Black Paradox
An old/new work by Ito Junji, master of horror manga
Fans of horror manga great Ito Junji will be happy to know that Black Paradox, a story originally published in 2007, is coming out thanks to VIZ Media. Black Paradox is a self-contained one-volume manga.
This is the story of four people intent on killing themselves who meet through the suicide website Black Paradox: Maruso, a nurse who despairs about the future; Taburo, a man who is tortured by his doppelganger; Pii-tan, an engineer with his own robot clone; and Baracchi, a girl who agonizes about the birthmark on her face.
The four aspiring suicides get in a car together, share their existential reasons for wanting to die, and plan it out. However, they don’t end up committing suicide: they do appear to eventually open a door to another dimension.
They get access to strange, beautiful stones that are made of an unknown mineral. (How they get to these stones would give away too much of the plot.) The stones appear to hold souls from another world, which might bring around spiritual feelings in another manga. But this is Ito, so it taps into the darker side of humanity: the stones can be used to bring in lots of money, and so corruption easily follows.
Black Paradox is creepy and mysterious, though it’s generally not the out-and-out horror that Junji Ito is best known for.
There’s a supernatural element that is never fully explained, and the point is more the mystery around it. It has a few fun, clever twists in the plot, and Ito’s artwork is amazing, as always. There are a some gruesome images — Ito is skilled at being disgusting in a very artistic way. But more than that,
there is Ito’s usual skill at delicate, detailed artwork, ranging from the characters themselves to the backgrounds.
There is a very short bonus story at the end called “Strange Pavilion,” which feels like half a vignette, and is in full color.
Black Paradox is a good book for fans of Junji Ito, or anyone who likes their manga dark, mysterious and bizarre. It’s just over 200 pages and is packaged as a handsome hardcover.
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