Reviews for Uzumaki: Spiral Into Horror

Uzumaki is, in my opinion, a true masterpiece of the horror manga genre. If you're even remotely curious about manga horror or willing to give it a shot, check out the manga—because this anime only manages to butcher it. The only redeeming factor is the innovation in art style in the first episode, which seemed like a good idea at first. Unfortunately, the quality drops quickly, and the changes to the source material are ultimately unwarranted. With that said, let’s start by exploring what this manga is about and the themes it seeks to convey. We’ll discuss whether the beginning is misleading, how it approaches itsthemes, and how effectively it utilizes the major elements of the medium.

So, what is this manga about?

At its core, Uzumaki is a story about obsession. The obsessive nature of spirals is an ingenious choice by Junji Ito, as spirals carry a natural, almost primal allure—there’s something entrancing about them, something that pulls you in. Spirals have long symbolized fascination, even madness, in various cultures, making them a fitting visual metaphor for the ever-tightening grip of obsession. The story uses this motif as a springboard for exploring how deeply and dangerously fixation can affect the human psyche, and how that fixation can spread like a curse through a town.

First things later, let’s talk art direction.

The true genius of Uzumaki lies in Ito’s exceptional art. His work captures an unsettling, almost Lovecraftian horror that is notoriously difficult to visualize. While Lovecraft relied on vague, indescribable horrors to terrify his readers, Ito makes the unexplainable tangible—without losing any of the dread that comes with it. From the first panels depicting the town of Kurouzu-cho and its residents, there's a persistent sense of unease, a feeling that something is inherently wrong. Even the mundane feels off, and once the spiral begins to take hold, the escalating absurdity feels strangely inevitable.

When the horrors occur, they are both shocking and eerily appropriate for the world Ito has crafted. Kurouzu-cho itself feels alive, transforming along with its inhabitants in grotesque and fascinating ways.

The anime tries to capture Ito's art by maintaining the black-and-white palette and replicating some iconic shots. It even succeeds in the first episode. But by the second episode, the animation becomes more cursed than the town itself. I wouldn’t mind if the animation were merely passable, but it is truly terrible.

At least the theme song is appropriately creepy and fitting.

So, how does it start?

The beginning of the Uzumaki anime is its only saving grace, although the last episode is also passable, as it follows the original structure. It manages to prove that an adaptation of Junji Ito works can be done with some creativity. Unfortunately, that is horribly misleading and some will even take it to heart and start thinking it really was impossible.

What about the characters?

Kirie, the protagonist, is a fascinating take on the “audience insert” character. Despite the surreal events unfolding around her, she maintains a calm detachment. Kurouzu-cho has always been strange, so her reactions aren’t as dramatic as one might expect, which allows readers to process the horrors through her more grounded perspective.

However, the real protagonist isn’t Kirie or even her boyfriend Shuichi, but the town itself. Kurouzu-cho becomes the true focal point, with the characters serving more as vehicles for the spirals’ effects than as figures with traditional character arcs.

What about the story itself?

Like much of Lovecraftian horror, Uzumaki doesn’t offer neat explanations. The plot isn’t concerned with wrapping up every mystery. Instead, it leaves much to the imagination, allowing the unease to linger long after the last page. The story provides just enough information to understand the thematic points, while keeping the greater mystery intact.

Structurally, Uzumaki follows an episodic format. However, the anime attempts to streamline the story, catering to a more modern audience obsessed with immersion as the end-all-be-all of fiction. The result? Horrible pacing and an experience far removed from the intended one. No tweaks could have made the immersion work—the story is meant to make you step back and think.

This is perhaps the most egregious change an anime adaptation has ever made to its source material. Altering the structure in such a fundamental way is, at the very least, a bold move.

Then, what did I think of it as a whole?

Uzumaki is a masterclass in horror storytelling. Ito’s ability to merge the grotesque with the philosophical makes it a standout not just in manga, but within the horror genre as a whole. While many horror works rely on shock value, Uzumaki weaves its unsettling imagery into a broader commentary on human nature, obsession, and the unknown. It’s rare to find a work that balances chilling moments with deep, resonant themes, ensuring it stays with you long after you’ve finished reading.

For those seeking a Lovecraftian horror experience that’s more eerie than outright terrifying, Uzumaki delivers in spades. Its growing sense of dread creeps into your mind, much like the spirals that drive the story. It might not be for everyone, but for those willing to embrace its strange world, it’s a journey worth taking.

Unfortunately, the anime doesn’t do the manga justice. It feels more like an experiment—and to be fair, the first episode does show that it can be done. But too many glaring mistakes ultimately sink the adaptation.

I can’t, in good faith, recommend anyone watch this anime before reading the manga. It skips so much stuff, which naturally, takes away all the buildup and tension from every single moment. Uzumaki follows the story of Kirie and Shuichi as they go through their daily lives in the spiral-infested fictional two of Kurozu-Cho. The story builds upon every weird and horrific encounter taking place in this city with great immersion and well-placed reveals. The anime takes away most of the manga’s charm by simply rushing through so many of these stories. Even episode 1, animated quite nicely, skims over a lot. Then, the secondepisode straight-up jumps from chapter 2 in the manga to chapter 8, attempting to fit in chapters 5, 6, and 7. I’m sure you can imagine how this would take away all the impact from the reveals. That intense slow burn that makes these horrific reveals land is sadly utterly missing here. The sequence of events is also all over the place due to this pacing.

And man the animation…. Don’t even get me started on the animation, it is abysmal. The first episode was mostly very well done. It had some shots where it looked like a black-and-white flash game but other than that it was good. But episode 2? It nosedived into an active volcano, both in pacing and animation. The third episode is much better than the second but it also ruins iconic segments from the manga by rushing through them. This show as a whole just fails to do the manga proper justice. With how much time this took in the oven and how much hype was around the entire thing I was very hopeful that this will finally be that one Junji Ito adaptation that does his work justice, but sadly, it just takes away so much of what makes Uzumaki memorable.

The best thing about the show is its OST, which fits in seamlessly. It was composed by the same person who did Hereditary, so they actually got a guy who knows what he's doing. I also really dig the backgrounds, they have been very well done thus far.

The manga is a beautifully crafted and paced artistic work whose every page is eye candy. I own a hard copy, despite living in Pakistan. It was worth every rupee. Even as someone who usually dislikes world-ending Lovecraftian horror stories, Uzumaki is one of my favorite manga. I waited a very long time for this, so, I’m very sad to see the project turn out this way. Do yourself a favor and read the manga before you watch this.

Honestly probably the best anime I have ever seen, it feels as if the manga has come to life, quite literally through the animation style, the fact people have given anything other than masterpiece is a travesty, if you know the manga of Junji Ito you will love this, if not I suppose that is why people aren't appreciating it. Regardless, as a fan of both horror and the amazing Junji Ito I absolutely adored this and how well it was done, his work is always disturbing in a captivating way which makes you fell enticed to the world he has created, this anime isno different.

I watched it yesterday and I will be watching again in the weekend to share the experience with my friend, thank you to everyone who took part in making this masterpiece.

The human mind is home to every single one of the greatest inventions that we, as a species, have seen; be them practical devices or amazing stories, there's a near infinite amount of beauty which originates in the brain of many a-homo sapiens sapiens out there. The human mind is also home to whatever the fuck this is, so it more or less evens things out to a middle-ground between "wonderful" and "God please we need another great flood and this time without Noah's ark". Junji Ito is, undeniably, one of the greatest horror writers in recent history, and Uzumaki is by many considered to behis magnum opus, his créme de la créme, and for those who don't understand Latin nor French: his bestest, goodest work. It takes a single man's mind to come up with such a story as that of Uzumaki, and when I mean "a single man's mind", it is in the sense that absolutely nobody else would have imagined such blasphemy which would have gotten him burnt at the stake a few centuries ago. In simple terms, he should consult a psychiatrist.

Uzumaki provides a rather basic horror plot: "some small rural town has a curse!", but the main thing about it is that the curse in Uzumaki is one that revolves around spirals, which at the time in which this story was originally written, were generally seen as a good or positive symbol in Japanese society, which prompted Mr. Ito to subvert said notion to create the basis of the story's plot. The first problem you'll find here is that such notion is, well, part of Japanese society, and perhaps also too localized in time (1990s), which makes at least a part of this anime's appeal be lost, since there's no real perception being subverted as a ways to achieve greater impact on the audience given that most Western audiences and perhaps many Asian/Japanese audiences do not (any longer) have any "positive" perception of spirals; in fact, while spirals might refer to cycles, beauty or nature in Japanese aesthetics, they are often associated with negative connotations in western audiences, such as madness, hypnosis, chaos and else, which in turns, completely nullifies any attempt at having a cultural impact on most of the younger people, specially those who are not from the Japans.

Now, the cultural impact of Uzumaki's plot might be an important root for the story's whole existence, but it is far from being what truly seeks to make an impact on those consuming it. This piece of Junji Ito's works does not rely on cultural cues to make the audience feel horrified, but on sheer visceral depravity: the type of events that are seen throughout Uzumaki will certainly make a lot of people want to look away due to the incredibly disgusting and morbid nature of it: ever wanted to see two humans turn into giant snails and then mate? Here you will get to see it... lord, believe me, you WILL get to see it. Such morbidity is what Uzumaki relies on for shock, and while it is certainly its most interesting aspect, it is, however, one of its greatest problems: the nature of everything revolving around spirals, and the rapid onset madness of the plot, which in turn leads to the aforementioned morbid events, make it so that it very quickly becomes predictable and much less impactful, which will make those with a stronger stomach rapidly find the anime to lose appeal given that whatever remains to be seen won't feel as horrid as that which has been already showcased earlier.

The horror genre is a complicated one: it is certainly hard to write a story that's convincing, after all, most horror relies on supernatural phenomena, which in turn needs to provide a coherent argument as to why such phenomena happens which can then cancel any necessity for suspension of disbelief by those consuming it: having a story about a ghost haunting a house, and not providing a coherent reason why the people who live in the house just don't go live fucking elsewhere, makes for lazy writing, since it'll require the audience to ignore all logical thinking in order to be capable of enjoying the story, which certainly makes it harder to take seriously. Perhaps the greatest problem with Uzumaki is that it cannot be said that it manages to do just that; watching this miniseries implies a rather large amount of suspension of disbelief, because the characters tend to act irrationally, and no explanation is ever given for such behavior. For reasons not explained (or at least not explicitly-enough so), most of the characters have highly illogical reactions to even highly more illogical events: it'd seem as if everyone wants to pretend everything is a-ok in a town where people are dying in inhumane ways and in which everything is clearly NOT ok by any interpretation of the word. Because of this, Uzumaki's plot quickly becomes void of rationality, which in consequence makes the story feel highly forced and convenient, thus, it makes it appear to be badly written, which will certainly bother those who are here for things other than human snail mating or watching people's body contort and deform way past natural limitations.

As stated at the very beginning of the previous paragraph, creating horror is complicated, and this is because the sense of "horror" consists of many negative feelings which need to be transmitted onto the public: anxiety, despair, restlessness, disgust, and many more emotions and states of the mind are the building blocks of a good piece of horror media, and to achieve them, you need to build an atmosphere through many audiovisual aspects, and in the case of an anime, these include the animation, color palettes, soundtrack, sound design, character design, voice acting, the plot, and many other bits and tads which make up the whole picture. Uzumaki, however, lacks much of them. The sound design is mediocre, the soundtrack mostly absent, the character design ranges from regular to absurd, the voice acting is at many times devoid of effort, the animation is hit or miss... there's just too many issues here. Uzumaki's production value is less consistent than a bipolar teenager's emotions, and it is not only clear throughout the 4 episodes of the anime, but it varies even throughout the very same episodes: the first episode starts off well, but the second has some horrendous animation quality, while the third and fourth tend to switch between good and bad. The whole anime is in black and white, and while this manages to make the entire thing a bit more unsettling, it also feels like a lazy way to avoid greater detail through color, lightning and other visual cues. The fluidity of the animation creates a bit of an uncanny valley feeling; it attempts to feel human-like, but it is not nearly fluid enough to feel convincing, which makes it perhaps be more awkward than anything else. All of this makes Uzumaki feel annoying to watch, since it creates no real atmosphere, no real horror, no real "art"; it instead feels like a bad attempt at adapting the story and adding the label "avant-garde" to justify the crappy production, crappy plot, crappy pacing, crappy you, crappy me, we are a crappy family!

No, Uzumaki is hardly a "good" anime in technical terms, it is just simply shock content disguised as horror, with a lackluster production and lots of issues everywhere; it is a pathetic adaptation of an acclaimed manga, but as bad as it is, it still somehow manages to provide a decent amount of entertainment, and it is not bad at making you go "Jesus what the fuck is this shit, I feel bad for those poor bastards who were asked to animate this" in many occasions. That said, it only works as entertainment, not so much as an impactful story or something memorable for anything other than its horrid morbidity. Give it a try if you got guts, but don't show it to your kids, like, really, that's not a good idea.

What even happened? That’s probably one of the more common questions viewers had when transitioning from the first episode to the rest of the series. The first episode, directed by Hiroshi Nagahama and animated by the original staff at Studio Fugaku, was seen as a very good adaptation that had beautiful rotoscope animation, detailed environments and backgrounds, great direction, and so on. So, it was a surprise to see all of that fly out the window after going into the second episode. But I guess when you have Jason Demarco as an executive producer and you’re firing the original staff and director, replacing them withhentei animators and a blacklist director, then the situation on why this happened makes much more sense.

Uzumaki had a lot of hype in the community for a while largely due to its 5-year production and the impressive teasers that were shown for the first episode. So you can imagine how disappointed I am for the finished product of the show "with warts and all”. The falloff for Uzumaki is probably the biggest I’ve seen in anime, considering that it took over 5 years to produce a 4-episode series that has animation that’s as fluid as the average Queen Bee production (excluding the first episode).

And mind you, these episodes also feel VERY rushed. It’s like the Cyberpunk Edgerunners effect but exponentially worse. It feels like every scene is jumped to the next without having any development or time to breathe for the story and characters, which really ruins the overall flow and impact that each scene could have had for the show.

With that being said though, the soundtrack in Uzumaki composed by Colin Stetson is undeniably very good, where it’s really the only area where this show really shines.

In the end, Uzumaki is a missed opportunity that could have been something great if the animation and art was consistent to the first episode, kept the same staff, and extended the amount of episodes to a reasonable 10-12 to resolve the pacing issues that the show has. If you haven’t seen Uzumaki yet, just watch the first episode and skip the rest of the show, writing this off as a 1 episode special. But if you really want to truly experience and finish Uzumaki, I strongly suggest reading the manga over the show as it is a lot better.

Overall Rating: 2/10

Uzumaki is a massive failure. Nevertheless, it is one of the best anime series of 2024. The anime is not as good as the manga. However, I actually believe that the first part of the anime is better than the source material. There is a crucial difference – while the manga narrates each of the unsettling episodes separately, the anime decides to tell you multiple ones at the same time. This way the whole story feels more interconnected and the characters, especially Shuuichi, have more space for personal development, or rather descent. Having said that, after a very strong start, the anime fails spectacularly. The second partalmost feels like a self-parody. The pacing is off, the feeling of horror is almost completely gone. Instead of being mesmerised and unsettled by the story, one almost laughs at it. You are almost encouraged to see the lack of logic, consistency and seriousness that is inherent to the entire horror genre (and is supposed to be covered by the lingering aura of mystery and fear). I believe that this horrible pacing is partially caused by the wrong decision to cover every single part of the manga. Some of it just should have been left out. However, it is also clear that a lot of bad decisions and other problems must have led to such a poor result.

Fortunately, the anime gets back on its feet in the 4th episode. The ending of the story is actually coherent and relatively closely resembles the manga (even though the pacing still is not always quite right).

All in all, some parts of the series are just bad. Still, it remains a fact that the first episode of Uzumaki is one of the best things that happened in the anime world of 2024.

U Z U M A K I Short review Story: (8) I understand the setting completely and how thestory unfolds, but if only more details were put into crafting this masterpiece. This would be one of my favorite horror. In my personal opinion: Each episode feels like it deserves its own season. The concept is there, but it lacks something. They’re cramped into one episode, but still I understand the author's intent.

Characters: (9)

SHUICHI (8.7)- Respectable. The curse is inevitable, but he still fights until the end :(

KIRIE (9) - Her decisions are sometimes questionable, but she’s alright since she’s not crazy. I also love her character

design; beautiful!

Unpopular opinion: I’d like to see her in a romance genre.

PEOPLE (7) - I like how they are mentally messed up all the way to the end. Also so s2pid

SNAILS - (8)

INTERTWINED COUPLE - (8)

VA: (9)

Animation: Ep 1 (9.5) -- Ep 2, 3 (8) -- Ep 4 (8.7)

I don’t know why people hate the animation so much; I think it’s decent. The black and white gives it an eerie

vibe. If they were only consistent, I’d probably rate it a 9.

ENDING (8)

From my perspective, It’s so difficult to envision a happy ending in such a scenario. I never would have guessed how the story would end because of the unpredictable plot. Fighting the curse of the town—how can you really counter that? As I reached the last episode, I was genuinely hopeful they would make it out. So I guess bittersweet is the only way, which is very very sad for a lovable MC

OVERALL, good show for a casual

Yep, this was certainly... a show that happened. The first episode was great, which makes this one particularly hard to rate because it's a balance of that with just how far it spiraled down in the next few episodes. Maybe... maybe that was the point? To make the audience feel like they're spiraling as well? If so, kudos to the showrunners: you did it. I'm sure plenty of reviews will talk about the visual quality, which took a nosedive after episode 1. This was a fraught product in development and it shows, with the budget for this thing nearly drying up after that first episode. It'stoo bad because you can really see the commitment to visual fidelity side-by-side with what it looks like when a studio phones it in, and the jank is absolutely real.

But it's not just the visuals that bring this thing down. The team behind this knows how to emphasize the creepiness, but don't seem capable of showcasing the horror. The storytelling and presentation made some of these scenes outright goofy. I laughed outright several times at scenes that were supposed to evoke dread. None of that is helped by the series' need to keep moving to the next element, which meant that, even if a scene worked for me, it was left behind almost immediately and no one talked about it anymore. I've heard that that gets explained in the manga, but here, it just looks like even the series just doesn't care about most of what it sets up.

It's not all bad, though without episode 1 to bring up the average, this would be significantly worse. I went into it thinking four episodes was not enough. I left thinking it was too many.

If you are curious about the Uzumaki universe and want to experience something about it, I recommend all of you to read the manga and avoid watching the anime at all. First of all, the animation is bad for an anime that has been worked on for years and only aired 4 episodes. They only worked hard on the first episode and did an incredible job with it, but the other three episodes are a total garbage. The reason for this is the use of bad CGI and wretched drawing. Another reason for anime being so bad is the pacing. They literally tried to cram 3volumes of story into 4 episodes, and as a result of this, they did a horrible job with the pacing. They also changed the appearing order of events from the manga in the anime. This makes good job fore some of the anime's but i can clearly say that its a horrible decision for uzumaki anime.

That's all I can tell you about Uzumaki. As I said before, if you are curious about the universe and story of Uzumaki, go read the manga and don't waste your time on the anime.

well... this was an experience like no other... Though as you can see I set this review as recommended but that's not because this show is anything amazing nor mind blowing. I think that for a 4 episode long anime this is a pretty unique experience that most anime fan should try to experience at least once. Anime as a medium isn't fit for horror, as animation especially in anime artstyle is pretty bad at showing fear or disturbing imagery so I guess I could appreciate Uzumaki for trying to make up for it by making the artstyle and coloring similar to that of a manga,but did it work? Well kinda... The artstyle manages to enhance the creepy eerie feeling that probably wouldn't exists if it was colored like a normal anime, but even then it is still quite lacking.

And now lets talk about the story. I genuinely don't know whether to praise nor criticize the story, because its incredibly... weird? or maybe its better to call it unique? The story is simply so stupid and kinda goofy but the atmosphere and the characters are made in a way to kinda trick us into thinking that its creepy and serious but if you just stop for a sec and think, you would realize that the story and the events that happens are just dumb and so random.

We all have definitely heard of the decrease in animation quality after the first episode and for a lot of people its a huge letdown, but I feel like it doesn't really matter whether the animation stayed consistent or not because its not like the animation could carry the stupidity and goofyness of the show.

The only reason I put this as recommended is simply because of "why not", its only 4 episodes anyways its not like its gonna hurt to try.

I want to start by pouring one out for the anime this could have been. It's a shame that production problems plagued this adaptation, because the concept of making the anime black and white and really paying attention to the tone and point of the source material were all good choices. The first episode had so much promise and then we never reached that level of greatness again. That said, the subsequent episodes, while their production values suffered, did an excellent job of taking the story from the manga and improving upon in here and there to make it flow a little better and functionwell within the constraints of four episodes. Those little tweaks is why this is marked recommended instead of mixed feelings. Yet, I also feel disappointed that we did not get the product we could have had. Maybe someday someone will adapt it into a movie and give it the proper treatment it deserves.

If you enjoy Itou Junji's works in general, you'll likely enjoy this anime. It'd make a great Halloween watch for those who celebrate. If you want something more faithful or haven't enjoyed other Itou adaptations, then this would be one to skip. If you don't like wonky animation, maybe if it gets a home release, the quality will improve.

Uzumaki starts off great in the first episode with gorgeous animation and a good vibe, bringing the original manga into life, but completely falls a part in the later episodes. The pacing of the show completely misses the mark, it got to the point where the pacing made it impossible for me to be immersed in the story. It completely failed to build tension or suspense like the original manga did. I would honestly recommend future viewers reading this to watch the first episode and to figure out what uzumaki is all about and switch over to the manga if you enjoyed ep1. Overall, Iwould not recommend this show and advise you to read the manga and save yourself from the horrible animation later on.

The overall negative views of the already existing reviews mostly focus on the source material at hand. I will refrain from doing so, and focus on the anime itself. Why disconnect my review from the manga? It is already quite obvious that the adaptation is in fact a different imagining of the events, so taking it at face rather than with its background would seem to do it more justice. Let's start with the visuals. Even though the crew took a *very* long time to get this anime done (about 4 years, for 4 episodes of TV standard length), the animation quality tends to lack quitea bit in places, especially for episodes 2 and 3. However, the art *style* was a perfect approach - it gives you the best Junji Ito feel from all the adaptations I've seen so far. A pity that they couldn't get it done with the best quality possible. Perhaps they did rely on too much rotoscoping.

The delivery of the content is not perfect, but considering that this is just 4 episodes for something much larger, we can take a different angle at this. How much of the horror you'd get from reading a Junji Ito book do you get out of this series? I'd say it's quite close. The live-action movie wasn't bad either - also decent - yet it didn't pack a punch this strong. The reason for watching a series like this is the visceral, gut-wrenching, outworldly horror that you'd get - and with Ito, you must get to visualize it the way he means it. This series does achieve that.

What's left is the music, and the writing behind the content itself. We have Colin Stetson on the soundtrack, couldn't get better for something like this. For the writing, I'd say the deadpan cast just forced to live through this pandemonium and submit to it as mere victims/observers is very typical of cosmic horror (Lovecraft anyone?). The contrast of everyone vs. Shuichi is also executed nicely, as he is no romantic/tragic hero, but also another victim of the eldritch. Everything just clicks together to form a very traditionally written, yet eloquent horror story that parallels an actual masterpiece of the same art.

So what's really wrong with this anime? Nothing *much* other than the animation quality really. It just needs to be criticized heavily if you consider the original source material. Take that with your own grain of salt.

To paraphrase Jurassic Park, the people making this show were so concerned with if they could adapt the entire Uzumaki manga in four episodes, they didn't stop to think if they should. A typical 25-minute TV episode will follow a single plotline, two at most. The 42-minute US drama format traditionally opts for two plotlines, the A/B story format as it's known. Uzumaki's 25-minute episodes have A, B, C, D, and E plotlines, each originally a separate chapter in the manga, and now spliced together with seemingly no thought given to pacing or structure. It's a baffling choice. Horror isn't just about the money shots. Theyonly work when time is taken to establish the characters and scenario, make us care about the stakes, crank up the tension, and then finally drop the hammer. With only a few minutes dedicated to each story, it frequently rushes through the setup, leaves out important information, and sometimes cuts the payoff short too.

I can only assume the priority was to cram in every single memorable image from the manga, but with so little runtime available it ends up feeling like a handful of poorly-edited recap episodes chopped down from a 12-episode series. The structural problems at least settle down in the final episode, but only because the last few chapters of the manga are one ongoing story, which made that easier to achieve.

It's heartbreaking to see Junji Ito's masterpiece reduced to this, and even more so considering the obvious passion that was poured into the anime version. Ultimately it falls at the same hurdle as the second TV adaptation of Berserk, focusing so much effort on replicating the iconic look of the manga that the whole project collapses under its own weight. Despite all that, the strength of the underlying source material does bleed through at times, and the anime does at least achieve what seems to have been its core objective: bringing motion to some of the eeriest images ever to curse the printed page.

I harbor such a deep distaste for this series it spurred this review, if that's worth anything. Its bad enough to have a bad adaptation, but we have had bad Junji Ito adaptations before. But to show that the talent was there to do it, then drop the ball so hard with episode 2 and 3. I truly hate that. The first episode shows talent in weaving chapters together, translating the manga panels to moving, horrifying images. Everything was fantastic, but there was a small hint of pacing issues that could easily be overlooked. The second episode though. Good god the second episode. Theanimation dropped off a clip, using cheap, stilted run cycles that just faltered so hard. The rotoscope became lazy, and everything fell apart. The thing I have seen less of though being discussed is the drop of in pacing. The first epsiode weaved together stories, horror beats and set up to future storylines well. The rushing of chapters, cutting of scenes that add/setup horror for future scenes was so poorly done the story becomes incomprehensible. The thing that set me off the most though was straight up cutting of major scenes, iconic panels not even translated, and CENSORSHIP. on ADULT swim. Adult Swim should be ashamed to have even released this.

Please, do yourself a favour and read the manga! The show, with the exception of the first episode, was badly animation and the story progress was far too quick, leaving you little time to fully enjoy the art and horrors, and numbing you to the next "scare". If you really must, just view the first episode to see how interested you are in the theme, and then begin reading the manga from the beginning. For anyone who wants to know more, the first episode is amongst the best adaptations of a Junji Ito work, the animation is great, the music is amazing, the plot compared tothe manga is condensed slightly but it palatable. However, you'll be a fool to think the rest is as amazing as that intro. From episode 2 you'll realise that the animation is choppy, and jarring, while the plot feels hurried. Unfortunately, things only get progressively worse by episode 3 & 4 that you'll want the show to end quickly just so that you can move on with your day.

When Production IG and Adult Swim announced this adaptation, I sighed "not again, Junji Itou-san's work of art is not suitable for anime even after the little improvement they did with the second one Tales or the Macabre" I was moderately relieved when they finally released the trailer, albeit a bit of scepticism. So when this anime came out, I was pleasantly surprised by how much improvements is apparent especially the choice to fully commit to black & white. Although the pacing is a bit hasty and some sequences from the manga are shuffled here and there(which I don't dislike nor like it either) Ithink it's needed because the production team behind Adult Swim(who didn't really wanna fully commit to the project cuz of the previous adaptations) only commisioned 4 episodes from Production IG, so they had to cram it in.. hence the pacing. I'd HIGHLY advice people to read the manga first then watch the anime later, that is quite important in the context that it is a compact adaptation. Okay, before I add the word 'adaptation' again let me stop and say having read the manga about 5 times now, I'd love it. This is definitely the way to move forward with Itou-san works, small steps, maybe adapt the previous ones again too in B/W while making improvements lil by lil. I'd highly recommend this as amid the budget constraints etc. this is as good we are gonna get for now. Thanks for considering this review and my own opinions. I may make a few additional notes as it wraps up and look back at the series as a whole. Cheers from 'The Enigma of Amigara Fault' lover and devoted Itou Junji fanboy. 🙂✌️

Decaiu, hein. It is really, really sad to see what has become of this series. It had the potential to be a modern-day classic and ended up being one of the most disappointing experiences I had this year. I did enjoy how they adapted many of the stories to make them happen at the same time, which is not obvious from the episodic structure of the source material and heightens the sense of urgency to leave the town before it is too late. The epilogue in the end of the four episode was also a very welcome addition to the lore, even though it's nothing too ambitious.I also enjoyed the eerie lullaby for the ending theme. In fact, one of the show's highlights is its superb score.

The production of this show was troublesome and it shows in the brusque decline in quality from the first to the second episode (the first episode, although often praised as the best - which it is - was also not free of issues). The way many of the stories were hastened was detrimental to the overall atmosphere of the show.

Ironically, it seems that Itō, who is famous for his stories about curses, is himself cursed with bad adaptations of his most popular works. This had the potential of being the greatest adaptation of his magnum opus and (almost) manages to be worse than the 2000 live action film.

Uzumaki was supposed to release back in 2020. For almost five years, we waited, like a ghost in the mist, unseen yet there. Based on Junji Ito critically acclaimed manga, deemed by many as Ito's magnum opus, expectations were very high. Uzumaki is set in the fictional Japanese town of Kurouzu-Cho and follows Kirie Goshima and her boyfriend Shuichi Saito as they start realizing that something truly strange is happening to their town. Unlike traditional horror stories, Uzumaki rely on obsession, madness, and the horrifying unknown to terrify its audience. Alas, when the anime finally aired, it was a huge failure and instead of beingfilled with fear, my head was filled with a spiral of disappointment.

The black and white CG animation was a unique and creative way of inviting us into the surreal world of Ito’s inked horrors. But after a studio change during production, the quality of animation went straight into the wall. What began with great promise became a real horror, the characters movements felt so robotic. It felt like watching a marionette spectacle, unnatural, awkward and slow, like the characters were moving at 10 FPS.

Another major issue was the anime’s pacing. It is not possible to adapt 600 pages in a four episode mini series, the story felt incredibly rushed. They cut so much panels, key moments leaving little room for atmosphere and immersion. They condense so much into one episode that the psychological horror that made the manga so compelling was lost, replaced by a rushed plot that struggled to capture the depth and intensity of Ito’s work.

And so, Uzumaki which was to be a grand epitaph to Junji Ito’s genius, failed to meet the expectation it had set. This is not a bad anime but it's not great either. Some scenes still gave the that grotesque, ridiculous vibe but this is no where near the manga.

60-SECOND REVIEWS Look how they massacred my boy! My sweet, spirally snailboy! Junji Ito is an auteur and Uzumaki is perhaps his greatest creation. And, boy, was I looking forward to this for YEARS since that initial announcement. Junji Ito has never once had a good adaptation of any of his works, but maybe MAYBE this would be the one. And then to pull off one of the worst bait and switches I've ever seen, releasing a first episode which was fantastic and everything I ever hoped and dreamed it would be. Maybe a little rushed, but that's okay. Finally, a great adaptation! And then episode2 released, then 3, then 4. Episode 1 is a strong 8/10 and worth a watch. The rest is a 3/10.

You know, perhaps the real spiraling horror is getting excited for every new Junji Ito adaptation only to be let down time and again.