2018

What is Babysitter about?

In Babysitter, the story is confined to one small room throughout its entire 22 pages. That small room has the look of a cell, but is in fact a baby’s nursery. The babysitter herself is a young woman named Erita, who arrives at an elderly couple’s home in the opening pages. She is quickly introduced to the couple’s baby, although without actually seeing it properly, before being shown into the nursery.

Once in the nursery, Erita is locked inside with the baby. The couple tells her that they’ve had past babysitters run away during the job, so this is merely a precaution from them. After the brief explanation to the situation, Erita is encouraged to pull back the baby’s blanket. Can you guess what she finds underneath? That’s right – underneath the blanket is not a baby at all, but what she believes to be a little monster. However, us as readers of this series will recognise it as being a regenerating Tomie.

Once the couple have left Tomie (the baby) and Erita alone, Tomie begins to cry and slowly drive Erita mad. Babies crying in general, to those outside of their family, tend to have that shrill, piercing effect on many. But couple that with the powers that Tomie has and you have a deadly mixture. As it turns out, the only thing that can calm the small Tomie is the colour of red, which Erita slowly realises she must use to her advantage. But in such a small, confined space that colour is sparse – save for the blood in her veins and the growing number of town fires outside the window. Oh yes the fires – I didn’t even mention those did I?

Confined in space and story

Babysitter is very much a confined story. Not only does it trap our heroine, Erita, inside a small cell with this demon baby Tomie, but it also focuses the story there too. Except for the opening panels with Erita travelling to the home, we only see things from her perspective within that room. Even whispers and rumours from outside are learned from her spying outside of the barred window. We only know what she knows.

Tomie’s madness is always something to be feared, but generally when people start to feel the effects, they have the opportunity to run or hide. However, in this small locked room, the babysitter Erita has no choice but to withstand and eventually comply with Tomie’s demands.

Despite the story taking place solely within this nursery, don’t be fooled into thinking that this has no extra layers. There is in fact a wider story going on outside the window, which actually has a big impact on the overall story. And not only that, but only the future of both Erita and Tomie.

In Summary

I find this chapter to be a very charming one. Something about it makes it one of my favourite from the collection. It has a certain charm in how it focuses in on the doomed relationship between Erita and Tomie. Although the story doesn’t really take us to many places, I find it does quite a lot in the space it does have.

I always find it more interesting somehow, when artists work within certain constraints, whether self-imposed or not. In this, Junji Ito has limited himself to a single room and seen what he can create from it. For me, he has created a short but nonetheless very entertaining segment of Tomie’s life. At least one of her many lives anyway.

What is Moromi about?

In Moromi, Junji Ito mixes things up a bit, centring the entire chapter around the attempted disposal of an already-killed Tomie. Not only has she already been killed, but her former partner – Ishizuka – is busy mashing her remains into a fine paste on the floor. And even though he is putting a lot of work into it, her bloody remains seem to not be getting any smaller. In fact, he has noticed that the flesh seems to be getting larger in volume.

In order to get some help, Ishizuka invites his friend Nagaoka round. Once he arrives, he is told about the strange situation going on. Ishizuka brings him up to speed, revealing that he has discovered that the pieces of Tomie seem to be regenerating. Tomie just can not die. He explains how he has tried to fight the growing flesh, by cutting it up as small as possible. However, he now has buckets and buckets of her remains that are still growing out of all proportion with no way of disposing of it.

His friend then comes up with a very strange method of disposing of the meat. And this is where the story gets a bit odd, at least within the context of Tomie. They both travel to Nagaoka’s parent’s Sake factory, where there are huge tanks of mixing vats. These mixing vats are where the family Sake is produced, and it will also become the target for Tomie’s disposal. They begin mixing in parts of the flesh piece by piece into the Sake mix. This begins to have a very strange effect on everyone as the vapours begin to circulate round the factory. Not only that, but when they decide to taste the new recipe things really get turned up a notch in strangeness.

Regeneration

This is a story that focuses solely on Tomie’s regenerative powers. But not as we’ve seen before from complete limbs or cuts in the body. Instead, this is regeneration from the mangled, squashed flesh of a once-beautiful woman. Her appearance in this chapter is relegated mostly to being just that of buckets of body parts and ooze. Except, that is, for the spirit hallucinations that occur once the vapours being to rise. It reminded me of the chapter Hair in that respect, as she didn’t appear completely in that one either.

There isn’t as much elegance attached to her here either, due to the fact that she spends the time as buckets of chopped-up flesh. This chapter is a much grittier, dirtier story than we’ve come to expect so far from the Tomie Collection. For that reason I enjoy it on its own level from others. I believe that Junji Ito must have approached this story in a very tongue-in-cheek manner. Just the fact that the friends very first suggestion, and the one that they actually go with, is to shove her parts into Sake vats in his family’s factory. It’s so ludicrous, but its one of those stories that always makes me smile.

Not only is it a fun and silly one, but it provides some much-needed relief after the much darker events of the previous chapter “Boy” too.

In Summary

This isn’t a chapter that features highly in my favourite Tomie stories, but it is still enjoyable nonetheless. I loved the juxtaposition of the opening panels – with the loving words from the boyfriend, followed by him beating her corpse into the ground.

This is another standalone chapter, which I think is suitably placed with its other chapters. Moromi sits comfortably in the middle of the overall collection. And while not the best there is, is definitely worthy of your time in reading.

What is Boy about?

Satoru is a young boy whose parents have recently moved them all to live by the sea. It was the father’s thinking that it would be good for a young child’s health and growth – how wrong he was. While wandering the beach alone, Satoru stumbles across a small cave with a pool of dark red coloured sea water inside. On closer inspection he finds the body of a young woman floating to the surface – her face cut to pieces but miraculously, still alive.

The young boy befriends the woman, who introduces herself as Tomie. As their friendship grows, she convinces the boy to help her in her recovery. First with bringing her food and some clothes form his mother’s wardrobe, followed by her having him steal a fancy dress more “befitting” of her. Tomie has the boy completely under her spell, even convincing him to call her “Mommy” from now on.

Satoru’s sanity declines very fast, as his obsession over his new mommy drives him to do some very bad things. Eventually, the parents notice that something strange is happening, and do their best to stop it. But will the boy’s parents be able to break the hold that Tomie now has on their son? Or have they tried to help him too far down the track; are they too late to save their only son?

The darkest Tomie chapter

Throughout our looking into the stories from the Tomie Collection, we have come across some pretty dark themes. However, this chapter sits up top for me as being the single most darkest one. Simply down to the fact that it involves the corruption and gradual insanity of a young boy. Junji Ito is most definitely not afraid to explore areas of his world that other people would perhaps be too afraid to conquer.

Characters who cross Tomie’s path generally have a pretty bad time with her. But when it comes to children, the horror becomes that little bit more scary. Ito has a talent for getting under my skin, and indeed many other people’s skins. However, this is where he officially got all of his claws in and asked “Are you ready to go deeper and darker?”

I remember having similar feelings from a chapter within Dissolving Classroom, where the young girl – Chizumi – has a boy her age kidnapped. But I think that Boy just pips that one to the post, as it goes pretty deep into how Satoru is changed at his very core. And how he transforms very quickly from innocent to cursed. So much so that it sets in motion the events for the rest of his tainted life. The final few panels that detail the boy’s adult life were pretty heartbreaking.

In Summary

Depending on your disposition, this could be quite a tough one to get through. This is all down to the fact that throughout the entire story, Tomie is corrupting a very young boy and moving herself into his mind as his mother. This is a big splinter that risks breaking the family right down the centre. The fact that she has no reason whatsoever to bring terror upon these people, makes it very easy to hate her completely.

I have mentioned in the past about how she had some characteristics that I enjoyed about her – even liking her at times. But in this chapter, Tomie is without redemption; without reason; and is at her most callous and destructive from start to finish.

What is Little finger about?

A father of four brothers brings home a new woman in his life. Her name is Tomie. As you can probably imagine, Tomie has an immediate effect on the brothers, an attraction that she returns. This chemistry between the brothers and Tomie takes its toll on the father, who soon commits suicide. She is then left alone with the four brothers.

The thing is though, not all of the brothers have desires towards Tomie. Hiroya is not conventionally attractive, often being the target of bullying from his three siblings. But he has something that his brothers do not – an immunity to Tomie’s charms. She hates the fact that he isn’t obsessed with her as the others are. And despite her best efforts, she is unable to win him over. This leads to Hiroya being locked away from everyone in the basement, away from the people who matter.

Hiroya is later released and discovers that his brothers have done something terrible to Tomie. They have killed her and cut her to pieces, which she probably expected to be honest. The weak, sickly brother is then forced to dispose of her body parts in exchange for his being let free. Hiroya makes good on his deal, but little does he know that he is forever sealing his fate. What follows is an encounter with Tomie, as she regenerates around him, tormenting him with echoes of his past. But will he survive the suffering, and will he reach the end of this path with his life intact?

A damaged man

This is the first time I have read a story from the Tomie Collection where the central character was weak and completely lacking in self-confidence. The characters in these stories are normally well-adjusted people, however, in Hiroya’s case this couldn’t be further from the truth. But with his weaknesses, comes a huge strength that many don’t possess – the power to resist Tomie’s powers.

That inner strength of his is soon put to the test though, as he is left hidden away with Tomie as she regenerates. And not one of her, but four! These four instances of her give Hiroya a glimpse at his own life from an outsider’s perspective. He is able to see these four versions of her grow up, with one of them significantly slower and weaker than the others. This echoing back to the story’s earlier theme is one of the things that makes Junji Ito the craftsman that he is.

Through the horrors of the regenerating Tomie siblings, Hiroya is reminded of elements from his own life. He knows what its like to be the slowest and the most hated, which allows him to know the pains of the weakest Tomie sibling. His inner strength knows no bounds too it seems, as he is able to befriend – and give comfort to – that weaker version of her. But at what cost?

In Summary

Despite being outwardly one of the weakest characters within the Tomie Collection, I think Hiroya is inwardly one of the strongest. Not just from his ability to resist Tomie, but with his power to empathise with something so threatening and grotesque. He is truly a man who is able to not only confront the fears from his past, but is able to embrace them too.

Little finger was a very enjoyable read for me. It was great to finally see a man who was almost invincible to Tomie’s powers. Although it took him being slightly disfigured and having zero self-confidence in order to have that gift. While this wasn’t the most visually inventive chapter, it does have many aspects that are to be admired. Like how Ito is able to tie in such a strong theme, that is used so well in the story’s pay off.

It is probably not the best introduction to the character of Tomie, but it is a chapter that is definitely worthy of your time. It will do well in expanding a preexisting knowledge of this awesome, and horrific, world.