Akuryo Byoutou

Once upon a time, I thought I was going to have a heart attack watching this movie called Ju-on. It was basically the last j-horror movie I have ever watched and I promised myself to never watch another one. I had watched It as a kid and that stuff scarred me for life but I still kept watching horror. Ju-on was on a whole other level of scary. However, the lure of Kaho and nurses was too much that I had to check out Akuryo Byoutou for myself, though its taken me a long time to get around to it.

Akuryo Byoutou is basically about cute nurses working nightshift in a hospital where they have to walk around the dark corridors at night with only a small flashlight and there is an old abandoned ward with no electricity.

Akuryo Byoutou is filled with staples of the j-horror genre ranging from woman in white to dead schoolgirls to silent ghosts that just stand there. Its my favourite thing about the j-horror genre,  the camera pans around you see a short glimpse of a head at the window thinking 'wtf was that' and it pans back and its not there. Less is scarier.

I also liked how the early episodes are told as flashback. Something happens to a character at the end of an episode and the next one we find out what actually happened and how they are connected to Kaho's character, Runa. The horror of inevitability.

Unfortunately after the halfway mark, Akuryo Byoutou stops being scary when things start getting explained and the show is forced to show more. Ghosts/monsters are scary when you don't see the whole thing and only see a glimpse. Imagination is scarier than the real thing.

Second half is more of a Blair Witch and zombie movie and the finale is something else entirely. I had fun watching. The horror genre really lends itself to low budget shows and I'm surprised there are not more them being made. I found Akuryo Byoutou fun and watchable.