Ito’s two older sisters loved scary manga, generously allowing their little brother to read their books and buying him his own for birthdays or when he was sick.
Fan favorites “The Enigma of Amigara Fault” and “The Sad Tale of the Principal Post” make a return, the latter with lush color pages - a feature of this collection that can be seen scattered throughout the book.įans of Ito as a person will delight in the autobiographical “Master Umezz and Me,” where Ito details his history of reading Kazuo Umezz’s works like Cat-Eyed Boy and The Drifting Classroom. In fact, obsession is the watchword for the majority of the stories found in Venus in the Blind Spot. Though this seems like some kind of otherworldly cockblock, the real culprit is of a more mundane - though equally terrifying - nature.įollowing over a year and a half after the release of Ito’s Frankenstein are three more horror adaptations: “The Human Chair” and “An Unearthly Love” by Edogawa Rampo, and “How Love Came to Professor Kirida,” an interpretation of Robert Hichens’s “How Love Came to Professor Guildea.” These adaptations add favorably to their source material, pushing the themes of obsession and desire with Ito’s stunning signature artwork. The men find that in time, while they can hear the object of their affections, they can no longer see her when she comes physically close to them. The title story focuses on a group of men who have fallen in love with a woman whose father runs a UFO research club.
Rather than dealing with strictly supernatural forces, the stories in Venus in the Blind Spot tend to focus on the tensions between people. Michio, who hasn’t left his room in seven years, begins to suspect that it is related to the strange radio broadcasts he’s been hearing, where a mysterious announcer calls out to the “billions alone,” encouraging listeners to “reach out from the heart” and “come together.” The increasing incidents force the citizens of Japan to stay inside, all alone, avoiding gatherings. Whatever the provenance, the killer is targeting gatherings of people. In it, groups of corpses are being found sewn together with fishing line, initially thought to be the work of a single serial killer until incidents begin cropping up in vastly different parts of Japan.
The first story, “Billions Alone,” seems like a timely tale for our current, socially distant lives. Publisher VIZ Media has committed to bringing more and more of his work to North America, the most recent installment being the short story collection Venus in the Blind Spot. He is long beloved of many manga fans, recently rising in popularity with a much wider audience, his horror comics touching upon universal fears and fancies. Junji Ito is, perhaps, a creator who needs no introduction. Translation & Adaptation: Jocelyne Allen and Yuji Oniki (“The Enigma of Amigara Fault” and “The Sad Tale of the Principal Post”)
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