Junji Ito Expresses Interest In Working With Stephen King

Comic Con 2020 has been taking place virtually due to the coronavirus pandemic, but that hasn’t stopped the annual convention from lining up some big time interviews in the mean time and the recent sit down with the master of horror manga, Junji Ito, revealed that the creator of the likes of Uzumaki and Tomie would love nothing more than to collaborate with North America’s resident master of horror, Stephen King! King, who has created the likes of Pet Semetary, The Shining, IT, and The Mist, definitely has his fair share of stories that would work well with Ito’s insanely detailed art style.

The interview with Junji Ito, arranged by the folks at Viz Media who have published a multitude of the horror mangaka’s original stories, asked Ito who he would most like to work with, as Junji responded that King is one of the creators at the top of his list for work he’d love to translate into a manga. With a wide birth of horror tales under the author’s resume, there are more than a few stories that Ito could choose from that have been created by Stephen King in the past. While Junji has created his fair share of original stories in the past, that also hasn’t stopped him from adapting novels or short stories by other writers.

Recently, Ito had adapted the novel, No Longer Human, which followed the cursed life of a young artist whose internal struggles manifested themselves as ghosts that haunted him throughout his life. Adapting the novel into a manga, Ito was able to capture the unsettling nature of the novel that was written by Osamu Dazai, a story made all the more unsettling by the fact that it was Dazai’s last before committing suicide. Needless to say, Ito could take the same skills he used to adapt Dazai’s novel to give us a fresh take on some of the classic stories of Stephen King.

While Junji Ito didn’t go into specifics regarding which stories he would like to adapt from the Master of Horror, there are plenty to choose from and we personally would love to see Ito tackle the likes of the killer clown of Derry, Pennywise, or the zombies that stumbled their way out of the Pet Sematary!

What Stephen King story would you like to see Junji Ito adapt? Feel free to let us know in the comments or hit me up directly on Twitter @EVComedy to talk all things comics, anime, and the spooky world of Junji Ito!