A blinding shaft of light shoots into the sky from a large city one night, and an electrical power surge blacks out the city. A month later, numerous students at local high schools and colleges have disappeared. Others are showing personality changes. A joking urban legend attributes this to "Boogiepop," a modernization of the personification of Death as the Grim Reaper.

© Kouhei Kadono/Mediaworks. Project Boogiepop. English version produced by Right Stuf International.

The first few episodes each seem to focus upon a different adolescent, all with markedly low self-esteem. "That was when I still hated myself," says Moto in episode #1. She had a crush on one of the boys who disappeared, but she never dared tell him because of her aversion to physical contact. She constantly washes her hands. Jonouchi in #2 considers himself a "sin-eater," who can see guilt and suffering in others and considers it his duty to "remove their pain." But as the series progresses, there are increasing references to things beginning five years earlier, long before the flash of light, when a never-caught serial killer terrorized the city. Brief, inconsequential scenes in one episode become the focus of later episodes. Eventually some complete scenes are repeated, unchanged but with whole new meanings based upon revelations in the intervening episodes. By #5 it is evident that the episodes are not nearly as self-contained as it originally seemed.

Each episode is presented through a mosaic of vignettes; scenes so distinct that they are individually numbered and dated, jumping about chronologically: "The present," "Five years ago," "The present," "Seven years ago." Boogiepop is glimpsed, so briefly at first that he/she(?) may be a protagonist's hallucination. "It" eventually seems to be real, and is not alone; a similar creature, Manticore, may be the actual cause of the disappearances and deaths. Are Boogiepop and Manticore causing madness, or are they drawn to those who are already seriously disturbed? Are they supernatural monsters? Dimensional aliens? Or is the whole scenario someone's twisted imagination?

This atmospheric urban horror thriller (based upon the continuing Boogiepop series of young adult sci-fi novels by Kouhei Kadono; at least eleven since February 1998) is skillfully directed to be bleak and depressing at all times. Colors are muted, with shades of brown and rusty reds predominating. There are many overhead shots, making the characters look small and vulnerable. Almost everything is seen through the eyes of that episode's protagonist; the viewer must guess at what is real and what may be a hallucination. Although everything comes to lock together, each episode focuses upon a different character and showcases a different neurosis or physical disease: a brother who sadistically beats his younger sister; an obsessive computer nerd who can only relate to girls who look like the exaggerated fantasy females on the Internet; a brain-damaged amnesiac with no memory. Boogiepop Phantom may not be "enjoyable" but it is intellectually demanding and artistically impressive.

Fred Patten has written on anime for fan and professional magazines since the late 1970s.