The following review assumes familiarity with the reviewed material. Spoilers below. To say that the second Kara no Kyoukai filmMurder Speculation Part Ais a bit confusing is an understatement. While the literal events that unfold arent particularly difficult to parse the characters enacting them have opaque and blurry motivations which blunts any possible emotional impact and renders the entire narrativedown to its intended tone confused and unclear. Murder Speculations three main characters are Shiki a reclusive girl who is the possible heir to her familys fortune and unknown to most is a serial killer SHIKI her split personality who is more rebellious and punky and Kokutou a shy nerd who falls for Shiki. If these descriptions seem slight well were not really given much insight into their personalities and none of them really grow outside of the fairly short descriptions Ive given here. We get some backstory wherein SHIKI tries to explain that he I am told SHIKI uses male pronouns and am not about to debate the gender identity of a doublyfictional person is in charge of Shikis repressed emotions and in a turn of phrase that I am only very slightly paraphrasing and is so laughably clunky I desperately want to believe its the result of a poor translation says that the only emotion Shiki feels is murder. Kokutou of course finds out that Shiki is a murderess fairly early on in fact but its here where the film takes a bizarre narrative turn. Rather than going to the police he is rather close to an individual implied to be the lead investigator in the murder cases he simply chooses not to believe her. Then when he actually witnesses her murdering someone chooses to stake out her house every night in a strange ploy to temper her murderous instincts recall that the film frames Shikis impulses as not being her own fault. Unbelievably this actually works for quite some time an entire fall and winter in fact. Then in the films only genuine moment of suspense or action Shiki attacks Kokutou coming dangerously close to killing him. Were not really given much clue what happens after that. There is a timeskip near the end of the film to a few years later where Shiki appears to be in a coma but again the film fails to provide any reason for what occurs within it and without proper background knowledge of the source material this entire development comes across as confusing. There is furthermore the issue of Kokutous character. Whether hes supposed to scan as genuinely kind and endearing which he very much does not or as dangerously obsessed with a woman he barely knows to the point of his own detriment which he sort of does isnt really clear either. This isnt an inherent problem and in a betterexecuted film could be a point of intriguing ambiguity but it doesnt seem to even be on purpose here and rather feels more like the film either simply forgot to provide us with some kind of emotional connection to this character or was simply uninterested in doing so in the first place. There are certainly positives mainly aesthetic ones. Animation studio ufotable remain as capable with pen and paintbrush as ever and their astounding backgrounds bring a haunting sense of eeriness to scenes that desperately need some kind of tonework and emotion. Furthermore the subtle visual distinction between Shiki and SHIKI which mostly comes down to body language and some very slight design alterations to make the latter look more androgynous are a really nice touch as is her floaty wraithlike movement in her confrontation with Kokutou. The soundtrack is of course excellent adding another notch to Yuki Kajiuras long belt. Unfortunately none of this can excuse the seriously lacking narrative. So what were left with again is a movie that down to its title and its short runtime a minute short of an hour at 59 minutes feels like and is indeed largely branded as the second episode of a series rather than a proper film but the fact remains that while it is obviously a sequel to the first KnK film at least in terms of release order the fact that its plot takes place earlier in the franchises chronology and thus neither film provides any real narrative or emotional context for the other makes it fall flat on that axis too. It comes across as hollow. Wellmade certainly but without any real care as to whether you understand it or not. To be generous it scans as a for fans only affair. There is of course the possibility that later episodes will draw on what this one has laid out but what that essentially means is that this particular film is on its own all buildup and no resolution.