Uzumaki: Spiral Into Horror may be Junji Ito’s ‘magnum opus’
Imagine being crowded into a cramped, impossibly long row house with an entire town’s worth of people, your limbs stretching disproportionally and warping into spirals. This is the mental image that inspired world-renowned horror manga artist Junji Ito to create Uzumaki, a process which started with an interest in the shape of a mosquito coil, leading to research on spirals and how they appear in everyday life, and ultimately to a haunting manga which many deem Junji Ito’s magnum opus.
Uzumaki is a sprawling and haunting story, taking a simple shape as mundane as a spiral to the extreme reaches of the horror genre. Originally published serially in a Japanese seinen manga magazine, the chapters of Uzumaki were then compiled into 3 bound volumes before being published as an omnibus. After many years spent as a fan-favorite among Ito’s work, fans who have long-awaited an anime adaptation are finally being rewarded with Uzumaki: Spiral Into Horror, which is midway through release by Production I.G. and Adult Swim.
The story of Uzumaki follows the inhabitants of the fictional town Kurouzu-cho, as the town becomes increasingly plagued by a supernatural curse involving spirals. Taking place as a bunch of episodic short stories, the episodes of Uzumaki are connected by the overarching storyline of schoolgirl Kirie Goshima and her boyfriend Shuichi, as their family and friends become increasingly afflicted by the curse of the spiral.
Initially, the curse manifests itself only as paranoia in Shuichi and obsession in his father. However, the story quickly accelerates, and after the death of Shuichi’s parents, he gains the ability to sense when the curse is about to take effect and tries to warn Kirie and the townspeople in advance. Unfortunately, they usually take his advice too late, and the curse results in outcomes ranging from pottery haunted by the ghosts of the spiral-stricken to a classmate turning into a giant grotesque snail hybrid to the entire town being stuck in a whirlpool of accelerated time and being demolished by typhoons and a cursed subterranean city.
Uzumaki was truly revolutionary for manga at its release, combining elements of body horror and supernatural, Lovecraftian horror, all bound together in Ito’s signature art style of black and white, incredibly detailed illustrations with in-depth hatching and haunting imagery. Junji Ito brings horror to life, leaving lasting impressions with his work, and the animation studios working on Uzumaki: Spiral Into Horror stay true to the original manga, keeping the animation black and white and maintaining high levels of detail.
Animators combined motion capture technology with hand-drawn animation and combined multiple dimensional styles of art, with any still frame from the animation looking like it could have been taken directly from the books, drawn by Ito’s own hand. This production of Uzumaki was truly incredible to see brought to life on the screen, especially for a longtime fan like me. The show is a faithful representation of Ito’s work and I think the story is reimagined and reworked in an interesting and fitting way.
That being said, the release of the show faced some controversy. Being several years in the making, the showmakers repeatedly mentioned not wanting to rush the production process and have the animation be of the highest quality possible. Nonetheless, the animation team was subject to budget cuts on the project, and the show faced backlash following the second and later episodes, as the animation quality dropped in comparison to the pilot. While I think in part this anger is justified, I think the quality decreases have been blown out of proportion by Uzumaki’s audience, since the artwork is still beautiful and striking, and definitely still brings across the creepiness and fear Junji Ito aims to achieve.
The final episode of Uzumaki: Spiral Into Horror is set to air on Saturday, October 17, closing out the limited four-episode series and bringing together the underlying storylines seen throughout the show and manga. I won’t spoil anything, but if Uzumaki continues on its current track and stays true to the manga’s ending, we’ll be in for a wild ride.
