I don't think I can look at spirals or pregnant woman anymore. What the Fudge, this was errie, stange, horrific and very discomforting to put down. ( )

I spent all night reading this as soon as I got it; I was hooked. It is a great combination of cosmic horror, amazing art, and beauty of the bizarre. ( )

This was the first manga I've read, and it is excellent. I love horror, and the spatial horror/cosmic horror here is top tier. This definitely benefited from being in graphic form, the story just wouldn't be as good without all those spirals. ( )

Some of these spiral-haunted stories were genuinely haunting, but others were laughably ridiculous. I was both creeped out and entertained, so that’s a win in my opinion! ( )

This tale of interlinking stories within a town haunted by spirals is perhaps Ito's finest work and certainly from the selection i have read so far. There is so much grotesqueness on show here from human snails, horrific preganancies, human jack in the boxes, hideous body morphism, cursed lighthouses and sentient-seeming storms - all of it lushly illustrated in Ito's evocative style.

What stands this one out though is how everything links together so seemlessly despite being multi-volume, with stories returning later as the meta tale literally spirals out of control to the cataclysmic finale.

If you want a showcase of what makes Ito so good at atmsopheric and graphic horror, this is a perfect place to start. but be warned, it's quite shocking in places. ( )

Kirie, a high school girl, is the primary narrator of Uzumaki. Through a variety of connected stories, she describes how her hometown of Kurouzu-cho gradually becomes completely contaminated by spirals. It all starts with her boyfriend Shuichi's father, whose obsession with spirals begins to twist his body and mind. Then Shuichi's mother is affected, then one of Kirie's classmates, and then her own father. It gradually spreads to more and more people, and affects more and more aspects of their lives.

The premise doesn't really sound like much, but Ito's artwork elevates it to something truly horrific. Aside from a few instances here and there that I, for some reason, found more amusing than horrific (the spiraled hair incident, for example), Ito somehow manages to transform something simple and ordinary into an infinitely deep well of dread.

After reading Junji Ito's Cat Diary, I decided that I should probably try one of his horror works (I have vague memories of being scarred by Ito's The Enigma of Amigara Fault, but I'm not sure if I've ever read the full thing). Uzumaki seemed like a good place to start.

The deluxe edition I read included several color pages, and I found that those reminded me a lot of Edvard Munch's The Scream. Ito's highly detailed artwork was especially effective at conveying the horror of the spirals in this work - by the end, they were everywhere.

There wasn't a lot of what I'd call gore in this (an incident with one girl's eye, and the story about the pregnant ladies), but the great gobs of body horror sometimes made it hard to remember that. Characters were physically affected by the spirals - initially, it was most visible in their eyes, which Ito drew practically popping out of characters' heads, but later it began affecting people's whole bodies. In order to further enhance the horror, Ito tied in mushrooms, snails, and more.

The two stories that gave me the most chills were the first one, about Shuichi's father, and the one about the pregnant women (what can I say, pregnancy horror is effective on me).

(Original review posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.) ( )

Loved this manga, it was the manga that introduced me to Junji Ito. It has amazing and twisted art and a fantastical almost Lovecraftian story. It very much seems like a kind of cosmic horror set in a small Japanese town. ( )

Rating: 4.5/5

Uzumaki is an amazing story about a pattern and also obsession. It has some of the best art I've seen in a manga.

I would give it five stars, but at the halfway point I was no longer as invested as before because it felt a little bit dragged out, but besides from that it's nearly perfect. ( )

EXCELLENT ( )

A horror manga about a town that slowly succumbs to a weird and supernatural obsession with spirals.

I read this one for the first time years ago and loved it, and I’ve reread it now because one of my Tuesday Teens has chatted it up as a favorite. It definitely holds up: creepy and weird and imaginative and really well done. ( )

Now I see spirals EVERYWHERE. Thanks Junji Ito! ( )

Hey that was pretty weird, huh? ( )

I have never really been into Manga. Not entirely sure why but this book has made it very clear I was just reading the wrong Manga. Beautiful and creepy. Full of horrific images. I absolutely loved it. I was talked into reading it and now can’t wait to read the rest of them. A whole new world of horror might have just opened for me. ( )

This is a book about a town infested with spirals. What does that mean? Well, a spiral is a shape that draws the eye along its path to the center. In the right circumstances, such as for the inhabitants of this town, spirals might draw and trap people into increasing horror. A teenager (Kirie) and her boyfriend begin to notice strange, inexplicable behavior and occurrences around town. This is a story about what they saw and experienced.

A number of the early and middle chapters read like short, mostly independent stories. While the stories themselves were enjoyable, in at least one instance I felt like an important plot line just fell through the bottom of the world. It had been the focus of multiple chapters and seemed to be going somewhere, but was then never brought up again.

I was torn on rating this a 3/5 or 4/5. I decided on the former because Lovecraftian horror isn't a favorite of mine, and the story suffers a bit from stupid-character syndrome (seriously, get out of that town!). But it was still a solid and weird horror story that really layers stuff on (especially in the last half or third), and I wish I could write about my favorite parts without spoiling the book. ( )

Masterpiece, only sold short by its abrupt ending.
There's so much to talk about in this particular omnibus (only the second horror manga I've ever read) - body horror, cannibalism, and so on - that you must read it to believe it. A small coastal town in Japan is cursed (hence the name, which means spiral in Japanese), and everything goes to hell. There are short stories on everything - such as mosquitoes (whose flying pattern is similar), snails (with the shape of their backs), and even tornadoes.
There's little to no characterization here, and I didn't know beforehand that this was a loose collection of short stories with a joining narrative, but that didn't detract from my immersion. There are the usual tropes here - a slightly unhinged deuteragonist with a gory past, the protagonist who's somehow not affected by the mania happening, and so on. Where Uzumaki shines is in creating a sense of helplessness - at no point do you feel that the characters are in control of what's happening, and this is different from the horror we're used to (the main character saving the day). I'd recommend this only for second-hand helplessness if nothing else. ( )

Oh my god. Go into this blind if you can. This is such a beautifully disturbing story, from the visuals to the dialogue. Imagine a mix between Cronenberg & Hitchcock, a perfect psychological body horror story. Read the manga for god's sake. ( )

Creepy, gory, fun. It's very Lovecraftian with its themes of madness and otherworldly intrusion. It does read like a fix-up novel with some consequences being carried over to the later chapters. It's around chapter 14 that it becomes a cohesive narrative. I definitely recommend this to anyone who likes horror, weird fiction, and definitely monsters. ( )

Eleventh Book of the spooky season (Well Manga, but it definitely counts!)
Trying to read horror or at least books with horror elements for the whole month of October.

WOW!

Absolutely dreadful, unexpected, horrible and twisted piece of work. Watching this town devolve and fall prey to the spiral was agonizing, and turning each page was some weird new horror.

The medium felt amazing, the stark contrast of black and white and the beautiful imagery of full panel manga shots.

I don’t think I’ll look at a spiral the same way again. ( )

i see spirals in everything now ( )

I'm okay with a reasonable expectation of suspension of disbelief for the sake of story, but this asks a bit too much. I can enjoy the fantastic elements, like people turning themselves into spirals, and roll my eyes a bit at someone's entire head being hollowed out yet still walking and talking, but my asking me to buy bug spray as a silver bullet for mosquito infused women is asking a lot.

Perhaps this sort of thing doesn't bother you, but I personally enjoy stories that are slightly more grounded, or at the very least, don't mix the natural and supernatural in such silly ways without setting it up beforehand. ( )

Holy crap.
I WISH I PURCHASED THE SECOND AND THIRD VOLUME! I didn't expect to be very hooked on the story. Not as sick as his other less popular book, 闇の声 新版, but I liked this story better. ( )

One of my favorite works by Junji Ito! An incredible story with chilling and horrifying symbolism and nerve, I can't recommend this title enough. If you've never heard of or read any of his work- this is a solid entry point. It seems like every horror fan knows of Junji Ito, and every Junji Ito fan I know has read this manga or owns it. I readily think that you could read this all in one day because the story is so addictively page turning. Now, we all know body horror is a common and prevalent theme in Junji Ito's work, but This one is absolutely one of the stronger ones for the Body horror fans out there! You can tell this one was a labor of love by Junji Ito. ( )

The manga that introduced me to Junji Ito. Love this book and I'm excited for the anime version. ( )

SO Good ( )

4.0

It was like reading a fever dream someone had after eating bad shell fish...

And I loved it. ( )