Simple human fears, from uncomfortable sweaters to being dissected alive, mix together with natural human urges, most often the erotic, to create a sequence of horror stories that feel raw and true. At one point a lady makes love to a house.īizarre, horrible, and yet often quite beautiful. From the second story, “Wooden Spirit”, it also becomes clear that Ito’s horror is often entwined with the erotic. As someone whose neck feels irritated with some shirt collars, “Tomio – Red Turtleneck” was pretty terrifying. Ito takes a seemingly ordinary aspect of life and twists it into something that feels off, wrong, and disturbing.Ī common thread with most of the stories of Fragments of Horror is the way Ito takes a seemingly ordinary aspect of life and twists it into something that feels off, wrong, and disturbing.
It’s short enough, though, to provide a quick refresher for both Ito and the reader, and it sets the tone for what’s to follow, all of which pretty much surpasses the first story. Perhaps due to its short length, the ideas feel just a bit underdeveloped.
It’s good, but does lack a certain spark that Ito’s work usually has. While the story is pretty good, it’s not exactly a classic. It’s about a guy who refuses to leave his futon because he’s scared of the outside world.
In the “Afterword”, Ito expresses some reservations over the first story in the collection, “Futon” – his first story after his eight year gap from horror. Some are more just creepy than fantastical and grotesque, and one is almost kind of sweet and touching in a haunting way (“Gentle Goodbye”). Anyway enough of my waffling, and let's go back to Fragments of Horror manga itself.Fragment of Horror collects together eight short stories, many of which feature Ito’s distinctive grotesque imagery, body horror, and Lovecraftian inspired weird horror. Talk about a huge markup, but what do you expect, that's Australia's products in a nutshell - heavy inflated prices and sometimes it's still cheaper to purchase from overseas than purchasing in a physical store (can you believe that?). Now I look at the BookDepository store, it's selling at $20 AUD. I actually purchased this book around October last year for about $15 AUD, and I didn't get around reading it until recently in physical form (I have read the online scanlated version multiple times too). Some mangas are just too focused on horror and it sometimes results in a weak story Junji Ito however is the contrary. For me, it's the right balance between horror value and readability. I personally enjoy Junji Ito's artstyle, and it doesn't create horror or dread, but still develops an unsettling atmosphere. I'm sure a lot of horror manga enthusiasts that love Junji Ito's works would always desire more of his works.
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