アニメ： 魍魎の匣 Mouryou no Hako

Difficulty Level: 3
Subs: Episodes 5-10 here
Number of Episodes: 13

Wow, this has to be one of the most intelligent series I've ever seen. One of my favorite movies is a little known film called Mindwalk, in which a poet, a politician, and a scientist spend the whole movie discussing questions of  life, space, time and the universe. Watching this series reminded me of it.
 
Story: This is a mystery series that isn't afraid to spend whole episodes with the characters just talking with one another, and while it might turn action fans off with this, the writing is solid, and the times the characters spend discussing things are one of my favorite parts of the series. you never know what little thing is going to be important later on, but even the unimportant points serve to flesh out the characters and the setting. The series was adapted from the second book in a novel series by Natsuhiko Kyogoku, and after finishing it I immediately ordered the first book, Ubume no Natsu. This series is also one of the hardest anime, in terms of language level, that I have seen. All sorts of obscure youkai references abound,  and all the discussions can be hard to keep up with if you miss something, but I still recommend this series if you want something to make you think. The first few episodes focus on one of the victims of the box-murder and her friend, which are kind of annoying, but I am glad I stuck past those episodes because it was worth the wait.

Characters: I love how fleshed out the characters in this series are. It makes me wish all anime series had episodes where the characters sit down to a round table discussion and just talk about what's happening in the series, although I admit it wouldn't work for every series, but the long discussions in this one really helped you get to know the characters. I don't think I have ever seen an anime series with so much time devoted to talking before, and that's a compliment. I like mystery series, but I've never felt like I was solving a case along with the characters until watching this.

Animation: The character designs are by CLAMP, which while I am a huge CLAMP fan, I'll admit that a lot of male characters they design tend to have a "pretty boy" look to them, and I wasn't sure if that would work in a mystery series, but it seems like they toned it down for this series. The animation is very good at showing subtle gestures and other things that make the characters seem more realistic.The visuals are just great to look at all around though.

Sound: The the opening and ending songs aren't really memorable, but the soundtrack was very good at setting a mood. The voice actors were also very good at their roles.

Overall, I highly recommend this series to anyone who likes intelligent anime and isn't put off by lots of talking.