Hikaru no Go

12-year-old Shindou Hikaru is just your average 6th grader. One day, while searching through his grandfather’s attic, he comes across an old Go board. Upon touching the Go board, Hikaru is possessed by the spirit of Fujiwara No Sai, and continues to be haunted by him soon after. Sai was once a great Go player, who committed suicide and continued to stay in the world as a spirit desiring only to play Go once again. Finally bending to Sai’s pleas, Hikaru allows Sai to play Go through himself, unknowingly attempting the first game with the young prodigy Touya Akira. Time has finally started moving, as Sai’s quest for the perfect game, “The Hand of God”, is set underway. Based on the manga by Yumi Hotta and Takeshi Obata.

While examining an old Go board in his grandfather’s basement, twelve-year-old Shindo Hikaru is possessed by the restless spirit of Sai, an ancient Go master who has waited for over one thousand years to play the Hand of God: the perfect move. Sai convinces Hikaru to act as a vessel for making his moves, but it is soon clear that Hikaru also enjoys Go and wants to play his own games. Moreover, the rules of Go have changed since Sai’s time, and Go players from all over the world are now much stronger, having had the benefit of hundreds of years of evolution and experimentation by the masters before them. Can this unlikely pair form a successful partnership and rise to the top of Japan’s Go community, and can Sai finally play the Hand of God and find some peace?