Uzumaki is a Japanese horror manga series created by Junji Ito.
The story centers around Kirie Goshima, a high school student, her boyfriend Suichi Saito and the residents of Kurouzu-cho, a sleepy little Japanese village surrounded by spiral-related paranormal activity. It is said to be able to infect individuals, take control of their bodies, and thoughts. According to the manga, only those who are cursed can see, hear, or feel the Spiral.
Disclaimer: This article contains spoilers for the Uzumaki manga series.
What is the Uzumaki manga about?
The story centres on Kirie Goshima, a high school student, and the residents of Kurôzu-cho, a small, made-up Japanese village plagued by paranormal spiral-related phenomena. Kirie and Shuichi see firsthand how the spiral curse affects those around them.
Kirie is also impacted by the curse as the town starts to collapse; her hair starts to coil in an odd way, saps her life force to make people hypnotized, and chokes her if she tries to cut it off. Shuichi saves her when he cuts her hair. The town is plagued by the curse until a storm brought on by it demolishes the majority of its buildings. The residents are compelled to live in the deteriorating abandoned row houses that are the only structures left, and as they get increasingly crowded, they start to expand.
Despite their best attempts, Kirie and Shuichi are unable to get out of Kurôzu-cho. They discover that several years have passed and that time flows more quickly in the cursed village when they return to the town. The row houses have been expanded by the other residents, forming a single, enormous circular design. When Kirie and Shuichi resolve to look for Kirie's parents, they end up in the spiral's center. They descend a pit in the middle, where they find Kirie's parents' bodies and an old city entirely wrapped in spiral designs.
Kirie states that she lacks the strength and would like to stay with him when Shuichi pushes her to go forward and figure out how to break the curse. The curse causes their bodies to twist and wrap around one another, so the two give one other an embrace. As they lay there together, Kirie observes that the curse ended at the same moment it started, concluding that it is eternal and that everything will happen again when a new Kurôzu-cho is constructed in the spot where the old one was.
Also Read: Who is the spiral girl in Uzumaki?
What type of horror is Uzumaki?
Uzumaki is a supernatural horror thriller that delves into psychology. When Ito tried to develop a story about people living in an extremely long terraced house, he was inspired to use a spiral design to achieve the needed length, which is how the story for Uzumaki came to be.
Ito thinks that the horror of Uzumaki works because it challenges symbols that are depicted positively in Japanese culture and because it centres on the idea of protagonists against an enigmatic power greater than themselves.
Also Read: Are Kirie and Shuichi dating?
FAQs on Junji Ito's Uzumaki
A. Uzumaki analyzes the structure of society and its disintegration using the idea of a spiral curse. The story examines what would transpire in the event of civilization collapse on a social, moral, and physical level, specifically, about the human body.
A. Kirie Goshima, a high school student is the main character in the Uzumaki manga series.
