J-horror blog
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~ PART I ~ THE INDONESIAN SPIRITUAL UNIVERSE To understand Indonesian horror, one must first abandon a deeply Western assumption: that the supernatural represents a break in reality. In Indonesian cosmology, spirits are not intrusions, they are not aberrations and they are not even necessarily hostile. They are simply there, occupying the same world as…
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Introduction: The Girl in the Third Stall There are few ghosts in the world as widely known, casually invoked, and quietly misunderstood as Hanako-san. In Japan, her name is whispered not in temples or abandoned tunnels, but in elementary schools. Not in the dark woods or on lonely highways, but in fluorescent-lit hallways that smell…
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Introduction: The Loneliest Urban Legend in Japan There are urban legends that feel theatrical. There are urban legends that feel cruel. And then there are a rare few that feel lonely; stories that don’t simply frighten you, but hollow something out inside your chest and leave it echoing for days afterward. Kisaragi Station (きさらぎ駅) belongs…
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Introduction – the Shape of a Modern Ghost Story There are some ghost stories that feel ancient, as though they have always existed. And then there are others that feel new; not in the sense that they were recently invented, but in the sense that they could only have come into being in the modern…
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Introduction At first glance, Koji Shiraishi’s Shirome (2010) looks like a joke. It opens not with dread or blood or ghostly imagery, but with rehearsal footage of a real-life J-pop idol group (Momoiro Clover Z) practicing choreography, laughing with one another, and nervously talking about their dreams of one day performing on Kōhaku Uta Gassen,…
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