Anime / Higurashi: When They Cry – Gou

Welcome back to Hinamizawa.

Higurashi: When They Cry – Gou (Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Gou) is an anime series based on the Visual Novel Higurashi: When They Cry, created by the Studio Passione. It premiered in October 2020, and its second season, Higurashi: When They Cry – Sotsu premiered in July 2021. The anime was advertised as a direct adaptation of the visual novel, but the start of the second episode established it as a Sequel Series of the original story.

Despite having escaped the endless cycle of torture and death, Rika Furude finds herself back in Hinamizawa of June 1983 for some unknown reason. The first arcs of Gou are very similar to the Question Arcs of the original series. However, there are very notable differences in the outcomes.

A manga series illustrated by Tomato Akase started serialization on Young Ace Up on the same day the first episode of the anime was aired. While it started as an adaptation of the anime plotline, it eventually becomes separate altogether with Higurashi When They Cry: Meguri significantly diverging from Sotsu. The manga includes four arcs, all of which share the same names as those of the first four arcs in the anime in the same order, while Meguri starts with an arc sharing the same name with the fifth and final arc in the Gou anime.

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Tropes:

Tropes in Gou

• Abusive Parents: Satoko's uncle and aunt abused her and her brother Satoshi, hitting them and refusing to feed them. When her uncle Teppei returns to Hinamizawa, Satoko is forced to live with him again and he apparently has continued to abuse her, which leads to her friends starting a protest to get child services to emancipate her from Teppei. However, considering the revelation of Satoko being the second looper, this throws the abuse into question.
• Adaptational Context Change: In Episode 8, the ladder scene happens again, but instead in the middle of daylight in the schoolyard when Keiichi and Mion(?) are looking for Rika when she goes missing after recess, with Keiichi on a ladder looking for something above the septic tank and Mion holding it from below. Instead of ranting about Satoko, Mion instead rants about realizing Rika is behind the annual murders and disappearances, and she goes back to normal when Chie finds them and tells them to go back to the classroom.
• Adaptation Deviation: The manga does a few things differently from the anime:
  • Near the end of Tataridamashi-hen when everyone goes to the Watanagishi festival, Satoko doesn't lure Keiichi to her house, and were there during Ooishi's rampage. Keiichi even gets into a one-on-one with Ooishi to try and save Rika, and almost wins until Ooishi knocks him out at the last second.
  • In Nekodamashi-hen, there were a few extra scenarios Rika had to endure, such as Keiichi's mother going L5, Rika getting tortured by Shion, and even Mion going insane.
    • Also in the same arc, the timeline Akasaka gets expanded on more.
• Adaptation-Induced Plot Hole: Hanyuu's absence post-Matsuribayashi-hen despite ending the original series as joining the humans to live among them with Rika and co. is only explained in the manga: she returned to her realm so that Rika could live a normal life.
• Aesop Amnesia: In the original series, Satoko had to learn to be okay with asking for help from her friends and the authorities when she was in danger of Teppei. Here, rather Truth in Television given the different context, Satoko has difficulty asking Rika for help in their schoolwork for St. Lucia's.
• Alas, Poor Villain: Episode 24 starts with Takano being cruelly told by the Banke that You Have Failed Me, has her work humiliated, will be remembered for nothing but being a silly conspiracy theorist that Tokyo wasted their time on, and is given no choice but to kill herself.
• Animation Bump: Rika's Watanagashi ritual dance as a Miko in episode 2 displays beautiful fluid animation by Passione.
• Anyone Can Die: Or rather... Anyone Can Fall To Hinamizawa Syndrome, as the ending of Tataridamashi-hen and the first half of Nekodamashi-hen shows by having Ooishi, Akasaka, Akane, and Kimiyoshi succumb to the plague in their respective loops.
• Arc Welding: At the end of Episode 20, a woman heavily resembling Featherine from Umineko: When They Cry appears, and in Episode 21, she indicates there's a connection between Satoko and Vier from Ciconia: When They Cry (and possibly Lambdadelta, also from Umineko), tying in all three entries of the When They Cry series together.
• The Atoner: In episode 23, Teppei turns over a new leaf after having nightmares of his deaths in earlier fragments and actively tries to be an uncle to Satoko, and offers an apology to her. Of course Satoko rejects it since being nice for one day doesn't make up for years and years of abuse.
• Audience Surrogate:
  • Keiichi is the Naïve Newcomer to Hinamizawa and has to be let in on what's going on with his friends or how the village operates.
  • Ultimately, Keiichi serves as the Decoy Protagonist and Rika is the real protagonist, just as in the original series. However, as Gou turns out to be a Stealth Sequel, this means Rika is an Audience Surrogate for viewers that have seen Higurashi before.
• Bait-and-Switch: Gou turns out to be one in the second episode, see Non-Indicative First Episode below. The end of its first arc is yet another example. The Demon-Deceiving Arc looks like a rehash of Demon-Exposing Arc only thanks to Rika, Keiichi has overcome his paranoia of Rena and learns to trust her. Then it turns out Rena has already succumbed to her paranoia and sets out to kill Keiichi in a reversal of how the original story ended.
• Batman Gambit: In Episode 17, Rika uses the trap giftbox from an earlier loop to see if Satoko remembers it and therefore is the other looper. Satoko recoils at the sight of it, and because Rika replaced the trap with an actual gift, Satoko can't claim she knew about the trap because of her trapmaster skills. It works.
• *Bleep*-dammit!: When Rena repeatedly stabs Keiichi in Episode 4, there's a censor blur covering it, although it's pretty obvious that the knife is stabbing him in the chest.
• Bloodier and Gorier: This series manages to be even more graphic and gory by the series' standards. Episode 16 cements this where we get to see Rika getting her intestines smashed and disemboweled.
• Boarding School of Horrors: Downplayed. St. Lucia's Academy is a prestigious girls' academy for the upper-class and wealthy, and like many prestigious schools (especially in Japan), their curriculum is rigorous and they expect their students to keep pace for the school's image or to otherwise drop out and save everyone from some embarrassment (although you would already be seen as embarrassing for giving up/unstudious). It also has a bullying and ostracizing problem due to the occassional student who won't conform and/or study, like Shion, Ange, and Satoko found out. If there's something from St. Lucia that plays this trope straight, however, is that they stick misbehaving children in jail cells for days beneath the school, prisoner uniforms and all.
• Borrowed Catchphrase: In Episode 22, Satoko borrows one of Rena's most famous lines: "YOU'RE LYING!"
• Both Sides Have a Point: Satoko and Rika's fallout in Satokowashi-hen. Although Satoko snapping and becoming murderous is certainly not how one should go about things, Satoko struggles at St. Lucia because the curriculum is much harder than she's used to and is afraid to ask for help because she's already seen as an immature hick by her high-class peers. On the other hand, Rika has the right to move on with her life and it would be unfair for her to be stuck as someone's Living Emotional Crutch, even if Satoko has abandonment issues, and regardless of what their classmates would think, she offered to help Satoko without judgement. Satoko later points out harshly to Rika that some people are just better at things than others and that should be okay, and that she partially joined her because Rika wanted this to be their dream life together. Alas, the whole debacle could have been solved with much needed therapy and communication.
• Bucket Booby-Trap: Satoko, in an effort to awaken the old Rika, stages a trap where bowls fell from the ceiling. Unfortunately, this results in one of the girls' foreheads bleeding, and Satoko is placed in solitary confinement until she learned the error of her ways.
• Call-Back:
  • Satoshi secretly being tired of Satoko having to constantly rely on him before his disappearance becomes a huge problem in Gou, as the events of the story kick off because she relied too heavily on Rika as a Living Emotional Crutch.
• Chekhov's Gun:
  • The strange object in the statue in Watadamashi-hen and that fragment at the end of the opening sequence? Hanyuu reveals in Episode 14 that it's a piece of Onigari-no-ryuuou, which she has now embedded with the power to end loops so that Rika can use it to either kill herself or the other looper.
    • Additionally, Onigari-no-ryuuou previously appeared in a TIP in Matsuribayashi-hen, explaining that it was used by Hanyuu's daughter Ouka to slay her, and in Kotohogushi-hen (exclusive to Kizuna), which revealed that it became inhabited by Hanyuu's mother Ryuun-Ohku and was specifically designed to slay demons.
  • The trap box that Rika gives to Satoko as a "gift". In Episode 17, Rika uses it in her Batman Gambit to see if Satoko is the looper. It works.
  • In Nekodamashi-hen, one of the Yamainu notices Satoshi has a teddy bear in his patient room and asks Irie about it, which Irie explains was supposed to be a gift for Satoko's birthday. The arc ends with Satoko being exposed as a looper on her birthday because she recognized Rika's gift box as a trap... only for it to turn out to be a teddy bear.
  • The bowl trap in the ceiling that Satoko sets up in Episode 20. In the next episode, she also rigs a ceiling trap but with a chandelier to kill Rika and herself.
• Connected All Along: Eua reveals that Satoko has "other names" — Mitsuyo, Vier, and Anomalous Spinal Cord Specimen LD3105. This also connects her to Takano and Lambdadelta by extension — as Mitsuyo and Miyo Takano both share the Goroawase Number of 34 with Lambdadelta reading 34 when written in Greek numerals, Vier is the spitting image of Takano, LD being the initials of Lambdadelta likely being a play on 34, and Lambdadelta being heavily implied to have empowered Takano in the original Higurashi; interestingly enough 3105 is Goroawase Number for Satoko. Made further interesting considering the narrator in the spinal factory segment of Ciconia talks about her father, mother, big brother, and herself being "processed" in that order (as Satoko lost her father, mother, and Satoshi in that same order too) and tells Miyao to fight against this "certainty"; at the end of Episode 22, Satoko vows that breaking Rika into submission will be "certain". This all comes to a head in the "Another End" novella, where Satoko's witch self is all but stated to become Lambdadelta after purging her humanity at the end of the series.
• Cruel Twist Ending:
  • In Gou's Onidamashi-hen, Rika convinces Keiichi that he shouldn't have any reason to be untrusting of Rena. He takes her advice to heart and lets Rena into his house when she comes to see him later that night. And then it turns out Rena really is trying to kill Keiichi, forcing him to beat her to death in self-defense.
  • Happens again in Episode 5 of Tataridamashi-hen. After the gang finally rescued Satoko from her abusive uncle, they have a fun at the festival. Everything goes fine until Satoko takes Keiichi to her former house to give him something special, only to be greeted by Teppei, who proceeds to attack Keiichi with murderous intent. Keiichi then snaps, and bludgeon's him to death before immediately passing out. Then it gets worse when Rena visits him to reveal that everyone of his friends got killed at the festival that night. And by Ooishi.
• Cryptic Background Reference: In Episode 21, Eua refers to Satoko as Mitsuyo, Vier, and Anomalous Spinal Cord Specimen LD3105.. What does that mean?
• Deadly Prank: In Episode 20, Satoko dropped some wash bins from the school chandelier almost on top of Rika in a misguided attempt to make her remember how they had fun in Hinamizawa. However, one of Rika's new friends gets hit and injured instead, and this gets Satoko put in solitary confinement.
• Death Montage: Episode 15 has four consecutive scenes where Rika is killed.
• Decoy Protagonist: Like in its predecessor series, Gou starts out with Keiichi as the protagonist, only to then reveal halfway through that Rika is the real protagonist.
• Despair Event Horizon: In Nekodamashi-hen, Rika plans to use Onigari-no-ryuuou on herself to die permanently if she can't find the other looper and escape within the next five loops. She fails, and the only reason why she doesn't off herself after the fifth loop is because of Satoko's brainwashing.
• Didn't See That Coming: As Hanyuu explains to Rika, this is not the same Hinamizawa that she was in five years ago — there is another looper at play and things will be different from how Rika first encountered them.
• Disproportionate Retribution: While it was wrong for Rika to emotionally neglect Satoko during her days at St. Lucia even though she promised to spend time with her, it certainly didn't justify Satoko committing murder and psychological torment onto her friend just so she could stay.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?: Satoko and Rika's fallout is reminiscent of a romantic couple's fallout, with the two of them moving away from their hometown because one of them got their dream job elsewhere, only for the other to struggle adjusting to their new home, eventually leading to a rift between them. Satoko going yandere can obviously be seen as an ex-lover becoming violently possessive and/or vengeful after a breakup.
• Double-Meaning Title:
  • Gou means "karma", referring to Satoko viewing her actions as a way to punish Rika for her "sin" of wanting to move on from Hinamizawa.
  • The title of the fifth arc, Satokowashi-hen. It can be read as "village-destroying arc" or "Satoko-destroying arc".
• Dramatic Irony:
  • Satoko believes that Rika was the anonymous student who told the faculty about her failed prank, when she actually didn't — it was another classmate who didn't like Satoko.
  • Takano discovers a letter from her grandfather in his old papers telling her that if carrying on his research interferes with her having a happy life, then he'll be okay if she gives up on continuing his work. He also muses that whatever happens, he'll leave her fate in God's hands. It's enough for her to give up on her plans and thus preventing the tragedies of the original series (at least, not by her hand this time), and she even states to Irie that she doesn't know why she decided to look back at her grandfather's papers now since she intended to do so only after completing her experiments...
• Early-Bird Cameo: A shadowed Satoshi can be seen beating one of the Watanagashi victims in a flashback picture when the curse is explained to Keiichi. This is before we officially see Satoshi in a flashback picture at the start of Tataridamashi-hen or learn in Gou about what happened to Satoshi and his aunt.
• Evil Counterpart: Not quite "evil", but Rika's new friends at St. Lucia consist of two brunettes and a green-haired girl, bringing to mind Keiichi, Rena, and Mion.
• Evolving Credits:
  • After Eua is introduced at the end of Episode 20, the show's anime opening sequence reveals that the mysterious silhouette is Eua. The teddy bear at the beginning is also changed to the trap box.
  • The credits switch from visuals of Rika falling and someone reaching out for her to Satoko falling down and reaching out to her. The credits also make clear that the symbol at the end is actually the chandelier that kills them both in Satoko's second loop, as it is now bloodied.
• Expendable Alternate Universe: How Satoko sees the "loops". She comments that given that she can just reset things to 1983 until she gets the perfect future she wants, anything that happens before that time "doesn't really happen" and, in essence, becomes just a bad dream. As such, she has no compunctions against killing her friends or subjecting them to suffering and misery, because she knows she can bring them back and they won't remember any of it.
• Falling Chandelier of Doom: In the second loop of Satokowashi-hen, Satoko drops the chandelier at St. Lucia's hall on both Rika and herself to restart the loop so that she can prevent Rika from pursuing her dream next time.
• The Fellowship Has Ended: Episode 18 has some inklings of this: in 1984, Mion (and likely Shion as an extension) have graduated and are attending high school thus leading to Keiichi taking on the leader role. And, Rika herself expresses a desire to attend St. Lucia Academy which means leaving Hinamizawa. With all of her friends seemingly parting ways, this could be the building blocks towards Satoko becoming the second looper.
• Foreshadowing: There are several subtle hints of Satoko's true nature as the second looper:
  • The opening theme, "I Believe What You Said," includes lyrics where it is apparent that it is being sung in Satoko's perspective (I believe what you said\A place I long to return to). In addition, Rika and Satoko are both looking away from each other with their backs turned furthering their drifting apart. A teddy bear sits in the middle of them, a tool that later played a crucial role in exposing the identity of the looper.
  • Satoko, upon winning the game in the first episode, gloats to Rika saying that victory was hers. While it at first applied to the game, it takes on a double meaning once it is revealed that Satoko traveled to other fragments and influenced events there.
  • While there was physical evidence of her abuse by her uncle, Satoko noticeably has no apparent injuries when she is taking a shower. She also has her face obscured when she was calling Keiichi.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: In Tataridamashi-hen, when the protesters are given a meeting room at the child services buildilng to discuss Satoko's abuse, there's an empty chair beside Rika even though it's indicated in Episode 2 (and later Episode 14) that Hanyuu isn't with her anymore.
• From Bad to Worse: Like many other youth have to go through, Satoko struggles with having to grow up, her friends moving on while she remains stagnant, and being stuck in an unsupportive environment. In a better world, Satoko would have eventually overcome her issues by properly communicating them as well as seeking therapy, but unfortunately, this makes her vulnerable to Eua's manipulations, leading to the return of tragedy.
• Get It Over With: In Episode 15, Rika goads Akane, Kimiyoshi, and Keiichi into killing her in their respective loops.
• Golden Ending: Horribly subverted. In Episode 16, all seems well, with no one going crazy before Watanagashi, no snooping, and Teppei staying away, except that we know Rika has been tortured into submission by Satoko.
• Groundhog Peggy Sue: Rika is forced to be this again for reasons she doesn't know. It is later revealed that Satoko became a looper because of Eua.
• Growing Up Sucks: Satoko. As everyone grows up, her friends are going their separate ways, and her best friend is moving onto another group of friends.
• Happy Ending Override: The original series ended on Rika finally escaping the "Groundhog Day" Loop by working together with her friends, only to promptly undone in Gou, where she somehow loops back to the same summer where the tragedies happened. And to add insult to injury, she managed to reach adolescence and escape Hinamizawa beforehand. As it turns out, this was invoked by none other than Satoko herself, all so she can torture Rika into submission and remain in Hinamizawa.
• Harmful to Minors: In Episode 15, we see Akasaka stabbing Rika in the neck while she's already bloody and lying on the ground, Akane decapitating people including Mion and Rika, and Keiichi batting Rena and Rika in the head, causing their eyes to pop out of their sockets.
• Hated Hometown: Rika is frustrated that she has to return to Hinamizawa of June 1983, as she was trapped in that loop for a hundred years and thought she had finally escaped to live beyond it. Meanwhile, Satoko is angry that Rika wants to leave the village, and therefore, Satoko, behind, and even after learning about what Rika had gone through, Satoko has gone full crazy by then and vows to make Rika do it again to break her and thus keep her by her side.
• How We Got Here: The fifth arc, Satokowashi-hen, shows what happened between the original series and the start of Gou.
• If I Can't Have You…: Episode 21 ends with Satoko going full yandere by luring Rika into a trap that kills the both of them in front of their classmates, including Rika's new friends.
• In the End, You Are on Your Own: In Episode 2, Hanyuu tells Rika that her presence is fading and thus she can't help Rika this time. In Episode 14, her presence finally fades away, though she gives Rika the ability to remember past loops again and a tool to break the loop via stabbing either herself or the other looper before disappearing forever. Rika reacts badly, as Hanyuu's company kept her from falling apart for all those years.
• Irony: In Nekodamashi-hen, Rika vows to use Hanyuu's sword to kill herself permanently if she can't find and kill the other looper in the next five loops. Cue Rika being killed in the next four loops without any progress... and on the fifth one, she's brainwashed as she dies, inadvertently forcing her to continue looping. Even more ironic considering Satoko tortured her to "punish" her for wanting to leave Hinamizawa, so whether she really knew about Rika looping or not, Satoko forcing Rika to continue and making her want to stay in the village was extra salt in the wound.
• Jerkass Has a Point: Rika's new friends call out Satoko on being a sorry excuse of a friend for making Rika worry about her getting into trouble, and when Rika is about to argue with Satoko, one of her friends tries to assure her that they can handle it for her.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia:
  • After killing Teppei and falling unconscious from his head wound at the end of Tataridamashi-hen, Keiichi can't remember when Katsuya visits him in the hospital to ask him what happened before he fainted.
  • Rika gets her ability to remember past loops back in Episode 14 after talking with Hanyuu, so from now on, she'll be able to remember who kills her.
• Late-Arrival Spoiler: In the first half of the show, Keiichi has flashbacks to things that happened in the original series' loops, and Gou also casually introduces Hanyuu in the second episode as well as Rika being more special than she appears. The second half also plainly brings up how Takano was the original Big Bad and also "introduces" the Yamainu.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Multiple characters refer to freeing Satoko from Teppei in Tataridamashi-hen as reaching the "happy ending", referencing how doing this in Minagoroshi-hen was the final arc and led to the Golden Ending. Rena lamenting that their "happy ending" was taken away from them at the end of the arc references that getting to it in Gou will have to be done differently this time...
• Line-of-Sight Name: In Episode 23, the mysterious goddess l allows Satoko to give her a name. Satoko stutters while thinking out loud ("Um... eh... ooh... ah...") and she takes it as an answer, declaring she is now named "Eua".
• Loved by All: Rika is instantly liked by the other students at St. Lucia for being beautiful and having a way with words. Meanwhile with Satoko...
• Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: Gou expands on the supernatural part of Higurashi, exploring the influential nature of Oyashiro-sama. Mainly, this is about Takano ceasing her plans on legitimizing Hinamizawa Syndrome. This only happens because, "for some reason", she suddenly decided to look back at her grandfather's research papers and discovers a letter from him telling her it's okay to give up on his work to pursue a happy life; this never happened before, as Takano vowed never to reopen his papers until completing the experiment. Rika notes that how strange it is for the "inhuman" determination she faced from Takano from all those loops to suddenly disappear, and Eua finds it quite amusing that Takano suddenly gave up.
• My God, What Have I Done?:
  • Satoko has this realization when the harmless prank she tried to pull off with the bowls ended up injuring one of the members of Rika's Girl Posse. However, she slides to hide away rather than confess to the incident.
  • The groupies are implied to have this reaction as well due to them inadvertently setting Satoko on a path that ends with her committing murder-suicide.
• Non-Indicative First Episode: Gou starts off as a retelling of the entire series, only for it to be revealed in the second episode that this is actually a sequel series and not a reboot.
• Not His Sled: Gou's Episode 4. We're heading halfway through Onikakushi-hen, with Rika advising Keiichi to trust Rena against his paranoia, something that didn't happen before. Then comes Rena bringing dinner to Keiichi's house... and Keiichi decides to trust her. And it turns out she's there to kill him.
• Offing the Offspring: A Hinamizawa Syndrome-infected Akane does this in one of the loops in Episode 15, killing her entire family including Mion.
• Once More, with Clarity: Episode 23 shows Tataridamashi-hen from Satoko's perspective, revealing that through a miracle, Teppei had a Heel–Face Turn.
• One Cast Member per Cover: The Gou manga's volumes have a different girl on each cover. Rena is on Volume 1, Mion on Volume 2, Satoko on Volume 3, and Rika on Volume 4. The Meguri manga, which contains the Answer Arcs, has pairs on the covers instead.
• Protagonist Journey to Villain: Satokowashi-hen is basically the story showcasing how Satoko goes off the deep-end from being a good-natured, if not a bit immature and mischieveous girl, to an Ax-Crazy yandere who will even resort to murder to make Rika stay.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: In one of the loops in Episode 22, Satoko harshly tells Rika that her dream of them going to St. Lucia's was always about Rika going to St. Lucia and that Satoko doesn't want to be dragged along, and that people will be better or worse at some things more than others. And a moment afterwards, Satoko kills herself. This being a loop and Rika not getting her ability to remember loops until later, Rika doesn't remember this nor does she understand why this happened.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning:
  • Rika's eyes glow red while she watches Keiichi and Rena in The Stinger to Episode 1.
  • At the end of Episode 7, Rika's eyes glow red again as she tells Keiichi off for snooping around in the tool shed, as doing so has sealed their fates in this loop.
  • At the end of Episode 17, we get this from Satoko, who's revealed to have retained her memories of previous loops.
• Rewatch Bonus:
  • Satoko being the second looper in Gou is jarring at first, but there are small hints of foreshadowing that should make the revelation more blatant.
  • In the first episode when Satoko wins the game, she gloats to Rika saying that victory was hers. While at first it may seem to be here simply bragging about winning this one in particular, it suddenly takes on a new meaning once it is revealed that Satoko was looping in that fragment as she did others.
  • When Satoko has her infamous breakdown during the arc revolving around her uncle, she reacts to Keiichi attempting to pet her head despite the fact that in the original, she only pushed him away when he unwittingly triggered memories of her brother by petting her. She remembered what she had done in the previous arc and reenacted it. In addition, as many pointed out, there are no visible markings implicating abuse on Satoko when she was taking a shower. Additionally, Teppei was seen using some prescripted medicine thus meaning that he is likely less physically capable of abuse.
  • At the beginning of the first opening to Gou, we're shown images as the camera becomes corrupted. When does it corrupt? On the image of a teddy bear... the one that Rika uses in her plan to confirm Satoko is the other looper.
  • The lyrics to the opening of Gou make sense after the reveal of the looper: it's about Satoko being angry with Rika for moving on from her and the village.
• Significant Monogram: In Episode 21, Eua refers to Satoko as Anomalous Spinal Cord Specimen LD3105. LD happens to be the initials for Lambdadelta, while 3105 is Goroawase for Sa-To-Ko.
• The Slow Path: In Satoko's first loop, she believes Rika will be closer to her this time but it only results in everything ending up the same as it did before, including Rika becoming closer to her new friends while Satoko struggles at St. Lucia's. Satoko then kills herself along with Rika to loop back, resulting in the events of Gou.
• Stealth Sequel: Gou starts off as a retelling of the original Higurashi series/visual novel, only for the second episode to indicate that this is actually a continuation. Becomes not-so-stealthy around halfway through the series, with Tataridamashi-hen switching into a rehash of the middle part of the original final arc, Minagoroshi-hen, and Nekodamashi-hen being about Rika struggling with things that never happened in the original series.
• The Stinger: After the credits of Episode 1, we see Rika with glowing red eyes watching Keiichi and Rena at the junkyard.
• Surprisingly Creepy Moment: Like its predecessor.
  • Episode 4: Keiichi goes against his paranoia and lets Rena into his house so that she can prepare him a nice dinner, and while he's in the living room and she's in the kitchen, she unpacks various tools that she certainly doesn't look like she'll be using for their intended purpose.
  • Episode 7: Rika's personality turns dark and her eyes turn red after Keiichi tells her his "naughty cat" story, and she enigmatically tells him that he's gotten himself in a bad ending and to enjoy his time before his death before reverting back to her normal persona.
  • Episode 15. After Rika successfully convinces Akasaka to stay in Hinamizawa for a little longer to help her out, we then immediately cut to a bloody and cut up Rika lying down on the floor as a crazed Akasaka rants about the "parasites".
  • Episode 16: As we apparently cut to the next scene of Rika mentally conversing to herself about why she left the village, we suddenly cut back to Satoko continuing to pull her guts out.
• That Liar Lies:
  • Rena does the "YOU'RE LYING!" scene again in Onidamashi-hen.
  • Throughout Satokowashi-hen, Satoko thinks to herself about how Rika lied to her about wanting to be with her, eventually culminating in Satoko screaming Rena's infamous line at Rika in Episode 22.
• There Are No Therapists: Given Satoko's abandonment and attachment issues stem from her childhood traumas of losing her family, being abused, and being ostracized, she should ideally seek out therapy. Unfortunately, St. Lucia seems to be isolated and discourages people from leaving, and the setting is rural 1980's Japan (infamously, Japan historically has a stigma against mental illness and addressing mental illness at all), making therapy a difficult option to pursue or even be thought of.
  • Even without a therapist, a decent guidance counselor at either the school in Hinamizawa or St. Lucia probably could have kept the entire (or at least most of the) plot from happening by helping Satoko find a way to maintain some sense of community or family without needing to stay at St. Lucia with Rika.
• Title Theme Drop: At the end of Episode 1, "When They Cry", the first opening song to the 2006 Higurashi anime, plays as the ending song.
• Took a Level in Kindness: In a surprising turn of events, Teppei manages to be this. After having recurring "nightmares" (which are most likely him remembering the alternate timelines where he died), he undergoes a Heel Realization, and decides to turn over a new leaf, and even goes out of his way to be kind to Satoko.
• Truth in Television: Satoko has difficulty adjusting to St. Lucia due to its more intense curriculum than in Hinamizawa as well as impersonal faculty, not getting along with her classmates, generally being surrounded by strangers, and a growing rift between her and her best friend can hit home for anyone who suffered from this when they moved to a new school or moved to college.
• Twin Switch: Like in the original arc, Mion and Shion utilize this in Watadamashi-hen, which makes it harder to tell who is who and who was where when the mystery arises.
• Ungrateful Bastard: In Episode 16, Satoko views Rika as this, being ungrateful towards her friends, the people that have supported them, and the memories they've had in Hinamizawa by wanting to leave the village.
• Unreliable Expositor: St. Lucia's Academy has been said to be a Boarding School of Horrors by Shion (according to her in the previous series) and Ange, but Rika thinks it's a great place. Of course, almost anywhere would be better than Hinamizawa for Rika, and Shion and Ange don't exactly have magnetic personalities like Rika.
• Upper-Class Twit: Very downplayed. Satoko views the girls at St. Lucia as this, but they're obviously smart enough if they can attend a prestigious and rigorous academy, and they have a strong sense of loyalty and dedication with each other judging by how they stand up for Rika against Satoko.
• The Upper Crass: The students at St. Lucia are mainly from the upper-class and live by a posh, mature, and studious lifestyle. Unsurprisingly, the unkempt and playful Satoko can't get along with them, while they get along swimmingly with the charismatic and very mature Rika.
• Wham Episode:
  • Episode 4. Keiichi takes Rika's advice to trust Rena and let her into his house in spite of his paranoia. And then it turns out Rena really is trying to kill him. The ending then reveals that after killing Rena in self-defense, Keiichi survived Rena's attack and that Rika and Satoko have also been mysteriously killed.
  • Episode 8. Keiichi survives after Shion/Mion hides him in the Sonozaki basement, and Shion/Mion is dead after killing a mysterious group of people trying to go after Keiichi. Mysteriously, Satoko and Rika were also involved in the home invasion and died in the attack along with the twins and the Sonozaki family.
  • Episode 10. It seems to be a repeat of Tatarigoroshi-hen, only for Shion showing up at school to switch it to Minagoroshi-hen...
  • Episode 13. Satoko is rescued from Teppei! The future seems bright... and then Teppei returns home after apparently escaping police custody and makes an attempt on Keiichi's life, only to be killed in self-defense. Keiichi awakens weeks later, unable to remember anything, and he learns from Rena that Ooishi killed Rika and the twins at the festival.
  • Episode 14. We see the ending of Tataridamashi-hen from Rika's perspective and that Ooishi had fallen to Hinamizawa Syndrome. Hanyuu then tells Rika that her presence is disappearing and that Rika will have to be alone from now on, though gives her the loop-breaking sword that Takano discovered in Watadamashi-hen and that she must use it on a looper to break the cycle. Rika then decides that she'll use the sword on herself if she can't find the looper in the next five loops...
  • Episode 15. Rika successfully persuades Akasaka to stay in Hinamizawa... only to be killed by him when he succumbs to Hinamizawa Syndrome. She is then killed by Akane, Kimiyoshi, and Keiichi in the next three loops, and Rika is losing hope...
  • Episode 16. Satoko knows about Rika looping, and, upset with her for wanting to leave Hinamizawa, tortures her into submission. In the next loop, nothing goes wrong at the cost of Rika blissfully trapped in the village seemingly forever, until Takano meets with Rika after her dance at the festival, noting that she's been wanting to talk to her for a while...
  • Episode 17. Takano abandons her plans and the Yamainu are all pulled out of Hinamizawa, conveniently averting the Great Hinamizawa Disaster the entire series hinged on stopping. Irie also discovers that a container of H-173, a drug that can immediately induce L5 Hinamizawa Syndrome, has gone missing. To top it all off, not only is Satoko aware of Rika's looping, she is the second looper.
  • Episode 20. With Satoko and Rika's relationship falling apart at the seams and the cheerful but bittersweet reunion of the club members, Satoko goes for a walk around Hinamizawa before heading into the storehouse. After touching the Oyashiro-sama statue, it breaks apart and a horn falls out. Touching the horn leads Satoko into the world of fragments...and greeting her isn't Hanyuu, but a woman resembling Featherine.
  • Episode 23: We learn that in Tataridamashi-hen that by a miracle, Teppei decided to make up for all the wrong he had done to people including Satoko. We also learn that Satoko killed her friends in the other loops because she thought they were out to get her, and that "miracles" are changes caused by "the cat"'s influence accumulated over loops.
  • Episode 24: Takano vaguely remembers that in another loop, she was humiliated and forced to commit suicide so that Tokyo could cover up the failure of the Great Hinamizawa Disaster. This leads to Takano discovering a letter from her grandfather giving his approval for her to pursue a life outside of continuing his research, hence why she abandons the plan in Gou. Satoko takes advantage of this by stealing a syringe of Hinamizawa Syndrome during one of her check-ups, and Eua confirms this is why various characters unexpectedly went Level 5 in earlier arcs.
• Wham Line: Episode 16: After Satoko rants to her about why she was wrong to hate and leave the village, Rika mentally asks herself, "Why did I begin to hate Hinamizawa in the first place? [...] What was it I disliked about Hinamizawa?", when we already know that the events of Higurashi are the answer, and as the converses with herself, she begins to think that the good times she had in the village should be more important than the pain she endured...
  • Episode 21: The first words out of Eua's mouth to Satoko are "Why the nonplussed expression, Vier?" This is a direct reference to the Takano-esque character from Ciconia. She also calls Satoko "Mitsuyo" and, bizarrely, "Anomalous Spinal Cord Speciment LD3105," LD more than likely standing for Lambdadelta.
  • Episode 22: Eua describing to Satoko that looping is like the "monkey on a typewriter" theorem, the same comparison Lambdadelta described Bernkastel trying to fix her logic error. This implies a connection between Satoko and Lambdadelta...
    • Furthermore, in the same episode, Satoko's last line can be translated as "I will not lose to you, Rika... after all I've always loved you... I'll CERTAINLY not lose.", further tying a connection between Satoko and Lambdadelta, the Witch of Certainty.
• Wham Shot:
  • In Onidamashi-hen of Gou, if Rena gathering assorted items on the kitchen table such as a buzzsaw, rope, and handcuffs wasn't suspicious enough, then the shot of her clawing her neck in front of Keiichi confirms that she's really gone off the deep end.
  • In the second part of Nekodamashi-hen, Rika smiles after convincing Akasaka to stay in Hinamizawa a little longer, then immediately cuts to a bloody and beaten Rika lying on the floor while a crazed Akasaka rants.
  • Episode 16: Satoko pulling down Rika's blankets to reveal she's cut her stomach open.
  • Episode 17: Satoko being revealed as the second looper.
  • Episode 20: After deciding to take a stroll around Hinamizawa, Satoko finds herself transported to Kakera where instead of Hanyuu greeting her, she is instead met by another goddess entirely posessing a familiar face. It was only seconds long at the end of the episode, but for any fans who have read both Higurashi and Umineko, Satoko's odd behaviour throughout Gou suddenly makes a lot more sense.
  • Episode 21: Eua pushes Satoko further in her descent into madness by making her into a looper, sending her back to June 1983, eventually culminating in Satoko rigging a trap that kills her and Rika in front of the whole school.
• Why Did You Make Me Hit You?: In Episode 16, as she brutally tortures Rika, a crazed Satoko tearfully rants about how Rika made her do this to her, as Rika's heart straying away from Hinamizawa has forced Satoko to become Oyashiro-sama's carrier in Rika's steed and thus it is her job to punish Rika for her sins. She then accuses Rika of truly being Oyashiro reborn and asks her why she would make her kill her and the club.
• Yandere: In Episode 16, Satoko tortures Rika and claims that it's her fault because she wanted to leave Hinamizawa, which would also mean leaving her friends and their memories behind as well as disrespecting Oyashiro-sama. However, as the scene continues, it would seem more than it's because Satoko doesn't want Rika to leave her.
  "All I want is to live here in Hinamizawa with you, Rika. I don't need anything else."
• You Are Already Dead: At the end of Episode 7, Rika breaks character and bitterly taunts Keiichi about this when he reveals he snooped around in the tool shed, as she knows that this can only end badly. After telling him off, she tells him to go enjoy the little time he has left.

Tropes in Sotsu

• Aesop Collateral Damage: Played with in-universe. Satoko wants to "teach" Rika that she should stay in the village by murdering her otherwise innocent friends and allies.
• Alone with the Psycho: In the first episode of Oniakashi-hen, after Rika pulls her face-stamp prank on Satoko, Rena excuses herself to go to the nurse because she doesn't feel good, Satoko also then excuses herself to go wash her face, and Mion decides to call it a day for the club. This allows Satoko to inject Rena with H-173 while she's asleep and with no one else around.
• Ascended Meme: It became a joke in the fandom that Satoko wanted revenge on Rika for the one loop where Rika bashed her head in with a chair from "Higurashi: Rei". Come Episode 14 and Rika pummels Satoko with the chair.
• "Could Have Avoided This!" Plot: Downplayed. At the end, Rika and Satoko have a heart-to-heart talk about why St. Lucia won't work out, followed by the club members telling them it's okay for friends to lose their intimacy but still be on good terms. This is likely what would've happened anyway if Satoko never decided to torment Rika (and it's also likely Rika would've been more forgiving towards Satoko since she would've then have never put her through the loops again; now, Rika and Satoko's friendship is forever scarred), though to her credit, Eua was an Outside-Context Problem and who knows what she would've done if Satoko tried to reject Eua's influence.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: In Oniakashi-hen, Rena not only stabbed Rina to death with her giant cleaver, but also chopped her up with her blade and other hardware blades so she could stuff the dismembered parts of her body in a bag and toss it somewhere. She was also going to do this to Keiichi.
• Death of Personality: In Episode 10, it is revealed Satoko split into two personalities. When her good side objects to killing Teppei and regrets all the horrors she's carried out, her bad side declares herself to be the real Satoko and kills her good side in that Kakera.
• Denser and Wackier: In a non-comedic (or at least comedic) example of this, the final showdown between Rika and Satoko in episode 14 was when the show turned from a relatively grounded horror mystery with supernatural elements, into a straight up DBZ-style action fantasy, with the both of them transforming into magical girls, flying through the air fighting each other.
• Despair Event Horizon: After learning of Keiichi and Rena's fate at the end of Oniakashi-hen, Rika leaves class early out of despair and kills herself at her home in order to leave for the next loop.
• Double-Meaning Title: Sotsu, short for sotsugyou (which is sotsu and gou together), means "graduation" and "moving on", of course referring to the protagonists progressing with their lives past their youth and education... and it also means "to die".
• Dramatic Irony:
  • The scene in Oniakashi-hen that does Gilligan Cuts between Rika saying that everything will turn out well and wishing Keiichi the best and Keiichi and Rena attacking each other inside Keiichi's house.
  • In Episode 14, when Satoko rants to Rika how badly she doesn't want to go back to St. Lucia's because "[she] hates studying", Rika interprets it as Satoko being lazy and making excuses; Rika vows to force Satoko to come back with her and that she'll make her study for entire nights, while we as the audience know Satoko did exactly that and still struggled.
• Driven to Suicide: At the end of Oniakashi-hen, after learning what happened to Keiichi and Rena, Rika stabs herself to death in order to enter the next loop. Satoko comes across her body and kills herself with the same knife, as she also needs to die after Rika in order to continue following her through the loops.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: Surprisingly enough, Sotsu ends this way. After besting Satoko, Rika refuses to kill her and they talk heart-to-heart about why St. Lucia didn't work. With some helpful talk from Keiichi, Rena, and Mion, the two also learn that some friendships drift apart and go their separate ways, though this doesn't mean their relationship is over. With Rika moving onto St. Lucia without Satoko, the duo accept that while their friendship has been forever tainted by the events of Gou and Sotsu, though still care about each other and intend to keep in touch. Not only that, but Satoshi finally wakes up from his coma, and it turns out the final fragment that Satoko and Rika teleported to in their fight is still a perfect world, where Teppei miraculously changed his ways and Takano never carried out her evil plans. Meanwhile, these developments are allowed to happen because Hanyuu was finally able to defeat Eua, excising her from Kakera… or at least we think so.
• Forced to Watch: Eua forces Hanyuu to watch Rika suffer multiple deaths, with her death by an L5-crazed Keiichi and her guts being harvested by Satoko being shown, much to Eua's enjoyment.
• Gaslighting:
  • A tragically non-malicious example. Believing that Onikakushi-hen/Oniakashi-hen was just a repeat of the original Onikakushi-hen, Rika tries to prevent the tragedy of it by nudging Keiichi into believing that he's just deluding Rena becoming violent and crazy so that he won't kill her (and Mion). As a result, Keiichi assumes It's Probably Nothing, but as we learn in Oniakashi-hen, his delusions were actually completely correct.
  • An intentional example comes from Satoko, who performs the old-fashioned Watangashi ritual on Rika while insisting that all her suffering is Oyashiro-sama's punishment for ever wanting to leave Hinamizawa. Despite knowing that Oyashiro-sama better than anyone else, Rika takes this seriously and actually starts to believe she was wrong to ever feel trapped in the village.
• Heel–Face Door-Slam:
  • Rina contemplates calling things off with Rena's father, but she is then murdered for her efforts.
  • In Episode 10 Satoko realizes her quest to save her relationship with Rika has turned her into a monster and she doesn't want to do it anymore. Witch Satoko removes her from the equation. Maybe?
• Improperly Paranoid: Rena turns against Keiichi because she thought he saw her with the weapons that she used to kill Rina and believed he was going to turn her in to the police, thus destroying her family forever. Except he didn't see her weapons at all, and even after apologizing for being wary of her, she still attacks him regardless.
• Irony: After a crazy Ooishi kills Rika in Episode 11, Ooishi accuses Satoko of having manipulated everyone and that she is the true Oyashiro-sama.
• My God, What Have I Done?:
  • Satoko comes to the realization at the climax of Episode 10 that her love for Rika has made her do monstrous things, and that she refuses to continue. Unfortunately, she has this realization during a confrontation with the Witch version of herself and is killed for it.
  • Rika gets one of her own in Episode 15 when she and Satoko, exhausted from their final fight, are finally forced to talk things out. What Rika had perceived as simple laziness on Satoko's part in St. Lucia had deeper roots: the reality is that Satoko simply cannot handle St. Lucia's strict curriculum, and Rika in her denial of this turned a blind eye to her struggles. Rika wanting to be with Satoko trapped her in a toxic environment that steadily caused her to snap; while it doesn't excuse Satoko's actions afterwards, Rika admits that her own behavior was the catalyst.
• Once More, with Clarity: As the Answer Arcs to Gou's Question Arcs, Sotsu retells Gou from the perspective of the other characters so that we can see what happened.
• Stealth Sequel: The Another light novel turns out to be this, as what appears to be a What If? showing Satoko and Rika spending their teenage years in St. Lucia turns out to be a mere fragment that both of them have entered after the events of Sotsu. Both of them seem to regularly jump through fragments to go through scenarios and satisfy each other's whims, and Rika mentions that they'll likely spend their teens in Hinamizawa on their next fragment.
• Title Drop: In Episode 15, after Rika and Satoko exchange the current state of their relationship, they end it with mata nanika no naku koro ni aimashou — let’s meet again, when they cry. Which also doubles as a shoutout to Bernkastel and Lambdadelta.
• Wham Episode: Episode 10 is a doozy. It ends with Satoko about to kill her uncle, when she seemingly starts Fighting from the Inside and breaks reality. The viewer sees two versions of Satoko fighting over the gun in the void between worlds. Eua then reveals the truth, Satoko stopped being herself when she accepted the power to loop. The evil Satoko proudly proclaims herself a witch and kills the good Satoko.
• Wham Line: In Episode 8, as Eua watches Satoko's breakdown, Eua says that Satoko has become a witch, further connecting Satoko to Lambdadelta.

Tropes in Meguri (Unmarked spoilers for Gou and Sotsu due to being a retelling)

• Adaptational Jerkass: Rika's new friends are more malicious, as opposed to the anime where they simply thought that Satoko was unsophisticated. Not only do they seem to give Satoko dirty looks, but they try to sabotage her friendship with Rika, by making it look like Rika ditched Satoko instead of waiting for her by saying that she went home. What actually happened, is that Rika was trying to help her new friends find a book at the library, while coincidentally Satoko was in study hall.
• Adaptation Deviation:
  • In Gou, Satoko's washtub prank slightly hurts a student from Rika's group. In Meguri, the victim is Rika herself and she gets hurt pretty badly, and Satoko is hit with an immediate My God, What Have I Done?, which she reflects on for the duration of her confinement.
  • In Gou, Satoko gets a mysterious call from the Oyashiro-sama's shrine and from there gets transported to Eua's realm. In Meguri, Eua effectively kidnaps her mid-conversation. The subplot with Hanyuu's horn is also Adapted Out.
  • In Gou Eua is mostly an Orcus on His Throne and Satoko's Jumping Off the Slippery Slope is mostly out of her own entitlement. In Meguri, Eua actively screws with Satoko to make it appear that Rika will get hurt if she leaves Hinamizawa, then spoonfeeds the ideas she wants Satoko to hear to push her into villainy.
  • In Gou, Satoko needs to die after Rika so Eua can transfer their memories to the same Fragment, though Satoko can still kill herself any time. In Meguri Satoko adds a self-imposed condition that if she dies before Rika, the tragedy will end, being concerned Eua will interfere if "the game" isn't exciting enough.
  • In Gou, Satoko initially doesn't know Rika's story, but she goes for the chandelier kill right away after failing to discourage Rika from going to St. Lucia. In Meguri, Eua shows Satoko the entirety of Tragedy of 1983 first, which makes her terrified, and her priority in the first loop is confirming what happened to Hanyuu and Satoshi. In different loops Satoko even lets Rika go to St. Lucia alone, or resigns from St. Lucia herself, but Rika and Satoshi end up dead due to accidents with implications that Eua had something to do with them. It's only after Satoko is over 100 years old she concludes that the Tragedy is what kept everyone together and she needs to enforce it, before killing Rika personally during the club reunion.
  • In Sotsu's Oniakashi-hen, Rika kills herself after realizing that she couldn't prevent the tragedy, then Satoko does so as well. In Meguri, Satoko confesses everything to Rika to gloat, then does the Murder-Suicide herself due to knowing Rika won't remember the conversation.
  • In Sotsu, Satoko somehow manages to inject Mion during the toy store trip. In Meguri, Satoko intends to inject Shion, but due to her sleeping together with Mion, she can't tell the two apart and picks one randomly.
  • In Sotsu, Mion strangles Shion in a fit of rage and regrets it immediately. In Meguri, she pushes her on a cabinet corner, then deludes herself that she's Shion playing as Mion. She also kills Rika simply because she's one of the Three Families, not because Rika had a suspicious cryptic conversation with Keiichi.
  • In Sotsu, Satoko somehow manages to shoot Mion while being held at gun on her temple and having a bottle of soy sauce in both of her hands. In Meguri, Satoko has more distance in a dimly lit corridor and she makes a confusing statement so Mion would drop her guard. Then, instead of being killed by Satoko, Mion realizes Satoko is evil and kills her first, before scratching herself out.
  • In Sotsu, Ooishi gets deluded by himself, with Teppei's death only adding fuel to the fire. In Meguri, Satoko fills in his paranoia personally multiple times.
  • In Meguri, Satoko doesn't kill Keiichi, he dies fighting Ooishi at the festival. Also, instead of dying last, Rika dies first during the dance, with the villagers having the Hinamizawa Syndrome triggered immediately due to Satoko infecting them after a drinking party with as much H173 as she had.
  • The final arc deviates Kagurashi-hen so much, it receives a different name, Akarigurashi-hen. Instead of Rika and Satoko Fighting Across Time and Space and Satoko spitefully leaving after giving up, Rika relies on Takano's and the club's Ripple-Effect-Proof Memory and they defeat Satoko with teamwork. Satoshi's sudden recovery finally pushes Satoko to Heel–Face Turn and Eua leaves due to losing interest.
• Adaptation Distillation:
  • The manga skips the first 17 episodes to where the new story starts chronologically, and also doesn't hide that it's a Sequel Series by showing Takano's confrontation with Hanyuu and her Heel–Face Turn on the very first page.
  • The manga skips Episodes 23 and 24 involving Teppei's and Takano's Heel Realization as them having a new Ripple-Effect-Proof Memory is already apparent and not majorly relevant.
  • The manga glosses over how Satoko learned to use a gun, as she could have done so any time.
  • The manga skips scenes with Hanyuu and implies she's so weak she can't even appear. Consequently, she doesn't have confrontations with Eua. Hanyuu only appears in a passing mention to use the last of her powers to restore Rika's memories.
  • In Tatariakashi-hen, Satoko gaslighting Rika that she's being punished by Oyashiro-sama is skipped.
  • Satoko doesn't have a sudden personality split with Battle in the Center of the Mind, and kills Teppei with no hesitation.
  • Rika's Death Montage is minialized to a few panels.
• Adaptation Expansion:
  • The manga adds Shion protesting against Rika going to St. Lucia, considering she also had a bad history there.
  • In Gou, Satoko feels betrayed by Rika not having a lot concern for her, and she really wasn't shown having them. In the Meguri, Rika did invite Satoko to a tea party, but with her being Country Mouse, the conversation gets awkward really quickly and leaves an impression to everyone, and Rika's new circle of friends lie to Satoko that Rika has gone home. Later, when Rika hears Satoko needs to take supplementary lessons, she offers help right away, but Satoko pridefully rejects it. This makes a later scene of Rika not sympathizing with Satoko lashing out on everyone when her grades fail more understandable. Rika also tries to defend Satoko before, during, and after her confinement, but it doesn't work out.
  • In Meguri, Eua heavily implies that Hanyuu's absence in new timelines can prevent the Hinamizawa Syndrome from triggering, which justifies Satoko's need to play a more active role and using more variety on how the tragedies start.
  • In Sotsu, Satoko just knows where H173 is stored right away. Meguri's Oniakashi-hen shows Satoko snatching H173 from Takano right before Tomitake is about to get injected, while Rika made effort off-scrren that Hounds would defect from Takano. Later, Satoko spends several loops killing Rika immediately so she can train herself to reliably steal the syringes from the Yamainu base.
  • In general, Sotsu kept H173's victims POV mostly the same as in the Question arcs, while Meguri focuses more on their state of mind before and after the injection, with additional scenes from console arcs or entirely new ones.
  • In Wataakashi-hen Mion finds it suspicious that Satoko is looking for Rika after Mion killed her. In Meguri Satoko snoops around the Sonozaki's dungeon to double-check if Rika is dead or not, which makes her being caught on other security cameras extremely suspicious.
• Adaptation-Induced Plot Hole: In Gou, when a student gets injured by Satoko's trap, she is quickly identified because Rika has told her friends that Satoko is a Trap Master prior to the incident, which Satoko takes as Rika throwing her under the bus. In Meguri, Satoko pridefully tells everyone about her traps herself, which makes her blaming Rika for it a Self-Serving Memory at best.
• Adaptation Personality Change: In Gou Satoko is quick to blame Rika for her falling friendship, though understands that she did make some stupid decisions. In Meguri, Satoko blames herself for not being a good enough friend and getting in the way of Rika's dream. As a Looper, Satoko also has her Yandere tendencies downplayed and she acts more like a Card-Carrying Villain who needs to break Rika by any means necessary, due to Eua handpicking worst timelines when Satoko not getting involved ends badly for them, and is less sadistic during murders.
• Conflict Ball: According to Meguri, Satoko did try different things at St. Lucia, but even with Time Travel, joining Rika with high class talks while keeping her grades up wasn't shown to be attempted, resulting in Rika again siding with her new friend group.
• Mythology Gag:
  • Satoko has My God, What Have I Done? scene after realizing her behavior is what makes her unable to see Rika, and does the same "I'm Sorry" Madness Mantra as Rena in Onikakushi-hen.
  • After Rika explains the looping to everyone to get their help, sceptical Rena asks Keiichi if he'll believe anything Rika would say, for example aliens coming to Hinamizawa to spread a parasytic virus. That's actually the plot of Hou.
• Tempting Fate: The first chapter heavily emphasizes that Rika's future should be bright now, since the initial tragedy got resolved. Cue Happy Ending Override.
• Title Drop: "Meguri" means "going round", which is how Satoko describes her looping ability.
• Villainous Friendship: Satoko and Eua enjoy some sweets together between loops.

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