The Painful Past
We begin episode 4 of JU-ON: Origins in 1995 with Yasuo sharing what he’s learned about this cursed house with the police officers working on the case. Together, they head to the house. This brings back a lot of painful memories for him too, given the tragic past he had with the house. However, a lot of these memories have been repressed for a long time and as he shows up, they all start flooding back. Inside the closet, he sees a young Kiyomi screaming – just as we witnessed earlier in the series – but when the officer arrives he seems to be hallucinating as there’s nothing there. In the wake of what happened last episode, Katsuji visits Kiyomi between jobs. She’s working as a prostitute now and seems to have lost any shred of innocence or happiness that she once had in the wake of all that tragedy she’s had to endure. Convincing her to let him “shoot up”, Tatsumi visits him while she’s out the room and tells him to run away. Yasuo finally finds Kiyomi’s house but when they get there, Katsuji lies dead in the bathtub. As we cut back in time, we see what actually happened that night. After killing her husband, Kiyomi was possessed by grief and haunted by the pictures that ruined her whole life. She made her way back to the house and broke down in tears after smashing up the windows with an axe. In the morning, the police officers and Yasuo make it to the house and see everything that took place that evening. As they keep searching, they see the hatch leading up to the attic. Only, this brings back bad memories for Yasuo who remembers a frightening incident from the past involving his parents. As he relives these memories, he makes it into the living room again where he witnesses a shadowy figure smashing the glass on the windows. Collapsing on the floor in shock, Yasuo looks through the broken panes of glass and struggles to put everything together that he’s just seen.
The Review Write-Up
Stylistically, Ju-On: Origins uses a lovely bit of black and white during this episode to depict flashbacks. The big reveal surrounding how Yasuo is tied to everything is a nice touch too and overall the episode really helps to tie everything together that we’ve seen so far. As I’ve said before though, where the series really excels is in its depiction of abuse and this show certainly does not shy away from that. With the finale up next, it remains to be seen whether Ju-On ends things with a whimper or a roar.
