Junji Ito’s prolific output has won him the rightful recognition of fans around the world as a modern master of horror. Between 1994 and 1998, Ito serialized a long form manga adaptation of the legendary Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Now, on the 200th anniversary of the classic novel’s release, VIZ has collected Junji Ito’s tribute in a formidable hardcover edition.

The story of Frankenstein is universally recognized, and Ito’s adaptation is reverent of Shelley’s source material. The obsessive, self-destructive nature of Victor Frankenstein’s pursuit of forbidden knowledge suits Ito’s sensibilities as an author nicely. Ito’s Victor resembles a young mangafied Peter Cushing from the Hammer horror films. Ito makes relatively few changes to his abridged version of the plot, and clearly relishes the opportunity to work on a gothic period piece. He finds places to spare a few additional panels of his trademark body horror, and is understandably unable to resist an opportunity to draw a brief appearance by the Bride of Frankenstein, who was destroyed before being reanimated in the novel.

Junji Ito’s "Frankenstein" first gained notoriety in the West as the source of the popular text-swapped “Dude! I’m a fairy! Let me in!” meme. Even without context, the unforgettable image of the rictus grinning Monster peering in through the window led many to seek out more of the famed artist’s work. Ito lovingly renders every pitiful detail of The Monster’s rotten face: the decaying skin stitched too tightly against his skull, a perpetually slobbering mouth of broken teeth pleading for companionship and vowing vengeance against the world which denies him its warmth, and lidless unblinking eyes filled with rage and sorrow without end. Under Junji Ito’s skilled draftsmanship, the iconic Monster is beautiful and terrible in a way that’s uniquely his own.

The VIZ edition of Frankenstein is rounded out by ten additional short stories. Six of these involve Oshikiri, one of a small handful of Ito’s recurring cast members, in cosmic horror stories that are more in line with what fans of his manga may expect. Oshikiri is a high school student living alone in a large dilapidated house, dealing with standard teen boy problems like being shorter than all of the girls in his class, bog curses, interdimensional doppelgangers bursting out of their own skin, and hiding a dead body that won’t stop growing. At 160 pages, "The Strange Tale of Oshikiri" originally constituted an entire paperback of the Junji Ito Story Collection’s original Japanese run, and is a very welcome second act to this hardcover edition.

"The Hell of a Doll Funeral" is a brief one-shot about a plague that’s turned a majority of the world’s children into porcelain dolls (or maybe something much worse) with an unforgettable final page flip. "Face Firmly In Place" features a woman trapped overnight in an orthodontic device that makes the most of Ito’s gift for drawing terrified facial expressions. The concluding pages are a brief, bittersweet remembrance of the Ito family’s spoiled, elderly Shih Tzu, Non-Non Ito.

Frankenstein is VIZ’s sixth Junji Ito release. It’s a sturdy hardcover with sewn binding, and at nearly 400 pages is comparable in size, quality, and value to the other releases. This is a worthy contribution to the Frankenstein canon and an essential addition to any horror fan’s home library.

By: Minovsky Article

Hardcore Junji Ito fans can double down on the horror with Uzumaki (3-in-1 Deluxe Edition) and Gyo (2-in-1 Deluxe Edition), now available in digital for the first time!