Undying love or Lovesick Dead, whatever you want to call it is a pretty much overlooked work by Junji Ito. I think it's overlooked because most people who eventually find this somewhere they have already read the popular ones and are thus let down by this one. Is it bad? No. It's definitely not horrible or bad. Ok, maybe the scanning could be better but that does not mean you can't enjoy the story. I'd say it's good, not as great as is Uzumaki but still good.
In this work Junji Ito explores the urban legends and superstition. The story takes place in a small port town in Japan. Nothing special about it, ordinary people, ordinary happenings but the teenagers in this town have their own special little game. The game goes something like this: you wait on a foggy day on a street, cover your face with something so that people can't recognize you and ask the first person who goes by to tell you your future and then leave. Childish little game but soon events start to take off in an interesting way because it is rumored that a handsome young boy goes around town telling future to other teens but those futures aren't so bright and they die in *seven dayssssss*. Ok not seven days, but they die; a hideous death. :D
That would be a somehow crude explanation of the plot. Of course there are also main protagonists and much more in depth plot twists but everything seems to focus on that game and that mysterious boy. How will it all end? Well it's up to you to find out. ;P
Art like in many other Junji Itos mangas is amazing. Especially the facial features. There are good scares in every chapter of the story and it won't let you down in that department. The only real downside is that this isn't scanned very well. By this I mean that the scans aren't in a large or medium sized resolution which sometimes damages the overall enjoyment of the reading but it's not that terrible so that it should be avoided. The resolution is usually 500x700 (give or take smaller changes). If you can get pass that minus I'm sure you'll love it as much as you loved his other works.
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hmmm. this was the work that actually got me into Junji Ito. Ito wouldn't really be guro, but he's pretty damn good. His stories are weird, also. You should check out his other works. They're all worth it, in my opinion. Museum of Terror, Uzumaki, Tomie, Gyo, and a bunch of shorts.
ReplyDeleteUh? :S
ReplyDeleteTrue! I found it perhaps even better than Uzumaki. Not as weird, but much more disturbing. And I could sympathise with the characters much more easily, since they felt more real and the story more of one story than lots of stories mixed up to one.
ReplyDeleteDoesn't read manga very often, but a friend recommended Ito and I really like it.