When They Cry - Higurashi (TV)

The name Rumiko Chie, when pronounced family name first in Japanese as Chie Rumiko, the first three syllables sound very similar to Ciel (pronounced in Japanese as シエル Shi-e-ru), a character in Tsukihime. Furthermore, both of them were created in doujin games, have short blue-grey hair, are zealous curry lovers, and voiced by Fumiko Orikasa.

Higurashi no Naku Koro Ni is based on a popular doujin (fan created) sound novel game. The "game" features no real interaction and the player reads through a good ammount of text. There were 8 chapters to the story, each released at the Winter and Summer Comic Markets. The games were divided into two series; Higurashi no Naku Koro Ni, and Higurashi no Naku Koro Ni Kai. The former contained the first four chapters (labelled question chapters) and the latter contained the last four chapter (answer chapters). As each new game was released into the series, the former chapters were included. Buyers can now purchase the entire series on two different discs, one for the question chapters and one for the answer chapters.

When Mion (or rather Shion) died at the end of Watanagashi-hen story arch, Mion (Shion) is found dead wearing her hospital cloth, but during Meakashi-hen story arch (answer arch to Watanagashi-hen), the story connects but Mion (Shion) died in Mion's regular clothing rather than her hospital cloths.

The fictional village of Hinamizawa is based on the real-life village of Shirakawa, in Gifu Prefecture, Japan which is also a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Photos can be found at: http://park17.wakwak.com/~mahosaro/higurashi_seiti.html http://07th-expansion.net/Soft/Map00.htm

The nickname Rena uses when referring to Shion (Mion's twin sister) is Shi-chan. Shi means Death in Japanese. Whether this was intentional or not is up to the viewers.

The restaurant that Shion works for is called Angel-Mort and mort in French means dead or death, depending on how you use it. Therefore, it could be read as "dead angel" or "angel of death."

About Watanagashi/Meakashi, Mion died when she landed in the well after Shion zapped her. Shion then stabbed Keiichi and plummeted to her death off the apartment building. When Keiichi died in the hospital, he died of a heart attack. Shion did not come back and hammer nails into his hands.

The maggots in Rena's blood are all her hallucinations. They are non-existant.

In the opening animation, Satoko is saying is 'Nii-nii'.

The white sedan Oishi drives mostly resembles a 1989-1993 Nissan Laurel. Although the series is set in mid 1983, no other sedan produced before that year has taillights like that of Oishi's. You see the back of his car many times when he takes Keiichi, Rena, or Rika for interrogation about Tomitake-san and Takano-san.

The white van the men looking for Rena (ep 24, you will get their names in Kai) are driving resemble a 1981 Mitsubishi Delica. Unlike Oishi's sedan, this vehicle is coherent with the time setting of the series.

In Episode 3, at 11:37, Keiichi writes a letter saying he thinks someone is trying to kill him and detailing everything he knows about the situation. However, if you pause the episode and read the actual letter, it mentions several things that don't happen until Episode 4 (two days later in anime-time).

In episode 11, Keiichi says that everything will end "when the cicadas cry." This could be an allusion to the series title.

In episode 16, one of the bikers has his hair in the shape of a Swastika.