Junji Ito has become a household name for Japanese horror in recent years. Initially finding success with the Tomie series, an anthology about an immortal girl that drives people insane, he would gain further fame through his prolific series of short stories, most of which feature some of the most bizarre scenarios the mind can conjure up. Did you ever think you’d be afraid of infectious, walking sharks? What about a woman who licks people to death? How would you react to a balloon that looked identical to your head?
For the longest time, most of Junji Ito’s works were bound to the pages they were inked on, and though several attempts have been made to bring these images to life through animation or films, they haven’t always hit the mark. However, back in 2019, Adult Swim announced a four-episode miniseries based on one of Junji Ito’s most popular works – Uzumaki.
The production is being handled by both Adult Swim itself and Production I.G, the studio responsible for the original Ghost in the Shell film as well as Jin-Roh: The Wolf Brigade. Production I.G has collaborated with Adult Swim on a handful of projects in the past, starting with Immortal Grand Prix in the early 2000s and followed by sequels to the Toonami hit FLCL in the late 2010s. This, in tandem with direct involvement from Junji Ito as well as other successful collaborators, bodes well for the adaptation’s success. It looks as if the planets are aligning to make Uzumaki one of the best animated horror projects in recent years.
Uzumaki: The Plot
The original story for Uzumaki was written over the course of a year, spanning around twenty chapters for the magazine Big Comic Spirits. The story takes place in the small seaside town of Kurouzu-cho, a place afflicted by an unusual curse. A pair of high-schoolers, Kirie Goshima and Shuichi Saito, confront increasingly bizarre phenomena themed around spirals. These range from obsessive behaviors afflicting the townsfolk, to abnormal physical changes in people’s bodies, to eventually cataclysmic changes in the world around them.
The original manga features some of Junji Ito’s most striking imagery, including bodies twisted and distorted into spiral shapes, a woman’s face spiraling into itself infinitely, and a hunchback slowly morphing into a gnarled snail shell. Kirie and Shuichi often come face-to-face with these bizarre encounters, which typically result in a tragic fate for those involved.
The manga was successfully adapted into a feature film in 2000, albeit with alterations to the original story. The film’s ending is abrupt and omits the last third of the source material, diverting off into its own traumatic ending. Seeing as how this adaptation will be limited to four episodes, it wouldn’t be surprising to see specific story-beats similarly modified, rearranged, or outright omitted. Thankfully, the serialized structure of the original manga allows for certain events – like the aforementioned paranormal happenings – to occur in a vacuum outside the main plot development.
Uzumaki: The Cast and Crew
Adult Swim
Uzumaki’s cast and crew are top-notch. Hiroshi Nagahama is in the director’s chair for this series, and his previous experience in directing Mushishi – a supernatural slice-of-life series – may help in capturing the strange atmosphere the town of Kurouzu-cho exudes. From the initial teasers, it’s revealed that the score for the series will be provided by none other than Colin Stetson. If you’re unaware, Stetson was the composer for several terrifying films in recent years, from Color Out of Space, to the recent Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake, to what he is most well known for: the utterly haunting score for Hereditary. It’s a perfect match for the otherworldly, oppressing tone that the source material exudes.
The animation itself – handled by Production I.G and Drive – is hauntingly beautiful, retaining the black and white color palette that accentuates Junji Ito’s unsettling artwork in striking detail.
Anime connoisseurs will likely recognize the talented cast on board. Kirie Goshima and Shuichi Saito will be voiced by Uki Satake and Shin-ichiro Miki, respectively. Satake has done previous voice work for Mob Psycho 100 and Space Dandy, the latter being another Adult Swim co-production. Miki, on the other hand, has a prolific series of works ranging from a recent role in My Hero Academia to being the original voice of James from the Pokémon anime.
Release Date
Mirroring the events in the story, Uzumaki’s release date has been “spiraling” out of control. According to IndieWire, Uzumaki was originally announced in 2019 and was supposed to release in 2020, but the onset of the global coronavirus pandemic had a significant impact on the show’s production. A new release date for October 2022 would be set but again delayed due to unsatisfactory results with the show’s production.
Currently, there is no definite release date for Uzumaki, though there are still a few months left for the series to keep a potential 2022 release. Whenever it does come out, each episode will air during Adult Swim’s Toonami programming block, which runs every Saturday night.
