DuwangDooD

I was intially drawn to Ibitsu thanks to the cover art alone. I don't buy physical manga often, but I thought "hey. this looks pretty cool and creepy. I'll make an exception." A $20.00 exception that ended up leaving me bored and disastified.

I am no Horror savant. I am scared quite easily. Yet nothing in Ibitsu served to frighten me. This really comes down to two major factors: The art style, and the story. Let's start by breaking down my problems with the art style. When illustrating a work of horror I think it's important to have an artistic style that stands out; something that really sells the uneasy and unatural nature of the stoy you're tell. Junji Ito and Q. Hayashida for example just nail this for me. Every monster, expression, or visceral act of gore is shown in an unforgetable amount of detail. The only time Ibitsu really succedes at this aspect is in some scenes of it's main 'monster?' (still kinda unclear to me if she's just a crazy person or a real ghost). Everything else just feels so standard for a manga/anime right down to the darkening shadows over a face to express terror, rather than contorting the facial features in a truly terrifying way.

The story is also very bland. It feels like a creepy pasta page more than anything. While I suppose that kind of fits the urban legend aspect of the main killer, it does little to engage me as a reader. I've heard plenty of tales like this before. What I will give Ibitsu credit for is the way it adds some mystery to the monster and how she became the way she was. It's a real shame they throw that away to just say "nah it was just some crazy girl pretending to be traumatised the whole time."

I wanted to like Ibitsu, I really did, especially since it put me 20 bucks in the hole. In the end it just felt way too bog standard, and couldn't even scare/disturb a realtive whimp like me. If you want some mangas with horrific elements that will really stick with you, as well as some other unqiue elements that make them stand out, you're better off picking up Dorohedoro, Franken Fran, or even Murcielago. They aren't single volume stories, but following them will leave you much more satisfied, trust me.