TV Tokyo Greenlights 13-Story Junji Ito Anthology Series

TV Tokyo announced on April 17 that it is producing a live-action anthology series based on 13 manga stories by Junji Ito, set to premiere on July 3 in the network's “Drama 24” programming block. The anthology format allows the production to showcase Ito's structural versatility while maintaining his signature focus on body horror as metaphor.

The live-action series, titled The Strange: Ito Junji no Yoru mo Nemurenu Kimyō na Hanashi (Strange: Junji Ito's Strange Stories for Sleepless Nights), references the original name of Asahi Shimbun's Nemuki+ magazine, where many of Ito's works first appeared.

Japanese film director Ryota Kondo, known for Missing Child Videotape (2024), will direct the series, along with Atsuhiro Yamada and Yuta Shimotsu. Screenplay will be overseen by Daisuke Hosaka and Tatsuro Inamoto. However, specific production details, including selected cast members, have not been announced.

South Korean girl group IVE will be singing the theme song, JIGSAW. Ito has illustrated a visual featuring the group members.

Ito, a prominent horror manga artist whose work has been defined by body horror and a distinct art style, has developed a substantial cult following since the 1980s. Five of Ito's hardcover volumes made it into ICv2's Top 20 manga unit sales chart for 2023, demonstrating his continued high commercial performance. His most notable titles include Tomie, a series about an immortal girl who drives admirers to madness, and Uzumaki, a three-volume work about a town cursed by spirals.

Junji Ito Anthology Adaptation is Rooted in Obsession and Bodily Collapse

The adapted stories include Lovesickness, In Old Records, Penpal, The Mansion of Phantom Pain, Earthbound, The Bully, The Rib Woman, Face Thief, A Father's Love, Further Tales of Oshikiri, Memory, and Tomio: Red Turtleneck. Except for In Old Records, which appeared in the Junji Ito Collection anime, others are available in English translation.

A unifying thread across the 13 selected stories is the breaking of the human body as a site, combined with the consequence of psychological horror. This thematic consistency provides a backbone for an anthology format, even as each episode explores different characters and scenarios.

One of the most popular among the adapted stories, Lovesickness, follows characters consumed by romantic fixation that manifests physically. On the other hand, Tomio: Red Turtleneck centers on a man cursed after rejecting a psychic.

The TV Tokyo series arrives alongside a growing slate of Ito adaptations. In 2023, Netflix released an animated anthology, Junji Ito Maniac: Japanese Tales of the Macabre, which manga readers later criticized for not capturing the intensity and narrative flow of the original works.

Ito’s work has seen multiple live-action adaptations over the years as well, particularly the Tomie film series in Japan. However, critical reception has been uneven, with many adaptations struggling to replicate the visual macabre and pacing of his manga panels. In 2025, Pan-Asian studio Through the Lens Entertainment and Fangoria Studios announced films based on The Mystery of the Haunted House and Bloodsucking Darkness.