Isolated from the rest of society, a group of faceless people lives in a remote place on top of a hill called the Shadow House. Shrouded in mystery, they work on building their empire and prospering toward their goal. People without a face, covered in soot, and even unable to weeb tears, bring humans to their place with the intention of making them serve as their faces. The humans are regarded as living dolls, stripped of their free will, only to be servants of those resembling a person’s shadow. But what exactly is happening behind the curtain?
About Shadow House
Shadow House is a manga series written by So-ma-to and published by Shueisha. It’s been serialized in Weekly Young Jump since September 2018 and adapted into anime in the Spring of 2021 by CloverWorks. The second season of the anime came out in the Summer of 2022. There are 25 total episodes with an average runtime of 23 minutes.
A Masterful Presentation
As a visual storytelling, it uses some crafty tricks to convey the story that helps in building up the drama, mystery, suspense, and foreshadowing. The overall aesthetics feel like a cinema set in the Victorian era. Through the use of clever camera tricks & perspectives, colors & shading, and sound, the perfect atmospheric & cinematic scene and potential foreshadowing are set up. But that’s all are nothing but trash if there is no substance. The story is conveyed in a thematic & meaningful way with some careful implementation and well-written characters.
The Thematic Approach
First of all, the theme of living doll. In the first episode, Emilico accidentally breaks her master, Kate’s ceramic doll. She is then ordered to throw it away & not to make a fuss about it. Later she started getting lightheaded & messing up every job, which makes her question, is she broken too? Will she be thrown away just like the doll she broke? She couldn’t fathom her dilemma at the time. Later she pours water on a stuffed doll accidentally which angers Kate. It looked cheap and seemed to be made for peasants, but Kate cherished that more than the other things she had in her room. This indicates Kate’s personality and her care for Emilico even though she’s only a servant. It shows where the true value lies. There are some other neat details such as Emilico sleeping inside a doll box fitting her size, Kate’s dress colored red while Emilico’s blue; mirroring each other’s looks & personalities, and some more that I failed to include.
The dolls aren’t allowed to have free thoughts, they are merely meant to mimic their master’s look, facial expressions, and ego. Even though in reality, it’s the opposite. So when Emiilico is supposed to act and dress like a doll, she acts the most humane way., most noticeably showing off her basic intellect. What exactly is the Shadow House? Who are the Shadow people? Her eagerness to learn and questions about the aspects carry the plot forward and reveal lore. That is an excellent way of writing a story, using the characters to unveil the plot. Later it was revealed that the more interactions between the doll & master are performed, the more refined personality and powers the shadow person develops. Which is about understanding the overall intentions but not the heart. It’s pretty jarring how the next theme plays out in the story.
The shadow persons always talk in the third person meaning they don’t address themselves as I or me, they call out their name. For example, Kate would say, “Kate would like to go to sleep now.” Their whole body is covered in soot, like black ashes from a fireplace. They get weaker when drenched in water and so they can’t cry tears, which indicates their whole body consists of soot. When they show emotions such as anger, agitation, and sorrow, soot comes out from their head and emits upwards causing the sooth to stick to the ceiling. Although, no one can see their face, hence can’t tell how they are actually feeling. That makes their whole existence completely worthless without their human counterpart. The dolls do all of their chores, clean their room, clothes, & the entire house, and hone their body to be durable. Which begs the question, how did the shadow people originate? They do eat normal food to fuel their body, but also the emotional support from their dolls to fully mature and grow up alongside them. Then another question rises, what would happen if they fail to meet the requirements?
All the mysteries are revealed little by little later on but the way this show puts different questions about different aspects makes this fun and interesting to watch. It’s not about mindblowing revelation but rather about making the audience question and solve the puzzle before the big reveal. The mystery of Shadow House & the characters go hand in hand.
The Colorful Characters
Shadow House is full of myriad characters with each of them having a unique design and agenda. Sometimes their ideals and attitude clash with each other whether it’s among allies or foes. Not to mention the use of colors to express their personality. Red means power, passion, aggression, & prestige, blue means confidence, freedom, & often melancholy, gold represents luxury, prestige, & royalty, green growth, harmony, & optimism, purple mysticism, intuition, ambiguity, creativity, & change, and so on. This is apparent in their character development as well, just as foreshadowed in the Ending theme. This is a plain example that stays consistent and executed properly. The characters aren’t that complex and they don’t have to be, as long as they are written with consistency, proper growth & development, the story will feel natural and engaging; which is something most other shows are missing nowadays.
The Opening & Ending
Season 1’s Opening & Ending are such eye-candy and melody to feast upon. The staff at CloverWorks nailed it perfectly. The OP has no song, it’s a musical drama that summarized the events of the season, like a live orchestra playing at a stage drama which is a doll house. The playful mystery and suspense are portrayed in it that foreshadows some upcoming events.
The ED is another mysterious melody that’s undeniably pretty to look at and listen to. The song “Nai Nai” by ReoNa is a masterpiece. Every line ends with “i” and lines in the chorus end with “a”. But this pattern breaks when unexpected occurrence takes place. The lyrics and tone just fit perfectly with the theme of the anime and the visuals speak for themselves. It shows characters set in a doll house, meaning that they are merely pawns for something ominous. Things started going backwards when the second verse of the chorus plays reflecting the fact that everything they are working towards will be in vain. It zooms out of the house and the train keeps circling around emitting smoke to show the outside perspective, meaning everyone is being observed by someone and they are stuck in a loop that they have to break out. The coffee cup breaking is a foreshadowing of that and of another mystery. The ink pouring & covering the dolls is another foreshadowing that is built up from the beginning. These are just some neat details I picked up when watching and there more easter eggs to find. The music, tone, lyrics, and visuals are in perfect sync to craft the unskippable ED. The episode ended on a cliffhanger; you wanna move on to the next? How about waiting a minute and letting the ED play out coz it’s that much good.
The Little Big Problem
At the end of the day, the anime is made by the infamous CloverWorks. Shadow House started with an incredible direction and storyboarding, just like some of the other works, The Promised Neverland and Wonder Egg Priority. But it’s no longer a surprise that this anime will also be defiled by rushing, running out of ideas, time limit, and episode limit. It’s always hard to fit everything within a set of episodes per season but it is possible with creative ideas & direction, just like The Promised Neverland season 1. But they only put effort into the first half of season 1, meaning they only intended the anime to be an advertisement for the manga after grabbing everyone’s attention. Season 2 is consistently bad including the OP & ED as they never picked my interest. The drama, mystery suspense, and urgency it built up, all went down the drain in an instant. Everything felt lackluster and drag to sit through the rest of the show. Studio CloverWorks is literally evil because of that.
After Thought
Shadow House is a great story with its whimsical narrative and colorful characters. In my opinion, the anime aesthetics fit better with the theme than the manga. The manga isn’t bad by any means, rather now you have to read it to make up for the damage the anime has done. After the Debut arc, the anime didn’t feel the same. Up until that point, it’s been intriguing. Surely it’s not a mindblowing mystery novel with an intricate plot & characters, but it is simple yet properly handled that everyone can enjoy.
Thank you for reading. ~♡~
