Hell Girl

If you have seen the ads and trailers of this show that makes you think of it as a Ringu or Ju-On rip-off, I guarantee that you are at least 80% deceived. Jigoku Shoujo is a show that takes a cliché subject (where a person or thing with some power offers in sending people you hate off to hell and taking your soul as payment for it) and treats it in such a way that you actually think about it, trust me. You think about the whole of this selfish human race that thinks nothing but of its own pleasures and comforts, you think about how valuable present circumstances - pleasure or pain is that much important in our lives. So what if you go to Hell hereafter? That is in the "distant" future, right? That is what the people in this show are thinking. So they call upon poor Ai Enma to do the dirty work, and it is what she was forced to do, whether she enjoyed it or not. She punishes the guilty. She ferries them directly off to Hell, but for making her do that (which becomes a mortal sin), the person who made the request is also doomed at the end of his or her natural life.

The animation is quite good, the music matches the mood, whether it is sadness or anxiety, and you have an unique show out of a very popular, dismal subject.