TRANS-SCRIBE: Strange Pictures: Volume 1 by Uketsu & Kikou Aiba

'From Japan’s breakout horror sensation comes a chilling new manga experience. Strange Pictures is the spine-tingling manga adaptation of Uketsu’s bestselling novel, brought vividly to life by artist Kikou Aiba. Uketsu – the enigmatic masked writer who has become one of Japan’s most talked-about authors – first captivated readers with a novel that sold in the millions. Now, the terror unfolds panel by panel.

'At its core lie nine childlike sketches. A pregnant woman’s doodles on her blog conceal a dire warning. A boy’s simple drawing of his home hides a message no child should know. A murder victim’s final sketch becomes a clue that drags an amateur sleuth into a labyrinth of secrets. Each picture is innocent at first glance – yet when pieced together, they reveal a web of unsolved mysteries and shattered psyches.'

I wasn't aware of Strange Pictures, originally published as a prose novel in Japan in 2022 by surreal YouTuber Uketsu, or its new manga adaptation until I was offered a copy from Titan Manga. After having my interest grabbed by the blurb I went and did a little looking online and thought that it might be something that would interest me due to its surreal, horror, mystery vibes. With only a small part of the original novel adapted into the first manga volume I wasn't sure just how well it would draw me in; but I soon found myself trying to solve the mystery alongside our protagonist, and am now patiently awaiting the next instalment.

Strange Pictures begins by introducing us to Sasaki, a university student who we're introduced to during a lecture about art therapy. The lecturer talks her students, and the readers, through the significance of a drawing made by a ten-year-old girl who was arrested for killing her mother. We have the features of the drawing explained to us, how the smile that was erased and redrawn over and over reveals the girl's feelings of having to pretend to be happy around her abusive mother. The house with no doors tells us that the girl felt trapped in her home, unable to escape the cycles of abuse she was living through. And that the tiny bird sitting in the middle of the spiky, dangerous looking tree tells us that she has an instinct to protect others, showing us that she's not an evil killer, but a girl who killed her abusive mother to protect herself and other people. This lecture isn't just a throw-away scene, but introduces us to some key concepts for the book; that pictures hold hidden meanings, and that in order to understand things fully you'll need to delve deep into them.

Following his lecture Sasaki meets a friend of his, Kurihara, from the uni's paranormal club. Kurihara mentions a strange blog he's discovered, and passes the information on to Saski. That evening Sasaki checks it out, finding what first appears to be a very ordinary blog by a man named Ken who writes about his wife, Yuki, and their life together. After Yuki falls pregnant the young couple of excited for their first child, but some complications through pregnancy puts them through some difficult times. During this period Yuki draws five pictures, pictures that Ken believes shows their child, and their possible future selves. Unfortunately, Yuki dies during childbirth, and shortly after the blog comes to a close after a cryptic post in which Ken mentions how he finally realised what the strange pictures really mean, and how he can't forgive Yuki, but will never stop loving her.

With Sasaki's interest in the blog piqued he discusses it with Kurihara, who reveals more strangeness within some of the blog entries. Believing that there is more to find within the blog, and knowing that the illustrations Yuki created holds some kind of key, the two of them set out to discover more and get to the bottom of the mystery.

Strange Pictures begins as something of a slow burn story, and I'm not entirely sure at what point I'd become invested in the narrative; something that is reflected in the story itself when Sasaki reads Ken's blog and starts off not thinking much of it but soon realises he's fully invested in the lives of these people he's never met before. The slow set-up works in the books favour, and I like how it gives you the mystery without you really knowing that's what's happening. The slow reveal of the five titular strange pictures definitely has a slightly unsettling edge to it, thanks in part to the somewhat unusual framing and the change in art style, but it's only when Kurihara reveals more that these pictures take on a different feel, becoming much darker.

I won't say much about what the pictures are, or how our protagonists use them to find the next piece of the puzzle, but it's definitely an interesting series of deductions that leads to a chilling twist in the tale. As I have no knowledge of the original story, beyond a small blurb describing it, I don't know if this is the end of Sasaki's part of the story, as the final chapter of the manga introduces a new protagonist and another strange picture with possible sinister implications, but I certainly hope that it's not as whilst a twist in the initial story presented in the blog posts certainly seems to have been presented it by no means feels conclusive or complete. If there is more of this mystery to come, along with the one introduced in the final pages, I'm more than happy to continue reading on and learning more; however, if this isn't the case it would certainly feel somewhat lacking and half finished.

The art on the book, by Kikou Aiba, feels fairly standard, with nothing about the art seeming to set Strange Pictures apart from other books on the shelf. Characters and environments are drawn cleanly and crisply, with it being easy to tell who everyone is and what's going on in the panels. However, it's when Aiba draws the titular pictures that the book begins to stand out. The art in these pictures has a very different feel to it, with the clean, dark linework replaced by faded, light illustrations, appearing more messily hand drawn, created with pencils and other physical media that gives it a rougher, more tangible feel. Delightfully, Titan Manga sent along art cards of each of the pieces, presenting them in colour, which really emphasised this aesthetic as the grain and shading in the manga changed to show where some parts of the paper had more pressure applied when colouring, creating darker and lighter areas, picking up rough details from the surface beneath the paper in places. These illustrations are so different from what else is in the book that you can't help but find yourself drawn to them in a similar way to Sasaki.

Strange Pictures is one of those manga's where I wished I had the next volume already as just one wasn't enough to satisfy me. I want to find out more, to see just how far this mystery goes and how surreal things will get.

Strange Pictures is available now from Titan Manga.