This is a slightly more un-sung series than most of my past recommendations, but FUNimation's Ghost Hunt-- not to be confused with Production I.G's Ghost Hound, a very different show that came out six months after Ghost Hunt ended –is a really solidly enjoyable show, even for those less interested in horror materials like myself.The basic setup is thus: a high school-age girl, Mai, finds herself in the employ of one Kazuya Shibuya, a very young, excessively intelligent, and extremely good-looking teenage ghost hunter. She nicknames him “Naru,” for narcissist, because he's very aware of his positive attributes. The anime series-- based on a novel series which also spawned a manga adaptation, which Del Rey has been releasing in English and you can see a preview of here –follows a series of cases which Mai, Naru, Naru's other assistant Lin, and a handful of other charming supernatural experts solve, from exorcisms to possessions to false alarms to curses and back again.Mai and part-time bassist Monk-san shrug, while wealthy priestess Ayako watchesAll of the characters are nicely fleshed out, and there's a fair amount of comic relief in Naru and Mai's interactions-- her bright, cheerful, but easily-frustrated self pitted against Naru's closed-off ways and biting sarcasm aren't unfamiliar, but are less common in these moe-infested days –as well as those of the secondary cast. There is, of course, some romantic tension between Mai and Naru, but it's not the primary focus of the show.The only downside of the anime adaptation is that its final episode ends immediately BEFORE the Really Big Arc that is effectively the climax of the novel series. We're kind of having the same problem with the manga, actually, since the 11th volume has yet to be released in Japan for reasons that remain somewhat mysterious.Soundtrack CoverIn the meantime, you can check out the Ghost Hunt anime, which is solidly animated by J.C. Staff, and it also has a decidedly under-appreciated soundtrack by Toshiro Masuda, who also created the music for Mushishi, Excel Saga, Mahoro Matic, and Naruto (although not Naruto Shippuden).So the short version is: it's a strongly-plotted and well-animated show with some interesting horror stories and really fun characters. Also worth noting, it's not a moe show, a mech show, a fantasy show, or a samurai show...it's not something amazingly different overall, but it's not the same stuff that's getting pumped out all over the place these days either. (Not that anything's necessarily wrong with those shows in general, it's just nice to try something different in the midst of it all.)The anime is currently available for free subtitled on Hulu, and I'll embed the first episode right here. You can get the entire anime series at Hulu for the time being, so click here if you decide you want to watch more!  <object height="296" width="512"><param name="movie" value="http://www.hulu.com/embed/KHgeXub-sXdhgJifd2b_9g"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><embed src="http://www.hulu.com/embed/KHgeXub-sXdhgJifd2b_9g" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" height="296" width="512"></embed></param></object> Be sure to share your #AniWednesday recommendations in the comments here or on Twitter, as well as your thoughts on Ghost Hunt!
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