 an arm peppered with tiny holes dangles from a sick girl's window. After an idol hangs herself, balloons bearing the faces of their destined victims appear in the sky. An amateur film crew hires an extremely individualistic fashion model and faces a real bloody ending. An offering of nine fresh nightmares for the delectation of horror fans. Hi everybody, it's We Can Geek them here, Giovanni Menendez, with another review. This time we're continuing the Junji Ito hype train. I am a huge fan of Junji. I have done several videos already. You can check out the playlist. I'll link it up at the end of this video about all the collected, all the hardcover collected editions that the man has seen published. Now, I have talked about zombie fish. I've talked about snail people. I've talked about succubus, crazy bird ladies. But this is quite honestly one of the best short horror anthologies that you will ever come across. I think Shiver is fantastic. And dare I say, after Uzumaki, because I still think it's number one to me, this is easily the best. And presentation wise, this is the best Ito book out there. This is a beautifully crafted hardcover book. As you can see, it's got a great colored image compared to the other books. And it has nine of the best Ito stories selected by the man himself. And it has detailed sketches and commentary on each story. So that makes it just a little bit extra special. You've got insight from the man himself, what he did to create the story or his inspiration, some quirky notes on each story. It's really fascinating. So on presentation alone, this is easily the best Ito book, in my opinion. Now, the stories in here, you're going to get nine individual horror stories and a bonus never before seen published story that is brand new to this book. Out of those nine stories, one of them is you're going to double dip on one of them because that was in Tomie. It's a Tomie, one of the many Tomie stories is in Shiver. It doesn't matter. It's excellent nonetheless. And I reread it and it has, I think the art is a little bit done, redone or retouched, I guess, I should say. And it just looks awesome. Now, one of the complaints I have with the book is that after reading so many Ito stories, some of the characters start looking alike and I'm reminded while I'm reading a story of that other character from that other book, from that other story, and it becomes a little bit of a jumbled mess, in my opinion. But the stories themselves are really fun, really spooky, creepy. Some are really gross, like the Shiver story and the fashion model. Those creeped me the hell out. I will be honest with you, because they were disgusting. But, you know, all in all the fashion model actually is my favorite story from the book. Then there's the whole thing with balloon heads and then there's like this giant centipede thing that is going on. It's a very strange and wonderful and beautiful and just ugly world that Ito has crafted with these amazing stories and you truly have to be innovative and imaginative to come up with these concepts of like a haunted LP record or the collective mind forming this giant monster thing. It's just really, really awesome that you've got somebody that by all means and purposes has a really sick and demented mind. But for the delight of literature fans and horror junkies, it's just awesome. It's really cool and I love Ito's work. Now, compared to the rest of the books, you know, most of these stories are pretty creepy. They're not like super scary or anything like that. You're gonna have a fun time with Shiver. I'll guarantee you that much. And in my opinion, this is easily, regardless of what I said earlier about the characters looking like, this is easily Ito's best drawings, best art out of all the books I've read so far. And this right there is extremely frightening and I was creeped the hell out. There you go. If that, if you got a fear of holes and that sort of thing, that's not gonna be a story you're gonna dig. But regardless, it's pretty great. And you get some super awesome crazy visuals like fashion model, which is this lovely lady right there, which you do not want to come across. I guarantee you that one actually was one of my favorite stories in the book, along with let's see if I can find it here real quick real time for you guys. What was it? Oh man, this, this little gem right here, the long dreams portion. This is some Christopher Nolan inception type crap. I was blown away by that. And this is one of the rare stories where I was just enamored by the concept and kept thinking about it because Ito presents us with stories that make you think about stuff. It's not just about scaring you. Sometimes it's a little bit about social commentary and other times you're just left wondering and thinking about these great stories. I don't know. What do you guys think? Let me know down below which is your favorite Junji Ito book. I know I am missing, correct me if I'm wrong, from the US releases I am missing dissolving classroom and the cat book thing that he did about his pet cats or something. I will be reading and reviewing those eventually, so stick around for that. But yeah, as for the like the main big collected editions, let me know which one is your favorite. For me right now, I would say my ranking from best to worst would be Uzumaki, Shiver, Fragments of Horror, Tomie, and Gio. I'm sorry, Gio is always at the bottom. I just didn't like it as much. But yeah, I'm pretty sure your list is going to be completely different. Let me know down below. Guys as always, thank you for liking, commenting, subscribing here that we can keep them. Find me on your favorite social media platform so we can keep the conversation going. Alright, I have got to go. I've talked long enough time to continue with other stuff, so I will catch all of you on our next episode.