Maniac par Junji Itō : Anthologie Macabre

I found this show randomly on Netflix. The concept seemed amazing. Anime and horror are 2 things I do like. However, I was very disappointed. The animation is very poor and dry. It felt like it was lacking in terms of animation or horror. Lots of shorts will leave you on some sort of cliffhanger. The diversity of characters in this show was very low, and I feel that the plot in most of the shorts were lacking and almost not there. When I finished the final episode, I sighed with relief. I hope they get their act together and make some actual horror and not some bootleg show about teenagers complaining to their parents about their siblings. The concepts are amazing, but the execution was very poor. This show needs to get its act together or just stop.

This series some pretty unforgettable stories one of which I like particularly is The Hanging Balloons. I haven't read the manga so my basis would be entirely on how the series was made.

1. The animation all looked similar . It could have been good but I felt like there was no connection on how each stories were grouped together in one episode.

2. It ends way too abrupt. I don't know if this is the way the stories are in manga but it always feel so open ended. Its like I am always waiting for something to be explained but then it just ends.

3. Going back on how it was animated, since it looked similar, watching it in one seating gets old pretty quick. I have some thoughts that this may have more impact as live action will effects and all.

Its an ok watch. I guess I just wanted more out of it. Also the ending music is quite comforting for a pretty dark animation.

I have to be dead honest unfortunately I'd rate Junji Ito Maniac about the same as the Junji Ito Collection they both have positives and negatives about different thing's focusing on Maniac the writing feels a bit better the suspense build up to the gruesome moments that are supposed to make your skin crawl and gut churn Junji Ito is such a master of fall so flat in this show it feels lifeless because knowing Junji Ito he doesn't rely on cheap scares and such he likes body horror the inescapable what makes his books so amazing and skin crawling he puts such a dreadful touch to his art that's so creepily detailed that it's incredible and this show takes the build up you start to get unsettled just for the big (supposed to be) shocking reveal for it to look slightly cartoonish and dumbed down almost as if it was censored if you're a hardcore Junji Ito fan like me you will find some enjoyment in it it's not all bad not at all just like the Collection it has its shining moments but I'd probably give Maniac a granted biased rating of 6 out of 10 and that's honestly a fanboy opinion so about the same as I'd give the Junji Ito Collection!

In the process of adapting a manga to the serial approach, some productions seem to struggle to conceive that adaptation is a more complex process than simply copying and pasting manga pages and hoping they will work in the same way on screen. This is the problem with an anime that could have had great potential, such as Junji Ito Maniac.

Indeed, in the development of the series, they opted to reproduce the original pages as faithfully as possible, stripping them of the soul given by the author and without caring to translate them into a different communicative medium.

This is unfortunate because animation could allow for the sublimation of master Junji Ito's haunting stories, and the lack of this effort makes the series incomplete, empty, and inconclusive. Moreover, there is a lack of overall cohesion and the pacing is erratic. The episodes are interesting only because of the unique material provided by the manga's sources.

Overall, the product, while not tremendous, comes across as a simple copy of the original manga with no soul and no real point of existence, as it adds nothing to the master's work but, on the contrary, takes away some of its charm.

After the disappointment of watching the Junji Ito collection series of 2018 I was hoping that Netflix would come to the rescue and create a series that made justice to Junji Ito's extraordinary works. Turns out I was completely wrong. The animation style is very underwhelming, the lack of detail made all the episodes very boring and the entire season looked very dull, which is something that shouldnt in any case be associated with Junji ito's original works who leave you traumatized and begging for more. Overall very disappointed and can't see why netflix decided to take on the project if it was going to turn out so bad.