Uzumaki

Recommended to me by @Rory.

This manga was demented, insane, deranged. Junji Ito knows how to convey a creepy and disturbing story. I wouldn't say it was scary for me, but some stories made me feel uneasy.

The imagery was quite grotesque and explicit. The mental states of the characters transmitted the obsession and madness, more than the actual town did. I like how the curse had its own way to get into people, the different manners it could ramified, perverting, tangling and twisting all around it.

I didn't like the main lead, Kirie Goshima, her decisions and actions didn't seem to fit the experience she was having. More often that not, I found her to be a damsel-in-distress type, who needed constant rescue.

But I enjoyed Shuichi Saito, for being the outcast who knew (or felt, or sense) the evil and tried to warn everyone else, even if that meant wearing the freak tag. How do you know you're sane when you're surrounded by insanity?

I love symbolism as much as I love metaphors. I love how art can represent the darkest parts of human nature. I'm not sure if seeing spirals with trigger the hell out of me, but I'm sure I'll remember this manga. I'm looking at you Fibonacci ¬¬

The art is beautiful and just nightmare fuel. I really cared about the main characters Kirie and Shuichi. Chie was a good character but was rushed and shoved into the plot. The story was disturbing, but I felt that there were too many plot holes. Some plot holes really didn't make sense and I felt cheated at times by the way characters unnaturally reacted to certain situations. I didn't like some of the choices taken and the creepy stuff that gets established but gets underused. One chapter out of nowhere turns into a shonen which caught me off guard. The manga is creepy, but the plot really disinterested me.

Story:

This is something that should be a recurring theme for all horror stories. Not just gore and jump scares for the sake of trying to frighten people. Horror should be unsettling and make you feel disturbed. That is exactly what this Manga does. It starts of at a slow and casual pace though I admit by the sixth or seventh chapter, I started wondering about the characters and why they weren't doing something about a certain moment that would have definitely gotten the public's attention. It wasn't until the next set of chapters that I realized they wouldn't have been able to do to certain other part of the ongoing plot. Most of each chapter is a short story of creepy yet creative themes and scary imagery that genuinely makes my skin crawl. Everything involves spirals in some way which can be found in animals, plants, inanimate objects and even with mundane things that involve spirals or things relating to causing spirals. I.E. Spinning, swirling, circling etc. and all of it do with a curse set upon the town of Kurozuo-Cho.

Art:

The style of this manga's art is fitting for the undertones of what terror you witness as the story progresses. It captures the moments where you see any of the shocking illustrations. The spirals were seen many times but remained fresh with the themes of whatever parts of the plot they were about and the creativity behind what they looked like as well as the symbolism was equally well written. The characters facial reactions or expressions were matching with the moments of whenever they're worried, afraid, saddened or losing their minds. All of it was pleasing to see even if I shuddered at some points.

Character:

All the cast might not be the strongest part but still necessary. If nothing else, they did respond to moments I feel would be correct for whatever dangers or challenges to their psyche they were faced with.

Kirie Goshima is the main character and is seen the most but what amazes me is how good she manages to stay throughout the series even when she's faced with difficult choices or dangerous situations. That's not an easy thing to accomplish and I commend her for staying sane through the whole story.

Her friend and main love interest Shuichi Saito is the first to be scarred by the events caused from the curse only because of who was placed under it and throughout the series might struggle the most while attempting to survive like Kirie. I feel if it weren't for her, he would have fallen victim much sooner.

Enjoyment:

Without spoiling too much, the way it ends may not be everyone's cup of tea but it didn't ruin the personal experience for myself. It just depends on the person, I feel. Whether or not you thought it was good, the entire journey is likely to make you anxious and perturbed if you're not somebody with nerves of steel.

Overall: 8/10

I can't really give this manga a high score not because it isn't good but because I didn't enjoy it. I didn't enjoy it not because it's bad but because of the feeling it gave me after reading it.

Be ready to be disgusted and gross out with this manga and blurt out swear words multiple times. The story is quite unique I guess but there are parts of it that made me shake my head and laugh because of the absurdity of it.

So if you're planning to read this, just don't make a mistake of eating food while reading, it's not really a good idea LMAO

Before I started reading this, I thought books couldn't be scary. Well, I was wrong. Although I'm easily scared, Uzumaki really is creepy. I think it's mostly the dark and realistic art style that does that, but also the story. This manga made me realize the horror genre is not for me :).

Story: 7/10
I think all of Junji Ito's stories are very creative and unique, and Uzumaki is no exception. It starts out fairly normal and gets creepier and more weird the further you get in the story. At a certain point it got a little predictable though, but the ending still surprised me and creeped me out.

Art: 8/10
I personally think the art is the best part of this manga. The art style is very realistic, which I think makes it a lot creepier. It makes it feel like it could happen in the real world (luckily it can't!). I also liked that there's quite a lot of colored pages in this manga.

Character: 6/10
I rated the characters relatively low, because I didn't really bond with any of them. I think a lot of the characters didn't have a lot of personality and some of them looked so alike, sometimes I couldn't even tell them apart.

Enjoyment: 7/10
Did I enjoy reading this manga? That's a hard question to answer. It was definitly too scary for me, yet I couldn't stop reading. It didn't feel like I enjoyed it and I'll probably never buy a horror manga again. Yet I think if you like the horror genre, you will definitely enjoy this manga.

Overall: 7/10
Overall I rated this manga a 7. Horror is really not my favorite genre, but that's no reason to rate it low. It really is a good story with great art. So if you like horror manga, definitely give this one a try!

Uzumaki is truly a one of a kind work, completely [BAD WORD] beautiful. Ito Junji's way of making an odd concept the center of a horror series is so captivating. I'm gonna break it into a few categories:

ART: Ito Junji has the (not arguable) BEST artwork in horror manga. He manages to use the layout of the page to the fullest keeping the horror moving throughout the pages. Uzumaki is about spirals (thats the easiest way to put it) and a town being affected by it. It is hard to talk about art without spoiling the experience but holy lolis it is gruesome and gut wrenching throughout. 10/10

HORROR: Spirals aren't inherently scary so a horror manga about them may seem quiet odd. It is, and very worth your read. Ito Junji is best known for short stories, and that carries into Uzumaki heavily. Every chapter has a mostly contained main spook, but it works since each chapter is given enough attention for this to be managable. 9/10

STORY: Honestly one of the low points of the series, YET is still very good. Watching the town slowly get more corrupted will most definitely keep you interested until its all over. You're not gonna get spoilers from me, go read this one. 9/10

VERDICT: Just go read it, its a masterpiece. 10/10

In many ways, Uzumaki is one of the best horror mangas ever. However, it has some flaws that could be fixed to make the story a true masterpiece. Here are the pros and cons of Uzumaki.


Pros:
- Amazing concept
- Beautiful art
- For the most part has amazing storyline
- Really uses the page turn to it's advantage
- Makes something familiar dreadful
- Quite scary in most cases

Cons:
- ending needs more and reason
- some chapters are more weird than scary
- some characters need more of a backstory


So, in conclusion, it could be a masterpiece but a few issues keep it in the 9 category.

This Manga is a true Masterpiece, it starts slow and almost comical as it takes the subject of spirals as its main horror element , but as the story progresses, it draws you in it. After a while, it gets very difficult to stop reading due to the excitement and at the same time very difficult to continue reading due to the horror, gore and the feeling of hopelessness the manga throws at you.


I would highly recommend it to any one looking for a short good horror/thriller manga.

Things I disliked / liked : Once you move forward in any story, every manga faces the challenge of, how to make the villain or the opposing force more powerful and not cross the line, that it becomes completely unrealistic and pulls the reader out of the narrative. This manga also deals with this issue, but it is able to hold you in the narrative even if the horror inspired by spirals (seriously just geometric shapes) continues to escalate. Kudos to the author for that.

Uzumaki is a horror manga written and illustrated by critically acclaimed horror artist Ito, Junji and in anticipation of the upcoming anime adaption I decided to give it a read.

The story is set in a small town of Kurouzu-cho, following a young girl Goshima, Kirie and her boyfriend Saito, Suuichi as their town and the residents are being plagued and driven to madness by the “spiral curse”.

Uzumaki’s core horror focus are spirals, the various supernatural tragedies related to them and the madness the residents succumb to. On first hearing it makes you wonder how such a concept could work for horror, but Junji Ito finds various creative ways of doing so, it is very commendable. Successfully and creatively being able to visually disturb the reader on various degrees.

A very efficient horror technique that Junji Ito uses and is without a doubt better than any author I’ve seen before is body horror. Body horror the disturbing and horrifying imagery regarding the human body. I have struggled to find an artist that is able to make as horrifying examples as Junji Ito.

It works to his favor even more with the fantastic artwork, when nothing is happening the artwork looks average, but when it wants to disturb you or show detail landscape, it looks exceptional.

Uzumaki is fairly short being only 3 volumes long, volumes 1-2 have an episodic structure each having a different horror theme focus but in entirety all are connected by the spiral curse. While the last volume is an arc of the characters attempting to escape from the town. I did find it a bit baffling how the main characters only decided on escaping once there was no way of escaping despite all the horrific stuff they have witnessed.

Unfortunately, while Uzumaki is very disturbing in its themes, art and sanity deprived characters. Much of the horror really is just creepy imagery rather than psychological or anything deeper. Ryukishi07’s Higurashi, is a prime example of a horror that is able to scare you on a psychological and deeper level rather than by just imagery, while having a great cast of characters.

As for the characters of Uzumaki, they’re nothing of note worthy to mention, they don’t really have much characterization or much development, for a story like this it would’ve been more appreciative if Junji Ito spent the time to flesh them out more. A part of makes a horror good is having attachments to the characters.

Overall Uzumaki was a good and entertaining read, definitely interested in seeing how the anime will adapt the material. I would still recommend giving it a read, it is short and fun. I’m giving Uzumaki a 7/10.

Manga artist Junji Ito is known for having done some of the best horror manga out there. Out of all of them Uzumaki's probably the most well known one. The series ran for 3 volumes from 1998 to 1999 and over the years has become quite a classic. So in honor of October and all I decided to give it a read.

Uzumaki tells about obscure events taking place in a small Japanese town. These events are presented through mostly separate stories that have the same main character, Kirie observing them. But Kirie isn't the only link between all of the absurd cases as it turns out they all have some kind of connection to spirals.

The story starts off with fairly traditional horror themes when people close to Kirie start getting involved with all kind of spirals. For the first half of the manga every chapter is basically a different tragedy with a different way of bringing spirals to it. And they cover a lot of different forms of spirals from snails and tree trunks to hurricanes and the skin on fingertips.

These stories are not realistic as there are some plot-holes, like why
everyone doesn't just leave the cursed town, but they offer concepts that make you think. Every occurrence is interesting and there's always an unsettling tone present which is mostly thanks to the wonderfully disturbing art-style.

While Uzumaki has fearsome themes, it's never quite scary. The story varies from scenes that are quite upsetting to ones that are just kind of hilarious. And it's this sense of obscure comedy that makes me how much of it is intentional.

Around the second half or the manga the story starts to change a bit. Suddenly the conflicts carry over from chapter to another and there's an overarching story with quite a step up on the stakes. But weirdly enough, to me this felt like the most lacking part in it's entirety. he previously nightmarish tone is replaced with intense catastrophe-type action sequences that just don't feel like they're complimenting what the story was good at.

Fortunately towards the end it goes back to the original pace. The whole story is concluded in a way, that without spoiling anything, completely fits the narrative and quite literally ties it all together. However considering the varying ways the spirals were around in early chapters I was left with a feeling that more of those elements could have been brought back as relevant plot points towards the end.

To me it would have benefited from some more consistency in themes and plot. Also the main character could use some personality so that her reactions to all this weird stuff wouldn't be so neutral.

In the end it's definitely worth checking out if you're looking for something different that's less about realism or plot but more about conversing themes through obscure situations. Although a fan of more traditional horror might find it too amusing to take as seriously frightening.