What you’re left with is some genuinely disturbing visions of horror scattered amidst numerous quite dull, predictable and almost laughably goofy stories. So here’s the thing with Ito: like HP Lovecraft, Ito is great at producing haunting images of primal horror but, also like Lovecraft, he’s very clumsy, almost amateurish, in incorporating these images into traditional stories. Of the stories collected here - Billions Alone, The Human Chair, An Unearthly Love, Venus in the Blind Spot, The Licking Woman, Master Umezz and Me, How Love Came to Professor Kirida, The Enigma of Amigara Fault, The Sad Tale of the Principal Post, and Keepsake - none were very good. Also, it would’ve been good if the contents page listed in which collections the stories previously appeared, like most “best of” collections do, but seeing as this appears to be nearly all-new material then I can see why it didn’t! So this is a “best of” collection that features almost all-new stories!? The blurb also mentions special colour pages and illustrations from Ito’s latest book, No Longer Human, and it doesn’t. His collection Frankenstein won the 2019 Eisner Award in the Best Adaptation from Another Medium category and his latest long-form manga, No Longer Human, has received critical acclaim.Viz Media’s blurb for Venus in the Blind Spot is really weird: it claims this is a “best of” collection of Junji Ito’s stories but, as far as I can tell, only one - maybe two - stories have previously appeared in print before: The Enigma of Amigara Fault and The Sad Tale of the Principal Post possibly both appeared in Dissolving Classroom. Ito’s influences include classic horror manga artists Kazuo Umezz and Hideshi Hino, as well as authors Yasutaka Tsutsui and H.P. His titles include Tomie and Uzumaki, which have been adapted into live-action films Gyo, which was adapted into an animated film and his short story collections Fragments of Horror, Shiver and Frankenstein, all of which are available from VIZ Media. Junji Ito made his professional manga debut in 1987 and since then has gone on to be recognized as one of the greatest contemporary artists working in the horror genre.
This striking collection presents the most remarkable short works of Junji Ito’s career, featuring an adaptation of Rampo Edogawa’s classic horror story "Human Chair” and fan favorite "The Enigma of Amigara Fault.” With a deluxe presentation-including special color pages, and showcasing illustrations from his acclaimed long-form manga No Longer Human-each chilling tale invites readers to revel in a world of terror.
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