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Where do I begin with Junji Ito's work?

P

Professor Renegade

Banned
So I've never really gotten into Junji Ito's manga for the longest time because I was never really into horror manga. Yesterday though a buddy of mine showed me The Enigma of Amigara Fault and I found myself really liking it! It was short but right from the beginning I was hooked and wanted to keep reading to see what would happen and what the purpose of those human shaped holes in the side of the mountain were. It kind of had that mysterious and inexplicable kind of horror that you kind of feel from reading something like H.P. Lovecraft. Something that can't be entirely understood by humans, and as a result the characters are punished for their curiosity of things that are beyond their comprehension.
So anyway as the thread title says, where do I begin if I want to get more into Junji Ito's manga?
 
P

PassiveObserver

Member
The recent Fragments of Horror is a nice collection of short stories:

23705532.jpg


The only series I've read of his is Uzumaki, which concerns a village becoming obsessed with spirals. That one is available in 3 volumes from Viz Media.
 
S

SuperStiltzkin

Member
Yeah Uzumaki is the only work of his I think that is officially translated. Even has a hardcover version. It's basically an anthology collection of a series of bizarre happening in a small town, but connects together to be a larger story and still has the same main characters.
 
A

Akuun

Looking for meaning in GAF
Uzumaki is probably the best place to start.

Glyceride is a much shorter story that's also good.
 
N

Nicolada

Member
Start with Uzumaki. It's one of his longer works and goes through a rollercoaster of horrifying stuff with amazingly disturbing visuals. Gyo and Hellstar Remina are also worthwhile - the latter abandons horror after a certain point and just becomes fun. Then you can go read all the one-shots you can find.

Just be prepared for unsatisfying endings. He makes these amazing concepts and conveys them well through manga, but there's never really proper explanations.
 
K

Kitsunebaby

Member
Uzumaki is still my favorite of his. It mixes the amazing body horror and beautiful art that he's known for with a nice bit of psychological horror. But really, I love all his work. Dive in anywhere, and it should be good.
 
P

Professor Renegade

Banned
Guess I'm gonna be starting with Uzimaki then haha. I actually saw it on the shelves of my local bookstore, so I'll probably pick it up the next time I go there.

Are his endings unsatisfying in the sense that they end on a low note though? Or is it more like unresolved plot lines?
 
A

Akuun

Looking for meaning in GAF
Professor Renegade said:
Guess I'm gonna be starting with Uzimaki then haha. I actually saw it on the shelves of my local bookstore, so I'll probably pick it up the next time I go there.

Are his endings unsatisfying in the sense that they end on a low note though? Or is it more like unresolved plot lines?
Click to expand...
It's more of the unresolved plot line sort. His endings leave much to the imagination, and may not explain as much as you'd like. But on the other hand, being light on explanations may also be why his stuff is good.
 
D

Dachande

Member
Good suggestions so far.

There's also been a big collection of Tomie stories released, which is some of his earliest work. Worth getting if you're a fan after Uzumaki, Fragments of Horror and Gyo.

There's also this, which is more comedy but a fun read, especially knowing his normal work:

51q7k8r5VUL.jpg
 
L

Lord of Ostia

Member
SuperStiltzkin said:
Yeah Uzumaki is the only work of his I think that is officially translated. Even has a hardcover version. It's basically an anthology collection of a series of bizarre happening in a small town, but connects together to be a larger story and still has the same main characters.
Click to expand...
It's not his only translated work, there is a good bit more than that, lile Gyo and the Cat Diaries.
 
P

Professor Renegade

Banned
Dachande said:
Good suggestions so far.

There's also been a big collection of Tomie stories released, which is some of his earliest work. Worth getting if you're a fan after Uzumaki, Fragments of Horror and Gyo.

There's also this, which is more comedy but a fun read, especially knowing his normal work:

51q7k8r5VUL.jpg
Click to expand...

I can't help but feel that those cats are like evil monsters or some shit, given his usual work.

Stone Vagabond said:
http://imgur.com/gallery/ZNSaq
Click to expand...

Yup, literally the exact link my buddy sent me.
 
R

RoyaleDuke

Banned
Hellstar Ramina, The Long Dream, First part of Uzumaki unless you want to see how weird and dumb it gets. Frankenstein for the greatest adaptation ever.

I didn't like Tomie or Gyo that much, but a lot of his short story compilations can be pretty weird or deeply unsettling. There is this one in I think his first haunted house stories or whatever manga where this girl moves into an apartment complex, and her next door neighbor makes weird mechanical noises, and one day,
Turns out her neighbor is a weird Knife monster.

This character becomes a recurring character that seemingly goes places and encounters strange things. There are a lot of stories kind of like that or they start off in a way you wouldn't expect.
 
Aizo

Aizo

Banned
I've read almost 100% of his works (not counting Rasputin, since he just did the art), and I'm sad to say that a lot of his best stories have yet to be officially translated. I don't know how the fan translations are going of his highly prolific collection, but that may be the only way to access them unless you can read Japanese, Korean, or Chinese.

I think most people start with Uzumaki, and I think that's a really great place to start. One of his best longform pieces. I personally think he's best when doing short stories, but Uzumaki is terrific. After Uzumaki, I'd recommend Tomie. Another classic. Gyo is of course very infamous, but it didn't resonate so much with me (although it is very entertaining).

After that, I'd say read whatever interests you. One of my very favorites is Shibito no Koiwazurai. One of the strongest collection volumes would be Michi no Naimachi (The Town with No Streets), but Fragments of Horror (available in English) is also good! I'd stay away from Dissolving Classroom; that is one of his weakest volumes of all. Okuman Bocchi, the short story in the back of the volume for Hellstar Remina, is very strong, too.

Professor Renegade said:
I can't help but feel that those cats are like evil monsters or some shit, given his usual work.
Click to expand...
This is how you're supposed to feel while reading it. So amusing.
 
K

KHlover

Banned
Start with Uzumaki (and "Gyo"+"Hellstar Remina", I guess), then read his short stories. I prefee his short stories, the long ones tend to drift off into absurd comedy around halfway through. Unfortunately many of them aren't legally available in the West, but it's easy enough to find them online. My personal favorites are "The Long Dream" and "Lovesick Dead".
 
M

Moose Biscuits

It would be extreamly painful...
Anything you can find, honestly, there's no real continuity between his stories except for the ones which explicitly form part of an overarching plot like Uzumaki, The Dissolving Classroom, etc.

Hellstar Remina is a good one.

Also: be aware that he has a habit of finishing a story by, well, not. Basically a ton of his works end with the equivalent of "and damn, that's pretty spooky isn't it? anyway the end."
 
M

maomaoIYP

Member
Aizo said:
I've read almost 100% of his works (not counting Rasputin, since he just did the art), and I'm sad to say that a lot of his best stories have yet to be officially translated. I don't know how the fan translations are going of his highly prolific collection, but that may be the only way to access them unless you can read Japanese, Korean, or Chinese.

I think most people start with Uzumaki, and I think that's a really great place to start. One of his best longform pieces.
Click to expand...

Actually I would argue against starting with Uzumaki. It's his best work bar none, and going back to read his shorter or older work can feel quite rough. I read all his work in chronological fashion, as they were published as such by a Taiwan publisher as a chronological collection of all his work. It starts with Tomie, and slowly progresses to other stories, with a Tomie chapter occasionally returning. It heightens the sensation of 'encountering' a Tomie story, because that is exactly how people tend to run into her.
 
A

Aurongel

Member
Glyceride is pretty gnarly. Hellstar Remina is like a horror comedy and has some great squeamish and belly laugh moments.
 
M

Mupod

Member
Cat Diary is amazing, but not as an introduction. It's better after you've read some of his other stuff.

Anyways, I think I started with Gyo so that one sticks out to me a lot. Hellstar Remina has one hell of a creepy concept and is pretty insane.
 
B

BoogieWoogie

Banned
None of the stories are really connected, so you can start anywhere.

I don't know the name of it, but that one about the woman trying to get in the kid's window scares the piss out of me.
 
F

Fury451

Banned
BoogieWoogie said:
None of the stories are really connected, so you can start anywhere.

I don't know the name of it, but that one about the woman trying to get in the kid's window scares the piss out of me.
Click to expand...

The Hanging Balloons. Only Ito could take such a stupid concept and make it chill your soul. The Enigma of Amigara Fault is also another good example of him doing this.

Uzumaki is the best starting point I think. I actually saw the movie adaptation first, then got heavily into his work.

Glyceride is some nasty shit. Like, seriously, next level disgusting.
 
H

HStallion

Now what's the next step in your master plan?
I can't wait I'll that anthology anime series comes out. Should expose a lot more people to Ito's work.
 
P

Professor Renegade

Banned
So a couple of weeks ago I picked up Uzumaki and pretty much loved it. The first half up to the Jack in the Box chapter was great, but after that it felt like Ito was scraping the bottom of the barrel to make spiral shaped things scary or disturbing (except for the Hospital chapters though, those were great).
It picked up again for me from the Storm chapter to the end. Despite what most have said IIT about Ito's unresolved endings, I think I actually prefer it that way.
Like once Kirie falls into the spiral city(?) there was definitely a sense of futility in terms of stopping something so grand and incomprehensible.
I was a little disappointed though that the Lost Chapter ended up being a cut story, I feel it could have been expanded on to give a lot more context as to what the spiral really is, but I guess Ito didn't want to go for some alien/cosmic entity as the antagonist.
Anyway, I really enjoyed reading it and it was just the right thing to scratch my itch for something Lovecraftian. Looking forward to reading his other stuff 👌

Edit: I think I'll read Gyo next, just found out that one of my favourite old memes came from it
gashunk.jpg
 
M

Mdk7

Member
Just read Glyceride... It was cool, but not as good as expected because of the ending.
I was expecting it to be a bit more unique and striking.
I mean, if you compare it to the ending of The Enigma of Amigara Fault it's certainly not there...
 
C

corn_fest

Member
Uzumaki is a wild ride, but it does suffer from some throwaway "look at this gross thing" chapters in the middle, which never end up relevant to the ending.

Gyo manages to tell an interesting story without some of Uzumaki's contrivances (
no reporters or scientists can make it into the town because reasons
)
 
Aizo

Aizo

Banned
maomaoIYP said:
Actually I would argue against starting with Uzumaki. It's his best work bar none, and going back to read his shorter or older work can feel quite rough. I read all his work in chronological fashion, as they were published as such by a Taiwan publisher as a chronological collection of all his work. It starts with Tomie, and slowly progresses to other stories, with a Tomie chapter occasionally returning. It heightens the sensation of 'encountering' a Tomie story, because that is exactly how people tend to run into her.
Click to expand...
Have you read everything? I think there are a lot of things one could end up liking more than Uzumaki. Uzumaki is great, but I started with it and ended up reading everything available in English and then Japanese. There's really no wrong way to go.
Messofanego said:
Is that the army of one stitch murder short story?
Click to expand...
YES! I had to look up the English title. That's the one.
 
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