Reiko Asakawa
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Reiko Asakawa is a fictional character and the heroine of the 1998 film adaptation of Koji Suzuki's novel Ring, published in 1991, portrayed by Nanako Matsushima. She also plays important roles in Ring 2 and Rasen. She was adaptated from Suzuki's original protatonist, Kazuyuki Asakawa, who was originally male. The choice to change Asakawa from a male to a female was because the movie makers felt that a woman would be more appealing to the box-office audience with her maternal job at risking everything to protect her child.
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[edit] Ring
Reiko Asakawa is in her early to mid twenties, hapless, divorced, single mother who struggles to juggle both her job as an investigative journalist and raising her seven-year-old son, Yoichi. After her niece Tomoko dies under mysterious conditions, she investigates the death and discovers that three of Tomoko's friends also died the same way, on the same day and at the same time. This connects to another story Reiko has been doing, the cursed videotape rumour centred around teenage girls. The urban myth, which started in Izu, claims that within seven days of watching a normal videotape you receive a phone call saying you will die in a horrible and painful way.
After learning her niece had stayed in Izu, Reiko goes travels to Izu and discovers the videotape at the resort cabin Tomoko had been staying at. She watches the video and receives a strange phone call. Deciding to take the threat of death seriously, she calls Ryuji Takayama, her scientist ex-husband and father of her child to help her. Ryuji also has a strange power called ESP, similar to the supernatural instincts that Reiko herself also demonstrates but to a larger extent. This sensitivity will prove useful later on in the story. Reiko makes Ryuji a copy of the tape and he watches the video, promising to help her figure who made the videotape and why.
They study the images of the videotape and discover several things: the face of a woman named "Shizuko Yamamura", the sign "sada", the word "eruption" and words "play in salt water, monster will come." During the investigations, Yoichi happens upon the tape and watches it. This action gives Reiko and Ryuji the extra motivation to figure out the riddle of the curse. Their investigations lead them to Oshima Island and Shizuko's family home. It is then they discover that Shizuko had a daughter, Sadako.
Sadako Yamamura was the daughter of Shizuko Yamamura and her scientist lover, Dr. Heihachiro Ikuma. The Yamamura Family had the strange powers that the Asakawa family all have. It was Ikuma who pedalled the theory that some human possess supernatural powers, such as ESP. Shizuko possessed these powers, as to did Sadako. Yet at a public demonstration, Shizuko supposedly took the life of one of the reporters watching, but it was Sadako who murdered him, not her mother. Reiko and Ryuji realise that Sadako’s powers went far beyond her mother’s, so much that the people who knew her considered her to be a monster and subhuman. This leads them to believe that Sadako created the videotape.
Reiko realises that while the phone didn't ring when Ryuji and Yoichi watched the tape, but it did when she watched the video. After threading everything together, Reiko and Ryuji return to the holiday resort where Reiko had found the tape and discover a well, as seen in the video, under the cabin Reiko and Tomoko had both stayed at. Ryuji goes into the well and they try to empty the well enough to look for Sadako's body, believing that if they find Sadako's body and lay her to rest, they will break the curse and save themselves and Yoichi. However, time passes quickly and Reiko's deadline approaches, she becomes too tired to pull up the buckets of water from the well, so Ryuji orders her down the well so he can pull the buckets up.
Reiko goes down the well but decides to look for Sadako rather than help empty the well. She feels around the bottom and discovers a chunk of Sadako's hair, and rather than her finding Sadako, Sadako finds her as her hand grabs out for her. However, Reiko doesn't panic and discovers that the body is merely the skeleton remains of Sadako's body. As the deadline passes, Reiko appears to be saved.
However, the next day Reiko receives a phone call from Ryuji; he is dying. Reiko hears his death over the phone and rushes to get to him to help him. By the time she gets to his flat however, he has already died. Reiko is distraught and has no idea why he died or why she's still alive. Nonetheless, Ryuji appears to her as a spirit in the form of towelhead and guides her towards the shocking truth of how to save their son.
[edit] Ring 2
After the death of his father, Yoichi has started to become more and more like Sadako and is unable so speak. Reiko and Yoichi go into hiding but are tracked down by Mai Takano, Ryuji's student, and she promises to help Reiko solve the problem with Yoichi. However, when another person dies from the curse of the videotape, Mai tells the police about Reiko and they arrest her. When Yoichi cries out to her the two of them try to escape but, possibly under Sadako's influence, Reiko falls into one of her visions and is killed in a car crash. It appears however that Reiko spirit is watching him still.
Yoichi is saved from Sadako by the spirit of his father Ryuji.
[edit] Rasen
Although she does not make an on-screen appearance, she plays a big role in the outcome of the film. After she and Yoichi turn up dead, her boss Yoshino turns up both the videotape and Reiko's diary. While everyone thinks that it is the video causing the deaths of everyone it turns out in the end that it is Reiko's diary; she was helping Sadako all along. Consequently the reincarnation of Ryuji takes the diary to publish it to spread the curse even further.
[edit] Other incarnations
- Kazuyuki Asakawa, in Koji Suzuki's 1991 novel Ring, a married man with a wife Shizu and a daughter Yoko. Difference between him and Reiko Asakawa is his gender, family and relation to Ryuji, who is an old school friend rather than an ex-lover/spouse.
- Rachel Keller, in the 2002 American remake of the 1998 Japanese film, a single mother with a son. Differences between her and Reiko Asakawa is that Rachel wasn't married to Noah whereas Reiko was married to Ryuji.
- Sun-joo Kong, in the 1999 South Korean remake of the 1998 Japanese film, a single mother with a daughter.
| The Ring Cycle |
|---|
| Novels: Ring | Spiral | Loop | Birthday |
| Japanese Films: Ring 0 | Ring | Ring 2 | Rasen |
| American Films: The Ring | Rings | The Ring Two | The Ring 3 |
| Korean Films: The Ring Virus |
| Curses: Samara Morgan | Sadako Yamamura | Eun-Suh Park | The Video | Towel-Headed Man |
| Misc: Anna Morgan | Moesko Island Lighthouse | Hideo Nakata | She Is Here | Koji Suzuki | Terror's Realm |
