Cosmic Horror

Uzumaki, above and beyond anything else, truly looks and feels like Ito’s manga brought to life. There’s something truly magical about this series even existing in the first place. It casts a cursed energy that’s akin to the videotape from The Ring. Ito’s work is hardly a medium that can’t exist in a full color palette and there are plenty of his stories that take advantage of a rich color spectrum. That being said, Uzumaki’s black-and-white aesthetic works here and makes this project, and Kirie and Shuichi’s story, feel all the more otherworldly. It casts the audience under a spell and it feels like the strange punk rock programming that Adult Swim used to pump out during the week hours of the night during the channel’s infancy. It’s been a long time since Adult Swim has had something that taps into this energy. The closest thing in memory is PFFR’s stop-motion fever dream, The Shivering Truth...

... The first episode alone is full of so many disturbing visuals that are deeply horrific and pure nightmare fuel. Uzumaki’s horror is omnipresent from the first frame. However, it’s remarkable how the series’ scares gradually grow more intense until they’re strangling the audience by the episode’s end. Uzumaki is only four episodes, but it feels like this short episode count is for the audience’s own good and that any more would be too intense. The series is a taught tightrope walk of terror that’s a true triumph. The first episode is filled with more harrowing body horror moments than some shows accomplish in their entire run. It’s cosmic horror with a sinister Lovecraftian edge to the finest degree...