On June 21 — Watanagashi, the Cotton Drifting Festival day in the series’ own lore — KADOKAWA announced that Higurashi: When They Cry is getting a brand new television anime, two decades after the original first aired.
みんな、おかえり — Everyone, Welcome Home
During a live-streamed 20th anniversary special on Sunday, KADOKAWA confirmed that a new Higurashi: When They Cry TV anime is now in production. The announcement came with a teaser visual featuring a smiling Rena Ryugu and the tagline みんな、おかえり — “Everyone, welcome home” — a phrase that is both deeply warm and deeply ominous if you know the character. A short promotional video with newly recorded voice dialogue was also released through the official KADOKAWAanime YouTube channel.
The Original Cast and Studio DEEN Are Back
The entire main voice cast is returning for the new series:
- Keiichi Maebara: Soichiro Hoshi
- Rena Ryugu: Mai Nakahara
- Mion Sonozaki / Shion Sonozaki: Satsuki Yukino
- Satoko Hojo: Mika Kanai
- Rika Furude: Yukari Tamura
Animation production returns to Studio DEEN, the studio behind the original 2006 and 2007 anime adaptations — not Passione, which handled the 2020–2021 GOU and SOTSU remakes. That is a deliberate homecoming on multiple fronts, and the announcement makes no effort to be subtle about it.
New to Higurashi? Here Is the Short Version
Higurashi: When They Cry (ひぐらしのなく頃に) is a horror-mystery visual novel series by Ryukishi07 via 07th Expansion, originally released in chapters from 2002 to 2006. It follows a group of friends in the rural village of Hinamizawa during the summer of 1983 — where, every year around the Cotton Drifting Festival, someone dies or goes missing. The series is known for its psychological horror, time loop mechanics, and a knack for making cheerful character designs do a lot of unsettling work. It is not for the faint-hearted, and that is precisely why it still has such a passionate following two decades on.
Last Words
No premiere date or streaming platform has been confirmed yet. Previous Higurashi adaptations — the original series and both GOU and SOTSU — have been available on Crunchyroll in Southeast Asia, so that is the platform Singapore fans would naturally look to, but nothing for the new series is confirmed. KADOKAWA says further announcements are coming soon.
For Singapore’s horror-anime crowd, Higurashi at twenty feels as alive as ever. Whatever direction this new series takes, that Watanagashi timing was not an accident — the team is very much in on the joke, and Rena is smiling. Keep an eye on our anime coverage for updates as they drop.