 * Shion's and Mion's grandmother. Most depictions of her throughout the series prior to Kai show her horribly grotesque and screaming in rage.
 * How about seeing her beaten corpse, courtesy of Shion? "USOTSUKI USOTSUKI USOTSUKI USOTSUKI USOTSUKI USOTSUKI USOTSUKI!!"
 * The manga omakes, especially the ones with Satoshi and Satoko's future teddy bear. They're supposed to be funny, and are, but can also be quite creepy.
 * The part in Rei where  screwed me up for a few hours.
 * And it doesn't stop there. Rika is
 * The sudden changes in the eyes of any of the characters (mostly Rena and Mion), in the first arc is absolutely horrifying to watch late at night.
 * Any of the mad laughter in general. Although it can sometimes cross over to Narm territory
 * What the hell is with this page? Is the boy hallucinating or is he... AAAUUUUUGHHH!
 * Keiichi Oishi no Uwasa Jikenbo ABC is a charming, upbeat, Engrish filled rap sang by Oishi and Keiichi. I was happily listening to it...only to become incredibly confused when  Since I wasn't all that familiar with the series, it took her a while to realize what it was--
 * The Hinamizawa village, location-wise, was based off a real village called "Shirakawa-go". The anime is already nightmarish, now imagine living there and then watching it. Paranoia Fuel at it's strongest.
 * Shion's path into insanity in . The anime left out a good portion of it, but the manga drives it home. She honestly thinks she's doing something good. It gets a bit depressing when she's having revelations and flashbacks mid-insane moment. For example,.
 * In the anime she's killed with a stab to the head. In the manga she's stabbed less, but dies of blood-loss, as her killer is having adorable-depressing flashbacks, while thinking of . Pick which is more horrifying.
 * Think about what everyone must have thought when they learned . Especially Shion.
 * Shion's hallucinations of after
 * close up head injury after her suicide in the manga. We get an adorable "What could have been" then..Wham.
 * The constant "mask" faces of the Minagoroshi-hen manga adaptation.
 * The notion that Miyo
 * You know Rena's hatchet? Remember Tatarigoroshi-hen? Just when we thought it was innocent in that arc.
 * Though complete with Narm, there's one part in the live action adaption where Rena is harassing  And then you think it's all over and
 * From the live action movies. Moreso a Tear Jerker then pure Nightmare Fuel however
 * chopping up was more graphic in the manga.
 * Kai's first arc. Let all of that register for a moment.
 * The "Limit" chapter. It's a fanfiction that won a contest and was drawn up by one of the Higurashi mangaka. The entirety of it is horrific, it's a Shion-Mion-Keiichi arc where Shion starts to act strange all of a sudden, and a Tear Jerker being that it's post-Kai. It reaches its limits when The worst part is that Satoko
 * It's something of a toss-up as to which member of the main group commits the most horrific acts, but the extreme contrast between initial portrayal, and just how far off the deep end she goes, is its own special kind of horrifying. If not for the Groundhog Day Loop Reset Button, she wouldn't even be able to see the Moral Event Horizon anymore.
 * When you get down to it, . Seeing the main characters commit horrible acts of violence against each other is scary enough, but you need to remember: at their core, the main characters are all good people and genuinely like each other.
 * Miyo preforming a vivisection on in the manga. It isn't explicit, going for a Gory Discretion Shot, but it still hits.
 * The scene in Episode 5 at the end, where  is looking down from the window, sent chills down my spine.
 * Something about the beginning of episode 20, is disturbingly psychotic.
 * In episode 26,
 * Also in episode 26, the scene where.
 * Rika telling Miyo to You don't actually see it, but the idea sent shivers through me. In the manga,
 * The manga's version of in Minagoroshi.  It's pitiful and horrifying. But you know what's the worst part about the chapter?.
 * We all may think that the series itself is already pretty terrifying, but some of the fanart kicks it up even further! Behold, and let your bodies shiver and your eyes water.
 * Miyo Takano becomes Nightmare Fuel incarnated the moment she's revealed to be the villain.
 * in the manga of the Eye Opening arc.
 * Yes, even Higurashi Kira has these. Episode 2, which features Rika and Satoko becoming Magical Girls, features a really dense fog that makes the residents of Hinamizawa act hostile towards those unaffected. And what's proof that someone was effected by said fog? Take a look at the insane look on their face, as well as the red eyes (with the same-colored pupils but now narrowed), and sometimes even blood running down their cheeks from their insane eyes, as if they were Tears of Blood. And what makes it scarier? Those effected by the fog are just as crazy as characters were when infected with the Hinamizawa Syndrome in earlier portions of the anime, with insane zombification added to the terror. Brrr...