# Penance (2012)

> A grieving mother's curse haunts the classmates of a murdered girl in a small Japanese village where everyone refuses to remember.

Canonical page: https://ember.film/tv/38178

## Facts

- Seasons: 1
- Episodes: 5
- Episode runtime: 61 min
- Status: Ended
- Genres: drama, mystery, crime
- Created by: Kiyoshi Kurosawa
- Network: WOWOW Prime
- Cast: Kyoko Koizumi, Mirai Moriyama, Yu Aoi, Eiko Koike, Sakura Ando, Chizuru Ikewaki, Hazuki Kimura, Erika Omata
- TMDB rating: 7.1/10
- IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2043616/

## Ember's analysis

- Pacing: slow
- Intensity: extreme
- Complexity: dense
- Violence: graphic
- Tone: austere, melancholic, unsettling, oppressive, bleak

## What critics say

Critics broadly view the miniseries as a positively received, unsettling drama about guilt, trauma and revenge in a small village.

## Synopsis

Penance (2012) is a Japanese psychological crime miniseries created by Kiyoshi Kurosawa for WOWOW Prime, told across five hour-long episodes. The murder of a young girl shocks a small village, and her grieving mother, played by Kyoko Koizumi as Asako Adachi, becomes consumed by rage when the classmates her daughter once played with all claim they cannot recall who the killer was. Her curse hangs over the story as the former playmates, portrayed by Yu Aoi as Sae Kikuchi and Sakura Ando as Akiko Takano among others, grow into adults still carrying the weight of a childhood they would rather forget. Each episode peels back another perspective, and the mystery unfolds through shifting viewpoints and fractured timelines rather than a simple case-of-the-week format. Set in contemporary rural Japan, the series builds a cold, oppressive atmosphere of denial and dread, where small-town silence becomes its own kind of crime. Its tone is austere, melancholic and unsettling, foregrounding guilt, trauma and the ethics of revenge. Fans of Broadchurch, The Killing and Kurosawa's own Cure will find resonance in its patient, morally heavy dread and its interest in how a community protects its own secrets.

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- [Another (2012)](https://ember.film/tv/38894)

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