Gyo (2-in-1 Deluxe Edition): The Death Stench Creeps (Junji Ito)

It starts out just creepy - maybe the first ½ of the story is these stinking fish crawling on to land on insect-like legs. And then the second ½ just turns horrendous, two fairly silly seeming premises (at first) taken to an extreme body horror conclusion that's genuinely disturbing.It feels unfinished, and burns out a little at the end, like it's missing a third act.Still, would recommend to horror fans.This also includes one of Ito's most striking one-off stories: the Enigma of Amigara Fault

Another epic collection of Junji Ito's work.

If you’re worried about the price don’t worry because this book will exceed your expectations. It came in great condition and came fast.I highly recommend.

Not had a chance to start reading this book yet. But, my order arrived quickly, and, I'm happy with it Looking forward to starting it. Good. Thanks.

I first came across Junji Ito unknowingly, when I read the profoundly disturbing short comic The Enigma of Amigara Fault several years ago. When Guillermo del Toro and Hideo Kojima connected him to the cancelled Silent Hills project, I recognised his art, and quickly felt compelled to read something of his in full. I had options: Tomie, Uzumaki. I chose the well regarded Gyo.First impressions are good. Ito's art is disarmingly crisp and clean, his backgrounds detailed and realistic. When things turn bizarre those details make the horror elements all the more unsettling. The story starts strong with a young couple terrorised by fish with mechanical, metallic legs, shortly before a massive invasion of Japan and the world by even more walking sea creatures. An early sequence with a walking shark is initially nerve wracking, demonstrating the full potential of taking such an enormous, otherworldly predator and putting it in an environment where humans have traditionally been safe from it. I was intrigued by what other creatures Ito could dredge up, wondering if the future held giant squid or other deep sea monsters, but after the early focus on the walking fish the story takes a hard left turn.[Some spoilers follow!]It's here that perhaps a mismatch between my expectations and the actual manga negatively coloured my experience, but I did not expect a tale of body horror. As the focus shifts from the walking fish to the gaseous, parasitic 'germ' that animates them - the 'death stench' referred to in the manga's extended title - my interest waned. Protagonist Tadashi's uncle is introduced as an exposition machine, looking like no less than a cross between Charles Manson and AUM cult leader Shoko Asahara. He explains a potential origin for the death stench in Japan's wartime biological warfare experiments, but ultimately, the conclusion of the manga and the mechanism for the walking fish is much more vague and supernatural, and for me, unsatisfying.Much of this could be mitigated with better characterisation. Tadashi is basically a cipher with zero personality. Perhaps this was intentional, leaving him a blank slate surrogate through which the audience can experience the story, but if so, his obsession with the superbly annoying Kaori is an enormous miscalculation. From the off she's frustratingly delicate, panics and puts herself and Tadashi in danger, faints repeatedly, and exhibits pretty much every other irritating woman-in-horror trope. When her situation worsens and Tadashi remains focused on helping her, it’s very difficult to understand why.Once the walking fish threat took a backseat to the spread of the death stench infection and the fate of humans caught up in it, the book had sadly lost me. A two-chapter aside into a macabre circus with yet another exposition-focused character was the death knell, the point at which the plot completely lost coherence and the manga is more goofy than disturbing.It’s peculiar then that the final two stories in the book are unconnected bonuses, culminating in The Enigma of Amigara Fault, the very story with which I’d first, accidentally discovered Ito. Here, in much shorter form, he’s at his best, presenting an unsettling scenario without explanation, but just enough information to disturb. Gyo falls down when attempts are made to explain the plot and go beyond the initial walking fish premise. Perhaps it should have only been a short story, too.

Honestly I love all of Junji Ito’s work I find his art style and story lines so mesmerising. The detail on the front cover gives it even more of that horror aesthetic.

The book was well-packed and arrived in great condition. GYO is a horror manga by Junji Itou, the master of Japanese horror writing. I am glad to have this in my hands. The edition is exceptionally pretty. Print quality and so on - excellent.

Having been deeply impressed by Ito's Uzumaki, I came to Gyo with high hopes. While, however, Uzumaki is a brilliant premise worked through to great effect Gyo is an absolutely dreadful premise that the author clings to tenaciously to the point that it almost works. Almost.I won't spoil the plot - it begins with a disagreeable odour clinging to a scuba diver but very quickly becomes a sort of apocalyptic body horror - but it's the stuff of B-movies ... if a B-movie could be this appallingly horrific and visceral. You'll want to laugh with derision, possibly you'll be sickened and you'll probably want to put the book down in sheer frustration at the fanciful nature of the tale. Ito spares us little, but ultimately his narrative is insoluble, having an unsatisfactory conclusion and yet hardly providing any basis for a follow-up.As a physical book, this is produced to the same high standards as Uzumaki, with which it is uniform. The illustrations - black & white throughout - are of course of a high standard, well printed & translated. Of the two stories added as a bonus one is barely a story but the other ("The Enigma Of Amigara Fault") is possibly the best thing here.Overall, it's hard to deprive this manga of four stars since it is certainly a bold work of imagination, and uniquely odd. I didn't enjoy it much but I can respect the obsessive & unflinching nature of the author's work.